Next day the husband took his wife to the fields and showed her which were his , and which belonged to his mother . The girl listened carefully to all he told her , and walked with him back to the hut ; but close to the door she stopped , and said : ' I have dropped my necklace of beads in the field , and I must go and look for it . ' But in truth she had done nothing of the sort , and it was only an excuse to go and seek the buffalo . The beast was crouching under a tree when she came up , and snorted with pleasure at the sight of her . ` You can roam about this field , and this , and this , ' she said , ` for they belong to my husband ; and that is his wood , where you may hide yourself . But the other fields are his mother 's , so beware lest you touch them . ' ' I will beware , ' answered the buffalo ; and , patting his head , the girl left him . Oh , how much better a servant he was than any of the little girls the bride had refused to bring with her ! If she wanted water , she had only to cross the patch of maize behind the hut and seek out the place where the buffalo lay hidden , and put down her pail beside him . Then she would sit at her ease while he went to the lake and brought the bucket back brimming over . If she wanted wood , he would break the branches off the trees and lay them at her feet . And the villagers watched her return laden , and said to each other : ` Surely the girls of her country are stronger than our girls , for none of them could cut so quickly or carry so much ! ' But then , nobody knew that she had a buffalo for a servant . Only , all this time she never gave the poor buffalo anything to eat , because she had just one dish , out of which she and her husband ate ; while in her old home there was a dish put aside expressly for the Rover of the Plain . The buffalo bore it as long as he could ; but , one day , when his mistress bade him go to the lake and fetch water , his knees almost gave way from hunger . He kept silence , however , till the evening , when he said to his mistress : ' I am nearly starved ; I have not touched food since I came here . I can work no more . ' ` Alas ! ' answered she , ` what can I do ? I have only one dish in the house .
You will have XXXXX steal some beans from the fields .
If about at because for from than that till to