Though thus deprived of his useful auxiliary,
the idler was not aroused from his love of ease.
The work formerly done by his brother he now
divided among several hands, engaging a
cowherd for his oxen, a " horseherd" for his horses,
a shepherd for his sheep, and a " bee-ward" for
his bees, and adhered to his lordly plan of doing
nothing. The active youth, on the other hand,
was as active as ever, and if the tale had been
pointed with an ordinary moral, he would have
attained enormous affluence, while his brother,
pillaged by his staff of officials, would have
sunk to beggary.

The reverse was the case, and in spite of all
the Hogarths of Servia, Idleness throve
handsomely, while Industry was even without a shoe
to his foot. When he had lost everything in
the world, the active lad wished to pay a visit
to his brother, and see how he was getting on.
His road took him across a meadow, where
there was a fine flock of sheep, tended by a
beautiful girl, who was spinning a golden
thread, and who informed him, when he
accosted her, that she was his brother's " luck,"
and that the sheep were his brother's property.

"Where," said the ragged wayfarer, " is
my luck?"

"A long way off," said the girl; and he felt
no reason to doubt the correctness of her
information.

Pursuing his journey, he reached the
residence of his brother, who being as kind-hearted
as he was lazy, received him with open arms,
feasted him for several days, and would not let
him depart without a pair of new shoes to his
feet, and money in his pocket.

When he had returned home the justly
discontented operative began to reflect that things
in this world were very oddly managed, and that
as the neighbourhood of " luck" was such an
advantage, his own luck was worth seeking.
So he clapped a knapsack with some bread upon
his shoulders, took a staff in his hand, and
resolved that he would find his distant, and yet
unknown helpmate. It was something to have
learned that he had a luck, however far off she,
he, or it might be.

Proceeding in no determined direction, he
came, after a while, to a dense wood, in the
depth of which he found an old hag, fast asleep.
To awaken her he laid his stick pretty smartly
about her shoulders, and this primitive
expedient, after several trials, proved successful.
The old crone opened her eyes with great difficulty,
and peevishly informed him that, far from
awaking her, he ought to have regarded it as a
great blessing that she was asleep. Had it not
been for her little doze he would never have got
his new shoes.

"Who are you, who, by the mere opening and
shutting of your eyes, settle whether I am to
have shoes or not?" asked the astonished
wanderer.

"I," replied the hag, "am your luck."

"You!" exclaimed the youth, with grief in
his accents, for he began to suspect that the
trouble of his journey had been as ill repaid as
all his other toils; "and pray who appointed
you to be my luck?"

"Fate," answered the old woman.

"Very well—and where is Fate?"

"Find out," was the uncivil and unsatisfactory
reply; and the hag vanished.

The object of the man, whom we shall henceforth
call the Pilgrim, was now changed. He
had found his luck, and a very bad luck she was,
and now he was determined to discover Fate.
Continuing his journey, he came to a village,
where the most conspicuous object was a handsome
house, in which so large a fire was blazing
that he thought a wedding or some other high
festivity was in preparation. When he entered
there was every appearance of comfort and
prosperity. An enormous kettle, containing
the evening meal, was hanging over the fire,
and the master of the house, who was seated in
the corner, requested him in a friendly voice to
sit down and give an account of himself. He
told his story, and then asked the master for
what large party so vast a supper was preparing,
whereupon his host heaved a melancholy sigh,
and thus replied:

"Brother in misfortune—for such I perceive
you are—the copious meal to which you refer is
the ordinary supper of my own family. I am
very wealthy, and my family is not very numerous,
but such is their general rapacity that
every member of it has a dragon in his stomach
that obstinately refuses to be satisfied. Only
stop this night with me, and your own eyes will
show you what a troop of wolves I maintain in
my household."

The Pilgrim accepted the invitation, and when
the family sat down to table, was shocked at the
spectacle of greediness presented to his eyes.
Not only was the kettle completely empty in a
few moments, but the gluttons seemed inclined
to tear the morsels from each other's mouths.
When the last particle of flesh was devoured,
the daughter, whose turn it was to superintend
the household, collected the dry bones and flung
them behind the stove. No sooner had she
done so, than two aged, wretched, dirty beings
crawled from an obscure nook, and began gnawing
the bones as eagerly as the others had
devoured the meat.

"Pray who are those behind the stove?" asked
the Pilgrim of his host, who again heaved a
heavy sigh.

"Those," said he, are my father and mother,
who, old as they are, seem destined never to
die. So firmly are they riveted to the surface
of the earth, that all the power of time is
insufficient to remove them."'

On the following morning the Pilgrim took
leave of his host, who, with tears in his eyes,
said, " Brother in misfortune, you see the extent
of my misery. I have a young family who can't
eat enough to satisfy their outrageous hunger,
and I have an old father and mother who won't
die. You say you are in search of Fate. If you
are happy enough to find it, will you be kind
enough to ask it why I am thus hardly used?"

The Pilgrim promised that if his journey was