Fairy Tales Every Child Should Know by Various

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But at the same time she seemed more sedate than usual. Perhaps that was
because a great pleasure spoils laughing. At all events, after this, the
passion of her life was to get into the water, and she was always the
better behaved and the more beautiful the more she had of it. Summer and
winter it was quite the same; only she could not stay so long in the
water when they had to break the ice to let her in. Any day, from
morning to evening in summer, she might be descried--a streak of white
in the blue water--lying as still as the shadow of a cloud, or shooting
along like a dolphin; disappearing, and coming up again far off, just
where one did not expect her. She would have been in the lake of a night
too, if she could have had her way; for the balcony of her window
overhung a deep pool in it; and through a shallow reedy passage she
could have swum out into the wide wet water, and no one would have been
any the wiser. Indeed, when she happened to wake in the moonlight she
could hardly resist the temptation. But there was the sad difficulty of
getting into it. She had as great a dread of the air as some children
have of the water. For the slightest gust of wind would blow her away;
and a gust might arise in the stillest moment. And if she gave herself a
push towards the water and just failed of reaching it, her situation
would be dreadfully awkward, irrespective of the wind; for at best there
she would have to remain, suspended in her night-gown, till she was seen
and angled for by somebody from the window.

"Oh! if I had my gravity," thought she, contemplating the water, "I
would flash off this balcony like a long white sea-bird, headlong into
the darling wetness. Heigh-ho!"

This was the only consideration that made her wish to be like other
people.

Another reason for her being fond of the water was that in it alone she
enjoyed any freedom. For she could not walk without a _cortege_,
consisting in part of a troop of light-horse, for fear of the liberties
which the wind might take with her. And the king grew more apprehensive
with increasing years, till at last he would not allow her to walk
abroad at all without some twenty silken cords fastened to as many parts
of her dress, and held by twenty noblemen. Of course horseback was out
of the question. But she bade good-bye to all this ceremony when she got
into the water.

And so remarkable were its effects upon her, especially in restoring her
for the time to the ordinary human gravity, that Hum-Drum and Kopy-Keck
agreed in recommending the king to bury her alive for three years; in
the hope that, as the water did her so much good, the earth would do her
yet more. But the king had some vulgar prejudices against the
experiment, and would not give his consent. Foiled in this, they yet
agreed in another recommendation; which, seeing that one imported his
opinions from China and the other from Thibet, was very remarkable
indeed. They argued that, if water of external origin and application
could be so efficacious, water from a deeper source might work a perfect
cure; in short, that if the poor afflicted princess could by any means
be made to cry, she might recover her lost gravity.

But how was this to be brought about? Therein lay all the difficulty--to
meet which the philosophers were not wise enough. To make the princess
cry was as impossible as to make her weigh. They sent for a professional
beggar, commanded him to prepare his most touching oracle of woe, helped
him out of the court charade box to whatever he wanted for dressing up,
and promised great rewards in the event of his success. But it was all
in vain. She listened to the mendicant artist's story, and gazed at his
marvellous make up, till she could contain herself no longer, and went
into the most undignified contortions for relief, shrieking, positively
screeching with laughter.

When she had a little recovered herself, she ordered her attendants to
drive him away, and not give him a single copper; whereupon his look of
mortified discomfiture wrought her punishment and his revenge, for it
sent her into violent hysterics, from which she was with difficulty
recovered.

But so anxious was the king that the suggestion should have a fair
trial, that he put himself in a rage one day, and, rushing up to her
room, gave her an awful whipping. Yet not a tear would flow. She looked
grave, and her laughing sounded uncommonly like screaming--that was all.
The good old tyrant, though he put on his best gold spectacles to look,
could not discover the smallest cloud in the serene blue of her eyes.

IX

_Put Me in Again!_

It must have been about this time that the son of a king, who lived a
thousand miles from Lagobel, set out to look for the daughter of a
queen. He travelled far and wide, but as sure as he found a princess, he
found some fault with her. Of course he could not marry a mere woman,
however beautiful; and there was no princess to be found worthy of him.
Whether the prince was so near perfection that he had a right to demand
perfection itself, I cannot pretend to say. All I know is, that he was a
fine, handsome, brave, generous, well-bred, and well-behaved youth, as
all princes are.

