The knight obeyed and as he touched the lady’s fingers, which were slender and pointed, he felt his heart warm within him, and he would gladly have kissed her.  But he only withdrew the ring.  As he forced it onto the end of his own little finger the lady said to him:  “Whenever you turn it round you will be changed to a falcon; for you must know....But woe to us!  There, where the water is lashed into foam, is the monster swimming towards us!”

She had hardly finished before a hideous creature drew itself out of the lake.  It looked as if it were covered with mouldering pumice-stone.  Two toads peeped from the cavities of the eyes, brown eel-grass hung dripping and disordered over its neck and forehead, and in place of teeth there were long iron spikes in its jaws which protruded and crossed one another over its lips.

“A fine wooer, indeed!” thought the squire.  “If the stone-clad fellow should not possess a vulnerable spot somewhere on his body I shall certainly lose my position!”

Similar thoughts passed through the knight’s mind, and consequently he did not attack it with his sword, but lifting a huge piece of granite from the ground he hurled it at the monster’s head.  The creature only sneezed, and passed its hand over its eyes as if to brush away a fly.  Then it looked round and, perceiving the knight, bellowed aloud, and changed itself into a dragon spouting fire.  Herr Wendelin rejoiced at this, for his favourite pastime was to kill that sort of beast.  He had no sooner, however, plunged his good sword into a soft part of the monster, and seen the blood flow from the wound, than his opponent changed itself into a griffin, and raising itself from the ground swooped upon him.  His defence now became more difficult, as the evil spirit continued to attack him in ever changing forms, but Sir Wendelin was no coward, and knew well how to use his arm and sword.  At length, however, the knight began to feel that his strength was deserting him; his sword seemed to grow heavier and heavier in his hand, and his legs felt as if an hundredweight had been attached to them.  His squire, noting his fatigue, grew faint, and began to think the best thing for him would be to ride off, for the fight was likely to end badly for his master.  The knight’s knees were trembling under him, and as the monster, in the form of a unicorn, charged against his shield he fell to the ground.

The creature shrank suddenly together and in the guise of a black, agile rat shot towards him.

Sir Wendelin felt that he was losing consciousness, he heard faintly a voice from the grotto where the lady was imprisoned calling to him:  “The ring, remember the ring!”