ing, but he dipped up some of the water in his palm
and dashed it upon the statue. "If you are the princess, take your true
shape again," said he. Before the words had left his lips the statue
became flesh and blood, and the princess stepped down from where
she stood, and the prince thought that he had never seen any one so
beautiful as she. "You have brought me back to life," said she, "and
whatever I shall have shall be yours as well as mine."

Then they all set their faces homeward again, and the prince took with
him a cupful of the water of life.

When they reached the farther shore the black dogs came running to meet
them. The prince sprinkled the water he carried upon them, and as soon
as it touched them that instant they were black dogs no longer, but the
tall, noble young men that the sorceress queen had bewitched. There, as
the old man had hoped, he found his own three sons, and kissed them with
the tears running down his face.

But when the people of that land learned that their youngest princess,
and the one whom they loved, had come back again, and that the two
sorceresses would trouble them no longer, they shouted and shouted for
joy. All the town was hung with flags and illuminated, the fountains ran
with wine, and nothing was heard but sounds of rejoicing. In the midst
of it all the prince married the princess, and so became the king of
that country.

And now to go back again to the beginning.

After the youngest prince had been driven away from home, and the old
king had divided the kingdom betwixt the other two, things went for a
while smoothly and joyfully. But by little and little the king was put
to one side until he became as nothing in his own land. At last hot
words passed between the father and the two sons, and the end of the
matter was that the king was driven from the land to shift for himself.

Now, after the youngest prince had married and had become king of that
other land, he bethought himself of his father and his mother, and
longed to see them again. So he set forth and travelled towards his old
home. In his journeying he came to a lonely house at the edge of a great
forest, and there night came upon him. He sent one of the many of those
who rode with him to ask whether he could not find lodging there for
the time, and who should answer the summons but the king, his father,
dressed in the coarse clothing of a forester. The old king did not know
his own son in the kingly young king