aster?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is eight?"

"The plow with eight oxen furrows the earth well."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

"What is nine?"

"Where there are nine grown daughters in a house, it is not swept."

"Is it you, master?"

"Burst, dragon!"

The Pea Emperor, who heard all this, could not sleep all night long,
even when it grew so still that one might have heard a fly buzz; he
waited for daylight with the utmost impatience.

When he rose the next morning the old servant had vanished. He went
out of the palace, and what did he behold? The scattered corpses of
nine dragons, which he gave to the ravens. While thanking God for
having preserved his life and delivered him from disgrace, he heard a
sweet voice say:

"Your compassion for the poor man saved you. Always be charitable."

The Morning Star and The Evening Star.

Once upon a time something extraordinary happened. If it had not
happened it would not be told.

There was once an emperor and empress who were childless. So they
sought out all the wizards and witches, all the old women and
astrologers; but their skill proved vain, no one knew how to help
them. At last the royal pair devoted themselves to almsgiving,
praying, and fasting, until one night the empress dreamed that the
Lord had taken pity on her, and appearing to her, said: "I have heard
your prayers, and will give you a child whose like can not be found on
earth. Your husband, the emperor, must go to the brook to-morrow with
a hook and line, then you are to prepare with your own hands the fish
he catches, and eat it."

Before it was fairly daylight, the empress went to the emperor and
woke him, saying: "Rise, my royal husband, it is morning."

"Why, what ails you to-day, wife, that you wake me so early?" the
emperor replied. "Has any foe crossed the frontiers of my country?"

"Heaven forbid. I've heard nothing of that sort, but listen to my
dream."

And she told him about it.

When the emperor heard her story he jumped out of bed, dressed, took
the hook and line, and, gasping for breath, went to the brook. He
threw in the hook and soon saw the cork on the line bob. He pulled it
out, and what did he see? A big fish, made entirely of gold. It was a
wonder that he did not die of joy. But what did the empress say when
_she_ saw it? She was still more out of her wits.

The empress cooked the fish with her own hands, the royal couple ate
it, and the empress