"'Ho, ho! stop! will you all go? Go, then!' said Boots; and he blew into one end of the pipe, so that they ran off on all sides, and there was not one of them left. But as he went on, and came to an old charcoal pit, he blew into the other end of the pipe; and before he knew where he was, the hares were all there, and stood in lines and rows, so that he could take them all in at a glance, just like a troop of soldiers on parade. 'Something like a pipe, this,' said Osborn Boots; and with that he laid him down to sleep away under a sunny slope, and the hares frisked and frolicked about till eventide. Then he piped them all together again, and came down to the king's grange with them, like a flock of sheep.
"The king and the queen, and the princess, too, all stood in the porch, and wondered what sort of fellow this was who so kept the hares that he brought them home again; and the king told and reckoned them on his fingers, and counted them over and over again; but there was not one of them missing—no! not so much as a leveret.
"'Something like a lad, this,' said the princess.
"Next day he went off to the wood, and was to keep the hares again; but as he lay and rested himself on a strawberry brake, they sent the maid after him from the grange that she might find out how it was that he was man enough to keep the king's hares so well.
"So he took out the pipe and showed it her, and then he blew into one end and made them fly like the wind over all the hills and dales; and then he blew into the other end, and they all came scampering back to the brake, and all stood in row and rank again.
"'What a pretty pipe,' said the maid. She would willingly give a hundred dollars for it, if he would sell it, she said.
"'Yes! it is something like a pipe,' said Osborn Boots; 'and it was not to be had for money alone; but if she would give him the hundred dollars, and a kiss for each dollar, she should have it,' he said.
"Well! why not? of course she would; she would willingly give him two for each dollar, and thanks besides.
"So she got the pipe; but when she had got as far as the king's grange, the pipe was gone, for Osborn Boots had wished for it back, and so, when it drew towards eventide, home he came with his hares just like any other flock of sheep; and for all the king's counting or telling, there was no help,—not a hair of the hares was missing.
"The third day that he kept the hares, they sent the princess on her way to try and get the pipe from him. She made herself as blithe as a lark, and she bade him two hundred dollars if he would sell her the pipe and tell her how she was to behave to bring it safe home with her.