opped and waited till the giants were close upon him. Then he
turned, and said quietly: 'Look, there is the Sister of the Sun!'

The giants raised their eyes all at once, and were instantly turned into
pillars of stone. The fox then made each pillar a low bow, and set off
to join his friends.

He knew a great many short cuts across the hills, so it was not long
before he came up with them, and all four travelled night and day till
they reached the castle of the Sister of the Sun. What joy and feasting
there was throughout the palace at the sight of the princess whom they
had mourned as dead! and they could not make enough of the boy who had
gone through such dangers in order to rescue her. The golden hen was
given to him at once, and, more than that, the Sister of the Sun told
him that, in a little time, when he was a few years older, she would
herself pay a visit to his home and become his wife. The boy could
hardly believe his ears when he heard what was in store for him, for his
was the most beautiful princess in all the world; and however thick the
darkness might be, it fled away at once from the light of a star on her
forehead.

So the boy set forth on his journey home, with his friends for company;
his heart full of gladness when he thought of the promise of the
princess. But, one by one, his comrades dropped off at the places where
they had first met him, and he was quite alone when he reached his
native town and the gates of the palace. With the golden hen under his
arm he presented himself before the king, and told his adventures, and
how he was going to have for a wife a princess so wonderful and unlike
all other princesses, that the star on her forehead could turn night
into day. The king listened silently, and when the boy had done, he said
quietly: 'If I find that your story is not true I will have you thrown
into a cask of pitch.'

'It is true--every word of it,' answered the boy; and went on to tell
that the day and even the hour were fixed when his bride was to come and
seek him.

But as the time drew near, and nothing was heard of the princess, the
youth became anxious and uneasy, especially when it came to his ears
that the great cask was being filled with pitch, and that sticks were
laid underneath to make a fire to boil it with. All day long the boy
stood at the window, looking over the sea by which the princess must
travel; but there were no signs of her, not even the tiniest white sail.
And,