The Real Thing and Other Tales

he crept into the cart, lay down on the straw, and went to sleep. When the farmers had driven some distance, they noticed John asleep in the cart. They thou

of wolves gathered under the rocks. They had [62]flocked round, attracted by the human smell. One of the wolves pushed his tail through the hole, and Sleepy John began to think that the hour of his death was approaching. But he wound the wolf's tail round his hand. The wolf was terrified,

the mountains and he met a hermit. The hermit said to him: "You may stay here w

direction you point this stick, you will find yourself there." Then he gave him a knapsack, saying: "Anything you want you wil

t died, and Jo

the queen would every night wear out a dozen pairs of shoes, yet nobody was able to follow her track. The lords were all flocking to offer to follow the queen's traces, and John we

red "Sle

her, when you are sleeping all the time? If y

he would try to tra

o sleep, [64]but when the queen was going by he pretended to be in a deep slumber. So the queen lit a candle and scorched the soles of his feet to make

pointed with his stick and said

when he broke off the twig it gave out a shrill sound as if a bell were ringing. The queen was frightened, but she rode on again. John pointed with his stick and said: "Let me be where the queen is," and instantly he was in the tin forest. He broke off a twig again and put it in his knapsack, and it rang again. The queen turned pale

they put aside disappearing. They couldn't make out what was happening, but they didn't care very much. And when the banquet was at an end the devils began to dance with the queen, and they kept on dancing until the queen had worn out all her shoes. When her shoes were worn out, those two dragons took her on their backs again and brought her to t

the king asked whether any of them had tracke

leepy John befor

and I know that she used up those twelve pa

and said: "The queen was carried by two dragons towards Hell, and she came to

no good. You might have

After that the queen drove through the tin forest, and ther

ou might have mad

ove through the silver forest, and when I broke off this twig she f

cried out: "Let the earth swallow me

ngdom, and, when the king died, th