` Ah , ' replied the owner of the golden horse , ` but who will undertake that you will ever come back ? ' ' I swear on the head of my father , ' answered the young man , ` that I will bring back either the maiden or the horse . ' And he went away to consult the fox . Now , the fox who was always patient and charitable to other people 's faults , led him to the entrance of a deep grotto , where stood a maiden all of gold , and beautiful as the day . He placed her on his horse and prepared to mount . -LSB- Illustration : LIMPING FOX ADVISES THE SIMPLETON TO KEEP THE GOLDEN GIRL HIMSELF -RSB- ` Are you not sorry , ' said the fox , ` to give such a lovely maiden in exchange for a horse ? Yet you are bound to do it , for you have sworn by the head of your father . But perhaps I could manage to take her place . ' So saying , the fox transformed himself into another golden maiden , so like the first that hardly anyone could tell the difference between them . The simpleton took her straight to the owner of the horse , who was enchanted with her . And the young man got back his father 's vine and married the real golden maiden into the bargain . -LSB- Contes Populaires Slaves . Traduits par Louis Léger . Paris : Ernest Leroux , éditeur . -RSB- THE UNLOOKED-FOR PRINCE -LRB- POLISH STORY -RRB- A long time ago there lived a king and queen who had no children , although they both wished very much for a little son . They tried not to let each other see how unhappy they were , and pretended to take pleasure in hunting and hawking and all sorts of other sports ; but at length the king could bear it no longer , and declared that he must go and visit the furthest corners of his kingdom , and that it would be many months before he should return to his capital . By that time he hoped he would have so many things to think about that he would have forgotten to trouble about the little son who never came . The country the king reigned over was very large , and full of high , stony mountains and sandy deserts , so that it was not at all easy to go from one place to another . One day the king had wandered out alone , meaning to go only a little distance , but everything looked so alike he could not make out the path by which he had come . He walked on and on for hours , the sun beating hotly on his head , and his legs trembling under him , and he might have died of thirst if he had not suddenly stumbled on a little well , which looked as if it had been newly dug .
On the surface floated a silver cup with a golden handle , but XXXXX it bobbed about whenever the king tried to seize it , he was too thirsty to wait any longer and knelt down and drank his fill .
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