Page:The pink fairy book (IA pinkfairybooklan00lang).pdf/254



had two sons. They were a pair of reckless fellows, who always had something foolish to do. One day they rowed out alone on the sea in a little boat. It was beautiful weather when they set out, but as soon as they had got some distance from the shore there arose a terrific storm. The oars went overboard at once, and the little boat was tossed about on the rolling billows like a nut-shell. The princes had to hold fast by the seats to keep from being thrown out of the boat.

In the midst of all this they met a wonderful vessel—it was a dough-trough, in which there sat an old woman. She called to them, and said that they could still get to shore alive if they would promise her the son that was next to come to their mother the queen.

‘We can’t do that,’ shouted the princes; ‘he doesn’t belong to us, so we can’t give him away.’

‘Then you can rot at the bottom of the sea, both of you,’ said the old woman; ‘and perhaps it may be the case that your mother would rather keep the two sons she has than the one she hasn’t got yet.’

Then she rowed away in her dough-trough, while the storm howled still louder than before, and the water dashed over their boat until it was almost sinking. Then the princes thought that there was something in what the old woman had said about their mother, and being, of course, eager to save their lives, they shouted to her, and