said, "They paid for the turnips."

"Paid for the turnips!" scolded the old woman. "A lot of children!
What did they give you? Mushrooms? We can get them without losing our
turnips."

"They gave me a tablecloth," said the old man; "it's a very good
tablecloth."

He pulled it out of his shirt and spread it on the table; and as
quickly as he could, before she began again, he said, "Tablecloth,
turn inside out!"

The old woman stopped short, just when she was taking breath to scold
with, when the tablecloth jumped up and danced in the air and settled
on the table again, covered with things to eat and to drink. She smelt
the meat, took a spoonful of the soup, and tried all the other dishes.

"Look at all the washing up it will mean," says she.

"Tablecloth, turn outside in!" says the old man; and there was a whirl
of white cloth and dishes and everything else, and then the tablecloth
spread itself out on the table as clean as ever you could wish.

"That's not a bad tablecloth," says the old woman; "but, of course,
they owed me something for stealing all those turnips."

The old man said nothing. He was very tired, and he just laid down and
went to sleep.

As soon as he was asleep the old woman took the tablecloth and hid it
away in an iron chest, and put a tablecloth of her own in its place.
"They were my turnips," says she, "and I don't see why he should have
a share in the tablecloth. He's had a meal from it once at my expense,
and once is enough." Then she lay down and went to sleep, grumbling to
herself even in her dreams.

Early in the morning the old woman woke the old man and told him to go
up to the dovecot and see how those turnips were getting on.

He got up and rubbed his eyes. When he saw the tablecloth on the
table, the wish came to him to have a bite of food to begin the day
with. So he stopped in the middle of putting on his shirt, and called
to the tablecloth, "Tablecloth, turn inside out!"

Nothing happened. Why should anything happen? It was not the same
tablecloth.

The old man told the old woman. "You should have made a good feast
yesterday," says he, "for the tablecloth is no good any more. That is,
it's no good that way; it's like any ordinary tablecloth."

"Most tablecloths are," says the old woman. "But what are you dawdling
about? Up you go and have a look at those turnips."

The old man went climbing up the narrow twisting stairs. He held on
with both hands for fear of falling, b