Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 7 1889.djvu/68

60 was in it, Uncle Rabbit at once put the stopper into the opening, and thus the snake was caught. Then he went on and said, "I bet there is room for them, I bet there is room for them." The wasps heard him and asked what his speech meant. "Oh !" said Uncle Rabbit, "the snake says there is not room enough for your swarm in this calabash, and I bet that all of you can get in there." "We will see at once who is right," said the wasps, and crawled into the calabash. When the whole swarm was in, Uncle Rabbit put the stopper into the opening, and thus the wasps were caught. He next went to a village, and when near the huts he began to cry and lament. Then all the women gathered, and asked the cause of his grief. "Oh !" said Uncle Rabbit, "why should I not cry and lament ? The world is going to be destroyed to-day, and all of us will perish." When the women heard this they began to cry wofully, and Uncle Rabbit filled a calabash with their tears. Then he returned to God. When the latter saw the three calabashes, with the snake, the wasps, and the tears. He said, "Uncle Rabbit, you are more cunning than any one else. Why do you want to be taller ? But, as you wish it, I will at least make your ears larger." Saying so, he pulled Uncle Rabbit's ears, and since that day they have remained long. Lancashire Folk-lore.— The last issue of The Folk-Lore Journal contains a quotation from Stukeley's Diary, forwarded by me, regarding milking a cow into a sieve. The tale comes from Shropshire. I have now come across a Lancashire variant. In Mr. Joseph Gillow's recently-published Haydock Papers it is recorded that "On the moors around Whittingham, it is stated, there once lived an old dun cow, of enormous size. Though recognising no owner, it gave milk to all comers, and that in no stinted quantity. At last an old witch said she would take a pail which the dun cow could not fill. She produced a riddle; and, after a vain attempt to fill it, the beast died of vexation." — (P. 64.) In the same work is another Lancashire witch story. "This hag resided in a wretched hut called Cuckoo Hall, situated in a solitary part of Wesham, adjoining a footpath leading from Kirkham to