the drawing; and the Court and King and Queen, and above all poor
Giglio, admired the picture of all things, and said, “Was there ever a
genius like Angelica?” So, I am sorry to say, was it with the Princess’s
embroidery and other accomplishments; and Angelica actually believed
that she did these things herself, and received all the flattery of the
Court as if every word of it was true. Thus she began to think that
there was no young woman in all the world equal to herself, and that no
young man was good enough for her. As for Betsinda, as she heard none of
these praises, she was not puffed up by them, and being a most grateful,
good-natured girl, she was only too anxious to do everything which might
give her mistress pleasure. Now you begin to perceive that Angelica had
faults of her own, and was by no means such a wonder of wonders as people
represented Her Royal Highness to be.
VI
HOW PRINCE GIGLIO BEHAVED HIMSELF
[Illustration]
And now let us speak about Prince Giglio, the nephew of the reigning
monarch of Paflagonia. It has already been stated, in page 398, that as
long as he had a smart coat to wear, a good horse to ride, and money
in his pocket, or rather to take out of his pocket, for he was very
good-natured, my young Prince did not care for the loss of his crown
and scepter, being a thoughtless youth, not much inclined to politics
or any kind of learning. So his tutor had a sinecure. Giglio would not
learn classics or mathematics, and the Lord Chancellor of Paflagonia,
Squaretoso, pulled a very long face because the Prince could not be
got to study the Paflagonian laws and constitution; but, on the other
hand, the King’s gamekeepers and huntsmen found the Prince an apt pupil;
the dancing-master pronounced that he was a most elegant and assiduous
scholar; the First Lord of the Billiard Table gave the most flattering
reports of the Prince’s skill; so did the Groom of the Tennis Court; and
as for the Captain of the Guard and Fencing Master, the _valiant_ and
_veteran_ Count Kutasoff Hedzoff, he avowed that since he ran the General
of Crim Tartary, the dreadful Grumbuskin, through the body, he never had
encountered so expert a swordsman as Prince Giglio.
[Illustration]
I hope you do not imagine that there was any impropriety in the Prince
and Princess walking together in the palace garden, and because Giglio
kissed Angelica’s hand in a polite manner. In the first place they are
cousins; next, the Queen is walking in the garden too (you cannot see
her, for she happens to be behind that tree), and Her Majesty always
wished that Angelica and Giglio should marry; so did Giglio: so did
Angelica sometimes, for she thought her cousin very handsome, brave,
and good-natured: but then you know she was so clever and knew so many
things, and poor Giglio knew nothing, and had no conversation. When they
looked at the stars, what did Giglio know of the heavenly bodies? Once,
when on a sweet night in a balcony where they were standing, Angelica
said, “There is the Bear.” “Where?” says Giglio. “Don’t be afraid,
Angelica! if a dozen bears come, I will kill them rather than they shall
hurt you.” “Oh, you silly creature!” says she; “you are very good, but
you are not very wise.” When they looked at the flowers, Giglio was
utterly unacquainted with botany, and had never heard of Linnæus. When
the butterflies passed, Giglio knew nothing about them, being as ignorant
of entomology as I am of algebra. So you see, Angelica, though she liked
Giglio pretty well, despised him on account of his ignorance. I think she
probably valued _her own learning_ rather too much; but to think too well
of one’s self is the fault of people of all ages and both sexes. Finally,
when nobody else was there, Angelica liked her cousin well enough.
[Illustration]
King Valoroso was very delicate in health, and withal so fond of good
dinners (which were prepared for him by his French cook Marmitonio),
that is was supposed he could not live long. Now the idea of anything
happening to the King struck the artful Prime Minister and the designing
old lady-in-waiting with terror. For, thought Glumboso and the Countess,
“when Prince Giglio marries his cousin and comes to the throne, what a
pretty position we shall be in, whom he dislikes, and who have always
been unkind to him. We shall lose our places in a trice; Gruffanuff
will have to give up all the jewels, laces, snuffboxes, rings, and
watches which belonged to the Queen, Giglio’s mother, and Glumboso will
be forced to refund two hundred and seventeen thousand millions nine
hundred and eighty-seven thousand four hundred and thirty-nine pounds,
thirteen shillings, and sixpence halfpenny, money left to Prince Giglio
by his poor dear father.” So the Lady of Honor and the Prime Minister
hated Giglio because they had done him a wrong; and these unprincipled
people invented a hundred cruel stories about poor Giglio, in order
to influence the King, Queen, and Princess against him; how he was so
ignorant that he could not spell the commonest words, and actually wrote
Valoroso Valloroso, and spelt Angelica with two I’s; how he drank a
great deal too much wine at dinner, and was always idling in the stables
with the grooms; how he owed ever so much money at the pastrycook’s and
haberdasher’s; how he used to go to sleep at church; how he was fond of
playing cards with the pages. So did the Queen like playing cards; so
did the King go to sleep at church, and eat and drink too much; and, if
Giglio owed a trifle for tarts, who owed him two hundred and seventeen
thousand millions nine hundred and eighty-seven thousand four hundred and
thirty-nine pounds, thirteen shillings, and sixpence halfpenny, I should
like to know? Detractors and tale-bearers (in my humble opinion) had much
better look at home. All this backbiting and slandering had effect upon
Princess Angelica, who began to look coldly on her cousin, then to laugh
at him and scorn him for being so stupid, then to sneer at him for having
vulgar associates; and at Court balls, dinners, and so forth, to treat
him so unkindly that poor Giglio became quite ill, took to his bed, and
sent for the doctor.
