heard that Billy, the King of Ireland's son, had come to see him, he
went out and welcomed him, an' asked in himself and Jack to come in
and make a visit with him. And, like the King of England, he thought
he couldn't make too much of the King of Ireland's sons, and threw
open his hall door and asked in the whole nobility and clergy and
genthry of all the counthry-side into a great dinner and ball given in
Billy's honour. But lo! and behould ye, doesn't it turn up at this
ball, too, that Billy had a squabble with the King of France's son and
struck him, and the ball was stopped by the King's ordhers, and the
people sent home, and Billy taken prisoner, and there was poor Jack
now left all alone. The King of France, taking pity on Jack, employed
him as a boy. And Jack was getting along very well at Court, and the
king and him used to have very great yarns together entirely. At
length a great war broke out betwixt France and Germany; and the King
of France was in great trouble, for the Germans were slaughtering and
conquering all before them. Says Jack, says he, to the King one day,
"I wish I had only half a rajimint of your men, and you'd see what I
would do." Instead of this the King gave him a whole army, and in less
nor three days there wasn't a German alive in the whole kingdom of
France. It was the king was the thankful man to Jack for this good
action, and said he never could forget it to him. After that Jack got
into great favour at court, and used to have long chats with the Queen
herself. But Jack soon found that he never could come into the Queen's
presence that he didn't put her in tears. He asked her one day what
was the meaning of this, and she told him that it was because she
never looked on him that he didn't put her in mind of her infant son
that had, twelve months before, been carried away by the Queen of the
Golden Mines, and who she had never heard tale or tidings of from that
day to this.

[Footnote 3: Hundred thousand welcomes.]

"Well, be this and be that," says Jack, says he, "but I'm not the man
to leave ye in your trouble if I can help it; and be this and be that
over again," says he, "but I won't sleep two nights in the one bed, or
eat two meals' meat in the one house, till I find out the Queen of the
Golden Mines' Castle, and fetch back your infant son to ye--or else I
'll not come back livin'."

"Ah," says the Queen, "that would never do!" and "Ah," says the King,
"that would never do at all