CHAPTER 1 - Why the Princess
Has a Story About Her
There was once a little princess whose father was
king over a great country full of mountains and valleys. His palace was built
upon one of the mountains, and was very grand and beautiful. The princess,
whose name was Irene, was born there, but she was sent soon after her birth,
because her mother was not very strong, to be brought up by country people in a
large house, half castle, half farmhouse, on the side of another mountain,
about half-way between its base and its peak.
The princess was a sweet little creature, and at
the time my story begins was about eight years old, I think, but she got older
very fast. Her face was fair and pretty, with eyes like two bits of night sky, each
with a star dissolved in the blue. Those eyes you would have thought must have
known they came from there, so often were they turned up in that direction. The
ceiling of her nursery was blue, with stars in it, as like the sky as they
could make it. But I doubt if ever she saw the real sky with the stars in it,
for a reason which I had better mention at once.
These mountains were full of hollow places
underneath; huge caverns, and winding ways, some with water running through
them, and some shining with all colours of the rainbow when a light was taken
in. There would not have been much known about them, had there not been mines
there, great deep pits, with long galleries and passages running off from them,
which had been dug to get at the ore of which the mountains were full. In the
course of digging, the miners came upon many of these natural caverns. A few of
them had far-off openings out on the side of a mountain, or into a ravine.
Now in these subterranean caverns lived a strange
race of beings, called by some gnomes, by some kobolds, by some goblins. There
was a legend current in the country that at one time they lived above ground,
and were very like other people. But for some reason or other, concerning which
there were different legendary theories, the king had laid what they thought
too severe taxes upon them, or had required observances of them they did not
like, or had begun to treat them with more severity, in some way or other, and
impose stricter laws; and the consequence was that they had all disappeared
from the face of the country. According to the legend, however, instead of
going to some other country, they had all taken refuge in the subterranean
caverns, whence they never came out but at night, and then seldom showed
themselves in any numbers, and never to many people at once. It was only in the
least frequented and most difficult parts of the mountains that they were said
to gather even at night in the open air. Those who had caught sight of any of
them said that they had greatly altered in the course of generations; and no
wonder, seeing they lived away from the sun, in cold and wet and dark places.
They were now, not ordinarily ugly, but either absolutely hideous, or
ludicrously grotesque both in face and form. There was no invention, they said,
of the most lawless imagination expressed by pen or pencil, that could surpass
the extravagance of their appearance. But I suspect those who said so had
mistaken some of their animal companions for the goblins themselves—of which
more by and by. The goblins themselves were not so far removed from the human
as such a description would imply. And as they grew misshapen in body they had
grown in knowledge and cleverness, and now were able to do things no mortal
could see the possibility of. But as they grew in cunning, they grew in
mischief, and their great delight was in every way they could think of to annoy
the people who lived in the open-air storey above them. They had enough of
affection left for each other to preserve them from being absolutely cruel for
cruelty's sake to those that came in their way; but still they so heartily
cherished the ancestral grudge against those who occupied their former
possessions and especially against the descendants of the king who had caused
their expulsion, that they sought every opportunity of tormenting them in ways
that were as odd as their inventors; and although dwarfed and misshapen, they
had strength equal to their cunning. In the process of time they had got a king
and a government of their own, whose chief business, beyond their own simple
affairs, was to devise trouble for their neighbours. It will now be pretty
evident why the little princess had never seen the sky at night. They were much
too afraid of the goblins to let her out of the house then, even in company
with ever so many attendants; and they had good reason, as we shall see by and
by.
CHAPTER 2 - The Princess Loses
Herself
I have said the Princess Irene was about eight years
old when my story begins. And this is how it begins.
One very wet day, when the mountain was covered
with mist which was constantly gathering itself together into raindrops, and
pouring down on the roofs of the great old house, whence it fell in a fringe of
water from the eaves all round about it, the princess could not of course go
out. She got very tired, so tired that even her toys could no longer amuse her.
