The lad asked about the youngest princess, whether she was to be married.  The servant said she would have no one, but wept continually, and no one could find out the reason for her sorrow.  Then the lad was glad, for he well knew that his love was faithful and true to him.

He went up into the guard-room, and sent a message to the king that a guest had come who prayed that he might add to the wedding mirth by exhibiting his dogs.  The king was pleased, and ordered that the stranger should be well received.  When the lad came into the hall, the wedding guests much admired his smartness and his manly form, and they all thought they had never before seen so brave a young man.  When the three princesses saw him they knew him at once, rose from the table, and ran into his arms.  Then the princes thought they had better not stay there, for the princesses told how the lad had saved them, and how all had befallen.  As a proof of the truth of what they said, they showed their rings in the lad’s hair.

When the king knew how the two foreign princes had acted so treacherously and basely he was much enraged, and ordered that they should be driven off his demesnes with disgrace.

The brave youth was welcomed with great honour, as, indeed, he deserved, and he was, the same day, married to the youngest princess.  When the king died, the youth was chosen ruler over the land, and made a brave king.  There he yet lives with his beautiful queen, and there he governs prosperously to this day.

I know no more about him.

THE LEGEND OF THORGUNNA.

A ship from Iceland chanced to winter in a haven near Helgafels.  Among the passengers was a woman named Thorgunna, a native of the Hebrides, who was reported by the sailors to possess garments and household furniture of a fashion far surpassing those used in Iceland.  Thurida, sister of the pontiff Snorro, and wife of Thorodd, a woman of a vain and covetous disposition, attracted by these reports, made a visit to the stranger, but could not prevail upon her to display her treasures.  Persisting, however, in her inquiries, she pressed Thorgunna to take up her abode at the house of Thorodd.  The Hebridean reluctantly assented, but added, that as she could labour at every usual kind of domestic industry, she trusted in that manner to discharge the obligation she might lie under to the family, without giving any part of her property in recompense of her lodging.  As Thurida continued to urge her request, Thorgunna accompanied her to Froda, the house of Thorodd, where the seamen deposited a huge chest and cabinet, containing the property of her new guest, which Thurida viewed with curious and covetous eyes.  So soon as they had pointed out to Thorgunna the place assigned for her bed, she opened the chest, and took forth such an embroidered bed coverlid, and such a splendid and complete set of tapestry hangings, and bed furniture of English linen, interwoven with silk, as had never been seen in Iceland.