lay
weeping in the chamber which he was forbidden to leave, when suddenly he
heard a sharp tapping at the window, and, looking up, he beheld a stork.

'What makes you so sad, prince?' asked he.

'Someone has told the king that I have prophesied that a child shall be
born this night in the palace, who can speak all the languages in the
world and play every musical instrument. I am no magician to bring these
things to pass, but he says that if it does not happen he will have me
dragged through the city at a horse's tail till I die.'

'Do not trouble yourself,' answered the stork. 'I will manage to find
such a child, for I am the king of the storks whose life you spared, and
now I can repay you for it.'

The stork flew away and soon returned carrying in his beak a baby
wrapped in swaddling clothes, and laid it down near a lute. In an
instant the baby stretched out its little hands and began to play a tune
so beautiful that even the prince forgot his sorrows as he listened.
Then he was given a flute and a zither, but he was just as well able
to draw music from them; and the prince, whose courage was gradually
rising, spoke to him in all the languages he knew. The baby answered him
in all, and no one could have told which was his native tongue!

The next morning the king went straight to the prince's room, and saw
with his own eyes the wonders that baby could do. 'If your magic can
produce such a baby,' he said, 'you must be greater than any wizard that
ever lived, and shall have my daughter in marriage.' And, being a king,
and therefore accustomed to have everything the moment he wanted it,
he commanded the ceremony to be performed without delay, and a splendid
feast to be made for the bride and bridegroom. When it was over, he said
to the prince:

'Now that you are really my son, tell me by what arts you were able to
fulfil the tasks I set you?'

'My noble father-in-law,' answered the prince, 'I am ignorant of all
spells and arts. But somehow I have always managed to escape the death
which has threatened me.' And he told the king how he had been forced to
run away from his stepfather, and how he had spared the three birds, and
had joined the two soldiers, who had from envy done their utmost to ruin
him.

The king was rejoiced in his heart that his daughter had married a
prince, and not a common man, and he chased the two soldiers away with
whips, and told them that if they ever dared to show their faces across
th