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‘That is nothing,’ they all replied. ‘We are not afraid!’

Then they were led before the Queen, and all were completely dazzled by her beauty. It was a long time before they realised that she was speaking to them. At last they understood her to say:

‘Here is my servant. See if you can eat more than he does.’

And the servant sat down in front of a table covered with dishes crowded with large joints of meat. And behold, he ate the whole lot up.

‘Oh! that is nothing at all,’ said the young hero. And, turning to the man who ate up the earth, he said:

‘Sit down there, my friend.’ Then turning again to the servant, he ordered him to bring in the biggest bull they could find.

They obeyed, and set it down in front of the man who ate the earth. And, in presence of the Queen, he swallowed the bull whole, head and tail and everything; and it was alive!

But the Queen said, ‘You have not won me yet!’

And then she called in a second servant and said:

‘Here is my servant. See if you can drink more than he can!’

And immediately the servant took hold of a whole cask of wine, and in one mouthful drank the whole lot up.

The young hero said, ‘That is nothing at all!’ Then, turning to the man with a mouth as big as a river, he added:

‘Come here, my friend. Place yourself on your stomach on the moat, and drink well!’

And the man with the mouth as large as a river placed himself on his stomach, with his mouth to the water of the great moat outside, and in one second he had drunk up the whole moat, fishes and all, absolutely dry.

But the Queen still said they had not won her!

And she beckoned another servant. Then, turning to the young man, she said: ‘See if you can run better than he can. There,’ she said, ‘at the top of that high mountain, just near the sun, lives a hermit. Go and ask him what it is he wishes to say to me. Then come back and tell me.’

‘Oh! that is nothing at all,’ said the young hero. And, turning to the man who ran like a hare, he said: ‘Go to the top of the mountain and come back with the message.’

And the man who ran like a hare was out of sight in a second, and before they could count three he had returned to the Queen with the message that the hermit was dead, which the Queen had known all the time.

And the young man said to the King:

‘You have submitted us to the test, and we have carried out all that you wished: we have now gained the Queen, and I am going to take her.’

Then the King got very angry and called out all his soldiers.

The young man, hearing this, said to the man with the strong arms:

‘Hi! friend! Take the whole castle, with the Queen and all that it contains, on your shoulders!’

The man obeyed and they went on their way!

They had not gone a great distance when the man who had gazed at the sun cried out:

‘In the distance I can see that we are being pursued by an army; they want to take the Queen!’

The King and his army approached rapidly, and demanded the Queen.

Then the man of the strong arm killed the King and every one of his army with a single blow.

Then he departed with the Queen and the castle to the home of the young man; and as soon as they got there the hero married the Queen, and, with her and his mother, they lived very happily to a good old age.