Page:Czechoslovak fairy tales.djvu/25

 yond it they could see tall gray rocks that looked like the walls of a great city and mountains overgrown with forests.

Longshanks pointed off across the plain and said: “There, master, goes a comrade of mine who would be very useful to you. You ought to take him into your service too.”

“Very well,” said the prince, “call him here that I may find out what sort of a fellow he is.”

“He is too far away to call,” Longshanks said.

“He wouldn’t hear my voice and if he did he would be a long time in reaching us, for he has much to carry. I had better step over and get him myself.”

As he said this, Longshanks stretched out and out until his head was lost in the clouds. He took two or three strides, reached his comrade, set him on his shoulder, and brought him to the prince.

The new man was heavily built and round as a barrel.

“Who are you?” the prince asked. “And what can you do?”

“I am called Girth,” the man said. “I can widen myself.”

“Let me see you do it,” the prince said.

“Very well, master,” said Girth, beginning to puff