Grimms' Fairy Tales

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conducted his troop by byways back to the forest, and called forth Iron
Hans. 'What do you desire?' asked the wild man. 'Take back your horse
and your troops, and give me my three-legged horse again.' All that he
asked was done, and soon he was riding on his three-legged horse. When
the king returned to his palace, his daughter went to meet him, and
wished him joy of his victory. 'I am not the one who carried away the
victory,' said he, 'but a strange knight who came to my assistance with
his soldiers.' The daughter wanted to hear who the strange knight was,
but the king did not know, and said: 'He followed the enemy, and I did
not see him again.' She inquired of the gardener where his boy was, but
he smiled, and said: 'He has just come home on his three-legged horse,
and the others have been mocking him, and crying: "Here comes our
hobblety jib back again!" They asked, too: "Under what hedge have you
been lying sleeping all the time?" So he said: "I did the best of all,
and it would have gone badly without me." And then he was still more
ridiculed.'