“Don’t take the red, don’t take the green,
But choose the blue, where may be seen
Three little crosses, all in a row;
We saw the marks, and so we know.”
She didn’t care a pin for what the birds sang, but took the red, which
caught her eye most. And so she set out on her road home, and she went
along quietly and easily enough; there was no one who came after _her_.
So when she got home, her mother was ready to jump with joy, and the two
went at once into the ingle, and put the casket up there, for they made
up their minds there could be nothing in it but pure silver and gold,
and they thought to have all the walls and roof gilded like the pig-sty.
But lo! when they opened the casket there came tumbling out nothing but
toads, and frogs, and snakes; and worse than that, whenever the woman’s
daughter opened her mouth, out popped a toad or a snake, and all the
vermin one ever thought of, so that at last there was no living in the
house with her.
That was all the wages _she_ got for going out to service with the old
witch.
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