,' said
he; 'we shall have a storm.'

'Oh, it is nothing but your fancy,' said his wife.

Matte lay down, but soon rose again.

'The weathercock is squeaking now,' said he.

'Just fancy! Go to sleep,' said his wife; and the old man tried to.

For the third time he jumped out of bed.

'Ho! how the weather-cock is roaring at the pitch of its voice, as if it
had a fire inside it! We are going to have a tempest, and must bring in
the net.'

Both rose. The summer night was as dark as if it had been October, the
weather-cock creaked, and the storm was raging in every direction. As
they went out the sea lay around them as white as now, and the spray
was dashing right over the fisher-hut. In all his life Matte had never
remembered such a night. To launch the boat and put to sea to rescue the
net was a thing not to be thought of. The fisherman and his wife stood
aghast on the doorstep, holding on fast by the doorpost, while the foam
splashed over their faces.

'Did I not tell thee that there is no luck in Sunday fishing?' said
Matte sulkily; and his wife was so frightened that she never even once
thought of Ahti's cows.

As there was nothing to be done, they went in. Their eyes were heavy for
lack of slumber, and they slept as soundly as if there had not been such
a thing as an angry sea roaring furiously around their lonely dwelling.
When they awoke, the sun was high in the heavens, the tempest had cased,
and only the swell of the sea rose in silvery heavings against the red
rock.

'What can that be?' said the old woman, as she peeped out of the door.

'It looks like a big seal,' said Matte.

'As sure as I live, it's a cow!' exclaimed Maie. And certainly it was a
cow, a fine red cow, fat and flourishing, and looking as if it had been
fed all its days on spinach. It wandered peacefully up and down the
shore, and never so much as even looked at the poor little tufts of
grass, as if it despised such fare.

Matte could not believe his eyes. But a cow she seemed, and a cow she
was found to be; and when the old woman began to milk her, every pitcher
and pan, even to the baler, was soon filled with the most delicious
milk.

The old man troubled his head in vain as to how she came there, and
sallied forth to seek for his lost net. He had not proceeded far when he
found it cast up on the shore, and so full of fish that not a mesh was
visible.

'It is all very fine to possess a cow,' said Matte, as he cleaned the
fis