Good-day, good-day, the sheep are going so fast I cannot wait.' So on she tripped, singing and calling to her sheep, who came every now and then to rub their soft coats against her, as if they loved her.

The queen looked after her, and her face began to pucker up.
"'Why am I not a shepherdess ?' she exclaimed, bursting into tears.

'I _hate_ being a queen! I never sang as merrily as that little maiden in all my life.

I must and will be a shepherdess, and drive sheep up into the mountain, or I shall die!" "And all that night the foolish queen sat at her window crying, and when the morning came she had made herself look quite old and ugly.

When the king came to see her he was dreadfully troubled, and begged her to tell him what was the matter now.
"'I want to be a shepherdess, and drive sheep up into the mountains,' sobbed the queen.