hat I have in my
treasury," Then he called the chief treasurer, who came forward with a
golden tray in his hand. Upon the tray was a purse of silk. "See," said
the king, "here is a purse, and in the purse are one hundred pieces of
gold money. But though that much may seem great to you, it is but little
of the true value of the purse. Its virtue lies in this: that however
much you may take from it, there will always be one hundred pieces of
gold money left in it. Now go; and while you are enjoying the riches
which I give you, I have only to ask you to remember these are not the
gifts of Fate, but of a mortal man."

But all the while he was talking the beggar's head was spinning and
spinning, and buzzing and buzzing, so that he hardly heard a word of
what the king said.

Then when the king had ended his speech, the lords and gentlemen who had
brought the beggar in led him forth again. Out they went through room
after room--out through the courtyard, out through the gate.

Bang!--it was shut to behind him, and he found himself standing in the
darkness of midnight, with the splendid clothes upon his back, and the
magic purse with its hundred pieces of gold money in his pocket.

He stood looking about himself for a while, and then off he started
homeward, staggering and stumbling and shuffling, for the wine that he
had drank made him so light-headed that all the world spun topsy-turvy
around him.

His way led along by the river, and on he went stumbling and staggering.
All of a sudden--plump! splash!--he was in the water over head and ears.
Up he came, spitting out the water and shouting for help, splashing and
sputtering, and kicking and swimming, knowing no more where he was than
the man in the moon. Sometimes his head was under water and sometimes it
was up again.

At last, just as his strength was failing him, his feet struck the
bottom, and he crawled up on the shore more dead than alive. Then,
through fear and cold and wet, he swooned away, and lay for a long time
for all the world as though he were dead.

Now, it chanced that two fisherman were out with their nets that night,
and Luck or Fate led them by the way where the beggar lay on the shore.
"Halloa!" said one of the fishermen, "here is a poor body drowned!" They
turned him over, and then they saw what rich clothes he wore, and felt
that he had a purse in his pocket.

"Come," said the second fisherman, "he is dead, whoever he is. His fine
clothes and hi