"Oh, if you're such a child, 'twill do you good to go and take a lesson," bawled out his brothers after him.
But Jack didn't care for what they said; he climbed the steep hillside towards where the noise came, and when he reached the place, what do you think he saw? Why, an axe that stood there hacking and hewing, all of itself, at the trunk of a fir.
"Good day!" said Jack. "So you stand here all alone and hew, do you?"
"Yes; here I've stood and hewed and hacked a long, long time, waiting for you," said the Axe.
"Well, here I am at last," said Jack, as he took the axe, pulled it off its haft, and stuffed both head and haft into his wallet.
So when he got down again to his brothers, they began to jeer and laugh at him.
"And now, what funny thing was it you saw up yonder on the hillside?" they said.
"Oh, it was only an axe we heard," said Jack.
So when they had gone a bit farther, they came under a steep spur of rock, and up there they heard something digging and shoveling.
"I wonder now," said Jack, "what it is digging and shoveling up yonder at the top of the rock!"