Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know by Various

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The first awkwardness that resulted from this unhappy privation was,
that the moment the nurse began to float the baby up and down, she flew
from her arms towards the ceiling. Happily, the resistance of the air
brought her ascending career to a close within a foot of it. There she
remained, horizontal as when she left her nurse's arms, kicking and
laughing amazingly. The nurse in terror flew to the bell, and begged the
footman, who answered it, to bring up the house-steps directly.
Trembling in every limb, she climbed upon the steps, and had to stand
upon the very top, and reach up, before she could catch the floating
tail of the baby's long clothes.

When the strange fact came to be known, there was a terrible commotion
in the palace. The occasion of its discovery by the king was naturally a
repetition of the nurse's experience. Astonished that he felt no weight
when the child was laid in his arms, he began to wave her up and--not
down; for she slowly ascended to the ceiling as before, and there
remained floating in perfect comfort and satisfaction, as was testified
by her peals of tiny laughter. The king stood staring up in speechless
amazement, and trembled so that his beard shook like grass in the wind.
At last, turning to the queen, who was just as horror-struck as himself,
he said, gasping, staring, and stammering:

"She _can't_ be ours, queen!"

Now the queen was much cleverer than the king, and had begun already to
suspect that "this effect defective came by cause."

"I am sure she is ours," answered she. "But we ought to have taken
better care of her at the christening. People who were never invited
ought not to have been present."

"Oh, ho!" said the king, tapping his forehead with his forefinger, "I
have it all. I've found her out. Don't you see it, queen? Princess
Makemnoit has bewitched her."

"That's just what I say," answered the queen.

"I beg your pardon, my love; I did not hear you. John! bring the steps I
get on my throne with."

For he was a little king with a great throne, like many other kings.

The throne-steps were brought, and set upon the dining-table, and John
got upon the top of them. But, he could not reach the little princess,
who lay like a baby-laughter-cloud in the air, exploding continuously.

"Take the tongs, John," said his Majesty; and getting up on the table,
he handed them to him.

John could reach the baby now, and the little princess was handed down
by the tongs.

IV

_Where Is She?_

One fine summer day, a month after these her first adventures, during
which time she had been very carefully watched, the princess was lying
on the bed in the queen's own chamber, fast asleep. One of the windows
was open, for it was noon, and the day was so sultry that the little
girl was wrapped in nothing less ethereal than slumber itself. The queen
came into the room, and not observing that the baby was on the bed,
opened another window. A frolicsome fairy wind, which had been watching
for a chance of mischief, rushed in at the one window, and taking its
way over the bed where the child was lying, caught her up, and rolling
and floating her along like a piece of flue, or a dandelion seed,
carried her with it through the opposite window, and away. The queen
went down-stairs, quite ignorant of the loss she had herself occasioned.

When the nurse returned, she supposed that her Majesty had carried her
off, and, dreading a scolding, delayed making inquiry about her. But
hearing nothing, she grew uneasy, and went at length to the queen's
boudoir, where she found her Majesty.

"Please, your Majesty, shall I take the baby?" said she.

"Where is she?" asked the queen.

"Please forgive me. I know it was wrong."

"What do you mean?" said the queen, looking grave.

"Oh! don't frighten me, your Majesty!" exclaimed the nurse, clasping her
hands.

The queen saw that something was amiss, and fell down in a faint. The
nurse rushed about the palace, screaming, "My baby! my baby!"

Every one ran to the queen's room. But the queen could give no orders.
They soon found out, however, that the princess was missing, and in a
moment the palace was like a beehive in a garden; and in one minute more
the queen was brought to herself by a great shout and a clapping of
hands. They had found the princess fast asleep under a rose-bush, to
which the elfish little wind-puff had carried her, finishing its
mischief by shaking a shower of red rose-leaves all over the little
white sleeper. Startled by the noise the servants made, she woke, and,
furious with glee, scattered the rose-leaves in all directions, like a
shower of spray in the sunset.

