The next morning the King and Queen followed the little grains of
wheat and very easily found out where the Princess had been.
Then the soldier was seized and put into prison.
Oh, how dark and tiresome it was! But it was worse than that one day,
when they told him he was to be hanged, "hanged to-morrow," they told
him.
What a fright the soldier was in, and, worst of all, he had left his
tinder-box at the hotel.
Morning came! Through the narrow bars of his little window the soldier
could see the people all hurrying out of town. They were going to see
him hanged.
He heard the drums, he saw the soldiers marching along. He wished he
were marching with them. Alas, alas! that could never be now--
A little shoemaker's apprentice, with a leather apron, came running
along. He was in such a hurry that he lost one of his slippers. It
fell close under the soldier's window, as he sat peering out through
the narrow bars.
The soldier called to the boy, "There is no hurry, for I am still
here. Nothing will happen till I go. I will give you two-pence if you
will run to the house where I used to live and fetch me my tinder-box.
You must run all the way."
The shoemaker's boy thought he would like to earn twopence, and off he
raced to bring the tinder-box.
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