ad also
gone with one, on the night before a certain day, when a merry young
smith came wandering to the town where the king's castle stood. It was
the capital of the country, and people of every king came to it to
get work. This smith, whose name was Christian, had come for that same
purpose. There was no work for him in the place he belonged to, and he
wanted now to seek a place in the capital.

There he entered an inn where he sat down in the public room, and got
something to eat. Some under-officers were sitting there, who were out
to try to get some one enlisted to stand sentry. They had to go in this
way, day after day, and hitherto they had always succeeded in finding
one or other reckless fellow. But on this day they had, as yet, found no
one. It was too well known how all the sentinels disappeared, who were
set on that post, and all that they had got hold of had refused with
thanks. These sat down beside Christian, and ordered drinks, and drank
along with him. Now Christian was a merry fellow who liked good company;
he could both drink and sing, and talk and boast as well, when he got a
little drop in his head. He told these under-officers that he was one of
that kind of folk who never are afraid of anything. Then he was just
the kind of man they liked, said they, and he might easily earn a good
penny, before he was a day older, for the king paid a hundred dollars to
anyone who would stand as sentinel in the church all night, beside his
daughter's chest.

Christian was not afraid of that he wasn't afraid of anything, so they
drank another bottle of wine on this, and Christian went with them up
to the colonel, where he was put into uniform with musket, and all the
rest, and was then shut up in the church, to stand as sentinel that
night.

It was eight o'clock when he took up his post, and for the first hour
he was quite proud of his courage; during the second hour he was well
pleased with the large reward that he would get, but in the third hour,
when it was getting near eleven, the effects of the wine passed off, and
he began to get uncomfortable, for he had heard about this post; that
no one had ever escapeed alive from it, so far as was known. But neither
did anyone know what had become of all the sentinels. The thought of
this ran in his head so much, after the wine was out of it, that he
searched about everywhere for a way of escape, and finally, at eleven
o'clock, he found a little postern in the steepl