trong iron posts several
fathoms long had been prepared.

The death-struggles of the monster lasted for three days and three
nights, and when it reared itself, it struck the ground so violently
with its tail, that the earth was shaken for fifty miles round. At
length, when it was too weak to move its tail any longer, the young man
lifted a stone with the help of his ring, which twenty men could not
have moved, and beat the monster about the head with it until no
further sign of life was visible.

Immeasurable was the rejoicing when the news arrived that the terrible
monster was actually dead. The victor was brought to the capital with
all possible respect, as if he had been a powerful king. The old king
did not need to force his daughter to the marriage, for she herself
desired to marry the strong man who had alone successfully accomplished
what others had not been able to effect with the aid of a whole army.
After some days, a magnificent wedding was prepared. The festivities
lasted a whole month, and all the kings of the neighbouring countries
assembled to thank the man who had rid the world of its worst enemy. But
amid the marriage festival and the general rejoicings it was forgotten
that the monster's carcass had been left unburied, and as it was now
decaying, it occasioned such a stench that no one could approach it.
This gave rise to diseases of which many people died. Then the king's
son-in-law determined to seek help from the sorcerer of the East. This
did not seem difficult to him with the aid of his ring, with which he
could fly in the air like a bird.

But the proverb says that injustice never prospers, and that as we sow
we reap. The king's son-in-law was doomed to realise the truth of this
adage with his stolen ring. The Hell-Maiden left no stone unturned,
night or day, to discover the whereabouts of her lost ring. When she
learned through her magic arts that the king's son-in-law had set out in
the form of a bird to visit the sorcerer, she changed herself into an
eagle, and circled about in the air till the bird for which she was
waiting came in sight. She recognised him at once by the ring, which he
carried on a riband round his neck. Then the eagle swooped upon the
bird, and at the moment that she seized him in her claws she tore the
ring from his neck with her beak, before he could do anything to prevent
her. Then the eagle descended to the earth with her prey, and they both
stood together in their f