“Well,” said Boots to himself, “if it isn’t worse than this, I can stand it well enough.”
A little while after came another creak and an earthquake, so that the litter in the barn flew about the lad’s ears. “Oh!” said Boots to himself, “if it isn’t worse than this, I daresay I can stand it out.”
But just then came a third rumbling, and a third earthquake, so that the lad thought walls and roof were coming down on his head; but it passed off, and all was still as death about him.
“It’ll come again, I’ll be bound,” thought Boots; but no, it didn’t come again; still it was, and still it stayed; but after he had lain a little while, he heard a noise as if a horse were standing just outside the barn-door, and cropping the grass. He stole to the door, and peeped through a chink, and there stood a horse feeding away. So big, and fat, and grand a horse, Boots had never set eyes on; by his side on the grass lay a saddle and bridle, and a full set of armour 134 for a knight, all of brass, so bright that the light gleamed from it.
“Ho, ho!” thought the lad; “it’s you, is it, that eats up our hay? I’ll soon put a spoke in your wheel, just see if I don’t.”
So he lost no time, but took the steel out of his tinder-box, and threw it over the horse; then it had no power to stir from the spot, and became so tame that the lad could do what he liked with it. So he got on its back, and rode off with it to a place which no one knew of, and there he put up the horse. When he got home, his brothers laughed and asked how he had fared?
“You didn’t lie long in the barn, even if you had the heart to go so far as the field.”
“Well,” said Boots, “all I can say is, I lay in the barn till the sun rose, and neither saw nor heard anything; I can’t think what there was in the barn to make you both so afraid.”
“A pretty story,” said his brothers; “but we’ll soon see how you have watched the meadow;” so they set off; but when they reached it, there stood the grass as deep and thick as it had been over night.
Well, the next St. John’s eve it was the same story over 135 again; neither of the elder brothers dared to go out to the outlying field to watch the crop; but Boots, he had the heart to go, and everything happened just as it had happened the year before. First a clatter and an earthquake, then a greater clatter and another earthquake, and so on a third time; only this year the earthquakes were far worse than the year before. Then all at once everything was as still as death, and the lad heard how something was cropping the grass outside the barn-door, so he stole to the door, and peeped through a chink; and what do you think he saw? Why, another horse standing right up against the wall, and chewing and champing with might and main. It was far finer and fatter than that which came the year before, and it had a saddle on its back, and a bridle on its neck, and a full suit of mail for a knight lay by its side, all of silver, and as grand as you would wish to see.