cleaned out the stable, so that a golden apple would run from
end to end of it. Next day the Giant set him to thatch the byre
with birds' down, and he had to go out on the moors to catch the
birds; but at midday, he had caught only two blackbirds, and
then the Giant's youngest daughter came again, and bid him
sleep, and then she caught the birds, and thatched the byre with
the feathers before sundown. The third day the Giant set him
another task. In the forest there was a fir-tree, and at the top
was a magpie's nest, and in the nest were five eggs, and he was
to bring these five eggs to the Giant without breaking one of
them. Now the tree was very tall; from the ground to the first
branch it was five hundred feet, so that the King's son could
not climb up it. Then the Giant's youngest daughter came again,
and she put her fingers one after the other into the tree, and
made a ladder for the King's son to climb up by. When he was at
the nest at the very top, she said, "Make haste now with the
eggs, for my father's breath is burning my back;" and she was in
such a hurry that she left her little finger sticking in the top
of the tree. Then she told the King's son that the Giant would
make all his daughters look alike, and dress them alike, and
that when the choosing time came he was to look at their hands,
and take the one that had not a little finger on one hand. So it
happened, and the King's son chose the youngest daughter,
because she put out her hand to guide him.

Then they were married, and there was a great feast, and they
went to their chamber. The Giant's daughter said to her husband,
"Sleep not, or thou diest; we must fly quick, or my father will
kill thee." So first she cut an apple into nine pieces, and put
two pieces at the head of the bed, and two at the foot, and two