In his wanderings he had come across some reports about our princess;
but as everybody said she was bewitched, he never dreamed that she could
bewitch him. For what indeed could a prince do with a princess that had
lost her gravity? Who could tell what she might not lose next? She might
lose her visibility, or her tangibility; or, in short, the power of
making impressions upon the radical sensorium; so that he should never
be able to tell whether she was dead or alive. Of course he made no
further inquiries about her.

One day he lost sight of his retinue in a great forest. These forests
are very useful in delivering princes from their courtiers, like a sieve
that keeps back the bran. Then the princes get away to follow their
fortunes. In this way they have the advantage of the princesses, who are
forced to marry before they have had a bit of fun. I wish our princesses
got lost in a forest sometimes.

One lovely evening, after wandering about for many days, he found that
he was approaching the outskirts of this forest; for the trees had got
so thin that he could see the sunset through them; and he soon came upon
a kind of heath. Next he came upon signs of human neighbourhood; but by
this time it was getting late, and there was nobody in the fields to
direct him.

After travelling for another hour, his horse, quite worn out with long
labour and lack of food, fell, and was unable to rise again. So he
continued his journey on foot. A length he entered another wood--not a
wild forest, but a civilised wood, through which a footpath led him to
the side of a lake. Along this path the prince pursued his way through
the gathering darkness. Suddenly he paused, and listened. Strange sounds
came across the water. It was, in fact, the princess laughing. Now there
was something odd in her laugh, as I have already hinted; for the
hatching of a real hearty laugh requires the incubation of gravity; and
perhaps this was how the prince mistook the laughter for screaming.
Looking over the lake, he saw something white in the water; and, in an
instant, he had torn off his tunic, kicked off his sandals, and plunged
in. He soon reached the white object, and found that it was a woman.
There was not light enough to show that she was a princess, but quite
enough to show that she was a lady, for it does not want much light to
see that.

Now I cannot tell how it came about--whether she pretended to be
drowning, or whether he frightened her, or caught her so as to embarrass
her--but certainly he brought her to shore in a fashion ignominious to a
swimmer, and more nearly drowned than she had ever expected to be; for
the water had got into her throat as often as she had tried to speak.

At the place to which he bore her, the bank was only a foot or two above
the water; so he gave her a strong lift out of the water, to lay her on
the bank. But, her gravitation ceasing the moment she left the water,
away she went up into the air, scolding and screaming.

"You naughty, _naughty_, Naughty, NAUGHTY man!" she cried.

No one had ever succeeded in putting her into a passion before. When the
prince saw her ascend, he thought he must have been bewitched, and have
mistaken a great swan for a lady. But the princess caught hold of the
topmost cone upon a lofty fir. This came off; but she caught at another;
and, in fact, stopped herself by gathering cones, dropping them as the
stalks gave way. The prince, meantime, stood in the water, staring, and
forgetting to get out. But the princess disappearing, he scrambled on
shore, and went in the direction of the tree. There he found her
climbing down one of the branches towards the stem. But in the darkness
of the wood, the prince continued in some bewilderment as to what the
phenomenon could be; until, reaching the ground, and seeing him standing
there, she caught hold of him, and said:

"I'll tell papa,"

"Oh no, you won't!" returned the prince.

"Yes, I will," she persisted. "What business had you to pull me down out
of the water, and throw me to the bottom of the air? I never did you any
harm."

"Pardon me. I did not mean to hurt you."

"I don't believe you have any brains; and that is a worse loss than your
wretched gravity. I pity you."

The prince now saw that he had come upon the bewitched princess, and had
already offended her. But before he could think what to say next, she
burst out angrily, giving a stamp with her foot that would have sent her
aloft again but for the hold she had of his arm:

"Put me up directly."

"Put you up where, you beauty?" asked the prince.

He had fallen in love with her almost, already; for her anger made her
more charming than any one else had ever beheld her; and, as far as he
could see, which certainly was not far, she had not a single fault about
her, except, of course, that she had not any gravity. No prince,
however, would judge of a princess by weight. The loveliness of her foot
he would hardly estimate by the depth of the impression it could make in
mud.

"Put you up where, you beauty?" asked the prince.

"In the water, you stupid!" answered the princess.

