ught him
and held him fast. He shrieked for help to his wife, who came running;
and luckily brought her rope with her. The poor old dog was drowned, but
the prince was pulled to shore. 'My wife,' he said, 'has been stronger
than my fate.'

[Adapted from Les Contes Populaires de l'Egypte Ancienne.]

The Fox and the Lapp

Once upon a time a fox lay peeping out of his hole, watching the road
that ran by at a little distance, and hoping to see something that might
amuse him, for he was feeling very dull and rather cross. For a long
while he watched in vain; everything seemed asleep, and not even a
bird stirred overhead. The fox grew crosser than ever, and he was just
turning away in disgust from his place when he heard the sound of feet
coming over the snow. He crouched eagerly down at the edge of the road
and said to himself: 'I wonder what would happen if I were to pretend to
be dead! This is a man driving a reindeer sledge, I know the tinkling
of the harness. And at any rate I shall have an adventure, and that is
always something!'

So he stretched himself out by the side of the road, carefully choosing
a spot where the driver could not help seeing him, yet where the
reindeer would not tread on him; and all fell out just as he had
expected. The sledge-driver pulled up sharply, as his eyes lighted on
the beautiful animal lying stiffly beside him, and jumping out he threw
the fox into the bottom of the sledge, where the goods he was carrying
were bound tightly together by ropes. The fox did not move a muscle
though his bones were sore from the fall, and the driver got back to his
seat again and drove on merrily.

But before they had gone very far, the fox, who was near the edge,
contrived to slip over, and when the Laplander saw him stretched out on
the snow he pulled up his reindeer and put the fox into one of the other
sledges that was fastened behind, for it was market-day at the nearest
town, and the man had much to sell.

They drove on a little further, when some noise in the forest made the
man turn his head, just in time to see the fox fall with a heavy thump
on to the frozen snow. 'That beast is bewitched!' he said to himself,
and then he threw the fox into the last sledge of all, which had a cargo
of fishes. This was exactly what the cunning creature wanted, and he
wriggled gently to the front and bit the cord which tied the sledge
to the one before it so that it remained standing in the middle of