The poor man obeyed with tears in his eyes, and took the cup to his daughter with the king’s message. But the maiden told him he need only leave the matter till the morning, when she would see to it.
In the morning she called her father, and gave him a pound of tow to take to the king, and bade him say:
“Let the king stop up all the springs and river mouths of the earth with this tow, and then will I dry up the sea for him.”
And the poor man went and told this to the king.
Now the king saw that this maiden was wiser that he was himself, and he ordered her to be brought before him. And when the father and daughter stood in his presence and bowed before him, he said to the daughter—
“Tell me, girl, what is it that man hears the farthest?”
And the maiden answered— “Great king! that which man hears the farthest is the thunder, and a lie.”
Upon this the king took hold of his beard, and turning to his councilors, demanded of them:
“Tell me what my beard is worth?”
And when one valued it at so much, and another at so much more, the maiden told them outright that they could not guess it. “The king’s beard,” she said, “is of as much worth as three rainy days in summer time.”