would never come back until they had
accomplished their purpose.

We will leave these two princes to wander here and there in their
search, and look at what was passing in another place. Deep down in the
heart of a wild wood there dwelt at that time an old woman who had an
only son, who used daily to attend to his mother's three hogs. As the
lad roamed through the forest, he one day cut a little pipe to play on.
He found much pleasure in the music, and he played so well that the
notes charmed all who heard him. The boy was well built, of an honest
heart, and feared nothing.

One day it chanced that, as he was sitting in the wood playing on his
pipe, while his three hogs grubbed among the roots of the pine-trees, a
very old man came along. He had a beard so long that it reached to his
waist, and a large dog accompanied him. When the lad saw the dog he said
to himself--

"I wish I had a dog like that as a companion here in the wood. Then
there would be no danger."

The old man knew what the boy thought, and he said--

"I have come to ask you to let me give you my dog for one of your hogs."

The lad was ready to close the bargain, and gave a gray hog in exchange
for the big dog. As he was going the old man said--

"I think you will be satisfied with your bargain. The dog is not like
other dogs. His name is Hold-fast, and if you tell him to hold, hold he
will whatever it may be, were it even the fiercest giant."

Then he departed, and the lad thought that for once, at all events,
fortune had been kind to him.

When evening had come, the lad called his dog, and drove the hogs to his
home in the forest. When the old woman learnt how her son had given away
the gray hog for a dog, she flew into a great rage, and gave him a good
beating. The lad begged her to be quiet, but it was of no use, for she
only seemed to get the more angry. When the boy saw that it was no good
pleading, he called to the dog--

"Hold fast."

The dog at once rushed forward, and, seizing the old woman, held her so
firmly that she could not move; but he did her no harm. The old woman
now had to promise that she would agree to what her son had done; but
she could not help thinking that she had suffered a great misfortune in
losing her fat gray hog.

The next day the boy went once more to the forest with his dog and the
two hogs. When he arrived there he sat down and played upon his pipe as
usual, and the dog danced to the music in such a wond