You would wonder at that if I had time to describe to you one half of the toys
she had. But then, you wouldn't have the toys themselves, and that makes all
the difference: you can't get tired of a thing before you have it. It was a
picture, though, worth seeing—the princess sitting in the nursery with the sky
ceiling over her head, at a great table covered with her toys. If the artist
would like to draw this, I should advise him not to meddle with the toys. I am
afraid of attempting to describe them, and I think he had better not try to
draw them. He had better not. He can do a thousand things I can't, but I don't
think he could draw those toys. No man could better make the princess herself
than he could, though—leaning with her back bowed into the back of the chair,
her head hanging down, and her hands in her lap, very miserable as she would
say herself, not even knowing what she would like, except it were to go out and
get thoroughly wet, and catch a particularly nice cold, and have to go to bed
and take gruel. The next moment after you see her sitting there, her nurse goes
out of the room.
Even that is a change, and the princess wakes up a
little, and looks about her. Then she tumbles off her chair and runs out of the
door, not the same door the nurse went out of, but one which opened at the foot
of a curious old stair of worm-eaten oak, which looked as if never anyone had
set foot upon it. She had once before been up six steps, and that was
sufficient reason, in such a day, for trying to find out what was at the top of
it.
Up and up she ran—such a long way it seemed to
her!—until she came to the top of the third flight. There she found the landing
was the end of a long passage. Into this she ran. It was full of doors on each
side. There were so many that she did not care to open any, but ran on to the
end, where she turned into another passage, also full of doors. When she had
turned twice more, and still saw doors and only doors about her, she began to
get frightened. It was so silent! And all those doors must hide rooms with
nobody in them! That was dreadful. Also the rain made a great trampling noise
on the roof. She turned and started at full speed, her little footsteps echoing
through the sounds of the rain—back for the stairs and her safe nursery. So she
thought, but she had lost herself long ago. It doesn't follow that she was
lost, because she had lost herself, though.
She ran for some distance, turned several times,
and then began to be afraid. Very soon she was sure that she had lost the way
back. Rooms everywhere, and no stair! Her little heart beat as fast as her
little feet ran, and a lump of tears was growing in her throat. But she was too
eager and perhaps too frightened to cry for some time. At last her hope failed
her. Nothing but passages and doors everywhere! She threw herself on the floor,
and burst into a wailing cry broken by sobs.
She did not cry long, however, for she was as
brave as could be expected of a princess of her age. After a good cry, she got
up, and brushed the dust from her frock. Oh, what old dust it was! Then she
wiped her eyes with her hands, for princesses don't always have their
handkerchiefs in their pockets, any more than some other little girls I know
of. Next, like a true princess, she resolved on going wisely to work to find
her way back: she would walk through the passages, and look in every direction for
the stair. This she did, but without success. She went over the same ground
again an again without knowing it, for the passages and doors were all alike.
At last, in a corner, through a half-open door, she did see a stair. But alas!
it went the wrong way: instead of going down, it went up. Frightened as she
was, however, she could not help wishing to see where yet further the stair
could lead. It was very narrow, and so steep that she went on like a
four-legged creature on her hands and feet.
CHAPTER 3 - The Princess and—We
Shall See Who
When she came to the top, she found herself in a
little square place, with three doors, two opposite each other, and one
opposite the top of the stair. She stood for a moment, without an idea in her
little head what to do next. But as she stood, she began to hear a curious
humming sound. Could it be the rain? No. It was much more gentle, and even
monotonous than the sound of the rain, which now she scarcely heard. The low
sweet humming sound went on, sometimes stopping for a little while and then
beginning again. It was more like the hum of a very happy bee that had found a
rich well of honey in some globular flower, than anything else I can think of
at this moment. Where could it come from? She laid her ear first to one of the
doors to hearken if it was there—then to another. When she laid her ear against
the third door, there could be no doubt where it came from: it must be from
something in that room. What could it be? She was rather afraid, but her
curiosity was stronger than her fear, and she opened the door very gently and
peeped in. What do you think she saw? A very old lady who sat spinning.
Perhaps you will wonder how the princess could
tell that the old lady was an old lady, when I inform you that not only was she
beautiful, but her skin was smooth and white. I will tell you more. Her hair
was combed back from her forehead and face, and hung loose far down and all
over her back. That is not much like an old lady—is it? Ah! but it was white
almost as snow. And although her face was so smooth, her eyes looked so wise
that you could not have helped seeing she must be old. The princess, though she
could not have told you why, did think her very old indeed—quite fifty, she
said to herself. But she was rather older than that, as you shall hear.
