Thereupon he led him to his own coarse wooden table, and set before him half of a hard brown loaf and a pitcher of water; but so hungry and thirsty was the Prince that the bread seemed to him the best he had ever eaten, and the water sweeter than any in the world.
'Unfasten your horse's bridle,' said Necessity, when the Prince had done, 'and I will soon teach him where to find something to feed upon.'
The Prince did as the giant told him at once, and then his stern-looking companion pointed to a wooden bedstead in a dark corner of the cave, which looked as hard as his own face, saying: 'There, lie down and sleep.'
'I can never sleep on that thing,' said the Prince.
'Ho, ho!' cried the other; 'Necessity can make any bed soft,' and taking a bundle of straw, he threw it down on the bedstead.
Chapter IV
Sleep was sweeter to the Prince that night than it had ever been upon a bed of down, and when he rose the next morning the monster's features did not seem half so stern and forbidding as they had done at first. The inside of the cave, too, looked much more light and blithesome, though it was a dark and frowning place enough still, with hard rock all round, and nothing but one window to let in a little sunshine.
Necessity, however, did not intend to keep the Prince there, and as soon as he was up the giant said to him: 'Come, trudge; you must quit my cave, and go on.'
'You must open the door for me, then,' said the Prince; 'for the bolt is so high up I cannot reach it.'
'You cannot get out by the door through which you came in,' said the giant, 'for it is the door of Idleness. There is but one way for you to get out, and that I will show you.'