"Come, then," said the prince.

The condition of her dress, increasing her usual difficulty in walking,
compelled her to cling to him; and he could hardly persuade himself that
he was not in a delightful dream, notwithstanding the torrent of musical
abuse with which she overwhelmed him. The prince being therefore in no
hurry, they came upon the lake at quite another part, where the bank was
twenty-five feet high at least; and when they had reached the edge, he
turned towards the princess, and said:

"How am I to put you in?"

"That is your business," she answered, quite snappishly. "You took me
out--put me in again."

"Very well," said the prince; and, catching her up in his arms, he
sprang with her from the rock. The princess had just time to give one
delighted shriek of laughter before the water closed over them. When
they came to the surface, she found that, for a moment or two, she could
not even laugh, for she had gone down with such a rush, that it was with
difficulty she recovered her breath. The instant they reached the
surface--

"How do you like falling in?" said the prince.

After some effort the princess panted out:

"Is that what you call _falling in_?"

"Yes," answered the prince, "I should think it a very tolerable
specimen."

"It seemed to me like going up," rejoined she.

"My feeling was certainly one of elevation too," the prince conceded.

The princess did not appear to understand him, for she retorted his
question:

"How do _you_ like falling in?" said the princess.

"Beyond everything," answered he; "for I have fallen in with the only
perfect creature I ever saw."

"No more of that. I am tired of it," said the princess.

Perhaps she shared her father's aversion to punning.

"Don't you like falling in, then?" said the prince.

"It is the most delightful fun I ever had in my life," answered she. "I
never fell before. I wish I could learn. To think I am the only person
in my father's kingdom that can't fall!"

Here the poor princess looked almost sad.

"I shall be most happy to fall in with you any time you like," said the
prince, devotedly.

"Thank you. I don't know. Perhaps it would not be proper. But I don't
care. At all events, as we have fallen in, let us have a swim together."

"With all my heart," responded the prince.

And away they went, swimming, and diving, and floating, until at last
they heard cries along the shore, and saw lights glancing in all
directions. It was now quite late, and there was no moon.

"I must go home," said the princess. "I am very sorry, for this is
delightful."

"So am I," returned the prince. "But I am glad I haven't a home to go
to--at least, I don't exactly know where it is."

"I wish I hadn't one either," rejoined the princess; "it is so stupid! I
have a great mind," she continued, "to play them all a trick. Why
couldn't they leave me alone? They won't trust me in the lake for a
single night! You see where that green light is burning? That is the
window of my room. Now if you would just swim there with me very
quietly, and when we are all but under the balcony, give me such a
push--_up_ you call it--as you did a little while ago, I should be able
to catch hold of the balcony, and get in at the window; and then they
may look for me till to-morrow morning!"

"With more obedience than pleasure," said the prince, gallantly; and
away they swam, very gently.

"Will you be in the lake to-morrow night?" the prince ventured to ask.

"To be sure I will. I don't think so. Perhaps," was the princess's
somewhat strange answer.

But the prince was intelligent enough not to press her further; and
merely whispered, as he gave her the parting lift, "Don't tell." The
only answer the princess returned was a roguish look. She was already a
yard above his head. The look seemed to say, "Never fear. It is too good
fun to spoil that way."

So perfectly like other people had she been in the water, that even yet
the prince could scarcely believe his eyes when he saw her ascend
slowly, grasp the balcony, and disappear through the window. He turned,
almost expecting to see her still by his side. But he was alone in the
water. So he swam away quietly, and watched the lights roving about the
shore for hours after the princess was safe in her chamber. As soon as
they disappeared, he landed in search of his tunic and sword, and, after
some trouble, found them again. Then he made the best of his way round
the lake to the other side. There the wood was wilder, and the shore
steeper--rising more immediately towards the mountains which surrounded
the lake on all sides, and kept sending it messages of silvery streams
from morning to night, and all night long. He soon found a spot where he
could see the green light in the princess's room, and where, even in the
broad daylight, he would be in no danger of being discovered from the
opposite shore. It was a sort of cave in the rock, where he provided
himself a bed of withered leaves, and lay down too tired for hunger to
keep him awake. All night long he dreamed that he was swimming with the
princess.

