en to them,
and saw that his bath was properly perfumed after his long journey.
'Where do you come from?' they said at last. 'And whose son are you?'

But the young prince had reasons for keeping his own secret, and he
answered:

'My father was master of the horse to the king of my country, and after
my mother died he married another wife. At first all went well, but as
soon as she had babies of her own she hated me, and I fled, lest she
should do me harm.'

The hearts of the other young men were touched as soon as they heard
this story, and they did everything they could think of to make him
forget his past sorrows.

'What are you doing here?' said the youth, one day.

'We spend our whole time climbing up the walls of the palace, trying
to reach the windows of the princess,' answered the young men; 'but, as
yet, no one has reached within ten feet of them.'

'Oh, let me try too,' cried the prince; 'but to-morrow I will wait and
see what you do before I begin.

So the next day he stood where he could watch the young men go up, and
he noted the places on the wall that seemed most difficult, and made up
his mind that when his turn came he would go up some other way.

Day after day he was to be seen watching the wooers, till, one morning,
he felt that he knew the plan of the walls by heart, and took his
place by the side of the others. Thanks to what he had learned from the
failure of the rest, he managed to grasp one little rough projection
after another, till at last, to the envy of his friends, he stood on the
sill of the princess's window. Looking up from below, they saw a white
hand stretched forth to draw him in.

Then one of the young men ran straight to the king's palace, and said:
'The wall has been climbed, and the prize is won!'

'By whom?' cried the king, starting up from his throne; 'which of the
princes may I claim as my son-in-law?'

'The youth who succeeded in climbing to the princess's window is not a
prince at all,' answered the young man. 'He is the son of the master
of the horse to the great king who dwells across the river, and he fled
from his own country to escape from the hatred of his stepmother.'

At this news the king was very angry, for it had never entered his head
that anyone BUT a prince would seek to woo his daughter.

'Let him go back to the land whence he came,' he shouted in wrath; 'does
he expect me to give my daughter to an exile?' And he began to smash the
drinking vesse