"Hurrah!" cried deaf Robert, waving his cap. "Do you know that you are the first person I have met, and that you are going to tell me how to become a real boy?"
"I will tell you at once," said the old woman, smiling, "for you come straight to the point and do not beat about the bush. This is what you must do, then:—something brave and something kind and something foolish and something wise. If you are not a real boy after that, it will be your own fault!" Then she walked round the blackberry bush and disappeared; and although deaf Robert forgot what she had just said about him and beat about that bush in good earnest, he never saw any more of her.
Then the minstrel's son walked straight on in search of a brave deed to do; and this did not take him long, for there are always plenty of brave deeds waiting to be done by some one. So, long before the sun was above his head that day, he came to a castle where a beautiful Princess was being kept captive by a cruel old giant,—all because he was cruel, and for no other reason at all. And when deaf Robert saw the Princess weeping behind the bars of her prison window, he was reminded of his own little Princess whom he had left weeping on the nursery floor; and that made him call on the giant instantly to come out and be killed. The giant laughed a great laugh and came out into the courtyard, not to be killed, but to kill the minstrel's son instead; but before he had time to do that, the minstrel's son had managed to kill him, and there was an end of the cruel old giant.
"That is the bravest deed I have ever seen done!" cried the Princess, when he fetched her out of her dungeon.
"Brave deeds are easily done, then," said deaf Robert; but he was glad enough, all the same, to hear that he had done the first part of his task. The next thing he did was to take the beautiful Princess back to her own country; and that seemed to him a great waste of time, for he could not certainly do his kind deed so long as he had the Princess on his hands. But when they reached her country and the Princess told her father how deaf Robert had come out of his way to bring her home, the old King was pleased, and asked him what reward he would like for his trouble. "For," he said, "you have done the kindest deed any one could possibly think of."
"No reward for me!" laughed deaf Robert; "for there is my kind deed done without my knowing it!" And off he set once more on his travels.
After that, the minstrel's son wandered about for a great many days; for neither a wise nor a foolish deed could he find to do. Sometimes, when he thought he had been wise, the people told him he was cruel, and drove him out of their country; and sometimes, when he was sure he had been foolish, they only praised him for his kindness. He grew tired and footsore, and his clothes became old and ragged, and he almost forgot that he had once been a Marquis and Playfellow-in-chief to a princess. But he never forgot how the little Princess Prunella had looked, as she sat on the nursery floor and wept with sobs that he was not able to hear. So two years passed away, and still he had not learned how to be a real boy.
One day, as he walked along a country road, he came upon a girl driving cows.
"Why are you looking so sad?" she asked him.