While the princess stared bewildered, with her
head just inside the door, the old lady lifted hers, and said, in a sweet, but
old and rather shaky voice, which mingled very pleasantly with the continued
hum of her wheel:
'Come in, my dear; come in. I am glad to see you.'
That the princess was a real princess you might
see now quite plainly; for she didn't hang on to the handle of the door, and
stare without moving, as I have known some do who ought to have been princesses
but were only rather vulgar little girls. She did as she was told, stepped
inside the door at once, and shut it gently behind her.
'Come to me, my dear,' said the old lady.
And again the princess did as she was told. She
approached the old lady—rather slowly, I confess—but did not stop until she
stood by her side, and looked up in her face with her blue eyes and the two
melted stars in them.
'Why, what have you been doing with your eyes,
child?' asked the old lady.
'Crying,' answered the princess.
'Why, child?'
'Because I couldn't find my way down again.'
'But you could find your way up.'
'Not at first—not for a long time.'
'But your face is streaked like the back of a
zebra. Hadn't you a handkerchief to wipe your eyes with?'
'No.'
'Then why didn't you come to me to wipe them for
you?'
'Please, I didn't know you were here. I will next
time.'
'There's a good child!' said the old lady.
Then she stopped her wheel, and rose, and, going
out of the room, returned with a little silver basin and a soft white towel,
with which she washed and wiped the bright little face. And the princess
thought her hands were so smooth and nice!
When she carried away the basin and towel, the
little princess wondered to see how straight and tall she was, for, although
she was so old, she didn't stoop a bit. She was dressed in black velvet with
thick white heavy-looking lace about it; and on the black dress her hair shone
like silver. There was hardly any more furniture in the room than there might
have been in that of the poorest old woman who made her bread by her spinning.
There was no carpet on the floor—no table anywhere—nothing but the
spinning-wheel and the chair beside it. When she came back, she sat down and
without a word began her spinning once more, while Irene, who had never seen a
spinning-wheel, stood by her side and looked on. When the old lady had got her
thread fairly going again, she said to the princess, but without looking at
her:
'Do you know my name, child?'
'No, I don't know it,' answered the princess.
'My name is Irene.'
'That's my name!' cried the princess.
'I know that. I let you have mine. I haven't got
your name. You've got mine.'
'How can that be?' asked the princess, bewildered.
'I've always had my name.'
'Your papa, the king, asked me if I had any
objection to your having it; and, of course, I hadn't. I let you have it with
pleasure.'
'It was very kind of you to give me your name—and
such a pretty one,' said the princess.
'Oh, not so very kind!' said the old lady. 'A name
is one of those things one can give away and keep all the same. I have a good
many such things. Wouldn't you like to know who I am, child?'
'Yes, that I should—very much.'
'I'm your great-great-grandmother,' said the lady.
'What's that?' asked the princess.
'I'm your father's mother's father's mother.'
'Oh, dear! I can't understand that,' said the
princess.
'I dare say not. I didn't expect you would. But
that's no reason why I shouldn't say it.'
'Oh, no!' answered the princess.
'I will explain it all to you when you are older,'
the lady went on. 'But you will be able to understand this much now: I came
here to take care of you.'
'Is it long since you came? Was it yesterday? Or
was it today, because it was so wet that I couldn't get out?'
'I've been here ever since you came yourself.'
'What a long time!' said the princess. 'I don't
remember it at all.'
'No. I suppose not.'
'But I never saw you before.'
'No. But you shall see me again.'
'Do you live in this room always?'
'I don't sleep in it. I sleep on the opposite side
of the landing. I sit here most of the day.'
'I shouldn't like it. My nursery is much prettier.
You must be a queen too, if you are my great big grand-mother.'
'Yes, I am a queen.'
'Where is your crown, then?' 'In my bedroom.'
'I should like to see it.'
'You shall some day—not today.'
'I wonder why nursie never told me.'
'Nursie doesn't know. She never saw me.'
'But somebody knows that you are in the house?'
'No; nobody.'
'How do you get your dinner, then?'
'I keep poultry—of a sort.'
'Where do you keep them?'
'I will show you.'
'And who makes the chicken broth for you?'
