The little Princess stopped and looked at the children curiously; and the old woman stepped forward and made a polite curtsey.
"They are rather noisy to-day," she said deprecatingly. "The oyster-nurses have gone out for a holiday, and I have to keep the whole bed in order!"
"I should like to wait and play with them," said the Princess, "but I really am in such a hurry—I've lost my golden shoe."
"Oh, you're going to the Crab-boy, I suppose?" said the old woman. "Down the road as straight as you can go, and you'll come to his hut," and she turned away to the children again.
Sidigunda took off her slipper, and poured out some drops from her magic bottle.
Immediately it grew larger and larger; and she had just time to spring in, before it galloped away with a series of bounds that made it very difficult to cling on.
Faster and faster it went, until the country seemed only a flying haze; and just as the Princess began to feel she could endure no more, it stopped abruptly before a small hut.
Outside the door a boy sat on a stone seat, playing on a long horn whose notes echoed among the rocky hills that surrounded him.
Princess Sidigunda looked at the boy with a friendly smile. He stopped playing, and made room for her to sit down beside him.
"I knew you were coming," he said. "You want to go to the Sea-grandmother, don't you?"