her horse standing there, and
hastened to her place behind the stove. In a short time the man and the
woman came home again too, and the witch said to the girl:

'Ah! you poor thing, there you are to be sure! You don't know what fine
times we have had at the palace! The King's son carried my daughter
about, but the poor thing fell and broke her arm.'

The girl knew well how matters really stood, but she pretended to know
nothing about it, and sat dumb behind the stove.

The next day they were invited again to the King's banquet.

'Hey! old man,' said the witch, 'get on your clothes as quick as you
can; we are bidden to the feast. Take you the child; I will give the
other one work, lest she weary.'

She kindled the fire, threw a potful of hemp seed among the ashes, and
said to the girl:

'If you do not get this sorted, and all the seed back into the pot, I
shall kill you!'

The girl wept bitterly; then she went to the birch tree, washed herself
on one side of it and dried herself on the other; and this time still
finer clothes were given to her, and a very beautiful steed. She broke
off a branch of the birch tree, struck the hearth with it, so that the
seeds flew into the pot, and then hastened to the castle.

Again the King's son came out to meet her, tied her horse to a pillar,
and led her into the banqueting hall. At the feast the girl sat next him
in the place of honour, as she had done the day before. But the witch's
daughter gnawed bones under the table, and the Prince gave her a push
by mistake, which broke her leg--he had never noticed her crawling about
among the people's feet. She was VERY unlucky!

The good man's daughter hastened home again betimes, but the King's son
had smeared the door-posts with tar, and the girl's golden circlet stuck
to it. She had not time to look for it, but sprang to the saddle and
rode like an arrow to the birch tree. There she left her horse and her
fine clothes, and said to her mother:

'I have lost my circlet at the castle; the door-post was tarred, and it
stuck fast.'

'And even had you lost two of them,' answered her mother, 'I would give
you finer ones.'

Then the girl hastened home, and when her father came home from the
feast with the witch, she was in her usual place behind the stove. Then
the witch said to her:

'You poor thing! what is there to see here compared with what WE have
seen at the palace? The King's son carried my daughter from one room to
anot