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Then he took the eggs, and coming down, put his foot on every bone, |
then took it with him, till he came to the last bone, which was so near |
the ground that he failed to touch it with his foot. |
He now placed all the bones of Auburn Mary in order again at the side |
of the spring, put the flesh on them, sprinkled it with water from the |
spring. She rose up before him, and said: "Didn't I tell you not to |
leave a bone of my body without stepping on it? Now I am lame for life! |
You left my little finger on the tree without touching it, and I have |
but nine fingers." |
"Now," says she, "go home with the eggs quickly, and you will get me to |
marry to-night if you can know me. I and my two sisters will be arrayed |
in the same garments, and made like each other, but look at me when my |
father says, 'Go to thy wife, king's son;' and you will see a hand |
without a little finger." |
He gave the eggs to the giant. |
"Yes, yes!" says the giant, "be making ready for your marriage." |
Then, indeed, there was a wedding, and it _was_ a wedding! Giants and |
gentlemen, and the son of the king of the Green City was in the midst |
of them. They were married, and the dancing began, that was a dance! |
The giant's house was shaking from top to bottom. |
But bed time came, and the giant said, "It is time for thee to go to |
rest, son of the king of Tethertown; choose thy bride to take with thee |
from amidst those." |
She put out the hand off which the little finger was, and he caught her |
by the hand. |
"Thou hast aimed well this time too; but there is no knowing but we may |
meet thee another way," said the giant. |
But to rest they went. "Now," says she, "sleep not, or else you are a |
dead man. We must fly quick, quick, or for certain my father will kill |
you." |
Out they went, and on the blue grey filly in the stable they mounted. |
"Stop a while," says she, "and I will play a trick to the old hero." |
She jumped in, and cut an apple into nine shares, and she put two |
shares at the head of the bed, and two shares at the foot of the bed, |
and two shares at the door of the kitchen, and two shares at the big |
door, and one outside the house. |
The giant awoke and called, "Are you asleep?" |
"Not yet," said the apple that was at the head of the bed. |
At the end of a while he called again. |
"Not yet," said the apple that was at the foot of the bed. |
A while after this he called again: "Are your asleep?" |
"Not yet," said the apple at the kitchen door. |
The giant called again. |
The apple that was at the big door answered. |
"You are now going far from me," says the giant. |
"Not yet," says the apple that was outside the house. |
"You are flying," says the giant. The giant jumped on his feet, and to |
the bed he went, but it was cold--empty. |
"My own daughter's tricks are trying me," said the giant. "Here's after |
them," says he. |
At the mouth of day, the giant's daughter said that her father's breath |
was burning her back. |
"Put your hand, quick," said she, "in the ear of the grey filly, and |
whatever you find in it, throw it behind us." |
"There is a twig of sloe tree," said he. |
"Throw it behind us," said she. |
No sooner did he that, than there were twenty miles of blackthorn wood, |
so thick that scarce a weasel could go through it. |
The giant came headlong, and there he is fleecing his head and neck in |
the thorns. |
"My own daughter's tricks are here as before," said the giant; "but if |
I had my own big axe and wood knife here, I would not be long making a |
way through this." |
He went home for the big axe and the wood knife, and sure he was not |
long on his journey, and he was the boy behind the big axe. He was not |
long making a way through the blackthorn. |
"I will leave the axe and the wood knife here till I return," says he. |
"If you leave 'em, leave 'em," said a hoodie that was in a tree, "we'll |