erly, but no one heard him or came to his help. Night came on, and
the poor blind youth had no eyes to close, and could only crawl along
the ground, not knowing in the least where he was going. But when the
sun was once more high in the heavens, Ferko felt the blazing heat
scorch him, and sought for some cool shady place to rest his aching
limbs. He climbed to the top of a hill and lay down in the grass, and as
he thought under the shadow of a big tree. But it was no tree he leant
against, but a gallows on which two ravens were seated. The one was
saying to the other as the weary youth lay down, 'Is there anything the
least wonderful or remarkable about this neighbourhood?'

'I should just think there was,' replied the other; 'many things that
don't exist anywhere else in the world. There is a lake down there below
us, and anyone who bathes in it, though he were at death's door, becomes
sound and well on the spot, and those who wash their eyes with the dew
on this hill become as sharp-sighted as the eagle, even if they have
been blind from their youth.'

'Well,' answered the first raven, 'my eyes are in no want of this
healing bath, for, Heaven be praised, they are as good as ever they
were; but my wing has been very feeble and weak ever since it was shot
by an arrow many years ago, so let us fly at once to the lake that I may
be restored to health and strength again.' And so they flew away.

Their words rejoiced Ferko's heart, and he waited impatiently till
evening should come and he could rub the precious dew on his sightless
eyes.

At last it began to grow dusk, and the sun sank behind the mountains;
gradually it became cooler on the hill, and the grass grew wet with dew.
Then Ferko buried his face in the ground till his eyes were damp with
dewdrops, and in a moment he saw clearer than he had ever done in his
life before. The moon was shining brightly, and lighted him to the lake
where he could bathe his poor broken legs.

Then Ferko crawled to the edge of the lake and dipped his limbs in the
water. No sooner had he done so than his legs felt as sound and strong
as they had been before, and Ferko thanked the kind fate that had led
him to the hill where he had overheard the ravens' conversation. He
filled a bottle with the healing water, and then continued his journey
in the best of spirits.

He had not gone far before he met a wolf, who was limping disconsolately
along on three legs, and who on perceiving Ferko