Page:Popular tales from the Norse (1912).djvu/408

 222 So it fell on a day, between hay time and harvest, the two went out to pull hemp. Grizzel's head was full of her good looks and her handiness, and she worked away at the hemp till she grew giddy from the strong smell of the ripe seed, and at last down she fell flat, fast asleep among the hemp. While she slept, her master got a pair of scissors and cut her skirts short all round, and then he rubbed her all over, face and all, first with tallow and then with soot, till she looked worse than the Deil himself. So, when Grizzel woke and saw how ugly she was, she didn't know herself.

"Can this be me now?" said Grizzel. "Nay, nay! it can never be me. So ugly have I never been; it's surely the Deil himself?"

Well! that she might really know the truth, she went off and knocked at her master's door, and asked,—

"Is your Girzie at home the day, father?"

"Ay, ay, our Girzie is at home safe enough," said the man, who wanted to be rid of her.

"Well, well!" she said to herself, "then I can't be his Grizzel," and stole away; and right glad the man was, I can tell you.

So, when she had walked a bit she came to a great wood, where she met two thieves. "The very men for my money," thought Grizzel, "since I am the Deil thieves are just fit fellows for me."

But the thieves were not of the same mind, not they. As soon as they set eyes on her they took to their heels as fast as they could, for they thought the Evil One was come to catch them. But it was no good, for Grizzel was longlegged and swift-footed, and she came up with them before they knew where they were.