king, 'and hear what I have to
say.'

'I know what it is,' answered the charcoal-burner, hanging his head.
'The mouse has escaped.'

'A guard of soldiers will take you back to your hut,' said the king.
'Your wife has the key.'

* * * * *

'Weren't they _silly_?' cried the grandchildren of the charcoal-burners
when they heard the story. 'How we wish that _we_ had had the chance!
_We_ should never have wanted to know what was in the soup-tureen!'

From 'Litterature Orale de l'Auvergne,' par P. Sebillot.

_HOW BRAVE WALTER HUNTED WOLVES_

A LITTLE back from the high road there stands a house which is called
'Hemgard.' Perhaps you remember the two beautiful mountain ash trees by
the reddish-brown palings, and the high gate, and the garden with the
beautiful barberry bushes which are always the first to become green in
spring, and which in summer are weighed down with their beautiful
berries.

Behind the garden there is a hedge with tall aspens which rustle in the
morning wind, behind the hedge is a road, behind the road is a wood, and
behind the wood the wide world.

But on the other side of the garden there is a lake, and beyond the lake
is a village, and all around stretch meadows and fields, now yellow, now
green.

In the pretty house, which has white window-frames, a neat porch and
clean steps, which are always strewn with finely-cut juniper leaves,
Walter's parents live. His brother Frederick, his sister Lotta, old
Lena, Jonas, Caro and Bravo, Putte and Murre, and Kuckeliku.

Caro lives in the dog house, Bravo in the stable, Putte with the
stableman, Murre a little here and a little there, and Kuckeliku lives
in the hen house, that is his kingdom.

Walter is six years old, and he must soon begin to go to school. He
cannot read yet, but he can do many other things. He can turn
cartwheels, stand on his head, ride see-saw, throw snowballs, play ball,
crow like a cock, eat bread and butter and drink sour milk, tear his
trousers, wear holes in his elbows, break the crockery in pieces, throw
balls through the windowpanes, draw old men on important papers, walk
over the flower-beds, eat himself sick with gooseberries, and be well
after a whipping. For the rest he has a good heart but a bad memory, and
forgets his father's and his mother's admonitions, and so often gets
into trouble and meets with adventures, as you shall hear, but first of
all I must tell you how b