one fish? And at this thought the pangs of hunger made him
feel quite sick with fear. But he need not have been afraid; in every
mesh of the net was a fine fat fish, and of course the net itself was
so heavy that he could only lift one corner. He threw some of the fish
back into the water, and buried some more in a hole under a stone,
where he would be sure to find them. Then he rolled up the net with
the rest, put it on his back and carried it home. The weight of the
load caused his back to ache, and he was thankful to drop it outside
their hut, while he rushed in, full of joy, to tell his grandmother.
'Be quick and clean them!' he said, 'and I will go to those people's
tents on the other side of the water.'

The old woman stared at him in horror as she listened to his proposal.
Other people had tried to steal fire before, and few indeed had come
back with their lives; but as, contrary to all her expectations, he
had managed to catch such a number of fish, she thought that perhaps
there was some magic about him which she did not know of, and did not
try to hinder him.

When the fish were all taken out, he fetched the net which he had laid
out to dry, folded it up very small, and ran down to the river, hoping
that he might find a place narrow enough for him to jump over; but he
soon saw that it was too wide for even the best jumper in the world.
For a few moments he stood there, wondering what was to be done, then
there darted into his head some words of a spell which he had once
heard a wizard use, while drinking from the river. He repeated them,
as well as he could remember, and waited to see what would happen. In
five minutes such a grunting and a puffing was heard, and columns of
water rose into the air, though he could not tell what had made them.
Then round the bend of the stream came fifteen huge whales, which he
ordered to place themselves heads to tails, like stepping stones, so
that he could jump from one to the other till he landed on the
opposite shore. Directly he got there he told the whales that he did
not need them any more, and sat down in the sand to rest.

Unluckily some children who were playing about caught sight of him,
and one of them, stealing softly up behind him, laid tight hold of his
ears. The hare, who had been watching the whales as they sailed down
the river, gave a violent start, and struggled to get away; but the
boy held on tight, and ran back home, as fast as he could go.

'Throw