rceived her love for the dragon, he became perfectly frantic.

"Well then, if you won't come, we'll carry you off by force!" he said,
ready to take the whole palace on his back and fly with it to the
other shore.

"Gently, gently," said the girl; "if it came to that, I need only pull
a nail out of this glass wall to bring the whole palace toppling down
upon your heads. But I pity your youth, and advise you not to stay
here long, because my betrothed husband might catch you, and you will
have no one to mourn for you."

The Poor Boy now took his ash-cake from his knapsack and said:
"Sister, just taste this bread, and then say that I am not your
brother."

She held out her hand and the glass walls opened; but after she had
taken the bread and tasted it she felt that it had been mixed with
her own mother's milk, and was seized with such terrible homesickness
that one might have wept for pity. "Forward!" she said hastily, "let
us fly, for if he finds us here, woe betide you."

The Poor Boy took her in his arms and kissed her, because she was his
sister, but the prince embraced and kissed her, too, because--because
he was the Poor Boy's sworn brother.

Then they agreed to serve this dragon as they had served his brother,
so they waited awhile, received the dragon as he deserved, conquered
him, and after thanking God that they had overcome this peril too,
journeyed on again to deliver the emperor's daughter.

But now came fresh trouble. The princess did not want to be rescued,
and the prince had no token with him by which she might have
recognized him as her brother. In vain the Poor Boy told her that if
she did not come willingly, he would carry her off by force; she kept
her hand on the dangerous nail and it was impossible to coax her.

I must mention that it would go hard with them if they waited for the
dragon; for there were only two champions, and if one held up the
palace by keeping the gates on their hinges and the other waited for
the dragon in the middle of the court-yard, there was no one who could
protect them from the nail.

"Let me attend to it," said the Poor Boy, who, since he had seen the
princess, had grown fairly frantic. "Either his life or mine!"

As we perceive, he had determined to fight the dragon in the open
ground, where he could not see him,--a thing never heard of since
fairy princes first began to fight the dragon's brood; for if it is
hard to conquer a dragon at all, it is doubly diffi