Our Jack was still fast asleep when his eleven brothers set out on the finest horses to fetch their girls. Jack did not get up till noon, at which hour the king ordered out a coach and six, together with a couple of outriders, and thus addressed the lad: "Well, Jack, my boy, I have no objection, you can take your foal, but don't reproach me hereafter." Jack thereupon had plenty to eat and drink, and even took out a bucketful of wine to his foal and made it drink the whole. He then took his goods and chattels and sat in the coach, but the king would not allow the foal to run along with the coach, and said: "Not that way, if I know it; put the ugly creature up on the box! I should feel ashamed if anybody saw the ugly brute running alongside my coach." So the foal was tied up to the box, and they set off till they reached the outskirts of the town. By this time the foal, which was in a most uncomfortable position, presented a most pitiful sight; for by rubbing against the box the whole of one of its sides had become raw. So they stopped, and it was taken down and placed on the ground. Jack got out, and, the coach having set out for home, he sat on the foal's back, his feet touching the ground. The foal gazed round to see whether anybody was looking on, and, not seeing a soul, it flew up high into the air and thus addressed the lad: "Well, my dear master, at what speed shall we proceed? Shall we go like the hurricane or like a flash of thought?" "As quick as you can, my dear horse," was his reply.
They flew along for a while, when the foal again spoke, asking: "Is your hat tied on, my dear master?"
Again they flew along, and again the little foal said: "Well, my dear master, your hat that you have bought for your wedding is gone. You have lost it. We have left it some seven miles behind, but we will go back to fetch it; nobody has as yet picked it up." So they returned and picked up the hat, and the little foal again flew high up into the air. After proceeding for three hours they reached the inn where his brothers had decided to take up their night's lodgings. The other lads had started at dawn, he not till noon, after his midday meal, and still he left them behind. Having got within a short distance of the inn, the foal alighted on the ground with Jack, and addressed him in these words: "Well, my dear master, get off here and turn me out on to that heap of rubbish and weeds yonder, then walk into the inn and have plenty to eat and drink; your eleven younger brothers will also arrive here shortly." So Jack entered the inn, ordered a bottle of wine, made a hearty meal, and enjoyed himself heartily. He took out a bucketful of wine to his foal and gave it to drink; time passed on ... when, at last his brothers arrived. They were still at some distance when the youngest caught sight of the foal, and exclaimed: "Oh, look at that miserable screw! Surely it is our eldest brother's steed." "So it is! So it is!" exclaimed all the others, but at the same time they all stared at each other, and could not explain how it came to pass that, although they had started much earlier than their brother, they had been outdistanced by him, notwithstanding the fact that his animal could not be compared with their own horses. The brothers put their steeds into the stables and placed plenty of hay and corn before them, then they walked into the tap-room and found Jack already enjoying himself.