His Majesty King Valoroso, as we have seen, had his own reasons for
disliking his nephew; and as for those innocent readers who ask why?—I
beg (with the permission of their dear parents) to refer them to
Shakespeare’s pages, where they will read why King John disliked Prince
Arthur. With the Queen, his royal but weak-minded aunt, when Giglio was
out of sight he was out of mind. While she had her whist and her evening
parties, she cared for little else.
I dare say _two villains_, who shall be nameless, wished Doctor
Pildrafto, the Court Physician, had killed Giglio right out, but he only
bled and physicked him so severely that the Prince was kept to his room
for several months, and grew as thin as a post.
Whilst he was lying sick in this way, there came to the Court of
Paflagonia a famous painter, whose name was Tomaso Lorenzo, and who was
Painter in Ordinary to the King of Crim Tartary, Paflagonia’s neighbor.
Tomaso Lorenzo painted all the Court, who were delighted with his works;
for even Countess Gruffanuff looked young and Glumboso good-humored in
his pictures. “He flatters very much,” some people said. “Nay!” says
Princess Angelica, “I am above flattery, and I think he did not make my
picture handsome enough. I can’t bear to hear a man of genius unjustly
cried down, and I hope my dear papa will make Lorenzo a knight of his
Order of the Cucumber.”
The Princess Angelica, although the courtiers vowed Her Royal Highness
could draw so _beautifully_ that the idea of her taking lessons was
absurd, yet chose to have Lorenzo for a teacher, and it was wonderful,
_as long as she painted in his studio_, what beautiful pictures she
made! Some of the performances were engraved for the Book of Beauty;
others were sold for enormous sums at Charity Bazaars. She wrote the
_signatures_ under the drawings, no doubt, but I think I know who did
the pictures—this artful painter, who had come with other designs on
Angelica than merely to teach her to draw.
One day, Lorenzo showed the Princess a portrait of a young man in armor,
with fair hair and the loveliest blue eyes, and an expression at once
melancholy and interesting.
“Dear Signor Lorenzo, who is this?” asked the Princess.
“I never saw any one so handsome,” says Countess Gruffanuff (the old
humbug).
“That,” said the painter, “that, madam, is the portrait of my august
young master, His Royal Highness Bulbo, Crown Prince of Crim Tartary,
Duke of Acroceraunia, Marquis of Poluphloisboio, and Knight Grand Cross
of the Order of the Pumpkin. That is the Order of the Pumpkin glittering
on his manly breast, and received by His Royal Highness from his august
father, His Majesty King Padella I., for his gallantry at the battle
of Rimbombamento, when he slew with his own princely hand the King of
Ograria and two hundred and eleven giants of the two hundred and eighteen
who formed the King’s bodyguard. The remainder were destroyed by the
brave Crim Tartar army after an obstinate combat, in which the Crim
Tartars suffered severely.”
[Illustration]
What a Prince! thought Angelica: so brave—so calm-looking—so young—what a
hero!
“He is as accomplished as he is brave,” continued the Court Painter.
“He knows all languages perfectly: sings deliciously: plays every
instrument: composes operas which have been acted a thousand nights
running at the Imperial Theatre of Crim Tartary, and danced in a ballet
there before the King and Queen; in which he looked so beautiful, that
his cousin, the lovely daughter of the King of Circassia, died for love
of him.”
“Why did he not marry the poor Princess?” asked Angelica, with a sigh.
“Because they were _first cousins_, madam, and the clergy forbid these
unions,” said the Painter.
“And, besides, the young Prince had given his royal heart _elsewhere_.”
“And to whom?” asked Her Royal Highness.