She was watched more carefully after this, no doubt; yet it would be
endless to relate all the odd incidents resulting from this peculiarity
of the young princess. But there never was a baby in a house, not to say
a palace, that kept the household in such constant good humour, at least
below-stairs. If it was not easy for her nurses to hold her, at least
she made neither their arms nor their hearts ache. And she was so nice
to play at ball with! There was positively no danger of letting her
fall. They might throw her down, or knock her down, or push her down,
but they couldn't _let_ her down. It is true, they might let her fly
into the fire or the coal-hole, or through the window; but none of these
accidents had happened as yet. If you heard peals of laughter resounding
from some unknown region, you might be sure enough of the cause. Going
down into the kitchen, or _the room_, you would find Jane and Thomas,
and Robert and Susan, all and sum, playing at ball with the little
princess. She was the ball herself, and did not enjoy it the less for
that. Away she went, flying from one to another, screeching with
laughter. And the servants loved the ball itself better even than the
game. But they had to take some care how they threw her, for if she
received an upward direction, she would never come down again without
being fetched.

V

_What Is to Be Done?_

But above-stairs it was different. One day, for instance, after
breakfast, the king went into his counting-house, and counted out his
money.

The operation gave him no pleasure.

"To think," said he to himself, "that every one of these gold sovereigns
weighs a quarter of an ounce, and my real, live, flesh-and-blood
princess weighs nothing at all!"

And he hated his gold sovereigns, as they lay with a broad smile of
self-satisfaction all over their yellow faces.

The queen was in the parlour, eating bread and honey. But at the second
mouthful she burst out crying, and could not swallow it. The king heard
her sobbing. Glad of anybody, but especially of his queen, to quarrel
with, he clashed his gold sovereigns into his money-box, clapped his
crown on his head, and rushed into the parlour.

"What is all this about?" exclaimed he. "What are you crying for,
queen?"

"I can't eat it," said the queen, looking ruefully at the honey-pot.

"No wonder!" retorted the king. "You've just eaten your breakfast--two
turkey eggs, and three anchovies."

"Oh, that's not it!" sobbed her Majesty. "It's my child, my child!"

"Well, what's the matter with your child? She's neither up the chimney
nor down the draw-well. Just hear her laughing."

Yet the king could not help a sigh, which he tried to turn into a cough,
saying:

"It is a good thing to be light-hearted, I am sure, whether she be ours
or not."

"It is a bad thing to be light-headed," answered the queen, looking with
prophetic soul far into the future.

"'T is a good thing to be light-handed," said the king.

"'T is a bad thing to be light-fingered," answered the queen.

"'T is a good thing to be light-footed," said the king.

"'T is a bad thing--" began the queen; but the king interrupted her.

"In fact," said he, with the tone of one who concludes an argument in
which he has had only imaginary opponents, and in which, therefore, he
has come off triumphant--"in fact, it is a good thing altogether to be
light-bodied."

"But it is a bad thing altogether to be light-minded," retorted the
queen, who was beginning to lose her temper.

This last answer quite discomfited his Majesty, who turned on his heel,
and betook himself to his counting-house again. But he was not half-way
towards it, when the voice of his queen overtook him.

"And it's a bad thing to be light-haired," screamed she, determined to
have more last words, now that her spirit was roused.

The queen's hair was black as night; and the king's had been, and his
daughter's was, golden as morning. But it was not this reflection on his
hair that arrested him; it was the double use of the word _light_. For
the king hated all witticisms, and punning especially. And besides, he
could not tell whether the queen meant light-_haired_ or light-_heired_;
for why might she not aspirate her vowels when she was exasperated
herself?

He turned upon his other heel, and rejoined her. She looked angry still,
because she knew that she was guilty, or, what was much the same, knew
that he thought so.

"My dear queen," said he, "duplicity of any sort is exceedingly
objectionable between married people of any rank, not to say kings and
queens; and the most objectionable form duplicity can assume is that of
punning."

"There!" said the queen, "I never made a jest, but I broke it in the
making. I am the most unfortunate woman in the world!"

She looked so rueful that the king took her in his arms; and they sat
down to consult.

"Can you bear this?" said the king.

"No, I can't," said the queen.

"Well, what's to be done?" said the king.

"I'm sure I don't know," said the queen. "But might you not try an
apology?"

"To my old sister, I suppose you mean?" said the king.

"Yes," said the queen.

"Well, I don't mind," said the king.

So he went the next morning to the house of the princess, and, making a
very humble apology, begged her to undo the spell. But the princess
declared, with a grave face, that she knew nothing at all about it. Her
eyes, however, shone pink, which was a sign that she was happy. She
advised the king and queen to have patience, and to mend their ways. The
king returned disconsolate. The queen tried to comfort him.

