the job properly."

Late in the evening the pope dragged the goat indoors, killed
it, and took off its skin--horns, beard, and all complete. Then
he pulled the goat's skin over himself and said to his wife:

"Bring a needle and thread, mother, and fasten up the skin
all round, so that it mayn't slip off."

So she took a strong needle, and some tough thread, and
sewed him up in the goatskin. Well, at the dead of night, the
pope went straight to the old man's cottage, got under the window,
and began knocking and scratching. The old man hearing
the noise, jumped up and asked:

"Who's there?"

"The Devil!"

"Ours is a holy spot![34]" shrieked the moujik, and began
crossing himself and uttering prayers.

"Listen, old man," says the pope, "From me thou will not
escape, although thou may'st pray, although thou may'st cross
thyself; much better give me back my pot of money, otherwise I
will make thee pay for it. See now, I pitied thee in thy misfortune,
and I showed thee the treasure, thinking thou wouldst
take a little of it to pay for the funeral, but thou hast pillaged it
utterly."

The old man looked out of window--the goat's horns and
beard caught his eye--it was the Devil himself, no doubt of it.

"Let's get rid of him, money and all," thinks the old man;
"I've lived before now without money, and now I'll go on living
without it."

So he took the pot of gold, carried it outside, flung it on the
ground, and bolted indoors again as quickly as possible.

The pope seized the pot of money, and hastened home.
When he got back, "Come," says he, "the money is in our
hands now. Here, mother, put it well out of sight, and take a
sharp knife, cut the thread, and pull the goatskin off me before
anyone sees it."

She took a knife, and was beginning to cut the thread at the
seam, when forth flowed blood, and the pope began to howl:

"Oh! it hurts, mother, it hurts! don't cut mother, don't
cut!"

She began ripping the skin open in another place, but with
just the same result. The goatskin had united with his body all
round. And all that they tried, and all that they did, even to taking
the money back to the old man, was of no avail. The goatskin
remained clinging tight to the pope all the same. God evidently
did it to punish him for his great greediness.

A somewhat less heathenish story with regard to money is the
following, w