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Then the snake slipped off along the ground, and almost before the hunter knew it was going, it was gone, and he never saw it again.

Well, he went on with the two dogs, looking for something to shoot at; and when the dark night fell he was still far from home, away in the deep forest.

“I am tired,” he thought, “and perhaps there will be birds stirring in the early morning. I will sleep the night here, and try my luck at sunrise.”

He made a fire of twigs and broken branches, and lay down beside it, together with his dogs. He had scarcely lain down to sleep when he heard the dogs talking together and calling each other “Brother.” He understood every word they said.

“Well, brother,” says the first, “you sleep here and look after our master, while I run home to look after the house and yard. It will soon be one o’clock, and when the master is away that is the time for thieves.”

“Off with you, brother, and God be with you,” says the second.

And the hunter heard the first dog go bounding away through the undergrowth, while the second lay still, with its head between its paws, watching its master blinking at the fire.

Early in the morning the hunter was awakened by the noise of the dog pushing through the brushwood on its way back. He heard how the dogs greeted each other.

“Well, and how are you, brother?” says the first.

“Finely,” says the second; “and how’s yourself?”

“Finely too. Did the night pass well?”

“Well enough, thanks be to God. But with you, brother? How was it at home?”

“Oh, badly. I ran home, and the mistress, when she sees me, sings out, ‘What the devil are you doing here without your master? Well, there’s your supper;’ and she threw me a crust of bread, burnt to a black cinder. I snuffed it and snuffed it, but as for eating it, it was burnt through. No dog alive could have made a meal of it. And with that she ups with a poker and beats me. Brother, she counted all my ribs and nearly broke each one of them. But at night, later on–just as I thought–thieves came into the yard, and were going to clear out the barn and the larder. But I let loose such a howl, and leapt upon them so vicious and angry, that they had little thought to spare for other people’s goods, and had all they could do to get away whole themselves. And so I spent the night.”

The hunter heard all that the dogs said, and kept it in mind. “Wait a bit, my good woman,” says he, “and see what I have to say to you when I get home.”

That morning his luck was good, and he came home with a couple of hares and three or four woodcock.

“Good-day, mistress,” says he to his wife, who was standing in the doorway.

“Good-day, master,” says she.

“Last night one of the dogs came home.”

“It did,” says she.

“And how did you feed it?”

“Feed it, my love?” says she. “I gave it a whole basin of milk, and crumbled a loaf of bread for it.”

“You lie, you old witch,” says the hunter; “you gave it nothing but a burnt crust, and you beat it with the poker.”

The old woman was so surprised that she let the truth out of her mouth before she knew. She says to her husband, “How on earth did you know all that?”

“I won’t tell you,” says the hunter.

“Tell me, tell me,” begs the old woman, just like Maroosia when she wants to know too much.

“I can’t tell you,” says the hunter; “it’s forbidden me to tell.”

“Tell me, dear one,” says she.

“Truly, I can’t.”

“Tell me, my little pigeon.”

“If I tell you I shall die the death.”

“Rubbish, my dearest; only tell me.”

“But I shall die.”

“Just tell me that one little thing. You won’t die for that.”