"I am an ox all smeared with tar,
And filled with straw, as oxen are,"
replied the ox.
"Oh," said the wolf, "I need some tar to smear my coat so that the dogs
cannot catch me."
"Help yourself," said the ox.
The wolf put up his paws to take the tar and his paws stuck fast. He
pulled and he tugged, and he tugged and he pulled, and the more he
pulled and tugged, the faster he stuck and he could not get away.
Then the ox dragged the wolf to the old house on the edge of the forest.
When the old woman came back with her apron full of flax and saw that
the straw ox had gone she ran home as fast as she could. There stood the
ox in the yard with the wolf stuck fast to him.
[Illustration: "THEN CAME THE FOX, WITH MANY GEESE RUNNING BEFORE
HIM"]
"Husband, husband! Come here at once!" she cried. "The ox has brought
home a wolf; what shall we do?"
So the old man came as fast as he could, pulled the wolf off the ox,
tied him up, and threw him into the cellar.
The next morning when the old woman went out into the field to gather
flax she again took the straw ox with her, and again she left it
standing alone near the edge of the forest.