tling pace, as if urged on by
some one. The fool had to pass by a town, and the people he
met were jammed into corners by his horseless sledge in a way
that was perfectly awful. They all began crying out:

"Stop him! Catch him!"

But they couldn't lay hands on him. The fool drove into
the forest, got out of the sledge, sat down on a log, and said--

"One of you axes fell the trees, while the other cuts them
up into billets."

Well, the firewood was cut up and piled on the sledge. Then
says the fool:

"Now then, one of you axes! go and cut me a cudgel,[353] as
heavy a one as I can lift."

The axe went and cut him a cudgel, and the cudgel came
and lay on top of the load.

The fool took his seat and drove off. He drove by the
town, but the townspeople had met together and had been looking
out for him for ever so long. So they stopped the fool, laid
hands upon him, and began pulling him about. Says the fool--

"By the Pike's command, at my request, go, O cudgel, and
bestir thyself."

Out jumped the cudgel, and took to thumping and smashing,
and knocked over ever such a lot of people. There they lay on
the ground, strewed about like so many sheaves of corn. The
fool got clear of them and drove home, heaped up the wood,
and then lay down on the stove.

Meanwhile, the townspeople got up a petition against him,
and denounced him to the King, saying:

"Folks say there's no getting hold of him the way we tried;[354]
we must entice him by cunning, and the best way of all will be
to promise him a red shirt, and a red caftan, and red boots."

So the King's runners came for the fool.

"Go to the King," they say, "he will give you red boots, a
red caftan, and a red shirt."

Well, the fool said:

"By the Pike's command, at my request, do thou, O stove,
go to the King!"

He was seated on the stove at the time. The stove went;
the fool arrived at the King's.

The King was going to put him to death, but he had a
daughter, and she took a tremendous liking to the fool. So
she began begging her father to give her in marriage to the fool.
Her father flew into a passion. He had them married, and
then ordered them both to be placed in a tub, and the tub to be
tarred over and thrown into the water; all which was done.

Long did the tub float about on the sea. His wife began to
beseech the fool:

"Do something to get us cast