You may well imagine what a great misfortune this was to a young and
lively princess. How could she join in the sports and dances of the
noble youths and maidens of the court? She could not always be silent,
neither could she always say, "With all my heart!" though this was her
favorite phrase, and she used it whenever she possibly could; and it
was not at all pleasant, when some gallant knight asked her whether
she would rather play croquet or Aunt Sally, to be obliged to reply,
"What is the price of butter?"
On certain occasions, however, the princess actually found her
infirmity of service to her. She could always put an end suddenly to
any conversation that did not please her, by interposing with her
first or second remark; and they were also a very great assistance
to her when, as happened nearly every day, she received an offer
of marriage. Emperors, kings, princes, dukes, earls, marquises,
viscounts, baronets, and many other lofty personages knelt at her
feet, and offered her their hands, hearts, and other possessions of
greater or less value. But for all her suitors the princess had but
one answer. Fixing her deep radiant eyes on them, she would reply with
thrilling earnestness, "_Has_ your grandmother sold her mangle yet?"
and this always impressed the suitors so deeply that they retired,
weeping, to a neighboring monastery, where they hung up their armor in
the chapel, and taking the vows, passed the remainder of their lives
mostly in flogging themselves, wearing hair shirts, and putting dry
toast-crumbs in their beds.
Now, when the king found that all his best nobles were turning into
monks, he was greatly displeased, and said to the princess:--
"My daughter, it is high time that all this nonsense came to an end.
The next time a respectable person asks you to marry him, you will
say, 'With all my heart!' or I will know the reason why."
But this the princess could not endure, for she had never yet seen
a man whom she was willing to marry. Nevertheless, she feared her
father's anger, for she knew that he always kept his word; so that
very night she slipped down the back stairs of the palace, opened the
back door, and ran away out into the wide world.
She wandered for many days, over mountain and moor, through fen and
through forest, until she came to a fair city. Here all the bells
were ringing, and the people shouting and flinging caps into the air;
for their old king was dead, and they were just about to crown a new
one. The new king was a stranger, who had come to the town only the
day before; but as soon as he heard of the old monarch's death, he
told the people that he was a king himself, and as he happened to be
without a kingdom at that moment, he would be quite willing to rule
over them. The people joyfully assented, for the late king had left no
heir; and now all the preparations had been completed. The crown had
been polished up, and a new tip put on the sceptre, as the old king had
quite spoiled it by poking the fire with it for upwards of forty years.
When the people saw the beautiful princess, they welcomed her with
many bows, and insisted on leading her before the new king.
"Who knows but that they may be related?" said everybody. "They both
came from the same direction, and both are strangers."
Accordingly the princess was led to the market-place, where the king
was sitting in royal state. He had a fat, red, shining face, and did
not look like the kings whom she had been in the habit of seeing; but
nevertheless the princess made a graceful courtesy, and then waited to
hear what he would say.
The new king seemed rather embarrassed when he saw that it was a
princess who appeared before him; but he smiled graciously, and said,
in a smooth oily voice,--
"I trust your 'Ighness is quite well. And 'ow did yer 'Ighness leave
yer pa and ma?"
At these words the princess raised her head and looked fixedly at the
red-faced king; then she replied, with scornful distinctness,--
"What is the price of butter?"
At these words an alarming change came over the king's face. The red
faded from it, and left it a livid green; his teeth chattered; his
eyes stared, and rolled in their sockets; while the sceptre dropped
from his trembling hand and fell at the princess's feet. For the truth
was, this was no king at all, but a retired butterman, who had laid by
a little money at his trade, and had thought of setting up a public
house; but chancing to pass through this city at the very time when
they were looking for a king, it struck him that he might just as
well fill the vacant place as any one else. No one had thought of his
being an impostor; but when the princess fixed her clear eyes on him
and asked him that familiar question, which he had been in the habit
of hearing many times a day for a great part of his life, the guilty
butterman thought himself detected, and shook in his guilty shoes.
Hastily descending from his throne, he beckoned the princess into a
side-chamber, and closing the door, besought her in moving terms not
to betray him.
"Here," he said, "is a bag of rubies as big as pigeon's eggs. There
are six thousand of them, and I 'umbly beg your 'Ighness to haccept
them as a slight token hof my hesteem, if your 'Ighness will kindly
consent to spare a respeckable tradesman the disgrace of being
hexposed."
The princess reflected, and came to the conclusion that, after all, a
butterman might make as good a king as any one else; so she took the
rubies with a gracious little nod, and departed, while all the people
shouted, "Hooray!" and followed her, waving their hats and kerchiefs,
to the gates of the city.
With her bag of rubies over her shoulder, the fair princess now
pursued her journey, and fared forward over heath and hill, through
brake and through brier. After several days she came to a deep
forest, which she entered without hesitation, for she knew no fear.
