"Ha!" said the king, "it is your mightiness and pride that has caused the loss of your means; but if you become a good man you shall get this along with the rest."
O'Cronicert bade the king good-bye, took the lap-dog, leapt on the back of the old lame white horse, and went off at speed through wood, and over moss and rugged ground. After he had gone some distance through the wood a roebuck leapt up and the lap-dog went after it. In a moment the deer started up as a woman behind O'Cronicert, the handsomest that eye had ever seen from the beginning of the universe till the end of eternity. She said to him, "Call your dog off me."
"I will do so if you promise to marry me," said O'Cronicert.
"If you keep three vows that I shall lay upon you I will marry you," said she.
"What vows are they?" said he.
"The first is that you do not go to ask your worldly king to a feast or a dinner without first letting me know," said she.
"Hoch!" said O'Cronicert, "do you think that I cannot keep that vow? I would never go to invite my worldly king without informing you that I was going to do so. It is easy to keep that vow."
"You are likely to keep it!" said she.
"The second vow is," said she, "that you do not cast up to me in any company or meeting in which we shall be together, that you found me in the form of a deer."
"Hoo!" said O'Cronicert, "you need not to lay that vow upon me. I would keep it at any rate."