with it; and I do beg you to let me live with it, and I will go out
every morning and cut wood for it and for all your other stoves, if
only you will let me stay beside it. No one has ever fed it with wood
but me since I grew big enough, and it loves me; it does indeed!" And
then he lifted up his little pale face to the young king, who saw that
great tears were running down his cheeks.

"Can't I stay with Hirschvogel?" he pleaded.

"Wait a little," said the king. "What do you want to be when you are a
man? Do you want to be a wood-chopper?"

"I want to be a painter," cried Karl. "I want to be what Hirschvogel
was. I mean the potter that made my Hirschvogel."

"I understand," answered the king, and he looked down at the child,
and smiled. "Get up, my little man," he said in a kind voice; "I will
let you stay with your Hirschvogel. You shall stay here, and you shall
be taught to be a painter, but you must grow up very good, and when
you are twenty-one years old, if you have done well, then I will give
you back your beautiful stove." Then he smiled again and stretched out
his hand. Karl threw his two arms about the king's knees and kissed
his feet, and then all at once he was so tired and so glad and hungry
and happy, that he fainted quite away on the floor.

Then the king had a letter written to Karl's father, telling him that
Karl had drawn him some beautiful charcoal pictures, and that he liked
them so much he was going to take care of him until he was old enough
to paint wonderful stoves like Hirschvogel. And he did take care of
him for a long time, and when Karl grew older, he often went for a few