THE little Princess Briar-Rose, of course, knew nothing of the strange
events that had happened at the feast of her christening, and the King
gave orders that nobody should even mention the subject to her. It is
not a pleasant thing to know that the fairies have decreed that one
shall fall asleep for a hundred years on one's fifteenth birthday, even
though one is to be awakened by a handsome Prince at the end of that
time. So all the lords-in-waiting and the ladies-in-waiting had to be
very careful and discreet. If they told the Princess a story, they had
to keep the word "spinning" out of it; and if they showed her a book
they had to take pains to see it did not contain a picture of a
spinning-wheel, or any reference to a distaff or spindle, lest she
should ask what they were. The King's Customs officers, on the
boundaries of the kingdom, had to examine every waggon-load of
merchandise that came into the country for fear it should contain a
spinning-wheel; and if anybody was found trying to smuggle one in he was
brought before the judges and punished.
By these devices the King felt certain that he had averted the fate laid
upon his daughter.
But the promises of the other wise women were fulfilled to the letter,
for the young Princess grew up to be the most beautiful, gifted and
gracious maiden in all the world. That, at any rate, was what everybody
in the palace said, from the lords and ladies down to the scullions in
the kitchen, and although people are inclined sometimes to flatter
Royalty, in this case there was reason for their admiration.
To begin with, the Princess was as lovely as a spring morning, with eyes
of the purest, softest blue, and hair in which the rays of the sun
seemed to be entangled. When she came into a room people stopped
whatever they were doing to look at her, and everyone felt happier
because she was there.
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[Illustration]
And her cleverness! She never had any trouble with her letters or her
multiplication table. She could cipher as easily as she could spell; she
knew the history of her own country and of every country round it; and
nobody could puzzle her with the hardest question in geography. She
could sew and embroider, and knit and paint and draw; she could repeat
poetry in five different languages; she studied mathematics and botany
and astronomy and even law. In short, there was no end to her knowledge,
and all because she had those fairies for her godmothers.
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[Illustration]
Besides this, there were all her other accomplishments; she could play
on all sorts of musical instruments, as, for instance, fiddle and
zither, large harp and jew's-harp, church organ and mouth organ, flute
and penny-whistle, and even on the nursery comb; she could sing like a
nightingale and dance like a fairy.
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And yet she was never conceited or puffed-up, as some good-looking and
accomplished people are apt to be. On the contrary, she was always
sweet-tempered and modest, and for this reason she was loved. People may
admire good looks and a graceful deportment, and they may respect
ability, but it is only sweetness of nature and goodness of heart that
can win love. And these things were the gift of the third fairy.
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[Illustration]
So the years passed, and at last came the day when the Princess
Briar-Rose was fifteen years of age.
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What a day that was! Everybody came to wish her many happy returns, and
she had so many presents that at least a dozen servants were kept busy
unwrapping the parcels. The King gave her a white pony with a saddle of
red velvet, and bridle and stirrups of gold, while the Queen's present
was a beautiful and costly necklace of pearls. Even the boy who turned
the spit in the kitchen brought her something, and though it was only a
little wooden shoe which he had carved with his own hands, the Princess
prized it just as much as though it had been made of gold.
The only person who was not happy on the Princess's birthday was the
Queen, and she went about with a pale face and a look of great anxiety.
"Come, come, my love," said the King, "what is the matter with you?
Surely you are not thinking of that foolish old prophecy!"
"How can I help thinking about it?" the Queen answered. "I have not been
able to get it out of my mind for fifteen years, and now that the day
has come I am afraid."
"Make your mind easy," said the King. "Nothing is going to happen. Why,
there's not a spinning-wheel within a hundred miles. I have taken good
care of that!" And he went away chuckling, to attend a meeting of his
Cabinet. But the Queen shook her head.
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Now while the King and Queen were talking, the Princess Briar-Rose was
wandering about in the castle, visiting room after room, as she had done
many times before. The castle was so big that a stranger might easily
have been lost in its maze of stairways and corridors, but Briar-Rose
knew every part of it quite well, from the great kitchens below ground,
where on feast days a score of cooks prepared the dinner for hundreds of
guests, to the topmost turret above the battlements, where the sentries
kept watch with their pikes on their shoulders. There was only one part
of the castle which Briar-Rose had never explored, and that was an
ancient tower which rose from the eastern end. The door of that tower
was always locked, and although the Princess had often tried to find
the key she had never succeeded. The servants told her that the tower
had not been inhabited for nearly a hundred years, and it had never been
entered within the memory of anybody in the castle.
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[Illustration]
To-day Briar-Rose flitted restlessly from place to place. She peeped
into the kitchen and saw the kitchen boys turning the spits on which
whole oxen were being roasted. Then she went into the empty throne room
and saw the golden thrones side by side upon the dais, and the rich
tapestry, glowing with all the colours of the rainbow, on the walls.
After that she mounted to the battlements from which she could see over
miles and miles of her father's kingdom, and not content with that, she
ran up the staircases into the turrets and looked through their narrow
slits of windows upon the courtyard below, so far down that the people
walking therein seemed no bigger than mice. And then she came down again
and continued her wanderings, searching in all sorts of out-of-the-way
corners, until at last she found herself before the door of the ancient
tower into which she had never been. And as she looked at the door, she
gave a start of surprise and then a cry of joy.
There was a key in the lock.
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