and
found that Ring's wood-heap was more than twice as big.

'I suspected,' said the King, 'that Ring was not quite useless; never
have I seen such a day's work.'

Ring was now in far greater esteem with the King than before, and Red
was all the more discontented. One day he came to the King and said,
'If Ring is such a mighty man, I think you might ask him to kill the
wild oxen in the wood here, and flay them the same day, and bring you
the horns and the hides in the evening.'

'Don't you think that a desperate errand?' said the King, 'seeing they
are so dangerous, and no one has ever yet ventured to go against
them?'

Red answered that he had only one life to lose, and it would be
interesting to see how brave he was; besides, the King would have good
reason to ennoble him if he overcame them. The King at last allowed
himself, though rather unwillingly, to be won over by Red's
persistency, and one day asked Ring to go and kill the oxen that were
in the wood for him, and bring their horns and hides to him in the
evening. Not knowing how dangerous the oxen were, Ring was quite
ready, and went off at once, to the great delight of Red, who was now
sure of his death.

As soon as Ring came in sight of the oxen they came bellowing to meet
him; one of them was tremendously big, the other rather less. Ring
grew terribly afraid.

'How do you like them?' asked Snati.

'Not well at all,' said the Prince.

'We can do nothing else,' said Snati, 'than attack them, if it is to
go well; you will go against the little one, and I shall take the
other.'

With this Snati leapt at the big one, and was not long in bringing him
down. Meanwhile the Prince went against the other with fear and
trembling, and by the time Snati came to help him the ox had nearly
got him under, but Snati was not slow in helping his master to kill
it.

[Illustration: Snati and Prince Ring Fight With the Oxen]

Each of them then began to flay their own ox, but Ring was only half
through by the time Snati had finished his. In the evening, after they
had finished this task, the Prince thought himself unfit to carry all
the horns and both the hides, so Snati told him to lay them all on his
back until they got to the Palace gate. The Prince agreed, and laid
everything on the Dog except the skin of the smaller ox, which he
staggered along with himself. At the Palace gate he left everything
lying, went before the King, and asked him to come that length wit