“Look,” said the musician, “if thou wilt learn to fiddle, put thy fore paws into this crevice.” The wolf obeyed, but the musician quickly picked up a stone and with one blow wedged his two paws so fast that he was forced to stay there like a prisoner. “Stay there until I come back again,” said the musician, and went his way.

After a while he again said to himself, “Time is beginning to pass heavily with me here in the forest, I will fetch hither another companion,” and took his fiddle and again played in the forest. It was not long before a fox came creeping through the trees towards him. “Ah, there’s a fox coming!” said the musician. “I have no desire for him.”

The fox came up to him and said, “Oh, dear musician, how beautifully thou dost play! I should like to learn that too.”

“That is soon learnt,” said the musician. “Thou hast only to do everything that I bid thee.”

“Oh, musician,” then said the fox, “I will obey thee as a scholar obeys his master.”