As he stood there, suddenly, the lion opened his great stone mouth and said:
“What are you doing here?”
The boy told him how cruel the elder brother had been; how the mother and himself had been obliged to leave home and live in a hut at the foot of the hill. When he had heard all of the story, the lion said:
“If you will bring a bucket here to-morrow and put it under my mouth, I will fill it with gold for you.”
The next day the boy brought the bucket.
“You must be very careful to tell me when it is nearly full,” said the lion, “for if even one piece of gold should fall to the ground, great trouble would be in store for you.”
The boy was very careful to do exactly as the lion told him, and soon he was on his way home to his mother with a bucketful of gold. They were so rich now that they bought a beautiful farm and went there to live.
At last the hard-hearted brother heard of their good fortune. He had married since his mother and brother had gone away, so he took his wife and went to pay a visit to his younger brother. It was not long before he had heard the whole story of their good fortune, and how the lion had given them all the gold.
“I will try that, too,” he said.
He and his wife went to the same hut his brother had lived in, and there they passed the night.