cond bidding, and in a moment were out of the
house.

By this time the ogress had slain all her daughters but one, who awoke
suddenly and saw what had happened. 'Mother, what are you doing?' cried
she. 'Do you know that you have killed my sisters?'

'Oh, woe is me!' wailed the ogress. 'Halfman has outwitted me after
all!' And she turned to wreak vengeance on him, but he and his brothers
were far away.

They rode all day till they got to the town where their real uncle
lived, and inquired the way to his house.

'Why have you been so long in coming?' asked he, when they had found
him.

'Oh, dear uncle, we were very nearly not coming at all!' replied they.
'We fell in with an ogress who took us home and would have killed us if
it had not been for Halfman. He knew what was in her mind and saved us,
and here we are. Now give us each a daughter to wife, and let us return
whence we came.'

'Take them!' said the uncle; 'the eldest for the eldest, the second for
the second, and so on to the youngest.'

But the wife of Halfman was the prettiest of them all, and the other
brothers were jealous and said to each other: 'What, is he who is only
half a man to get the best? Let us put him to death and give his wife to
our eldest brother!' And they waited for a chance.

After they had all ridden, in company with their brides, for some
distance, they arrived at a brook, and one of them asked, 'Now, who will
go and fetch water from the brook?'

'Halfman is the youngest,' said the elder brother, 'he must go.'

So Halfman got down and filled a skin with water, and they drew it up by
a rope and drank. When they had done drinking, Halfman, who was standing
in the middle of the stream, called out: 'Throw me the rope and draw me
up, for I cannot get out alone.' And the brothers threw him a rope to
draw him up the steep bank; but when he was half-way up they cut the
rope, and he fell back into the stream. Then the brothers rode away as
fast as they could, with his bride.

Halfman sank down under the water from the force of the fall, but
before he touched the bottom a fish came and said to him, 'Fear nothing,
Halfman; I will help you.' And the fish guided him to a shallow place,
so that he scrambled out. On the way it said to him, 'Do you understand
what your brothers, whom you saved from death, have done to you?'

'Yes; but what am I to do?' asked Halfman.

'Take one of my scales,' said the fish, 'and when you find yourself in
d