"But however it happened, so it happened; she got a bit of a candle-end to take with her when she started.
"So the first thing she did when he was sound asleep, was to light the candle-end and throw a light on him; and he was so lovely she never thought she could gaze enough at him; but as she held the candle over him, a hot drop of tallow dropped on his forehead, and he woke up.
"'What is this you have done?' he said. 'Now you have made us both unlucky; there was no more than a month left, and had you lasted it out, I should have been saved; for a hag of the trolls has bewitched me, and I am a white bear by day. But now it is all over between us, for now I must go to her and take her to wife.'
"She wept and bemoaned herself; but he must set off, and he would set off. Then she asked if she might not go with him. 'No!' he said, 'there was no way of doing that.' But for all that, when he set off in his bear-shape, she took hold of his shaggy hide and threw herself upon his back, and held on fast.
"So away they went over crags and hills, and through brakes and briars, till her clothes were torn off her back, and she was so dead tired, that she let go her hold and lost her wits. When she came to herself she was in a great wood, and then she set off again, but she could not tell whither she was going. So after a long, long, time she came to a hut, and there she saw two women, an old woman and a pretty little girl. Then the princess asked, had they seen anything of King Valemon, the white bear.
"'Yes!' they said. 'He passed by here this morning early, but he went so fast you'll never be able to catch him up.'
"As for the girl, she ran about clipping in the air and playing with a pair of golden scissors, which were of that kind, that silk and satin stuffs flew all about her if she only clipped the air with them. Where they were, there was never any want of clothes.
"'But this woman,' said the little lass, 'who is to go so far and on such bad ways, she will suffer much; she may well have more need of these scissors than I to cut out her clothes with.'
"And as she said this she begged her mother so hard, that at last she got leave to give her the scissors.
"So away travelled the princess through the wood, which seemed never to come to an end, both day and night, and next morning she came to another hut. In it there were also two women, an old wife and a young girl.