asked the boy, thinking in his simplicity the fountain must belong to her.

"That you may, and take a draught of the cool water too," replied the dame, wondrously propitiated by his civility.

"And what may it be with which you are so laden, my pretty boy?" she continued. "It ought to be a precious burden to be worth carrying so far as you seem to have come. What have you in your

Krattle?"

"Precious are the contents, I believe you," replied the simple boy; "at least, so one would think from the store my father sets by them. They are true golden pears, and he says there are no finer grown in the whole kingdom; and I am taking them to the Kaiser because he is very fond of them.”

"Only ripe pears, and yet so heavy?" returned the old wife; "one would say it was something heavier than pears. But you'll see when you come to your journey's end.”

The boy assured her they were nothing but pears, and as one of his father's injunctions had been not to lose time by the way, he paid the old dame a courteous greeting and continued his journey.

When the servants saw another peasant boy from Bürs come to the palace with the story that he had pears for the king, they said, "No, no! we have had enough of that! you may just turn round and go back." But the poor simple boy was so disap

pointed at the idea of going back to be laughed at for not fulfilling his message, that he sank down on the door-step and sobbed bitterly, and there he remained sobbing till the Kaiser came out.

The Kaiser had his daughter with him, and when she saw the boy sobbing, she inquired what ailed him; and learnt it was another boy from Bürs come to insult the Kaiser with a basket of road-sweepings, and asked if they should take him off to prison

too.

"But I have got pears!" sobbed the boy; "and my father says there are no finer in the empire."

"Yes, yes; we know that by heart. That's what the others said!" replied the servants, jeering; and they would have dragged him away.

"But won't you look at my pears first, fair lady? the pears that I have brought all this long way for the Kaiser? My father will be so sorry!" for he was too ignorant to feel abashed at the presence of the princess, and he spoke to her with as much confidence as if she had been a village maiden.

The princess was struck by the earnestness with which he spoke, and decided to see the contents of his basket. The moment he heard her consent, he walked straight up with his Krattle, quite regardless of the whole troop of lacqueys, strong in the justice of his cause.

The princess removed the covering of leaves, and discovered that what he had brought were golden

D d

pears indeed, for each pear, large as it was, was of solid shining metal!

"These are pears indeed worthy to set before the Kaiser!" she said, and presented them to her father.

The Kaiser was pleased to see his favourite fruit so splendidly immortalized, and ordered the pears to be laid up in his cabinet of curiosities; but to the boy, for his reward, he ordered that whatever he asked should be given.

"All I want is to find my two brothers, who hold some great office at court," said the boy.

"Your brothers hold office in prison, if they are those I suspect," said the Kaiser, and commanded that they should be brought. The boys immediately ran to embrace each other; and the Kaiser made them each recount all their adventures.

"You see how dangerous it is to depart from the truth!" he said, when they had done. "And never forget that, with all your cleverness, you might have remained in prison to the end of your days but for the straightforward simplicity of him you thought so inferior to yourselves."

Then he ordered that the tree which brought forth such excellent pears should be transplanted to his palace; and to the father and his three sons he gave places among his gardeners, where they lived in plenty and were well content.

HOW THE POOREST BECAME

THE RICHEST1.

HERE was once a poor peasant, named
Taland, who lived in a poor cottage in

the Walserthal, a valley of Vorarlberg. He was as poor in wits as in fortune, so that he was continually making himself the laughing-stock of his neighbours; yet, as he possessed a certain sort of cunning, which fortune was pleased to favour, he got on better in the long run than many a wiser

man.

1 It has been my aim generally, in making this collection, to give the preference to those stories which have a moral point to recommend them; my readers will not, perhaps, take it amiss, however, if I present them with this specimen of a class in which this is wanting, and which aims only at amusement. It is, moreover, interesting from the strong evidence it bears of extremely remote origin; for the light way in which putting people to death, deception, and selfishness are spoken of prove it has a pre-Christian source, while the unimportant accessories show how details get modified by transmission.

Plodding along steadily, and living frugally, Taland, in process of time, laid by enough money to buy a cow; and a cow he bought without even stopping to consider that he had no means of pasturing it.

The cow, however, provided for that by her own instinct; there were plenty of good pastures in the neighbourhood, and the cow was not slow to discover them. Wherever the grass was freshest and sweetest, thither she wandered, and by this token Taland had no difficulty in finding her out at milking time; and in the whole country round there was no sleeker or better-favoured animal.

But the neighbours at whose expense she fed so well in course of time grew angry; and finding remonstrance vain, they met together and determined to kill the cow; and, that none might have to bear the blame of killing her more than another, every one of them stuck his knife into her. By this means, not only was poor Taland's cow destroyed, but even the hide was riddled with holes, and so rendered useless.

Nevertheless, Taland skinned his cow, and plodded away with the hide to the nearest tanner, as if he had not the sense to be conscious that it was spoilt. The tanner was not at home, but his wife was able to decide without him, that there was no business to be done with such goods, and she sent him away with a mocking laugh, bid