The wool had grown well that summer. He had taken two crops off the sheep, and was thinking of a third, when first the lambs, and then the ewes, began to stray away; and, search as the brothers would, none of them was ever found again. The flocks grew smaller every day, and all the brothers could find out was that the closest clipped were the first to go.
Kind grew tired of watching, and Clutch lost his sleep with vexation. The other shepherds, to whom he had boasted of his wool and his profits, were not sorry to see pride having a fall. Still the flock melted away as the months wore on, and when the spring came back nothing remained with Clutch and Kind but three old ewes. The two brothers were watching these ewes one evening when Clutch said:
“Brother, there is wool to be had on their backs.”
“It is too little to keep them warm,” said Kind. “The east wind still blows sometimes.” But Clutch was off to the cottage for the bag and shears.
Kind was grieved to see his brother so covetous, and to divert his mind he looked up at the great hills. As he looked, three creatures like sheep scoured up a cleft in one of the hills, as fleet as any deer; and when Kind turned he saw his brother coming with the bag and shears, but not a single ewe was to be seen. Clutch’s first question was, what had become of them; and when Kind told him what he saw, the eldest brother scolded him for not watching better.
“Now we have not a single sheep,” said he, “and the other shepherds will hardly give us room among them at shearing time or harvest. If you like to come with me, we shall get service somewhere. I have heard my father say that there were great shepherds living in old times beyond the hills; let us go and see if they will take us for sheep-boys.”
Accordingly, next morning Clutch took his bag and shears, Kind took his crook and pipe, and away they went over the plain and up the hills. All who saw them thought that they had lost their senses, for no shepherd had gone there for a hundred years, and nothing was to be seen but wide moorlands, full of rugged rocks, and sloping up, it seemed, to the very sky.
By noon they came to the stony cleft up which the three old ewes had scoured like deer; but both were tired, and sat down to rest. As they sat there, there came a sound of music down the hills as if a thousand shepherds had been playing on their pipes. Clutch and Kind had never heard such music before, and, getting up, they followed the sound up the cleft, and over a wide heath, till at sunset they came to the hill-top, where they saw a flock of thousands of snow-white sheep feeding, while an old man sat in the midst of them playing merrily on his pipe.
“Good father,” said Kind, for his eldest brother hung back and was afraid, “tell us what land is this, and where we can find service; for my brother and I are shepherds, and can keep flocks from straying, though we have lost our own.”
“These are the hill pastures,” said the old man, “and I am the ancient shepherd. My flocks never stray, but I have employment for you. Which of you can shear best?”