but do not despise
it, for it may possibly bring your son good fortune some day. I had a
very clever aunt, who understood all sorts of magic arts, and before she
died she gave me the bird's egg in this little box, saying, 'When
something quite unexpected happens to you, which you could never have
imagined, then part with this egg. If it comes into the possession of
him for whom it is destined, it may bring him great good fortune. But
guard the egg like the apple of your eye, that it does not break, for
the shell of fortune is tender.' But although I am nearly sixty years
old, nothing unexpected has happened to me till to-day, when I was
invited to stand as godfather, and my first thought was, You must give
the egg to the child as a christening gift."

The little Paertel grew and prospered, and became the delight of his
parents, and at the age of ten he was sent to another village to become
herd-boy to a rich farmer. All the people of the household were well
satisfied with the herd-boy, as he was a good quiet fellow, who never
gave any annoyance to his companions. When he left home, his mother put
his christening gift in his pocket, and charged him to keep it as safe
as the apple of his eye, and Paertel did so. There was an old lime-tree
in the pasturage, and a large granite rock lay under it. The boy was
very fond of this place, and every day in summer he used to go and sit
on the stone under the lime-tree. Here he used to eat the lunch which
was given him every morning, and he quenched his thirst at a little
brook hard by. Paertel had no friendship with the other herd-boys, who
were up to all sorts of pranks. It was remarkable that there was no such
fine grass anywhere as between the stone and the spring, and although
the flocks grazed here every day, next morning the grass looked more
like that of an enclosed meadow than of a pasturage.

When Paertel slept a little while on the stone on a hot day, he had
wonderfully pleasant dreams, and when he awoke, the sounds of music and
song were still in his ears, so that he dreamed on after his eyes were
open. The stone was like a dear friend to him, and he parted from it
every day with a heavy heart, and returned to it next day full of
longing. Thus Paertel lived till he was fifteen years old, and was no
longer to be herd-boy. His master now employed him as a farm-labourer,
but did not give him any heavier work than he was able to accomplish. On
Sundays and summer evenings, t