The Red Fairy Book - Illustrated by H. J. Ford and Lancelot Speed. Andrew Lang

      The man did tell him, and the youth thought it would be easy enough to do it. So he set himself to work to catch three hares alive, put them in a bag, clad himself in some old rags so that he looked so poor and wretched that it was quite pitiable to see him, and in this guise on Sunday forenoon he sneaked into the passage with his bag, like any beggar boy. The Governor himself and every one in the house was in the kitchen, keeping watch over the joint. While they were doing this the youth let one of the hares slip out of his bag, and off it set and began to run round the yard.

      ‘Just look at that hare,’ said the people in the kitchen, and wanted to go out and catch it.

      The Governor saw it too, but said, ‘Oh, let it go! it’s no use to think of catching a hare when it’s running away.’

      It was not long before the youth let another hare out, and the people in the kitchen saw this too, and thought that it was the same. So again they wanted to go out and catch it, but the Governor again told them that it was of no use to try.

      Very soon afterwards, however, the youth let slip the third hare, and it set off and ran round and round the courtyard. The people in the kitchen saw this too, and believed that it was still the same hare that was running about, so they wanted to go out and catch it.

      ‘It’s a remarkably fine hare!’ said the Governor. ‘Come and let us see if we can get hold of it.’ So out he went, and the others with him, and away went the hare, and they after it, in real earnest.

      In the meantime, however, the Master Thief took the joint and ran off with it, and whether the Governor got any roast meat for his dinner that day I know not, but I know that he had no roast hare, though he chased it till he was both hot and tired.

      At noon came the Priest, and when the Governor had told him of the trick played by the Master Thief there was no end to the ridicule he cast on the Governor.

      ‘For my part,’ said the Priest, ‘I can’t imagine myself being made a fool of by such a fellow as that!’

      ‘Well, I advise you to be careful,’ said the Governor, ‘for he may be with you before you are at all aware.’

      But the Priest repeated what he had said, and mocked the Governor for having allowed himself to be made such a fool of.

      Later in the afternoon the Master Thief came and wanted to have the Governor’s daughter as he had promised.

      ‘You must first give some more samples of your skill,’ said the Governor, trying to speak him fair, ‘for what you did to-day was no such very great thing after all. Couldn’t you play off a really good trick on the Priest? for he is sitting inside there and calling me a fool for having let myself be taken in by such a fellow as you.’

      ‘Well, it wouldn’t be very hard to do that,’ said the Master Thief. So he dressed himself up like a bird, and threw a great white sheet over himself; broke off a goose’s wings, and set them on his back; and in this attire climbed into a great maple tree which stood in the Priest’s garden. So when the Priest returned home in the evening the youth began to cry, ‘Father Lawrence! Father Lawrence! ‘for the Priest was called Father Lawrence.

      ‘Who is calling me?’ said the Priest.

      ‘I am an angel sent to announce to thee that because of thy piety thou shalt be taken away alive into heaven,’ said the Master Thief. ‘Wilt thou hold thyself in readiness to travel away next Monday night? for then will I come and fetch thee, and bear thee away with me in a sack, and thou must lay all thy gold and silver, and whatsoever thou may ‘st possess of this world’s wealth, in a heap in thy best parlour.’

      So Father Lawrence fell down on his knees before the angel and thanked him, and the following Sunday he preached a farewell sermon, and gave out that an angel had come down into the large maple tree in his garden, and had announced to him that, because of his righteousness, he should be taken up alive into heaven, and as he thus preached and told them this everyone in the church, old or young, wept.

      On Monday night the Master Thief once more came as an angel, and before the Priest was put into the sack he fell on his knees and thanked him; but no sooner was the Priest safely inside it than the Master Thief began to drag him away over stocks and stones.

      ‘Oh! oh! ‘cried the Priest in the sack. ‘Where are you taking me?’

      ‘This is the way to heaven. The way to heaven is not an easy one,’ said the Master Thief, and dragged him along till he all but killed him.

      At last he flung him into the Governor’s goose-house, and the geese began to hiss and peck at him, till he felt more dead than alive.

      ‘Oh! oh! oh! Where am I now?’ asked the Priest.

      ‘Now you are in Purgatory,’ said the Master Thief, and off he went and took the gold and the silver and all the precious things which the Priest had laid together in his best parlour.

      Next morning, when the goose-girl came to let out the geese, she heard the Priest bemoaning himself as he lay in the sack in the goose-house.

      ‘Oh, heavens! who is that, and what ails you?’ said she.

      ‘Oh,’ said the Priest, ‘if you are an angel from heaven do let me out and let me go back to earth again, for no place was ever so bad as this—the little fiends nip me so with their tongs.’

      ‘I am no angel,’ said the girl, and helped the Priest out of the sack. ‘I only look after the Governor’s geese, that’s what I do, and they are the little fiends which have pinched your reverence.’

      ‘This is the Master Thief’s doing! Oh, my gold and my silver and my best clothes!’ shrieked the Priest, and, wild with rage, he ran home so fast that the goose-girl thought he had suddenly gone mad.

      When the Governor learnt what had happened to the Priest he laughed till he nearly killed himself, but when the Master Thief came and wanted to have his daughter according to promise, he once more gave him nothing but fine words, and said, ‘You must give me one more proof of your skill, so that I can really judge of your worth. I have twelve horses in my stable, and I will put twelve stable boys in it, one on each horse. If you are clever enough to steal the horses from under them, I will see what I can do for you.’

      ‘What you set me to do can be done,’ said the Master Thief, ‘but am I certain to get your daughter when it is?’

      ‘Yes; if you can do that I will do my best for you,’ said the Governor.

      So the Master Thief went to a shop, and bought enough brandy to fill two pocket flasks, and he put a sleeping drink into one of these, but into the other he poured brandy only. Then he engaged eleven men to lie that night in hiding behind the Governor’s stable. After this, by fair words and good payment, he borrowed a ragged gown and a jerkin from an aged woman, and then, with a staff in his hand and a poke on his back, he hobbled off as evening came on towards the Governor’s stable. The stable boys were just watering the horses for the night, and it was quite as much as they could do to attend to that.