"I couldn't think of anything to ask for; so I did not ask for
anything at all."

"Fool," says his wife, "and dolt, and us with no food to put in our
mouths. Go back at once, and ask for some bread."

Well, the poor old fisherman got down his net, and tramped back to the
seashore. And he stood on the shore of the wide blue sea, and he
called out,--

"Head in air and tail in sea,
Fish, fish, listen to me."

And in a moment there was the golden fish with his head out of the
water, flapping his tail below him in the water, and looking at the
fisherman with his wise eyes.

"What is it?" said the fish.

"Be so kind," says the fisherman; "be so kind. We have no bread in the
house."

"Go home," says the fish, and turned over and went down into the sea.

"God be good to me," says the old fisherman; "but what shall I say to
my wife, going home like this without the bread?" And he went home
very wretchedly, and slower than he came.

As soon as he came within sight of his hut he saw his wife, and she