'I never kill any of MY chickens.'
'Then I can't understand.'
'What did you have for breakfast this morning?'
asked the lady.
'Oh! I had bread and milk, and an egg—I dare say
you eat their eggs.'
'Yes, that's it. I eat their eggs.'
'Is that what makes your hair so white?'
'No, my dear. It's old age. I am very old.'
'I thought so. Are you fifty?'
'Yes—more than that.'
'Are you a hundred?'
'Yes—more than that. I am too old for you to
guess. Come and see my chickens.'
Again she stopped her spinning. She rose, took the
princess by the hand, led her out of the room, and opened the door opposite the
stair. The princess expected to see a lot of hens and chickens, but instead of
that, she saw the blue sky first, and then the roofs of the house, with a
multitude of the loveliest pigeons, mostly white, but of all colours, walking
about, making bows to each other, and talking a language she could not
understand. She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose such a flapping of
wings that she in her turn was startled.
'You've frightened my poultry,' said the old lady,
smiling.
'And they've frightened me,' said the princess,
smiling too. 'But what very nice poultry! Are the eggs nice?'
'Yes, very nice.' 'What a small egg-spoon you must
have! Wouldn't it be better to keep hens, and get bigger eggs?'
'How should I feed them, though?'
'I see,' said the princess. 'The pigeons feed
themselves. They've got wings.'
'Just so. If they couldn't fly, I couldn't eat
their eggs.'
'But how do you get at the eggs? Where are their
nests?'
The lady took hold of a little loop of string in
the wall at the side of the door and, lifting a shutter, showed a great many
pigeon-holes with nests, some with young ones and some with eggs in them. The
birds came in at the other side, and she took out the eggs on this side. She
closed it again quickly, lest the young ones should be frightened.
'Oh, what a nice way!' cried the princess. 'Will
you give me an egg to eat? I'm rather hungry.'
'I will some day, but now you must go back, or
nursie will be miserable about you. I dare say she's looking for you
everywhere.'
'Except here,' answered the princess. 'Oh, how
surprised she will be when I tell her about my great big grand-grand-mother!'
'Yes, that she will!' said the old lady with a
curious smile. 'Mind you tell her all about it exactly.'
'That I will. Please will you take me back to
her?'
'I can't go all the way, but I will take you to
the top of the stair, and then you must run down quite fast into your own
room.'
The little princess put her hand in the old
lady's, who, looking this way and that, brought her to the top of the first
stair, and thence to the bottom of the second, and did not leave her till she
saw her half-way down the third. When she heard the cry of her nurse's pleasure
at finding her, she turned and walked up the stairs again, very fast indeed for
such a very great grandmother, and sat down to her spinning with another
strange smile on her sweet old face.
About this spinning of hers I will tell you more
another time.
Guess what she was spinning.
CHAPTER 4 - What the Nurse
Thought of It
'Why, where can you have been, princess?' asked
the nurse, taking her in her arms. 'It's very unkind of you to hide away so
long. I began to be afraid—' Here she checked herself.
'What were you afraid of, nursie?' asked the
princess.
'Never mind,' she answered. 'Perhaps I will tell
you another day. Now tell me where you have been.'
'I've been up a long way to see my very great,
huge, old grandmother,' said the princess.
'What do you mean by that?' asked the nurse, who
thought she was making fun.
'I mean that I've been a long way up and up to see
My GREAT grandmother. Ah, nursie, you don't know what a beautiful mother of
grandmothers I've got upstairs. She is such an old lady, with such lovely white
hair—as white as my silver cup. Now, when I think of it, I think her hair must
be silver.'
'What nonsense you are talking, princess!' said
the nurse.
'I'm not talking nonsense,' returned Irene, rather
offended. 'I will tell you all about her. She's much taller than you, and much
prettier.'
'Oh, I dare say!' remarked the nurse.
'And she lives upon pigeons' eggs.'
'Most likely,' said the nurse.
'And she sits in an empty room, spin-spinning all
day long.'
'Not a doubt of it,' said the nurse.
'And she keeps her crown in her bedroom.'
'Of course—quite the proper place to keep her
crown in. She wears it in bed, I'll be bound.'
'She didn't say that. And I don't think she does.
