Page:The pink fairy book (IA pinkfairybooklan00lang).pdf/312

296 this dream told to some one, so that the king at last came to hear of it, and had him taken up out of the pit and brought before him. The king then asked him if he could produce to him his sister as beautiful as he had formerly described her. The brother said he could if they would bring him the duck and a knife.

Both of them were brought to him, and he said, ‘I wonder how you would look if I were to cut the point off your beak.’

With this he cut a piece off the beak, and there came a voice which said, ‘Oh, oh, you cut my little finger!’

Next moment Maiden Bright-eye stood there, as lovely and beautiful as he had seen her when he was home. This was his sister now, he said; and the whole story now came out of how the other had behaved to her. The wicked sister was put into a barrel with spikes round it, which was dragged off by six wild horses, and so she came to her end. But the king was delighted with Maiden Bright-eye, and immediately made her his queen, while her brother became his prime minister.