"We will wait till she is older. She may then be able to suggest
something herself. She will know at least how she feels, and explain
things to us."

"But what if she should marry?" exclaimed the king, in sudden
consternation at the idea.

"Well, what of that?" rejoined the queen.

"Just think! If she were to have children! In the course of a hundred
years the air might be as full of floating children as of gossamers in
autumn."

"That is no business of ours," replied the queen. "Besides, by that time
they will have learned to take care of themselves."

A sigh was the king's only answer.

He would have consulted the court physicians; but he was afraid they
would try experiments upon her.

VI

_She Laughs Too Much_

Meantime, notwithstanding awkward occurrences, and griefs that she
brought upon her parents, the little princess laughed and grew--not fat,
but plump and tall. She reached the age of seventeen, without having
fallen into any worse scrape than a chimney; by rescuing her from which,
a little bird-nesting urchin got fame and a black face. Nor, thoughtless
as she was, had she committed anything worse than laughter at everybody
and everything that came in her way. When she was told, for the sake of
experiment, that General Clanrunfort was cut to pieces with all his
troops, she laughed; when she heard that the enemy was on his way to
besiege her father's capital, she laughed hugely; but when she was told
that the city would certainly be abandoned to the mercy of the enemy's
soldiery--why, then she laughed immoderately. She never could be brought
to see the serious side of anything. When her mother cried, she said:

"What queer faces mamma makes! And she squeezes water out of her cheeks!
Funny mamma!"

And when her papa stormed at her, she laughed, and danced round and
round him, clapping her hands, and crying:

"Do it again, papa. Do it again! It's such fun! Dear, funny papa!"

And if he tried to catch her, she glided from him in an instant, not in
the least afraid of him, but thinking it part of the game not to be
caught. With one push of her foot, she would be floating in the air
above his head; or she would go dancing backwards and forwards and
sideways, like a great butterfly. It happened several times, when her
father and mother were holding a consultation about her in private, that
they were interrupted by vainly repressed outbursts of laughter over
their heads; and looking up with indignation, saw her floating at full
length in the air above them, whence she regarded them with the most
comical appreciation of the position.

One day an awkward accident happened. The princess had come out upon the
lawn with one of her attendants, who held her by the hand. Spying her
father at the other side of the lawn, she snatched her hand from the
maid's, and sped across to him. Now when she wanted to run alone, her
custom was to catch up a stone in each hand, so that she might come down
again after a bound. Whatever she wore as part of her attire had no
effect in this way. Even gold, when it thus became as it were a part of
herself, lost all its weight for the time. But whatever she only held in
her hands retained its downward tendency. On this occasion she could see
nothing to catch up but a huge toad, that was walking across the lawn as
if he had a hundred years to do it in. Not knowing what disgust meant,
for this was one of her peculiarities, she snatched up the toad and
bounded away. She had almost reached her father, and he was holding out
his arms to receive her, and take from her lips the kiss which hovered
on them like a butterfly on a rosebud, when a puff of wind blew her
aside into the arms of a young page, who had just been receiving a
message from his Majesty. Now it was no great peculiarity in the
princess that, once she was set agoing, it always cost her time and
trouble to check herself. On this occasion there was no time. She _must_
kiss--and she kissed the page. She did not mind it much; for she had no
shyness in her composition; and she knew, besides, that she could not
help it. So she only laughed, like a musical box. The poor page fared
the worst. For the princess, trying to correct the unfortunate tendency
of the kiss, put out her hands to keep off the page; so that, along with
the kiss, he received, on the other cheek, a slap with the huge black
toad, which she poked right into his eye. He tried to laugh, too, but
the attempt resulted in such an odd contortion of countenance, as showed
that there was no danger of his pluming himself on the kiss. As for the
king, his dignity was greatly hurt, and he did not speak to the page for
a whole month.

I may here remark that it was very amusing to see her run, if her mode
of progression could properly be called running. For first she would
make a bound; then, having alighted, she would run a few steps, and make
another bound. Sometimes she would fancy she had reached the ground
before she actually had, and her feet would go backwards and forwards,
running upon nothing at all, like those of a chicken on its back. Then
she would laugh like the very spirit of fun; only in her laugh there was
something missing. What it was, I find myself unable to describe. I
think it was a certain tone, depending upon the possibility of
sorrow--_morbidezza_, perhaps. She never smiled.

