“Why,” says the mayor, “I wish I may be choked to death with a string of sausages if it is not a dog, and a big dog and a fat dog into the bargain.” So there was an end of the matter, and Master Jacob had to march off home without his pig and with no more in his pockets than he had before. All the same, he saw what kind of trick had been played on him, and, says he to himself, “What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. If one can pipe another can whistle; I’ll just try a bit of a trick myself.” So he went to his wife and told her that he had a mind to do thus and so, and that she must do this and that; for he thought of trying his hand at a little trickery as well as other folks. Now, as I told you before, Master Jacob had two goats, both of them as black as the inside of your hat at midnight; moreover, they were as like as two spoons in the same dish; for no one could have told them apart unless he had lived with them year in and year out, rainy weather and clear, as Master Jacob had done. Well, the next day Master Jacob tied a rope around the neck of one of the goats, took down a basket from the wall, and started off to the town over the hill, leading his goat behind him. By and by he came to the market place and began buying many and one things, until his basket was as full as it could hold. After a while whom should he see coming along but the priest and the provost and the mayor, walking arm in arm as bold as you please. “Halloa, Master Jacob,” said they, “and what have you there?” “The blessed saints only know that,” said Master Jacob. “It may be a black cat for all that I know; it _was_ a black goat when I left home this morning.” And what was Master Jacob going to do with his little black goat? That was what they should like to know. “Oh,” said Master Jacob, “I am about to send my little black goat on an errand; if you will wait you shall see for yourselves.” Then what did he do but hang the basket around the goat’s neck. “Go home to your mistress,” said he, “and tell her to boil the beef and cabbage for dinner to-day; and, stop! tell her to go to Neighbor Nicholas’s house and borrow a good big jug of beer, for I have a masterful thirst this morning.” Then he gave the goat a slap on the back, and off it went as though the ground were hot under it. But whether it ever really went home or not, I never heard. [Illustration: Master Jacob takes his black goat to town.] As for the priest, the provost, and the mayor, you may guess how they grinned at all of this. Good land sake’s alive! And did Master Jacob really mean to say that the little black goat would tell the mistress all that? Oh, yes; that it would. It was a keen blade, that little black goat, and if they would only come home with him, Master Jacob would show them.