believed that it would have been the herd's greatest joy and pride that the king's son should take his daughter to wife,—and here he was asking what trade the prince understood! The king sent a second councillor; but the cattle-herd made him the same answer:—
"So long as the king's son has not learnt a handicraft, and cannot bring to me some of his own work as a proof of his knowledge, he and I can never become closer friends."
When this councillor also returned and informed the king that the cattle-herd was not willing to give his daughter to the prince until he had learnt some handicraft, however simple it might be, the prince went himself forth to find out among the different workshops what trade would be the easiest to learn. As he went from shop to shop, and saw what the various masters worked at, he came upon one where work-people were busy plaiting rush-mats; and as that appeared to him to be the lightest of all handicrafts, he set about to learn it at once. And when in a few days he had learnt to work he plaited a rush-mat all by himself, which a messenger took to the cattle-herd and explained that the prince had already learnt a handicraft, and that the rush-mat was a piece of his own work.
The cattle-herd took the mat in his hand, and looking at it on all sides, demanded,—
