more than they?"
One night, a year after she had taken her last lesson from the Wizard, she
arose and returned to his cave, and he raised his eyes and saw her standing
before him as formerly.
"What do you want?" he said. "I have taught you all I know."
"You have taught me much," she said, falling on her knees beside him, "yet
I am ignorant of one thing--teach me that also--_how to be happy_.'
"Nay," said the Wizard with a very mournful smile; "I cannot teach you
that, for I do not know it myself. Go and ask it of them who know and are
wiser than I."
[Illustration: "Then the Princess left the cave and wandered down to the
sea-shore."--P. 178.]
Then the Princess left the cave and wandered down to the sea-shore. All
that night she spent sitting on a rock that jutted out into the sea,
watching the wild sky and the moon coming and going behind the clouds. The
sea dashed up around her, and the wind blew, but she did not fear them, and
when the sun rose the waters were still and the wind fell. A skylark rose
from the fields and flew straight up to heaven, singing as though his heart
would burst with pure joy.
"Surely that bird is happy," said the Princess to herself; and she called
it in its own tongue.
"Why do you sing?" she asked.
"I sing because I am so happy," answered the lark.
"And why are you so happy?" asked the Princess.
"So happy?" said the lark. "God is so good. The sky is so blue, and the
fields are so green. Is that not enough to make me happy?"
"Teach me, then, that I may be happy too," said Princess Fernanda.
"I cannot," said the lark; "I don't know how to teach;" and then he rose,
singing, into the blue overhead, and Princess Fernanda sighed and turned
back towards the palace.
Outside her door she met her little lap-dog, who barked and jumped for joy
on seeing her.
"Little dog," she said; "poor little dog, are you so glad to see me? Why
are you so happy?"
"Why am I so happy?" said the little dog, surprised. "I have plenty to eat,
and a soft cushion to rest upon, and you to caress me. Is not it enough to
make me happy?"
"It is not enough for me," said the Princess, sighing; but the little dog
only wagged his tail and licked her hand.
Inside her room was the Princess's favourite little maid Doris, folding up
her dresses.
"Doris," she said, "you look very merry. Why are you so happy?"
"Please your Royal Highness, I am going to the fair," answered Doris, "and
Luke is to meet me there; only," she added, pouting a little, "I wish I had
a pretty new hat to wear with my new dress."
"Then you are not perfectly happy, so you cannot teach me," said Princess
Fernanda, and then she sighed again.
In the evening at sunset she arose, and went out into the village, and at
the door of the first cottage to which she came, sat a woman nursing a
baby, and hushing it to sleep. The baby was fat and rosy, and the mother
looked down at it proudly.
The Princess stopped, and spoke to her.
"You have a fine little child there," she said. "Surely you must be very
happy."
The woman smiled.
"Yes," she said, "so I am; only just now my goodman is out fishing, and as
he's rather late, it makes me anxious."
"Then you could not teach me," said the Princess, sighing to herself as she
moved away. She wandered on till she came to a church, which she entered.
All was still within, for the church was empty; but before the altar, on a
splendid bier, lay the body of a young man, who had been killed in the war.
He was dressed in his gay uniform, and his breast was covered with medals,
and his sword lay beside him. He was shot through the heart, but his face
was peaceful and his lips were smiling. The Princess walked to his side,
and looked at the quiet face. Then she stooped and kissed the cold
forehead, and envied the soldier. "If he could speak," she said, "he surely
could teach me. No living mouth could ever smile like that." Then she
looked up and saw a white angel standing on the other side of the bier, and
she knew it was Death.
"You have taught him," she said, holding out her arms. "Will you not teach
me to smile like that?"
"Nay," said Death, pointing to the medals on the dead man's breast, "I
taught him whilst he was doing his duty. I cannot teach you." And so saying
he vanished from her sight.
She went out from the church down to the sea-shore. There was a high sea,
and a great wind, a little child had been playing on a row of rocks, and
had slipped off them into the water, and was struggling among the waves,
and would soon be drowned, for he was beyond his depth in the water.
When the Princess saw him, she plunged into the water and swam to where the
child was, and taking him in her arms, placed him safely on the rocks
again, but the waves were so strong that she could scarcely keep above
them. As she tried to seize the rocks, she saw Death coming over the water
towards her, and she turned to meet him gladly.
"Now," said he, clasping her in his arms, "I will teach you all you want to
know;" and he drew her under the water, and she died.
* * * * *
The Kings servants found her lying on the shore, with her face white and
her lips cold, but smiling as they had never smiled before, and her face
was very calm. They carried her home, and she was laid out in great state,
covered with gold and silver.
"She was so wise," sobbed her little maid, as she placed flowers in the
cold hand, "she knew everything."
"Not everything," said the skylark from the window; "for she asked me,
ignorant though I am, to teach her how to be happy."
"That was the one thing I could not teach her," said the old Wizard,
looking at the dead Princess's face. "Yet I think now she must be wiser
than I, and have learned that too. For see how she smiles."
[Illustration]
_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_.