after his
father and mother, and the wind carried him across to another country
and there he landed.

'Now,' said the wind, clapping him on the back, 'off you go, and good
luck to you!'

And it turned round and took the boat home again.

When Sep's mother found the writing on the slate, and his father found
the boat gone they feared that Sep was drowned, but when the wind
brought the boat back wrong way up, they were quite sure, and they both
cried for many a long day.

The wind tried to tell them that Sep was all right, but they couldn't
understand wind-talk, and they only said, 'Drat the wind,' and fastened
the shutters up tight, and put wedges in the windows.

Sep walked along the straight white road that led across the new
country. He had no more idea how to look for _his_ fortune than you
would have if you suddenly left off reading this and went out of your
front door to seek _yours_.

However, he had made a start, and that is always something. When he had
gone exactly seven miles on that straight foreign road, between strange
trees, and bordered with flowers he did not know the names of, he heard
a groaning in the wood, and some one sighing and saying, 'Oh, how hard
it is, to have to die and never see my wife and the little cubs again.'

The voice was rough as a lion's mane, and strong as a lion's claws, and
Sep was very frightened. But he said, 'I'm not afraid,' and then oddly
enough he found he had spoken the truth--he wasn't afraid.

He broke through the bushes and found that the person who had spoken was
indeed a lion. A javelin had pierced its shoulder and fastened it to a
great tree.

'All right,' cried Sep, 'hold still a minute, sir.'

He got out his knife and cut and cut at the shaft of the javelin till he
was able to break it off. Then the lion drew back and the broken shaft
passed through the wound and the broken javelin was left sticking in the
tree.

'I'm really extremely obliged, my dear fellow,' said the lion warmly.
'Pray command me, if there's any little thing I can do for you at any
time.'

'Don't mention it,' said Sep with proper politeness, 'delighted to have
been of use to you, I'm sure.'

So they parted. As Sep scrambled through the bushes back to the road he
kicked against an axe that lay on the ground.

'Hullo,' said he, 'some poor woodman's dropped this, and not been able
to find it. I'll take it along--perhaps I may meet him.'

He was getting very tired and very hungry,