But scarcely had she seen him when he began to change into a
bird, and then he said: "Now you have seen me, you shall see me no more,
unless you are willing to serve seven years and a day for me, so that I
may become a man once more." Then he told her to take three feathers
from under his side, and whatever she wished through them would come to
pass. Then he left her at a great house to be laundry-maid for seven
years and a day.
And the girl used to take the feathers and say:
"By virtue of my three feathers may the copper be lit, and the clothes
washed, and mangled, and folded, and put away to the missus's
satisfaction."
And then she had no more care about it. The feathers did the rest, and
the lady set great store by her for a better laundress she had never
had. Well, one day the butler, who had a notion to have the pretty
laundry-maid for his wife, said to her, he should have spoken before but
he did not want to vex her. "Why should it when I am but a
fellow-servant?" the girl said.
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