VII

_Try Metaphysics_

After a long avoidance of the painful subject, the king and queen
resolved to hold a council of three upon it; and so they sent for the
princess. In she came, sliding and flitting and gliding from one piece
of furniture to another, and put herself at last in an arm-chair, in a
sitting posture. Whether she could be said _to sit_, seeing she received
no support from the seat of the chair, I do not pretend to determine.

"My dear child," said the king, "you must be aware by this time that you
are not exactly like other people."

"Oh, you dear funny papa! I have got a nose, and two eyes, and all the
rest. So have you. So has mamma."

"Now be serious, my dear, for once," said the queen.

"No, thank you, mamma; I had rather not."

"Would you not like to be able to walk like other people?" said the
king.

"No indeed, I should think not. You only crawl. You are such slow
coaches!"

"How do you feel, my child?" he resumed, after a pause of discomfiture.

"Quite well, thank you."

"I mean, what do you feel like?"

"Like nothing at all, that I know of."

"You must feel like something."

"I feel like a princess with such a funny papa, and such a dear pet of a
queen-mamma!"

"Now really!" began the queen; but the princess interrupted her.

"Oh, yes," she added, "I remember. I have a curious feeling sometimes,
as if I were the only person that had any sense in the whole world."

She had been trying to behave herself with dignity; but now she burst
into a violent fit of laughter, threw herself backwards over the chair,
and went rolling about the floor in an ecstasy of enjoyment. The king
picked her up easier than one does a down quilt, and replaced her in her
former relation to the chair. The exact preposition expressing this
relation I do not happen to know.

"Is there nothing you wish for?" resumed the king, who had learned by
this time that it was useless to be angry with her.

"Oh, you dear papa!--yes," answered she.

"What is it, my darling?"

"I have been longing for it--oh, such a time!--ever since last night."

"Tell me what it is."

"Will you promise to let me have it?"

The king was on the point of saying yes, but the wiser queen checked him
with a single motion of her head.

"Tell me what it is first," said he.

"No, no. Promise first."

"I dare not. What is it?"

"Mind, I hold you to your promise. It is--to be tied to the end of a
string--a very long string indeed, and be flown like a kite. Oh, such
fun! I would rain rose-water, and hail sugar-plums, and snow
whipped-cream, and--and--and--"

A fit of laughing checked her; and she would have been off again over
the floor, had not the king started up and caught her just in time.
Seeing that nothing but talk could be got out of her, he rang the bell,
and sent her away with two of her ladies-in-waiting.

"Now, queen," he said, turning to her Majesty, "what _is_ to be done?"

"There is but one thing left," answered she. "Let us consult the college
of Metaphysicians."

"Bravo!" cried the king; "we will."

Now at the head of this college were two very wise Chinese
philosophers--by name Hum-Drum, and Kopy-Keck. For them the king sent;
and straightway they came. In a long speech he communicated to them what
they knew very well already--as who did not?--namely, the peculiar
condition of his daughter in relation to the globe on which she dwelt;
and requested them to consult together as to what might be the cause and
probable cure of her _infirmity_. The king laid stress upon the word,
but failed to discover his own pun. The queen laughed; but Hum-Drum and
Kopy-Keck heard with humility and retired in silence.

Their consultation consisted chiefly in propounding and supporting, for
the thousandth time, each his favourite theories. For the condition of
the princess afforded delightful scope for the discussion of every
question arising from the division of thought--in fact, of all the
Metaphysics of the Chinese Empire. But it is only justice to say that
they did not altogether neglect the discussion of the practical
question, _what was to be done_.

Hum-Drum was a Materialist, and Kopy-Keck was a Spiritualist. The former
was slow and sententious; the latter was quick and flighty; the latter
had generally the first word; the former the last.

"I reassert my former assertion," began Kopy-Keck, with a plunge. "There
is not a fault in the princess, body or soul; only they are wrong put
together. Listen to me now, Hum-Drum, and I will tell you in brief what
I think. Don't speak. Don't answer me. I _won't_ hear you till I have
done. At that decisive moment, when souls seek their appointed
habitations, two eager souls met, struck, rebounded, lost their way, and
arrived each at the wrong place. The soul of the princess was one of
those, and she went far astray. She does not belong by rights to this
world at all, but to some other planet, probably Mercury. Her proclivity
to her true sphere destroys all the natural influence which this orb
would otherwise possess over her corporeal frame. She cares for nothing
here. There is no relation between her and this world.