X

_Look at the Moon_

Early the next morning the prince set out to look for something to eat,
which he soon found at a forester's hut, where for many following days
he was supplied with all that a brave prince could consider necessary.
And having plenty to keep him alive for the present, he would not think
of wants not yet in existence. Whenever Care intruded, this prince
always bowed him out in the most princely manner.

When he returned from his breakfast to his watch-cave, he saw the
princess already floating about in the lake, attended by the king and
queen--whom he knew by their crowns--and a great company in lovely
little boats, with canopies of all the colours of the rainbow, and flags
and streamers of a great many more. It was a very bright day, and the
prince, burned up with the heat, began to long for the cold water and
the cool princess. But he had to endure till twilight; for the boats had
provisions on board, and it was not till the sun went down that the gay
party began to vanish. Boat after boat drew away to the shore, following
that of the king and queen, till only one, apparently the princess's own
boat, remained. But she did not want to go home even yet, and the prince
thought he saw her order the boat to the shore without her. At all
events it rowed away; and now, of all the radiant company, only one
white speck remained. Then the prince began to sing.

And this is what he sung:

"Lady fair,
Swan-white,
Lift thine eyes,
Banish night
By the might
Of thine eyes.

"Snowy arms,
Oars of snow,
Oar her hither,
Plashing low.
Soft and slow,
Oar her hither.

"Stream behind her
O'er the lake,
Radiant whiteness!
In her wake
Following, following, for her sake,
Radiant whiteness!

"Cling about her,
Waters blue;
Part not from her,
But renew
Cold and true
Kisses round her.

"Lap me round,
Waters sad
That have left her
Make me glad,
For ye had
Kissed her ere ye left her."

Before he had finished his song, the princess was just under the place
where he sat, and looking up to find him. Her ears had led her truly.

"Would you like a fall, princess?" said the prince, looking down.

"Ah! there you are! Yes, if you please, prince," said the princess,
looking up.

"How do you know I am a prince, princess?" said the prince.

"Because you are a very nice young man, prince," said the princess.

"Come up then, princess."

"Fetch me, prince."

The prince took off his scarf, then his swordbelt then his tunic, and
tied them all together, and let them down. But the line was far too
short. He unwound his turban, and added it to the rest, when it was all
but long enough; and his purse completed it. The princess just managed
to lay hold of the knot of money, and was beside him in a moment. This
rock was much higher than the other, and the splash and the dive were
tremendous. The princess was in ecstasies of delight, and their swim was
delicious.

Night after night they met, and swam about in the dark clear lake, where
such was the prince's gladness, that (whether the princess's way of
looking at things infected him, or he was actually getting light-headed)
he often fancied that he was swimming in the sky instead of the lake.
But when he talked about being in heaven, the princess laughed at him
dreadfully.

When the moon came, she brought them fresh pleasure. Everything looked
strange and new in her light, with an old, withered, yet unfading
newness. When the moon was nearly full, one of their great delights was
to dive deep in the water, and then, turning round, look up through it
at the great blot of light close above them, shimmering and trembling
and wavering, spreading and contracting, seeming to melt away, and again
grow solid. Then they would shoot up through the blot, and lo! there was
the moon, far off, clear and steady and cold, and very lovely, at the
bottom of a deeper and bluer lake than theirs, as the princess said.

The prince soon found out that while in the water the princess was very
like other people. And besides this, she was not so forward in her
questions or pert in her replies at sea as on shore. Neither did she
laugh so much; and when she did laugh, it was more gently. She seemed
altogether more modest and maidenly in the water than out of it. But
when the prince, who had really fallen in love when he fell in the lake,
began to talk to her about love, she always turned her head towards him
and laughed. After a while she began to look puzzled, as if she were
trying to understand what he meant, but could not--revealing a notion
that he meant something. But as soon as ever she left the lake, she was
so altered, that the prince said to himself, "If I marry her, I see no
help for it: we must turn merman and mermaid, and go out to sea at
once,"

XI

_Hiss_!

