met him, and he was quite alone when he reached
his native town and the gates of the palace. With the golden hen under
his arm he presented himself before the king, and told his adventures,
and how he was going to have for a wife a princess so wonderful and
unlike all other princesses, that the star on her forehead could turn
night into day. The king listened silently, and when the boy had done,
he said quietly: 'If I find that your story is not true I will have
you thrown into a cask of pitch.'

'It is true--every word of it,' answered the boy; and went on to tell
that the day and even the hour were fixed when his bride was to come
and seek him.

But as the time drew near, and nothing was heard of the princess, the
youth became anxious and uneasy, especially when it came to his ears
that the great cask was being filled with pitch, and that sticks were
laid underneath to make a fire to boil it with. All day long the boy
stood at the window, looking over the sea by which the princess must
travel; but there were no signs of her, not even the tiniest white
sail. And, as he stood, soldiers came and laid hands on him, and led
him up to the cask, where a big fire was blazing, and the horrid black
pitch boiling and bubbling over the sides. He looked and shuddered,
but there was no escape; so he shut his eyes to avoid seeing.

The word was given for him to mount the steps which led to the top of
the cask, when, suddenly, some men were seen running with all their
might, crying as they went that a large ship with its sails spread was
making straight for the city. No one knew what the ship was, or whence
it came; but the king declared that he would not have the boy burned
before its arrival, there would always be time enough for that.

At length the vessel was safe in port, and a whisper went through the
watching crowd that on board was the Sister of the Sun, who had come
to marry the young peasant, as she had promised. In a few moments more
she had landed, and desired to be shown the way to the cottage which
her bridegroom had so often described to her; and whither he had been
led back by the king's order at the first sign of the ship.

'Don't you know me?' asked the Sister of the Sun, bending over him
where he lay, almost driven out of his senses with terror.

'No, no; I don't know you,' answered the youth, without raising his
eyes.

'Kiss me,' said the Sister of the Sun; and the youth obeyed her, but
still without look