e carried to such and such a
tavern." For he had been in that town before, and knew the places where
good living was to be had.

Whir! whiz! away flew the stool as high and higher than it had flown
before, and then down it came again, and down and down until it lit as
light as a feather in the street before the tavern door. The soldier
tucked his feather cap in his pocket, and the three-legged stool under
his arm, and in he went and ordered a pot of beer and some white bread
and cheese.

Meantime, at the king's palace was such a gossiping and such a hubbub as
had not been heard there for many a day; for the pretty princess was not
slow in telling how the invisible King of the Wind had come and asked
her to marry him; and some said it was true and some said it was not
true, and everybody wondered and talked, and told their own notions of
the matter. But all agreed that three days would show whether what had
been told was true or no.

As for the soldier, he knew no more how to do what he had promised to do
than my grandmother's cat; for where was he to get clothes fine enough
for the King of the Wind to wear? So there he sat on his three-legged
stool thinking and thinking, and if he had known all that I know he
would not have given two turns of his wit upon it. "I wish," says he, at
last--"I wish that this stool could help me now as well as it can carry
me through the sky. I wish," says he, "that I had a suit of clothes such
as the King of the Wind might really wear."

The wonders of the three-legged stool were wonders indeed!

Hardly had the words left the soldier's lips when down came something
tumbling about his ears from up in the air; and what should it be but
just such a suit of clothes as he had in his mind--all crusted over with
gold and silver and jewels.

"Well," says the soldier, as soon as he had got over his wonder again,
"I would rather sit upon this stool than any I ever saw." And so would
I, if I had been in his place, and had a few minutes to think of all
that I wanted.

So he found out the trick of the stool, and after that wishing and
having were easy enough, and by the time the three days were ended the
real King of the Wind himself could not have cut a finer figure. Then
down sat the soldier upon his stool, and wished himself at the king's
palace. Away he flew through the air, and by-and-by there he was, just
where he had been before. He put his feather cap upon his head, and
stepped in throu