y the
prediction that he exposed his son in a wood. The child was found by a
magician, who brought him up, and from whom he afterwards escaped. He
went to the court of the king, his father, and won the hand of the
princess (his own sister) by leaping his horse over a broad ditch. At
the marriage banquet the king handed his son a glass of wine, and the
latter recognized him and exclaimed: "Behold, the father serves the
son." The marriage was of course given up and the previous aversion of
the sister explained.[27]

Closely connected with the original story in The Seven Wise Masters is
the class of stories where the hero is acquainted with the language of
animals, and attains by means of it some high position (generally
becoming pope) after he has been driven from home by his father. The
following version is from Monferrato (Comparetti, No. 56) and is
entitled:

XLIII. THE LANGUAGE OF ANIMALS.

A father once had a son who spent ten years in school. At the end of
that time, the teacher wrote the father to take away his son because he
could not teach him anything more. The father took the boy home and gave
a grand banquet in his honor, to which he invited the most noble
gentlemen of the country. After many speeches by those gentlemen, one of
the guests said to the host's son: "Just tell us some fine thing that
you have learned." "I have learned the language of dogs, of frogs, and
of birds." There was universal laughter on hearing this, and all went
away ridiculing the pride of the father and the foolishness of the son.
The former was so ashamed at his son's answer and so angry at him that
he gave him up to two servants, with orders to take him into a wood and
kill him and to bring back his heart. The two servants did not dare to
obey this command, and instead of the lad they killed a dog, and carried
its heart to their master. The youth fled from the country and came to a
castle a long way off, where lived the treasurer of the prince, who had
immense treasures. There he asked for and obtained a lodging, but
scarcely had he entered the house when a multitude of dogs collected
about the castle. The treasurer asked the young man why so many dogs had
come, and as the latter understood their language he answered that it
meant that a hundred assassins would attack the castle that very
evening, and that the treasurer should take his precautions. The
castellan made two hundred soldiers place themselves in ambush about the
cas