l.

"He just was a chap to ride!" they said; "so grand a knight isn't to
be found in the wide world."

"Oh!" said _Boots_, "I should so like to have seen him, that I
should."

"Ah!" said his brothers, "his mail shone a deal brighter than the
glowing coals which you are always poking and digging at; nasty dirty
beast that you are."

Next day all the knights and princes were to pass before the king and
the _Princess_--it was too late to do so the night before, I
suppose--that he who had the gold apple might bring it forth; but one
came after another, first the _Princes_, and then the knights, and
still no one could show the gold apple.

"Well," said the king, "some one must have it, for it was something we
all saw with our own eyes, how a man came and rode up and bore it
off."

So he commanded that every man who was in the kingdom should come up
to the palace and see if they could show the apple. Well, they all
came one after another, but no one had the golden apple, and after a
long time the two brothers of _Boots_ came. They were the last of all,
so the king asked them if there was no one else in the kingdom who
hadn't come.

"Oh, yes," said they; "we have a brother, but he never carried off the
golden apple. He hasn't stirred out of the dusthole on any of the
three days."

"Never mind that," said the king; "he may as well come up to the
palace like the rest."

So _Boots_ had to go up to the palace.

"How now," said the king; "have you got the golden apple? Speak out!"

"Yes, I have," said _Boots_; "here is the first, and here is the
second, and here is the third too;" and with that he pulled all three
golden apples out of his pocket, and at the same time threw off his
sooty rags, and stood before them in his gleaming golden mail.

"Yes!" said the king; "you shall have my daughter, and half my
kingdom, for you well deserve both her and it."

So they got ready for the wedding, and _Boots_ got the _Princess_ to
wife, and there was great merry-making at the bridal-feast, you may
fancy, for they could all be merry though they couldn't ride up the
_Hill of Glass_; and all I can say is, if they haven't left off their
merry-making yet, why, they're still at it.

THE WIDOW'S SON

Once on a time there was a poor, poor _Widow_, who had an only _Son_.
She dragged on with the boy till he had been confirmed, and then she
said she couldn't feed him any longer, he must just go out and earn
his own bread.