'I want an army with cannons to throw down the palace,' said the
youth; and instantly there was a tramp of armed men, and a rumble of
artillery waggons.
The queen was sitting at dinner, but when she heard all the noise she
came to the window; meantime the soldiers had surrounded the palace
and pointed their guns.
'What's all this about! What's the matter!' cried the queen out of
the window.
'The matter is, that I want my purse and my hat back,' answered
the youth.
'To be sure! you are right; here they are. I don't want my palace
battered down, so I will give them to you.'
The youth went up to receive them; but when he got upstairs he found
the queen sunk half fainting in a chair.
'Oh! I'm so frightened; I can't think where I put the things. Only
send away that army and I'll look for them immediately.'
The youth sent away the army, and the queen got up and began looking
about for the things.
'Tell me,' she said, as she wandered from one cupboard to another,
'how did you, who are such a shabby-looking fellow, manage to call
together such an army?'
'Because I've got this horn,' answered the youth. 'And with it I can
call up whatever I want, and if you don't make haste and find the
purse and the hat, I'll call up the army again and batter down the
palace in right earnest.'
'You won't make me believe that!' replied the queen. 'That sorry
horn can't work such wonders as that: let me try.' And she took the
horn out of his hands and sounded it and One appeared. 'Two stout
men!' she commanded quickly; and when they came she bid them drive
the shabby-looking youth out of the palace and give him a bastonata.
He was now quite undone, and was ashamed to go back to his brothers. So
he wandered away outside the town. After much walking he came to a
vineyard, where he strolled in; and what struck him was, that though it
was January, there was a fine fig-tree covered with ripe luscious figs.
'This is a godsend indeed,' he said, 'to a hungry man,' and he began
plucking and eating the figs. Before he had eaten many, however,
he found his nose had begun to grow to a terrible size; a foot for
every fig.
'That'll never do!' he cried, and left off eating the figs and wandered
on. Presently he came to another vineyard, where he also strolled in:
there, though it was January, he saw a tree all covered with ripe red
cherries. 'I wonder what calamity will pursue me for eating them,'
he said, as he gathered them. But when he had eaten a good many he
perceived that at last his luck had turned, for in proportion as he
ate his nose grew less and less, till at last it was just the right
size again.
'Now I know how to punish the queen,' he said, and he filled a bottle
with the juice of the cherries, and went back and gathered a basketful
of figs.
These figs he cried under the palace window, and as he had got more
dusty and threadbare with his late wanderings no one recognised
him. 'Figs in January! that is a treat!' and they bought up the whole
basketful. Then as they ate, their noses all began to grow, but the
queen, as she was very greedy, ate twelve for her share, so that she
had twelve feet of nose added to the length of hers. It was so long
that it trailed behind her on the ground as she walked along.
Then there was a hue and cry! All the surgeons and physicians in the
kingdom were sent for, but could do no good. They were all in despair,
when our youth came up disguised as a foreign doctor.
'Noses! I can heal noses! whoever has got too much nose let him come
to me!'
All the inhabitants gathered round him, and the queen called to him
loudest of all.
'The medicine I have to give is necessarily a very strong one to
effect so extraordinary a cure; therefore I won't give it to the
queen's majesty till she has seen it used on all her servants,
beginning with the lowest.'
Taking them all in order, beginning with the lowest, he gave a few
drops of cherry-juice to each, and all their noses came right.
Last of all the queen remained.
'The queen can't be treated like common people,' he said; 'she must
be treated by herself. I must go into her room with her, and I can
cure her with one drop of my cordial.'
'You think yourself very clever that you talk of curing with one
drop of your cordial, but you're not the only person who can work
wonders. I've got greater wonders than yours. I've got a hat which
makes you invisible, a purse that never is empty, and a horn that
gives you everything you call for.'
'Very pretty things to talk about,' answered the pretended doctor,
'but such things don't exist.'
'Don't they!' said the queen. 'There they are!'
And she laid them all out on the table.
This was enough for him. Taking advantage of the lesson she had
given him by her example, he quickly put on the hat, making himself
invisible; after that it was easy to snatch up the other things and
escape; nor could anyone follow him. He lived very comfortably for the
rest of his life, taking a scudo out of his purse for whatever he had
to pay, and his brothers likewise got on very well with their legacies,
for he restored them as soon as he had rescued them from the queen. But
the queen remained for the rest of her life with TWELVE FEET OF NOSE.