The princess's pleasure in the lake had grown to a passion, and she
could scarcely bear to be out of it for an hour. Imagine then her
consternation, when, diving with the prince one night, a sudden
suspicion seized her that the lake was not so deep as it used to be. The
prince could not imagine what had happened. She shot to the surface,
and, without a word, swam at full speed towards the higher side of the
lake. He followed, begging to know if she was ill, or what was the
matter. She never turned her head, or took the smallest notice of his
question. Arrived at the shore, she coasted the rocks with minute
inspection. But she was not able to come to a conclusion, for the moon
was very small, and so she could not see well. She turned therefore and
swam home, without saying a word to explain her conduct to the prince,
of whose presence she seemed no longer conscious. He withdrew to his
cave, in great perplexity and distress.

Next day she made many observations, which, alas! strengthened her
fears. She saw that the banks were too dry; and that the grass on the
shore, and the trailing plants on the rocks, were withering away. She
caused marks to be made along the borders, and examined them, day after
day, in all directions of the wind; till at last the horrible idea
became a certain fact--that the surface of the lake was slowly sinking.

The poor princess nearly went out of the little mind she had. It was
awful to her to see the lake, which she loved more than any living
thing, lie dying before her eyes. It sank away, slowly vanishing. The
tops of rocks that had never been seen till now, began to appear far
down in the clear water. Before long they were dry in the sun. It was
fearful to think of the mud that would soon lie there baking and
festering, full of lovely creatures dying, and ugly creatures coming to
life, like the unmaking of a world. And how hot the sun would be without
any lake! She could not bear to swim in it any more, and began to pine
away. Her life seemed bound up with it; and ever as the lake sank, she
pined. People said she would not live an hour after the lake was gone.

But she never cried.

Proclamation was made to all the kingdom, that whosoever should discover
the cause of the lake's decrease, would be rewarded after a princely
fashion. Hum-Drum and Kopy-Keck applied themselves to their physics and
metaphysics; but in vain. Not even they could suggest a cause.

Now the fact was that the old princess was at the root of the mischief.
When she heard that her niece found more pleasure in the water than any
one else had out of it, she went into a rage, and cursed herself for her
want of foresight,

"But," said she, "I will soon set all right. The king and the people
shall die of thirst; their brains shall boil and frizzle in their skulls
before I will lose my revenge."

And she laughed a ferocious laugh, that made the hairs on the back of
her black cat stand erect with terror.

Then she went to an old chest in the room, and opening it, took out what
looked like a piece of dried seaweed. This she threw into a tub of
water. Then she threw some powder into the water, and stirred it with
her bare arm, muttering over it words of hideous sound, and yet more
hideous import. Then she set the tub aside, and took from the chest a
huge bunch of a hundred rusty keys, that clattered in her shaking hands.
Then she sat down and proceeded to oil them all. Before she had
finished, out from the tub, the water of which had kept on a slow motion
ever since she had ceased stirring it, came the head and half the body
of a huge gray snake. But the witch did not look round. It grew out of
the tub, waving itself backwards and forwards with a slow horizontal
motion, till it reached the princess, when it laid its head upon her
shoulder, and gave a low hiss in her ear. She started--but with joy; and
seeing the head resting on her shoulder, drew it towards her and kissed
it. Then she drew it all out of the tub, and wound it round her body. It
was one of those dreadful creatures which few have ever beheld--the
White Snakes of Darkness.

Then she took the keys and went down to her cellar; and as she unlocked
the door she said to herself:

"This _is_ worth living for!"

Locking the door behind her, she descended a few steps into the cellar,
and crossing it, unlocked another door into a dark, narrow passage. She
locked this also behind her, and descended a few more steps. If any one
had followed the witch-princess, he would have heard her unlock exactly
one hundred doors, and descend a few steps after unlocking each. When
she had unlocked the last, she entered a vast cave, the roof of which
was supported by huge natural pillars of rock. Now this roof was the
under side of the bottom of the lake.

She then untwined the snake from her body, and held it by the tail high
above her. The hideous creature stretched up its head towards the roof
of the cavern, which it was just able to reach. It then began to move
its head backwards and forwards, with a slow oscillating motion, as if
looking for something. At the same moment the witch began to walk round
and round the cavern, coming nearer to the centre every circuit; while
the head of the snake described the same path over the roof that she did
over the floor, for she kept holding it up. And still it kept slowly
osculating. Round and round the cavern they went, ever lessening the
circuit, till at last the snake made a sudden dart, and clung to the
roof with its mouth.

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