54 Fairy Tales

There lay two warm suits for himself, and
a number of books, and a new pair of stilts,
and quite the most beautiful doll you ever
beheld, and a box full of its clothes, so that
he jumped for joy. He dressed himself in
his new garments, and set the books all in
a row ona Shelf his father had made before
he died, and then he tucked the doll and
its trunk under his arm, and opened the
door and slipped out. He met old Grethel,
with whom he lived, as he ran round a
corner, and she stared at him as if he had
been a ghost. Jacob did not care.

‘She knows nothing, and she shall never
know,” he said, nodding. ‘“ Only Réschen.”

The sun was shining on the red roofs, and
the weathercock on the church spire shone
like burnished gold, and his heart was so
warm and glad to be there again that he
went and thumped on the schoolmaster’s
door till all the windows round were thrown
up, and out came the heads of half the
women in the place.

“ Ach, if it is not little Jacob come home