d
still more splendidly dressed than he was before, and easily distanced
everybody else. But again he left the prize unclaimed, and so it
happened on the third day, when it seemed as if all the people in
the kingdom were gathered to see the race, for they were filled with
curiosity to know who the winner could be.

'If he will not come of his own free will, he must be brought,' said the
king, and the messengers who had seen the face of the victor were sent
to seek him in every street of the town. This took many days, and when
at last they found the young man in the weaver's cottage, he was so
dirty and ugly and had such a strange appearance, that they declared he
could not be the winner they had been searching for, but a wicked robber
who had murdered ever so many people, but had always managed to escape.

'Yes, it must be the robber,' said the king, when the fisher's son was
led into his presence; 'build a gallows at once and hang him in the
sight of all my subjects, that they may behold him suffer the punishment
of his crimes.'

So the gallows was built upon a high platform, and the fisher's son
mounted the steps up to it, and turned at the top to make the speech
that was expected from every doomed man, innocent or guilt. As he spoke
he happened to raise his arm, and the king's daughter, who was there at
her father's side, saw the name which she had written under it. With
a shriek she sprang from her seat, and the eyes of the spectators were
turned towards her.

'Stop! stop!' she cried, hardly knowing what she said. 'If that man
is hanged there is not a soul in the kingdom but shall die also.' And
running up to where the fisher's son was standing, she took him by the
hand, saying,

'Father, this is no robber or murderer, but the victor in the three
races, and he loosed the spells that were laid upon me.'

Then, without waiting for a reply, she conducted him into the palace,
and he bathed in a marble bath, and all the dirt that the fairies had
put upon him disappeared like magic, and when he had dressed himself in
the fine garments the princess had sent to him, he looked a match for
any king's daughter in Erin. He went down into the great hall where she
was awaiting him, and they had much to tell each other but little
time to tell it in, for the king her father, and the princes who were
visiting him, and all the people of the kingdom were still in their
places expecting her return.

'How did you find me out?'