loads of food into his bag and set out again.
He travelled both long and far, over woods and hills and wild moors,
till he came to the big mountains where the troll, who had taken the
sword of the king's grandfather, was living.

But the troll seldom came out in the open air, and the mountain was well
closed, so the youngster was not man enough to get inside.

So he joined a gang of quarrymen who were living at a farm on top of the
hill, and who were quarrying stones in the hills about there. They had
never had such help before, for he broke and hammered away at the rocks
till the mountain cracked, and big stones of the size of a house rolled
down the hill. But when he rested to get his dinner, for which he was
going to have one of the cartloads in his bag, he found it was all eaten
up.

"I have generally a good appetite myself," said the youngster; "but the
one who has been here can do a trifle more than I, for he has eaten all
the bones as well."

Thus the first day passed; and he fared no better the second. On the
third day he set out to break stones again, taking with him the third
load of food, but he lay down behind the bag and pretended to be asleep.
All of a sudden, a troll with seven heads came out of the mountain and
began to eat his food.

"It's all ready for me here, and I will eat," said the troll.

"We will see about that," said the youngster, and hit the troll with his
club, so the heads rolled down the hill.

So he went into the mountain which the troll had come out of, and in
there stood a horse eating out of a barrel of glowing cinders, and
behind it stood a barrel of oats.

"Why don't you eat out of the barrel of oats?" asked the youngster.

"Because I cannot turn round," said the horse.

"But I will soon turn you round," said the youngster.

"Rather cut my head off," said the horse.

So he cut its head off, and the horse turned into a fine handsome
fellow. He said he had been bewitched, and taken into the mountain and
turned into a horse by the troll. He then helped the youngster to find
the sword, which the troll had hidden at the bottom of the bed, and in
the bed lay the old mother of the troll, asleep and snoring hard.

So they set out for home by water, but when they had got some distance
out to sea the old mother came after them. As she could not overtake
them, she lay down and began to drink the sea, and she drank till the
water fell; but she could not drink the sea dry, and so s