once get above ground, well out of this hole." But he said nothing out loud.
So after a while the rat said—
"I dare say now you would be glad to get home again; but I'll hasten on the wedding as fast as ever I can. And now you must take with you this thread of wool; and when you come above ground you must not look round, but go straight home, and all the way you must mind and say nothing than
'Short before, and long back,
Short before, and long back;'"
and as she said that she gave him a thread of wool into his hand.
"Heaven be praised!" said the lad, "that I got away. Thither I'll never go again, if I can help it;" and so he sang and jumped as he was wont. As for the rat-hole, he thought no more about it; but as he had got his tongue into tune he sang,
"Short before, and long back,
Short before, and long back;"
so he kept on the whole way home.
So when he had got into the yard at home again he turned and looked behind him, and there lay the finest cloth, more than many hundred ells; ay, almost above half a mile long, and so fine, that no town dandy could have had finer cloth to his coat.
"Mother! mother! come out," bawled the lad.
So the goody came out of doors, and clapped her hands, and was almost ready to swoon for joy when she saw all that lovely cloth; and then he had to tell
