"where are you going? I declare you
have put on your Sunday clothes!"

"We're going to the king's court, as suitors to the king's daughter.
Don't you know the announcement that has been made all through the
country?" And they told him all about it.

"My word! I'll be in it too!" cried Jack the Dullard; and his two
brothers burst out laughing at him, and rode away.

"Father dear," said Jack, "I must have a horse too. I do feel so
desperately inclined to marry! If she accepts me, she accepts me; and
if she won't have me, I'll have her; but she _shall_ be mine!"

"Don't talk nonsense," replied the old gentleman. "You shall have no
horse from me. You don't know how to speak--you can't arrange your
words. Your brothers are very different fellows from you."

"Well," quoth Jack the Dullard, "if I can't have a horse, I'll take
the billy-goat, who belongs to me, and he can carry me very well!"

And so said, so done. He mounted the billy-goat, pressed his heels
into its sides, and gallopped down the high street like a hurricane.

"Hei, houp! that was a ride! Here I come!" shouted Jack the Dullard,
and he sang till his voice echoed far and wide.

But his brothers rode slowly on in advance of him. They spoke not a
word, for they were thinking about all the fine extempore speeches
they would have to bring out, and all these had to be cleverly
prepared beforehand.

"Hallo!" shouted Jack the Dullard. "Here am I! Look what I have found
on the high-road." And he showed them what it was, and it was a dead
crow.

"Dullard!" exclaimed the brothers, "what are you going to do with
that?"

"With the crow? why, I am going to give it to the princess."

"Yes, do so," said they; and they laughed, and rode on.

"Hallo, here I am again! Just see what I have found now: you don't
find that on the high-road every day!"

And the brothers turned round to see what he could have found now.

[Illustration: JACK'S INTRODUCTION TO THE PRINCESS.]

"Dullard!" they cried, "that is only an old wooden shoe, and the upper
part is missing into the bargain; are you going to give that also to
the princess?"

"Most certainly I shall," replied Jack the Dullard; and again the
brothers laughed and rode on, and thus they got far in advance of him;
but----

"Hallo--hop rara!" and there was Jack the Dullard again. "It is
getting better and better," he cried. "Hurrah! it is quite famous."

"Why, what have you found this time?" inquired the brothers.