“I am not at liberty to mention the Princess’s name,” answered the
Painter.
“But you may tell me the first letter of it,” gasped out the Princess.
“That your Royal Highness is at liberty to guess,” says Lorenzo.
“Does it begin with a Z?” asked Angelica.
The Painter said it wasn’t a Z; then she tried a Y; then an X; then a W,
and went so backwards through almost the whole alphabet.
When she came to D, and it wasn’t D, she grew very much excited; when she
came to C, and it wasn’t C, she was still more nervous; when she came
to B, _and it wasn’t B_, “O dearest Gruffanuff,” she said, “lend me your
smelling-bottle!” and, hiding her head in the Countess’s shoulder, she
faintly whispered, “Ah, Signor, can it be A?”
“It was A; and though I may not, by my Royal Master’s orders, tell your
Royal Highness the Princess’s name, whom he fondly, madly, devotedly,
rapturously loves, I may show you her portrait,” says this slyboots: and
leading the Princess up to a gilt frame, he drew a curtain which was
before it.
O goodness! the frame contained a LOOKING-GLASS! and Angelica saw her own
face!
VII
HOW GIGLIO AND ANGELICA HAD A QUARREL
The Court Painter of His Majesty the King of Crim Tartary returned to
that monarch’s dominions, carrying away a number of sketches which he had
made in the Paflagonian capital (you know, of course, my dears, that the
name of that capital is Blombodinga); but the most charming of all his
pieces was a portrait of the Princess Angelica, which all the Crim Tartar
nobles came to see. With this work the King was so delighted, that he
decorated the Painter with his Order of the Pumpkin (sixth class), and
the artist became Sir Tomaso Lorenzo, K. P., thenceforth.
King Valoroso also sent Sir Tomaso his Order of the Cucumber, besides a
handsome order for money, for he painted the King, Queen, and principal
nobility while at Blombodinga, and became all the fashion, to the perfect
rage of all the artists in Paflagonia, where the King used to point to
the portrait of Prince Bulbo, which Sir Tomaso had left behind him, and
say, “Which among you can paint a picture like that?”
It hung in the royal parlor over the royal sideboard, and Princess
Angelica could always look at it as she sat making the tea. Each day it
seemed to grow handsomer and handsomer, and the Princess grew so fond
of looking at it, that she would often spill the tea over the cloth, at
which her father and mother would wink and wag their heads, and say to
each other, “Aha! we see how things are going.”
In the meanwhile poor Giglio lay upstairs very sick in his chamber,
though he took all the doctor’s horrible medicines like a good young
lad; as I hope _you_ do, my dears, when you are ill and mamma sends
for the medical man. And the only person who visited Giglio (besides
his friend the captain of the guard, who was almost always busy or on
parade), was little Betsinda the housemaid, who used to do his bedroom
and sitting-room out, bring him his gruel, and warm his bed.
When the little housemaid came to him in the morning and evening, Prince
Giglio used to say, “Betsinda, Betsinda, how is the Princess Angelica?”
And Betsinda used to answer, “The Princess is very well, thank you, my
Lord.” And Giglio would heave a sigh, and think, if Angelica were sick,
I am sure _I_ should not be very well.
Then Giglio would say, “Betsinda, has the Princess Angelica asked for me
to-day?” And Betsinda would answer, “No, my Lord, not to-day”; or, “She
was very busy practising the piano when I saw her”; or, “She was writing
invitations for an evening party, and did not speak to me”; or make some
excuse or other, not strictly consonant with truth; for Betsinda was such
a good-natured creature, that she strove to do everything to prevent
annoyance to Prince Giglio, and even brought him up roast chicken and
jellies from the kitchen (when the Doctor allowed them, and Giglio was
getting better), saying, “that the Princess had made the jelly, or the
bread-sauce, with her own hands, on purpose for Giglio.”
When Giglio heard this he took heart and began to mend immediately; and
gobbled up the jelly, and picked the last bone of the chicken-drumsticks,
merry-thought, sides’-bones, back, pope’s nose, and all—thanking his
dear Angelica; and he felt so much better the next day, that he dressed
and went downstairs, where, whom should he meet but Angelica going into
the drawing-room! All the covers were off the chairs, the chandeliers
taken out of the bags, the damask curtains uncovered, the work and things
carried away, and the handsomest albums on the table. Angelica had her
hair in papers: in a word, it was evident there was going to be a party.
“Heavens, Giglio!” cries Angelica: “_you_ here in such a dress! What a
figure you are!”
“Yes, dear Angelica, I am come downstairs, and feel so well to-day,
thanks to the _fowl_ and the _jelly_.”
