He turned upon my forefather and would have beheaded him on the spot for having told him about the thing, had not my forefather asked the privilege of cutting down the tree. He was at once commanded so to do, and in not very choice language, for the king was so far gone he had entirely forgotten the rules of polite society.
My forefather had been thinking all this time and thinking pretty hard, too, for he felt pretty sure he would not be home for supper that night if the king got no golden apples. And he thought to some purpose, and had observed the tree very minutely.
He took a long piece of heavy wire from his pocket, quickly placed it around the trunk of the tree, and, though he was carried some distance up before he could fasten it to his liking, he succeeded in doing so and dropping safely to the ground, though it was a goodly jump he had to make.
As the tree expanded in its growth of girth in proportion to its upward movement the wire soon began to cut into the trunk. Thus the tree was caught, for it had now grown to such a height if it did not keep on growing larger around it would become top-heavy and break off at the narrow point where was the wire.
And now the king’s pleasure knew no more bounds than did his wrath, and he knighted my forefather on the spot.
The work of the wire was made apparent by the waving of the tree top, which soon became quite visible; but the tree had grown so high when the wire had finished its task, the top fell far out into the ocean, with all its golden fruit.
And now the king did a very mean thing—he directed his sword-bearer to give him his long sword, which was about twenty feet long, with which he desired to have the honor of removing my forefather’s head.
But my forebear was not to be outdone. He grasped the king about the middle with the long fingers of his long hand on his long arm, held him high above his head for a moment, then threw him far out to sea, telling him to bring him some of the golden fruit and he would sit on his throne until he did so, which he proceeded to do, and thereby attained all the things he would have bought with the golden fruit, and many more besides.
So great had been the effort in throwing the king into the ocean, my forefather’s arm at once resumed its natural length.