A little while passed and then there came another wild goose.  She flew still slower and lower; and it seemed even more difficult for her to find her way between the beech-branches.  Smirre made a powerful spring!  He was within a hair’s breadth of catching her; but that goose also managed to save herself.

Just after she had disappeared, came a fourth.  She flew so slowly, and so badly, that Smirre Fox thought he could catch her without much effort, but he was afraid of failure now, and concluded to let her fly past—­unmolested.  She took the same direction the others had taken; and just as she was come right above Smirre, she sank down so far that he was tempted to jump for her.  He jumped so high that he touched her with his tail.  But she flung herself quickly to one side and saved her life.

Before Smirre got through panting, three more geese came flying in a row.  They flew just like the rest, and Smirre made high springs for them all, but he did not succeed in catching any one of them.

After that came five geese; but these flew better than the others.  And although it seemed as if they wanted to lure Smirre to jump, he withstood the temptation.  After quite a long time came one single goose.  It was the thirteenth.  This one was so old that she was gray all over, without a dark speck anywhere on her body.  She didn’t appear to use one wing very well, but flew so wretchedly and crookedly, that she almost touched the ground.  Smirre not only made a high leap for her, but he pursued her, running and jumping all the way down to the lake.  But not even this time did he get anything for his trouble.

When the fourteenth goose came along, it looked very pretty because it was white.  And as its great wings swayed, it glistened like a light, in the dark forest.  When Smirre Fox saw this one, he mustered all his resources and jumped half-way up to the tree-canopy.  But the white one flew by unhurt like the rest.

Now it was quiet for a moment under the beeches.  It looked as if the whole wild-goose-flock had travelled past.

Suddenly Smirre remembered his prisoner and raised his eyes toward the young beech-tree.  And just as he might have expected—­the boy had disappeared.

But Smirre didn’t have much time to think about him; for now the first goose came back again from the lake and flew slowly under the canopy.  In spite of all his ill luck, Smirre was glad that she came back, and darted after her with a high leap.  But he had been in too much of a hurry, and hadn’t taken the time to calculate the distance, and he landed at one side of the goose.  Then there came still another goose; then a third; a fourth; a fifth; and so on, until the angle closed in with the old ice-gray one, and the big white one.  They all flew low and slow.  Just as they swayed in the vicinity of Smirre Fox, they sank down—­kind of inviting-like—­for him to take them.  Smirre ran after them and made leaps a couple of fathoms high—­but he couldn’t manage to get hold of a single one of them.