e with the strong
grinding, and fell in two. And the whole world shook and trembled with
the mighty shock of that breaking.

But through the crash and din came the voices of the Giant-Maidens,
loudly chanting,--

"We have turned the stone round;
Though weary the maidens,
See what they have ground!"

And that same night a mighty sea-king came up and slew Frode and
plundered his city.

When he had sacked the city, the sea-king took on board his ship the two
Giant-Maidens, and with them the broken millstones. And he bade them
begin at once to grind salt, for of this he had very scanty store.

So they ground and ground; and in the middle of the night, being weary,
they asked the sea-king if he had not got salt enough.

But the sea-king was hard of heart, like Frode, and he roughly bade them
go on grinding. And the maidens did so, and worked to such effect that
within a short time the millstones had ground out so much salt that the
weight of it began to sink the ship. Down, down it sank, ship and giants
and millstones, and in that spot, in the very middle of the ocean, arose
a whirlpool, from whence the salt is carried north and south, east and
west, throughout the waters of the earth.

And that is how the sea became salt.

THE CASTLE OF FORTUNE[33]

One lovely summer morning, just as the sun rose, two travellers started
on a journey. They were both strong young men, but one was a lazy fellow
and the other was a worker.

As the first sunbeams came over the hills, they shone on a great castle
standing on the heights, as far away as the eye could see. It was a
wonderful and beautiful castle, all glistening towers that gleamed like
marble, and glancing windows that shone like crystal. The two young men
looked at it eagerly, and longed to go nearer.

Suddenly, out of the distance, something like a great butterfly, of
white and gold, swept toward them. And when it came nearer, they saw
that it was a most beautiful lady, robed in floating garments as fine as
cobwebs and wearing on her head a crown so bright that no one could tell
whether it was of diamonds or of dew. She stood, light as air, on a
great, shining, golden ball, which rolled along with her, swifter than
the wind. As she passed the travellers, she turned her face to them and
smiled.

"Follow me!" she said.

The lazy man sat down in the grass with a discontented sigh. "She has
an easy time of it!" he said.

But the industriou