he king, somewhat unwillingly, gave his consent,
and these two were also married.

When Singalong saw to what high positions his friends had attained,
he became desirous of like fortune, so he went to the king and obtained
his consent to his marriage with the Princess Maria.

All three of the king's sons-in-law lived with their wives at the
palace, at the king's expense. The latter seeing that his daughters'
husbands were lazy fellows, determined to make them useful, so he sent
Pusong and Amo-Mongo out to take charge of his estates in the country,
while to Singalong he gave the oversight of the servants who worked
in the kitchen of the palace.

Pusong and Amo-Mongo went out to the hacienda with the intention
of doing something, but when they arrived there, they found so much
to do that they concluded that it would be impossible to attend to
everything and so decided to do nothing.

The latter, after merely looking over the estate, entered the forest,
in order to visit his relatives there. His fellow monkeys, who knew of
his marriage with the princess, believed him to be of some importance,
and begged him to save them from the famine which was devastating the
forest. This Amo-Mongo, with much boasting of his wealth, promised to
do, declaring that at the time of harvest he would give them plenty
of rice.

When Pusong and his companion returned to the palace they were asked by
the king how many acres they had cleared. They replied that they had
cleared and planted about one thousand acres. The king was satisfied
with their answer, and, at Amo-Mongo's request, gave orders for a
large quantity of rice to be carried from the storehouse to the spot
in the forest where his son-in-law had promised the monkeys that they
should find it.

On the other hand, Singalong during the day did nothing, and as the
king never saw him at work he disliked his third son-in-law very
much. Yet every morning there were great piles of fish and vegetables
in the palace kitchen. Amo-Mongo, knowing that his brother-in-law
usually went out at night in order to bring something home, contrived
to get up early and see what there was in the kitchen, so as to present
it to the king as the result of his own labors. In this way, Amo-Mongo
became each day dearer and dearer to the king, while Singalong became
more and more disliked. Maria knew that her husband procured their
food in some way, for every morning he said to her: "All that you
see here I ha