He
caught it, too, just as it ran out of doors, and gave it such a kick
that piggy lay for dead on the spot. Then all at once he remembered
he had the tap in his hand; but when he got down to the cellar, every
drop of ale had run out of the cask.
Then he went into the dairy and found enough cream left to fill the
churn again, and so he began to churn, for butter they must have at
dinner. When he had churned a bit, he remembered that their milking
cow was still shut up in the stable, and hadn't had a bit to eat or
a drop to drink all the morning, though the sun was high. Then all at
once he thought 'twas too far to take her down to the meadow, so he'd
just get her up on the housetop--for the house, you must know, was
thatched with sods, and a fine crop of grass was growing there. Now
their house lay close up against a steep down, and he thought if he
laid a plank across to the thatch at the back he'd easily get the cow
up.
But still he couldn't leave the churn, for there was his little babe
crawling about on the floor, and "if I leave it," he thought, "the
child is sure to upset it." So he took the churn on his back, and
went out with it; but then he thought he'd better first water the cow
before he turned her out on the thatch; so he took up a bucket to draw
water out of the well; but, as he stooped down at the well's brink,
all the cream ran out of the churn over his shoulders, and so down
into the well.
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