She had not gone a hundred paces under the arching limes, when she
was met by a band of robbers, who stopped her and asked what she did
in their forest, and what she carried in her bag. They were fierce,
black-bearded men, armed to the teeth with daggers, cutlasses,
pistols, dirks, hangers, blunderbusses, and other defensive weapons;
but the princess gazed calmly on them, and said haughtily,--
"Has your grandmother sold her mangle yet?"
The effect was magical. The robbers started back in dismay, crying,
"The countersign!" Then they hastily lowered their weapons, and
assuming attitudes of abject humility, besought the princess
graciously to accompany them to their master's presence. With a lofty
gesture she signified assent, and the cringing, trembling bandits led
her on through the forest till they reached an open glade, into which
the sunbeams glanced right merrily. Here, under a broad oak-tree which
stood in the centre of the glade, reclined a man of gigantic stature
and commanding mien, with a whole armory of weapons displayed upon
his person. Hastening to their chief, the robbers conveyed to him, in
agitated whispers, the circumstance of their meeting the princess,
and of her unexpected reply to their questions. Hardly seeming to
credit their statement, the gigantic chieftain sprang to his feet, and
advancing toward the princess with a respectful reverence, begged her
to repeat the remark which had so disturbed his men. With a royal air,
and in clear and ringing tones, the princess repeated,--
"_Has_ your grandmother sold her mangle yet?" and gazed steadfastly at
the robber chief.
He turned deadly pale, and staggered against a tree, which alone
prevented him from falling.
"It is true!" he gasped. "We are undone! The enemy is without doubt
close at hand, and all is over. Yet," he added with more firmness, and
with an appealing glance at the princess, "yet there may be one chance
left for us. If this gracious lady will consent to go forward, instead
of returning through the wood, we may yet escape with our lives.
Noble princess!" and here he and the whole band assumed attitudes of
supplication, "consider, I pray you, whether it would really add to
your happiness to betray to the advancing army a few poor foresters,
who earn their bread by the sweat of their brow. Here," he continued,
hastily drawing something from a hole in the oak-tree, "is a bag
containing ten thousand sapphires, each as large as a pullet's egg. If
you will graciously deign to accept them, and to pursue your journey
in the direction I shall indicate, the Red Chief of the Rustywhanger
will be your slave forever."
The princess, who of course knew that there was no army in the
neighborhood, and who moreover did not in the least care which way she
went, assented to the Red Chief's proposition, and taking the bag of
sapphires, bowed her farewell to the grateful robbers, and followed
their leader down a ferny path which led to the farther end of the
forest. When they came to the open country, the robber chieftain took
his leave of the princess, with profound bows and many protestations
of devotion, and returned to his band, who were already preparing to
plunge into the impenetrable thickets of the midforest.
The princess, meantime, with her two bags of gems on her shoulders,
fared forward with a light heart, by dale and by down, through moss
and through meadow. By-and-by she came to a fair high palace, built
all of marble and shining jasper, with smooth lawns about it, and
sunny gardens of roses and gillyflowers, from which the air blew so
sweet that it was a pleasure to breathe it. The princess stood still
for a moment, to taste the sweetness of this air, and to look her
fill at so fair a spot; and as she stood there, it chanced that the
palace-gates opened, and the young king rode out with his court, to go
a-catching of nighthawks.
Now when the king saw a right fair princess standing alone at his
palace-gate, her rich garments dusty and travel-stained, and two
heavy sacks hung upon her shoulders, he was filled with amazement;
and leaping from his steed, like the gallant knight that he was, he
besought her to tell him whence she came and whither she was going,
and in what way he might be of service to her.
But the princess looked down at her little dusty shoes, and answered
never a word; for she had seen at the first glance how fair and goodly
a king this was, and she would not ask him the price of butter, nor
whether his grandmother had sold her mangle yet. But she thought in
her heart, "Now, I have never, in all my life, seen a man to whom I
would so willingly say, 'With all my heart!' if he should ask me to
marry him."
The king marvelled much at her silence, and presently repeated his
questions, adding, "And what do you carry so carefully in those two
sacks, which seem over-heavy for your delicate shoulders?"
Still holding her eyes downcast, the princess took a ruby from one
bag, and a sapphire from the other, and in silence handed them to
the king, for she willed that he should know she was no beggar, even
though her shoes were dusty. Thereat all the nobles were filled with
amazement, for no such gems had ever been seen in that country.
But the king looked steadfastly at the princess, and said, "Rubies are
fine, and sapphires are fair; but, maiden, if I could but see those
eyes of yours, I warrant that the gems would look pale and dull beside
them."
At that the princess raised her clear dark eyes, and looked at the
king and smiled; and the glance of her eyes pierced straight to his
heart, so that he fell on his knees and cried:
"Ah! sweet princess, now do I know that thou art the love for whom I
have waited so long, and whom I have sought through so many lands.
Give me thy white hand, and tell me, either by word or by sign, that
thou wilt be my queen and my bride!"
And the princess, like a right royal maiden as she was, looked him
straight in the eyes, and giving him her little white hand, answered
bravely, "_With all my heart!_"