tied it round the princess’s neck; and then she cut a small hole in the bag, so
that the flour might be scattered on the ground as the princess went along.
During the night, the dog came again and carried the princess on his back,
and ran with her to the soldier, who loved her very much, and wished that
he had been a prince, so that he might have her for a wife. The dog did not
observe how the flour ran out of the bag all the way from the castle wall to
the soldier’s house, and even up to the window, where he had climbed with
the princess. Therefore in the morning the king and queen found out where
their daughter had been, and the soldier was taken up and put in prison. Oh,
how dark and disagreeable it was as he sat there, and the people said to him,
“To-morrow you will be hanged.” It was not very pleasant news, and
besides, he had left the tinder-box at the inn. In the morning he could see
through the iron grating of the little window how the people were hastening
out of the town to see him hanged; he heard the drums beating, and saw the
soldiers marching. Every one ran out to look at them. and a shoemaker’s
boy, with a leather apron and slippers on, galloped by so fast, that one of his
slippers flew off and struck against the wall where the soldier sat looking
through the iron grating. “Hallo, you shoemaker’s boy, you need not be in
such a hurry,” cried the soldier to him. “There will be nothing to see till I
come; but if you will run to the house where I have been living, and bring
me my tinder-box, you shall have four shillings, but you must put your best
foot foremost.”
The shoemaker’s boy liked the idea of getting the four shillings, so he ran
very fast and fetched the tinder-box, and gave it to the soldier. And now we
