pay him well for it. He said,
"It certainly was not to be sold; but seeing that it would be so useful
to them, he would let them have it if they would pay him what was
right," and he asked a hundred florins for it. The boors were glad to
find that he asked so little, and concluded a bargain with him, he
agreeing to take half the money down, and to come again in six months to
fetch the rest. As soon as the bargain was struck on both sides, they
gave the traveller the half of the money, and he carried the mouser into
the granary, where they kept their corn, for there were most mice there.
The traveller went off with the money at full speed, for he feared
greatly lest they should repent them of the bargain, and want their
money back again; and as he went along he kept looking behind him to see
that no one was following him. Now the boors had forgotten to ask what
the cat was to be fed upon, so they sent one after him in haste to ask
him the question. But when he with the gold saw that some one was
following him, he hastened so much the more, so that the boor could by
no means overtake him, whereupon he called out to him from afar off,
"What does it eat?" "What you please! What you please!" quoth the
traveller. But the peasant understood him to say, "Men and beasts! Men
and beasts!" Therefore he returned home in great affliction, and said as
much to his worthy masters.

On learning this they became greatly alarmed, and said, "When it has no
more mice to eat, it will eat our cattle; and when they are gone, it
will eat us! To think that we should lay out our good money in buying
such a thing!" And they held counsel together and resolved that the cat
should be killed. But no one would venture to lay hold of it for that
purpose, whereupon it was determined to burn the granary, and the cat in
it, seeing that it was better they should suffer a common loss than all
lose life and limb. So they set fire to the granary. But when the cat
smelt the fire, it sprang out of a window and fled to another house, and
the granary was burned to the ground. Never was there sorrow greater
than that of the Schildburgers when they found that they could not kill
the cat. They counselled with one another, and purchased the house to
which the cat had fled, and burned that also. But the cat sprang out
upon the roof, and sat there, washing itself and putting its paws behind
its ears, after the manner of cats; and the Schildburgers understood
thereby th