THERE was once an old woman who got up an hour before sunrise, mounted her horse and started for market with her panniers well filled with produce which she intended to sell. As she was going along a narrow roadway with a thick hedge on either side, she heard the baying of a pack of hounds. She looked over into the field in the direction of the sound and saw a hare making rapidly toward her. "That is what the hounds are chasing," said she. "Poor thing, I hope they won't catch it."

    She turned her horse close to the hedge and stopped to see what would happen. To her surprise, the hare came directly to where she was and leaped up to the top of the hedge. "Save me," it said, speaking just as if it had been a human being. "Please hide me away from those dreadful hounds."

"I don't know who or what you are," responded the woman, "but I will do the best I can for you."

So she put forth her hand, picked up the hare and dropped it into one of her panniers. Then she let her cloak fall over it so that it was completely hidden, and rode on. She had scarcely left the spot when the hounds arrived and scattered about in all directions sniffing the ground and trying to pick up the lost trail. A few moments later a man came galloping into the midst of the hounds, and when he noted their trouble he called after the woman, who was still within earshot, to know if she could tell him which way the hare had gone.

"I saw the hare cross the field whence your dogs came," she replied, "but I have not seen it cross the road."

"I wish you had watched more closely," said the huntsman. "I would give you all the gold you could hold in your two hands, if you could put me in the way of catching that hare."

"I would much like such a sum of money as he offers me," thought the woman, "but I have given my promise to the hare, and that ends the matter."

So she called back, "I can't earn your money by telling you whither the hare went, and I must jog on to market."

When she was well beyond the view of the man with the hounds she heard the hare stirring in the pannier. She lifted her cloak and said, "You are now safe and can go your way."

The hare sprang lightly to the ground, and, as it did so, it changed to a beautiful lady dressed all in white. "Good dame," said she, "I admire your courage and your ready wit. You have rescued me from great suffering. The hunter who pursued me was a wicked magician. By his art he has kept me in the form of a hare for a whole year, and he hoped to destroy me, but now the time is up and I am myself again. As a reward for your kindness, I promise that your hens shall each lay two eggs every day, and that your cows shall yield a double quantity of milk, and that you shall prosper in all you undertake."

So saying, the lady in white turned and walked away by a field path. The woman on the horse never saw her afterward. At market that morning the woman had the best of luck with her traffic, and when she got home in the evening she found that her hens had laid two eggs apiece, and when she milked the cows they gave twice as much milk as usual. It was the same always afterward, and everything went well with her to the end of her days.