At last, after a long time, the sixty huntsmen returned, laden down with huge bags, the contents of which they piled up in a great heap in the middle of the courtyard. A mountain of birds! Such a thing had never been seen before. The mountain was so high that everybody thought the full number of birds must be there; and the Chief Cook began to make his preparations, and sent to borrow the garden roller from John the gardener, as his own was not big enough to roll out such a quantity of paste. The King and the Wise Men next proceeded to count the birds. But alas! what was their sorrow to find that the number fell short by one! They counted again and again; but it was of no use: there were only nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-eight birds in the pile. The next thing was to find out what bird was missing. So the Wise Men sorted all the birds, and compared them with the pictures in the books, and studied so hard that they wore out three pairs of spectacles apiece; and at last they discovered that the missing bird was the “Golden-breasted Kootoo.” The chief Wise Man read aloud from the biggest book:— “The Golden-breasted Kootoo, the most beautiful and the most melodious of singing birds, is found only in secluded parts of the Vale of Coringo. Its plumage is of a brilliant golden yellow, except on the back, where it is streaked with green. Its beak is—” “There! there!” interrupted the King impatiently; “never mind about its beak. Tell the Lord Chamberlain to pack my best wig and a clean shirt, and send them after me by a courier; and, Chief Huntsman, follow me. We start this moment for the Vale of Coringo!” And actually, if you will believe it, the King _did_ start off in less than an hour from the counting of the birds. He rode on horseback, and was accompanied only by the Chief Huntsman and the jews-harp band, the courier being obliged to wait for the King’s best wig to be curled. [Illustration: “He rode on horseback, and was accompanied only by the Chief Huntsman and the jews-harp band.”] The poor Band had a hard time of it; for he had a very frisky horse, and found it extremely difficult to manage the beast with one hand and hold the jews-harp with the other; but the King, with much ingenuity, fastened the head of the horse to the tail of his own steady cob, thereby enabling the musician to give all his attention to his instrument. The music was a trifle jerky at times; but what of that? It was music, and the King was satisfied. They rode night and day, and at length arrived at the Vale of Coringo, and took lodgings at the principal hotel. The King was very weary, as he had been riding for a week without stopping. So he went to bed at once, and slept for two whole days.