But he only withdrew the ring.

As he forced it onto the end of his own little finger the lady said to him: "Whenever you turn it round you will be changed to a falcon; for you must know....
But woe to us! There, where the water is lashed into foam, is the monster swimming towards us!" She had hardly finished before a hideous creature drew itself out of the lake.

It looked as if it were covered with mouldering pumice-stone.
Two toads peeped from the cavities of the eyes, brown eel-grass hung dripping and disordered over its neck and forehead, and in place of teeth there were long iron spikes in its jaws which protruded and crossed one another over its lips.
"A fine wooer, indeed!" thought the squire.

"If the stone-clad fellow should not possess a vulnerable spot somewhere on his body I shall certainly lose my position!" Similar thoughts passed through the knight's mind, and consequently he did not attack it with his sword, but lifting a huge piece of granite from the ground he hurled it at the monster's head.

The creature only sneezed, and passed its hand over its eyes as if to brush away a fly.
Then it looked round and, perceiving the knight, bellowed aloud, and changed itself into a dragon spouting fire.