you don't," returned the head more cheerfully.

The people were greatly amazed at this, and took the wood-chopper to
the palace, where all was soon explained.

When the Queen saw the King's head she immediately kissed it; but the
King rebuked her, saying she must kiss only him.

"But it is your head," said the poor Queen.

"Probably it is," replied the King; "but it is on another man. You must
confine yourself to kissing my wooden head."

"I'm sorry," sighed the Queen, "for I like to kiss the real head best."

"And so you shall," said the King's head; "I don't approve your kissing
that wooden head at all."

The poor lady looked from one to the other in perplexity. Finally a
happy thought occurred to her.

"Why don't you trade heads?" she asked.

"Just the thing!" cried the King; and, the wood-chopper consenting, the
exchange was made, and the Monarch of Mo found himself in possession of
his own head again, whereat he was so greatly pleased that he laughed
long and merrily.

The wood-chopper, however, did not even smile. He couldn't because of
the wooden face. The head he had made for the King he now was compelled
to wear himself.

"Bring hither the princesses," commanded the King. "This good man shall
choose his bride at once, for he has restored to me my own head."

But when the princesses arrived and saw that the wood-chopper had a
wooden head, they each and all refused to marry him, and begged so hard
to escape that the King was in a quandary.

"I promised him one of my daughters," he argued, "and a King never
breaks his word."

"But he hadn't a wooden head then," explained one of the girls.

The King realized the truth of this. Indeed, when he came to look
carefully at the wooden head, he did not blame his daughters for not
wishing to marry it. Should he force one of them to consent, it was not
unlikely she would call her husband a blockhead--a term almost certain
to cause trouble in any family.

After giving the matter deep thought, the King resolved to go to the
Purple Dragon and oblige it to give up the wood-chopper's head.

So all the fighting men in the kingdom were got together, and, having
picked ripe swords off the sword-trees, they marched in a great body to
the Dragon's castle.

Now the Purple Dragon realized that if it attempted to fight all this
army, it would perhaps be cut to pieces; so it retired within its
castle and refused to come out.

The wood-chopper was a brave man.