time to take
them home again, and then he blew them together with the wrong end of
the pipe.

When the King found the lad had brought the whole herd home again for
the second time he was greatly troubled, for he had no mind to give
the Princess to Boots for a bride. So the third day he bade the
Princess go out to the hills and hide herself among the bushes and
watch and see how it was that Boots managed to keep the hares
together.

This the Princess did. She hid back of the bushes; she saw Boots come
tramping up the hill with the hares frisking before him; she saw him
blow them away with his pipe as though they had been so many dry
leaves in the wind, and then, after he had had a nap, she saw him blow
them together again.

Then the Princess must and would have that pipe. She came out from the
bushes and offered to buy it. She offered ten dollars for it.

"No."

"Fifty!"

"No!"

"A hundred!"

"No." Boots had no wish to sell, but as it was the Princess, and as
she seemed so set and determined on having it, he would tell her what
he would do; he would sell the pipe for a hundred dollars if she would
give him a kiss for every dollar she paid.

The Princess did not know what to say to that. It was not becoming
that a Princess should kiss a herdsman; still she wanted the pipe and
as that was the only way to get it she at last agreed. She paid the
lad a hundred bright silver dollars, and she also gave him a hundred
kisses out there on the hillside, with no one to look on but the
hares.

Then she took the pipe and hastened home with it.

But small good the pipe did her. Just as she reached the palace steps
the pipe slipped out of her fingers as though it had been buttered,
and look as she might she could not find it again.

That was because the lad had wished it back to himself. At that very
moment he was on his way home with the pipe in his pocket and the
hares hopping before him in lines like soldiers.

When the King heard the story he thought and pondered. The Princess
had told him nothing of the kisses. He thought she had bought the pipe
for a hundred dollars, so the next day he sent the Queen out to the
hillside with two hundred dollars in her pocket.

"The Princess is young and foolish," said he. "She must have lost the
pipe on the hillside, and no doubt the lad has it back by this time.
Do you go out and see if you can buy it from him and if you once have
your fingers on it you'll not lose it, I'll