"And I know, too: when I am a woman I shall weave a net of my hair,
and fish up all the gold that has sunk to the beds of the rivers. Then
I know who will have a set of hard gold teeth, and a silver
rocking-chair."
"Thou art lovely enough to be a goddess, little Goldilocks. And what
wilt thou do with the rest of the gold?"
"Oh, Despard shall have all he can carry; for Despard is good, let
people say what they may. And I will have a crown made for him, with
diamonds set in it as plenty as plums in a pudding."
"Listen, my children," said the old Sibyl, sadly: "there will be no
one to give me grapes and pomegranates when I am faint and weak. I can
read by the stars that you are soon to go on a pilgrimage, and leave
your old nurse behind. You may well weep, my good little boy: there is
to be no rest for your feet till you have travelled over the whole
world, from north to south."
Despard groaned aloud; but Goldilocks clapped her hands and laughed.
"Oh, let us start to-night," she cried.
"When the sun-god has made twelve journeys in his winged boat," sighed
Sibyl, "and when the young moon has arisen out of the ocean, then you
may go."
And, at the appointed time, the faithful nurse, with many tears,
prepared her foster-children for their long journey. She took from a
worm-eaten coffer some family heirlooms, which had been lying since
the days of the Golden Age, enveloped in rose-leaves and gold paper.
She placed in the hand of Despard a dagger with a jewelled hilt, a
quiver of poisoned arrows, and a glittering sword, with a blade
sharper than a serpent's tooth.
But to Goldilocks she gave a flask of smooth, fragrant oil, a vase of
crystal-bright water, and a fan made of the feathers of the beautiful
bird of Paradise.