"She must therefore be taught, by the sternest compulsion, to take an
interest in the earth as the earth. She must study every department of
its history--its animal history, its vegetable history, its mineral
history, its social history, its moral history, its political history,
its scientific history, its literary history, its musical history, its
artistical history, above all, its metaphysical history. She must begin
with the Chinese dynasty and end with Japan. But first of all she must
study geology, and especially the history of the extinct races of
animals--their natures, their habits, their loves, their hates, their
revenges. She must--"

"Hold, h-o-o-old!" roared Hum-Drum. "It is certainly my turn now. My
rooted and insubvertible conviction is, that the causes of the anomalies
evident in the princess's condition are strictly and solely physical.
But that is only tantamount to acknowledging that they exist. Hear my
opinion. From some cause or other, of no importance to our inquiry, the
motion of her heart has been reversed. That remarkable combination of
the suction and the force-pump works the wrong way--I mean in the case
of the unfortunate princess, it draws in where it should force out, and
forces out where it should draw in. The offices of the auricles and the
ventricles are subverted. The blood is sent forth by the veins, and
returns by the arteries. Consequently it is running the wrong way
through all her corporeal organism--lungs and all. Is it then at all
mysterious, seeing that such is the case, that on the other particular
of gravitation as well, she should differ from normal humanity? My
proposal for the cure is this:

"Phlebotomise until she is reduced to the last point of safety. Let it
be effected, if necessary, in a warm bath. When she is reduced to a
state of perfect asphyxy, apply a ligature to the left ankle, drawing it
as tight as the bone will bear. Apply, at the same moment, another of
equal tension around the right wrist. By means of plates constructed for
the purpose, place the other foot and hand under the receivers of two
air-pumps. Exhaust the receivers. Exhibit a pint of French brandy, and
await the result."

"Which would presently arrive in the form of grim Death," said
Kopy-Keck.

"If it should, she would yet die in doing our duty," retorted Hum-Drum.

But their Majesties had too much tenderness for their volatile offspring
to subject her to either of the schemes of the equally unscrupulous
philosophers. Indeed, the most complete knowledge of the laws of nature
would have been unserviceable in her case; for it was impossible to
classify her. She was a fifth imponderable body, sharing all the other
properties of the ponderable.

VIII

_Try a Drop of Water_

Perhaps the best thing for the princess would have been to fall in love.
But how a princess who had no gravity could fall into anything is a
difficulty--perhaps _the_ difficulty. As for her own feelings on the
subject, she did not even know that there was such a beehive of honey
and stings to be fallen into. But now I come to mention another curious
fact about her.

The palace was built on the shores of the loveliest lake in the world;
and the princess loved this lake more than father or mother. The root of
this preference no doubt, although the princess did not recognise it as
such, was, that the moment she got into it, she recovered the natural
right of which she had been so wickedly deprived--namely, gravity.
Whether this was owing to the fact that water had been employed as the
means of conveying the injury, I do not know. But it is certain that she
could swim and dive like the duck that her old nurse said she was. The
manner in which this alleviation of her misfortune was discovered was as
follows:

One summer evening, during the carnival of the country, she had been
taken upon the lake by the king and queen, in the royal barge. They were
accompanied by many of the courtiers in a fleet of little boats. In the
middle of the lake she wanted to get into the lord chancellor's barge,
for his daughter, who was a great favourite with her, was in it with her
father. Now though the old king rarely condescended to make light of his
misfortune, yet, happening on this occasion to be in a particularly good
humour, as the barges approached each other, he caught up the princess
to throw her into the chancellor's barge. He lost his balance, however,
and, dropping into the bottom of the barge, lost his hold of his
daughter; not, however, before imparting to her the downward tendency of
his own person, though in a somewhat different direction, for, as the
king fell into the boat, she fell into the water. With a burst of
delighted laughter she disappeared into the lake. A cry of horror
ascended from the boats. They had never seen the princess go down
before. Half the men were under water in a moment; but they had all, one
after another, come up to the surface again for breath, when--tinkle,
tinkle, babble, and gush! came the princess's laugh over the water from
far away. There she was, swimming like a swan. Nor would she come out
for king or queen, chancellor or daughter. She was perfectly obstinate.

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