And one day—a hundred and a hundred years ago it was—he had gone to chase a deer. The deer fled into a cave. He followed with his hounds and his sword, his trumpet and his missile-ball. He went astray and fell asleep in the Cave. And when he wakened up, his hounds were heaps of dust beside him. He went into the world, and he found that his companions were dead for a hundred and a hundred years and that the men of the earth had become smaller and smaller. In the Cave he left his sword and his trumpet and his missile-ball.
All flew from the mountain except one bird and he was the greatest amongst them all.
The Cock put his two feet on the ground and shook his red comb from over his left to over his right eye. Then said he, Everyone in the house was friendly to Little Fawn except one person—Murrish the Cook-woman. From the first day he came there were disputes between them. "Big men have big appetites," said she to him the day he came, "and so to-night I will give you two eggs for your supper." But when she handed him the eggs Little Fawn said "It was not the eggs of the hedge-sparrow we were wont to eat in my time." "Eggs of the hedge-sparrow!" said Murrish, "I have handed you the biggest eggs laid by the best hens in the country." "In my time there were bigger eggs in the nest of the hedge-sparrow," said Little Fawn.
The next day she gave him a barley-cake for his breakfast. He ate it and then sent the boy—Ardan was his name—to ask what else she was going to give him.
"Give him!" said Murrish the Cook-woman, "I have given him a whole barley cake, and that is enough for two men's breakfasts."
"Tell her," said Little Fawn, "that I often saw an ivy-leaf that was as big as her barley cake."
"Tell him," said Murrish the Cook-woman, "that I am not here to listen to old mens' romances."