“What do I know about fowls and jellies, that you allude to them in that
rude way?” says Angelica.
“Why, didn’t—didn’t you send them, Angelica dear?” says Giglio.
“I send them indeed! Angelica dear! No, Giglio dear,” says she, mocking
him, “_I_ was engaged in getting the rooms ready for His Royal Highness
the Prince of Crim Tartary, who is coming to pay my papa’s Court a visit.”
“The—Prince—of—Crim—Tartary!” Giglio said, aghast.
“Yes, the Prince of Crim Tartary,” says Angelica, mocking him. “I dare
say you never heard of such a country. What _did_ you ever hear of? You
don’t know whether Crim Tartary is on the Red Sea or on the Black Sea, I
dare say.”
“Yes, I do, it’s on the Red Sea,” says Giglio, at which the Princess
burst out laughing at him, and said, “Oh, you ninny! You are so ignorant,
you are really not fit for society! You know nothing but about horses
and dogs, and are only fit to dine in a mess-room with my Royal father’s
heaviest dragoons. Don’t look so surprised at me, sir: go and put your
best clothes on to receive the Prince, and let me get the drawing-room
ready.”
Giglio said, “Oh, Angelica, I didn’t think this of you. _This_ wasn’t
your language to me when you gave me this ring, and I gave you mine in
the garden, and you gave me that k—”
But what k was we never shall know, for Angelica, in a rage, cried,
“Get out, you saucy, rude creature! How dare you to remind me of your
rudeness? As for your little trumpery twopenny ring, there, sir, there!”
And she flung it out of the window.
“It was my mother’s marriage-ring,” cried Giglio.
“_I_ don’t care whose marriage-ring it was,” cries Angelica. “Marry the
person who picks it up if she’s a woman; you shan’t marry _me_. And give
me back _my_ ring. I’ve no patience with people who boast about the
things they give away. _I_ know who’ll give me much finer things than you
ever gave me. A beggarly ring indeed, not worth five shillings!”
Now Angelica little knew that the ring which Giglio had given her was a
fairy ring: if a man wore it, it made all the women in love with him;
if a woman, all the gentlemen. The Queen, Giglio’s mother, quite an
ordinary-looking person, was admired immensely whilst she wore this ring,
and her husband was frantic when she was ill. But when she called her
little Giglio to her, and put the ring on his finger, King Savio did not
seem to care for his wife so much any more, but transferred all his love
to little Giglio.
So did everybody love him as long as he had the ring; but when, as quite
a child, he gave it to Angelica people began to love and admire _her_;
and Giglio, as the saying is, played only second fiddle.
“Yes,” says Angelica, going on in her foolish ungrateful way. “_I_
know who’ll give me much finer things than your beggarly little pearl
nonsense.” “Very good, miss! You may take back your ring too!” says
Giglio, his eyes flashing fire at her and then, as if his eyes had been
suddenly opened, he cried out, “Ha! what does this mean? Is _this_ the
woman I have been in love with all my life? Have I been such a ninny as
to throw away my regard upon _you_? Why—actually—yes—you are a little
crooked!”
“Oh, you wretch!” cries Angelica.
“And, upon my conscience, you—you squint a little.”
“Eh!” cries Angelica.
“And your hair is red—and you are marked with the smallpox—and what? you
have three false teeth—and one leg shorter than the other!”
“You brute, you brute, you!” Angelica screamed out; and as she seized the
ring with one hand, she dealt Giglio one, two, three smacks on the face,
and would have pulled the hair off his head had he not started laughing,
and crying—
“Oh dear me, Angelica, don’t pull out _my_ hair, it hurts! You might
remove a great deal of _your own_, as I perceive, without scissors or
pulling at all. Oh, ho, ho! ha, ha, ha! he, he, he!”
And he nearly choked himself with laughing, and she with rage; when, with
a low bow, and dressed in his Court habit, Count Gambabella, the first
lord-in-waiting, entered and said, “Royal Highnesses! Their Majesties
expect you in the Pink Throne-room, where they await the arrival of the
Prince of Crim Tartary.”
VIII
HOW GRUFFANUFF PICKED THE FAIRY RING UP, AND PRINCE BULBO CAME TO COURT
Prince Bulbo’s arrival had set all the Court in a flutter: everybody
was ordered to put his or her best clothes on: the footmen had their
gala liveries; the Lord Chancellor his new wig; the Guards their last
new tunics; and Countess Gruffanuff, you may be sure, was glad of an
opportunity of decorating _her_ old person with her finest things. She
was walking through the court of the Palace on her way to wait upon their
Majesties, when she spied something glittering on the pavement, and bade
the boy in buttons who was holding up her train, to go and pick up the
article shining yonder. He was an ugly little wretch, in some of the late
groom-porter’s old clothes cut down, and much too tight for him; and yet,
when he had taken up the ring (as it turned out to be), and was carrying
it to his mistress, she thought he looked like a little Cupid. He gave
the ring to her; it was a trumpery little thing enough, but too small for
any of her old knuckles, so she put it into her pocket.
