Page:Grimm's Fairy Tales.djvu/50

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32
THE FOX'S BRUSH

golden saddle, the groom awoke, and cried out so loud, that all the guards ran in and took him prisoner; and in the morning he was brought before the king's court to be judged, and was once more doomed to die. But it was agreed that if he could bring thither the beautiful princess, he should live and have the horse given him for his own.

Then he went his way again very sorrowful; but the old fox once more met him on the road, and said, "Why did you not listen to me? If you had, you would have carried away both the bird and the horse. Yet I will once more give you counsel. Go straight on, and in the evening you will come to a castle. At twelve o'clock every night the princess goes to the bath: go up to her as she passes, and give her a kiss, and she will let you lead her away; but take care you do not let her go and take leave of her father and mother." Then the fox stretched out his tail, and away they went over stock and stone till their hair whistled again.

As they came to the castle all was as the fox had said; and at twelve o'clock the young man met the princess going to the bath, and gave her the kiss; and she agreed to run away with him, but begged with many tears that he would let her take leave of her father. At first he said, "No!" but she wept still more and more, and fell at his feet, till at last he yielded; but the moment she came to her father's door the guards awoke, and he was taken prisoner again.

So he was brought at once before the king, who lived in that castle. And the king said, "You shall never have my daughter, unless in eight days you dig away the hill that stops the view from my window." Now this hill was so big that all the men in the whole world