then pretended to be seized with remorse at the sight of this
dreadful catastrophe, and cried out in a loud voice, 'Unhappy wretch
that I am! What have I done? Like a madman I have killed the woman who
is the prop and stay of my old age. How could I ever go on living
without her?' Then he seized a pipe, and when he had blown into it for
some time Nina sprang up alive and well.

The rogues were more amazed than ever; they forgot their anger, and
buying the pipe for two hundred gold pieces, they went joyfully home.

Not long after this one of them quarrelled with his wife, and in his
rage he thrust his knife into her breast so that she fell dead on the
ground. Then he took Simon's pipe and blew into it with all his might,
in the hopes of calling his wife back to life. But he blew in vain, for
the poor soul was as dead as a door-nail.

When one of his comrades heard what had happened, he said, 'You
blockhead, you can't have done it properly; just let me have a try,' and
with these words he seized his wife by the roots of her hair, cut her
throat with a razor, and then took the pipe and blew into it with all
his might but he couldn't bring her back to life. The same thing
happened to the third rogue, so that they were now all three without
wives.

Full of wrath they ran to Simon's house, and, refusing to listen to a
word of explanation or excuse, they seized the old man and put him into
a sack, meaning to drown him in the neighbouring river. On their way
there, however, a sudden noise threw them into such a panic that they
dropped the sack with Simon in it and ran for their lives.

Soon after this a shepherd happened to pass by with his flock, and while
he was slowly following the sheep, who paused here and there by the
wayside to browse on the tender grass, he heard a pitiful voice wailing,
'They insist on my taking her, and I don't want her, for I am too old,
and I really can't have her.' The shepherd was much startled, for he
couldn't make out where these words, which were repeated more than once,
came from, and looked about him to the right and left; at last he
perceived the sack in which Simon was hidden, and going up to it he
opened it and discovered Simon repeating his dismal complaint. The
shepherd asked him why he had been left there tied up in a sack.

[Illustration]

Simon replied that the king of the country had insisted on giving him
one of his daughters as a wife, but that he had refused the honour
be