Page:Tales from the Fjeld.djvu/407

Rh It was not long before the princess brought out the napkin and the flask, that you may be sure; and when the children were all full and glad, she cut them out clothes with her golden scissors.

"Well," said the goody in the hut, "since you have been so kind and good towards me and my bairns, it were a shame if I didn't do all in my power to try to help you over the hill. My husband is one of the best smiths in the world, and now you must lie down and rest till he comes home, and then I'll get him to forge you claws for your hands and feet, and then you can see if you can crawl and scramble up."

So when the smith came home he set to work at once at the claws, and next morning they were ready. She had no time to stay, but said, "Thank you," and then clung close to the rock and crept and crawled with the steel claws all that day and the next night; and just as she felt so very, very tired that she thought she could scarce lift hand or foot, but must slip down, there she was all right at the top. There she found a plain, with tilled fields and meads, so big and broad, she never thought there could be any land so wide and so flat; and close by was a castle full of workmen of all kinds, who swarmed like ants on an ant-hill.

"What is going on here?" asked the princess.

Well, if she must know, there lived the old hag who had bewitched King Valemon, the white bear, and in three days she was to hold her wedding feast with him. Then she asked if she mightn't have a word with her. "No! was it likely? It was quite impossible." So she sat down under the window and began to clip in the air with her golden scissors, till