“Oh, mum!” says the boy, looking at her, “how—how beyoutiful you do look,
mum, to-day, mum!”
“And you, too, Jacky,” she was going to say; but, looking down at him—no,
he was no longer good-looking at all—but only the carroty-haired little
Jacky of the morning. However, praise is welcome from the ugliest of men
or boys, and Gruffanuff, bidding the boy hold up her train, walked on in
high good-humor. The guards saluted her with peculiar respect. Captain
Hedzoff, in the ante-room, said, “My dear madam, you look like an angel
to-day.” And so, bowing and smirking, Gruffanuff went in and took her
place behind her Royal Master and Mistress, who were in the throne-room,
awaiting the Prince of Crim Tartary. Princess Angelica sat at their feet,
and behind the King’s chair stood Prince Giglio, looking very savage.
The Prince of Crim Tartary made his appearance, attended by Baron
Sleibootz, his chamberlain, and followed by a black page carrying the
most beautiful crown you ever saw! He was dressed in his travelling
costume, and his hair, as you see, was a little in disorder. “I have
ridden three hundred miles since breakfast,” said he, “so eager was I to
behold the Prin—the Court and august family of Paflagonia, and I could
not wait one minute before appearing in your Majesties’ presences.”
Giglio, from behind the throne, burst out into a roar of contemptuous
laughter; but all the Royal party, in fact, were so flurried, that they
did not hear this little outbreak. “Your R. H. is welcome in any dress,”
says the King. “Glumboso, a chair for His Royal Highness.”
“Any dress His Royal Highness wears _is_ a Court dress,” says Princess
Angelica, smiling graciously.
“Ah! but you should see my other clothes,” said the Prince. “I should
have had them on, but that stupid carrier has not brought them. Who’s
that laughing?”
It was Giglio laughing. “I was laughing,” he said, “because you said
just now that you were in such a hurry to see the Princess, that you
could not wait to change your dress; and now you say you come in those
clothes because you have no others.”
“And who are you?” says Prince Bulbo, very fiercely.
“My father was King of this country, and I am his only son, Prince!”
replies Giglio, with equal haughtiness.
“Ha!” said the King and Glumboso, looking very flurried; but the former,
collecting himself, said, “Dear Prince Bulbo, I forgot to introduce to
your Royal Highness my dear nephew, His Royal Highness Prince Giglio!
Know each other! Embrace each other! Giglio, give His Royal Highness your
hand!” and Giglio, giving his hand, squeezed poor Bulbo’s until the tears
ran out of his eyes. Glumboso now brought a chair for the royal visitor,
and placed it on the platform on which the King, Queen, and Prince were
seated; but the chair was on the edge of the platform, and as Bulbo
sat down, it toppled over, and he with it, rolling over and over, and
bellowing like a bull. Giglio roared still louder at this disaster, but
it was with laughter; so did all the Court when Prince Bulbo got up; for
though when he entered the room he appeared not very ridiculous, as he
stood up from his fall for a moment he looked so exceedingly plain and
foolish, that nobody could help laughing at him. When he had entered the
room, he was observed to carry a rose in his hand, which fell out of it
as he tumbled.
“My rose! my rose!” cried Bulbo; and his chamberlain dashed forwards and
picked it up; and gave it to the Prince, who put it in his waistcoat.
Then people wondered why they had laughed; there was nothing particularly
ridiculous in him. He was rather short, rather stout, rather red-haired,
but, in fine, for a Prince, not so bad.
So they sat and talked, the royal personages together, the Crim Tartar
officers with those of Paflagonia—Giglio very comfortable with Gruffanuff
behind the throne. He looked at her with such tender eyes, that her heart
was all in a flutter. “Oh, dear Prince,” she said, “how could you speak
so haughtily in presence of their Majesties? I protest I thought I should
have fainted.”
“I should have caught you in my arms,” said Giglio, looking raptures.
“Why were you so cruel to Prince Bulbo, dear Prince?” says Gruff.
“Because I hate him,” says Gil.
“You are jealous of him, and still love poor Angelica,” cries Gruffanuff,
putting her handkerchief to her eyes.