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By Root 2196 0

brought her back should have her to wife. The four brothers said to each other: “This would be a fine opportunity for us to show what we can do!” and resolved to go forth together and liberate the King’s daughter. “I will soon know where she is,” said the astronomer, and looked through his telescope and said: “I see her already, she is far away from here on a rock in the sea, and the dragon is beside her watching her.” Then he went to the King, and asked for a ship for himself and his brothers, and sailed with them over the sea until they came to the rock. There the King’s daughter was sitting, and the dragon was lying asleep on her lap. The huntsman said, “I dare not fire, I should kill the beautiful maiden at the same time.” “Then I will try my art,” said the thief, and he crept thither and stole her away from under the dragon, so quietly and dexterously, that the monster never noticed it, but went on snoring. Full of joy, they hurried off with her on board ship, and steered out into the open sea; but the dragon, who when he awoke had found no princess there, followed them, and came snorting angrily through the air. Just as he was circling above the ship, and about to descend on it, the huntsman shouldered his gun, and shot him to the heart. The monster fell down dead, but was so large and powerful that his fall shattered the whole ship. Fortunately, however, they laid hold of a couple of planks, and swam about the wide sea. Then again they were in great peril, but the tailor, who was not idle, took his wondrous needle, and with a few stitches sewed the planks together, and they seated themselves upon them, and collected together all the fragments of the vessel. Then he sewed these so skillfully together, that in a very short time the ship was once more seaworthy, and they could go home again in safety.

When the King once more saw his daughter, there were great rejoicings. He said to the four brothers: “One of you shall have her to wife, but which of you it is to be you must settle among yourselves.” Then a heated argument arose among them, for each of them preferred his own claim. The astronomer said: “If I had not seen the princess, all your arts would have been useless, so she is mine.” The thief said: “What would have been the use of your seeing, if I had not got her away from the dragon? so she is mine.” The huntsman said: “You and the princess, and all of you, would have been torn to pieces by the dragon if my ball had not hit him, so she is mine.” The tailor said: “And if I, by my art, had not sewn the ship together again, you would all of you have been miserably drowned, so she is mine.” Then the King pronounced his verdict: “Each of you has an equal right, and as all of you cannot have the maiden, none of you shall have her, but I will give to each of you, as a reward, half a kingdom.” The brothers were pleased with this decision, and said: “It is better thus than that we should be at variance with each other.” Then each of them received half a kingdom, and they lived with their father in the greatest happiness as long as it pleased God.

One-Eye, Two-Eyes, and Three-Eyes

THERE WAS once a woman who had three daughters, the eldest of whom was called One-eye, because she had only one eye in the middle of her forehead, and the second, Two-eyes, because she had two eyes like other folks, and the youngest, Three-eyes, because she had three eyes; and her third eye was also in the center of her forehead. However, as Two-eyes saw just as other human beings did, her sisters and her mother could not endure her. They said to her: “You, with your two eyes, are no better than the common people; you do not belong to us!” They pushed her about, and threw old clothes to her, and gave her nothing to eat but what they left, and did everything that they could to make her unhappy. It came to pass that Two-eyes had to go out into the fields and tend the goat, but she was still quite hungry, because her sisters had given her so little to eat. So she sat down on a ridge and began to weep, and so bitterly that two streams ran