That wouldn't be comfortable—would it? I don't think my papa wears his crown
for a night-cap. Does he, nursie?'
'I never asked him. I dare say he does.'
'And she's been there ever since I came here—ever
so many years.'
'Anybody could have told you that,' said the
nurse, who did not believe a word Irene was saying.
'Why didn't you tell me, then?'
'There was no necessity. You could make it all up
for yourself.'
'You don't believe me, then!' exclaimed the
princess, astonished and angry, as she well might be.
'Did you expect me to believe you, princess?'
asked the nurse coldly. 'I know princesses are in the habit of telling
make-believes, but you are the first I ever heard of who expected to have them
believed,' she added, seeing that the child was strangely in earnest.
The princess burst into tears.
'Well, I must say,' remarked the nurse, now
thoroughly vexed with her for crying, 'it is not at all becoming in a princess
to tell stories and expect to be believed just because she is a princess.'
'But it's quite true, I tell you.'
'You've dreamt it, then, child.'
'No, I didn't dream it. I went upstairs, and I lost
myself, and if I hadn't found the beautiful lady, I should never have found
myself.'
'Oh, I dare say!'
'Well, you just come up with me, and see if I'm
not telling the truth.'
'Indeed I have other work to do. It's your
dinnertime, and I won't have any more such nonsense.'
The princess wiped her eyes, and her face grew so
hot that they were soon quite dry. She sat down to her dinner, but ate next to
nothing. Not to be believed does not at all agree with princesses: for a real
princess cannot tell a lie. So all the afternoon she did not speak a word. Only
when the nurse spoke to her, she answered her, for a real princess is never
rude—even when she does well to be offended.
Of course the nurse was not comfortable in her
mind—not that she suspected the least truth in Irene's story, but that she
loved her dearly, and was vexed with herself for having been cross to her. She
thought her crossness was the cause of the princess's unhappiness, and had no
idea that she was really and deeply hurt at not being believed. But, as it
became more and more plain during the evening in her every motion and look,
that, although she tried to amuse herself with her toys, her heart was too
vexed and troubled to enjoy them, her nurse's discomfort grew and grew. When
bedtime came, she undressed and laid her down, but the child, instead of
holding up her little mouth to be kissed, turned away from her and lay still.
Then nursie's heart gave way altogether, and she began to cry. At the sound of
her first sob the princess turned again, and held her face to kiss her as
usual. But the nurse had her handkerchief to her eyes, and did not see the
movement.
'Nursie,' said the princess, 'why won't you
believe me?'
'Because I can't believe you,' said the nurse,
getting angry again.
'Ah! then, you can't help it,' said Irene, 'and I
will not be vexed with you any more. I will give you a kiss and go to sleep.'
'You little angel!' cried the nurse, and caught
her out of bed, and walked about the room with her in her arms, kissing and
hugging her.
'You will let me take you to see my dear old great
big grandmother, won't you?' said the princess, as she laid her down again.
'And you won't say I'm ugly, any more—will you,
princess?' 'Nursie, I never said you were ugly. What can you mean?'
'Well, if you didn't say it, you meant it.'
'Indeed, I never did.'
'You said I wasn't so pretty as that—'
'As my beautiful grandmother—yes, I did say that;
and I say it again, for it's quite true.'
'Then I do think you are unkind!' said the nurse,
and put her handkerchief to her eyes again.
'Nursie, dear, everybody can't be as beautiful as
every other body, you know. You are very nice-looking, but if you had been as
beautiful as my grandmother—'
'Bother your grandmother!' said the nurse.
'Nurse, that's very rude. You are not fit to be
spoken to till you can behave better.'
The princess turned away once more, and again the
nurse was ashamed of herself.
'I'm sure I beg your pardon, princess,' she said,
though still in an offended tone. But the princess let the tone pass, and
heeded only the words.
'You won't say it again, I am sure,' she answered,
once more turning towards her nurse. 'I was only going to say that if you had
been twice as nice-looking as you are, some king or other would have married
you, and then what would have become of me?'
'You are an angel!' repeated the nurse, again
embracing her. 'Now,' insisted Irene, 'you will come and see my
grandmother—won't you?'
'I will go with you anywhere you like, my cherub,'
she answered; and in two minutes the weary little princess was fast asleep.
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