This the princess refused to do, and said, ‘It is quite useless to speak of such a thing. But tell me, did you notice anything particular on my shoulder?’
The youth answered, ‘Yes, I saw a star!’
‘Ah!’ exclaimed the princess; ‘for that you can never pay me enough, and yet you want your lamb back!’ So they almost quarrelled, for the king’s daughter persisted in begging him to give her another lamb, and the young shepherd insisted that she should bring him the first one back again.
At last, seeing there was no end to her begging, the boy said, ‘Well! I will give you one if you uncover before me your other shoulder.’ This the princess did instantly, and he remarked that she had the mark of a star on that arm also. In this way he lost a second lamb; and when the evening came he went home very sadly, feeling sure his mother would scold him. And so she did, far more than at the first time, calling him ill names and threatening to beat him. The boy was really sorry that he had given way to the princess’s prayers, but he could not help it now. Next day, again, the princess came to him and begged so hard and so long for a third lamb that he became impatient, and, thinking to shame her, said he would give her one if she showed him her neck. To his great surprise, however, the king’s daughter at once let her mantle fall, and he saw that she had the mark of a crescent on her throat. So the poor boy lost a third lamb, and hardly dared go home to his mother at night with the one lamb left them. Indeed the poor old woman was so angry at her son’s carelessness in losing one lamb after another whilst he slept—for he did not dare to tell her the truth about the princess—that she cursed him as ‘a good-for-nothing who would bring her to beggary.’
Notwithstanding all his mother’s reproaches and threats the boy could not refuse the princess the next day when she came out to ask for the fourth lamb. However, he tried to get her to go away a long time, and not until quite tired out with her begging, did he exclaim, ‘Well, I will give you the lamb if you will show me your breast!’ Then the princess pushed her robe aside, and the boy noticed that she had the mark of a sun on her bosom.
In this way the young shepherd lost all the four lambs, and he lived a long time with his mother in great poverty.
A long, long time afterwards the king sent out a proclamation that he intended to let his daughter marry, and would give her to that man who could tell him what particular birth-marks she had about her. The young shepherd heard this proclamation, and when he went home in the evening he said to his mother, ‘Mother, I intend to go to the king’s palace to-morrow, so get me my best linen ready.’
‘And what do you want in the king’s palace?’ asked the poor old woman wondering.
‘I intend, God helping me, to marry the king’s daughter,’ replied the young man boldly.
‘Oh! you had better give up that fancy,’ cried the mother. ‘It will be better for you to go and work and gain a piaster than to go, like a fly without a head, dreaming about things that are as high as the sky above you.’