thanking you, sir," replied the master of the house, bowing with
his hands on the ground, "for the fox's liver which we asked you to
procure for us."

"I really am perfectly unaware of having sent you a fox's liver: there
must be some mistake here. Pray inquire carefully into the matter."

"Well, this is very strange. Four nights ago, a man of some five or six
and thirty years of age came with a verbal message from you, to the
effect that you had sent him with a fox's liver, which you had just
procured, and said that he would come and tell us the price another day.
When we asked him to spend the night here, he answered that he would
lodge with a relation in the next village, and went away."

The visitor was more and more lost in amazement, and, leaning his head
on one side in deep thought, confessed that he could make nothing of it.
As for the husband and wife, they felt quite out of countenance at
having thanked a man so warmly for favours of which he denied all
knowledge; and so the visitor took his leave and went home.

That night there appeared at the pillow of the master of the house a
woman of about one or two and thirty years of age, who said: "I am the
fox that lives at such-and-such a mountain. Last spring, when I was
taking out my cub to play, it was carried off by some boys, and only
saved by your goodness. The desire to requite this kindness pierced me
to the quick. At last, when calamity attacked your house, I thought I
might be of use to you. Your son's illness could not be cured without a
liver taken from a live fox, so to repay your kindness I killed my cub
and took out its liver; then its sire, disguising himself as a
messenger, brought it to your house."

And as she spoke, the fox shed tears; and the master of the house,
wishing to thank her, moved in bed, upon which his wife awoke and asked
him what was the matter; but he too, to her great astonishment, was
biting the pillow and weeping bitterly.

"Why are you weeping thus?" asked she.

At last he sat up in bed and said: "Last spring, when I was out on a
pleasure excursion, I was the means of saving the life of a fox's cub,
as I told you at the time. The other day I told Mr. So-and-so that,
although my son were to die before my eyes, I would not be the means of
killing a fox on purpose, but asked him, in case he heard of any hunter
killing a fox, to buy it for me. How the foxes came to hear of this I
don't know; but the foxes to whom I had show