Princess Rosette

PRINCESS ROSETTE

Once upon a time there lived a King and Queen who had two beautiful

sons and one little daughter, who was so pretty that no one who saw her

could help loving her. When it was time for the christening of the

Princess, the Queen—as she always did—sent for all the fairies to be

present at the ceremony, and afterwards invited them to a splendid

banquet.

When it was over, and they were preparing to go away, the Queen said to

them:

‘Do not forget your usual good custom. Tell me what is going to happen

to Rosette.’

For that was the name they had given the Princess.

But the fairies said they had left their book of magic at home, and

they would come another day and tell her.

‘Ah!’ said the Queen, ‘I know very well what that means—you have

nothing good to say; but at least I beg that you will not hide anything

from me.’

So, after a great deal of persuasion, they said:

‘Madam, we fear that Rosette may be the cause of great misfortunes to

her brothers; they may even meet with their death through her; that is

all we have been able to foresee about your dear little daughter. We

are very sorry to have nothing better to tell you.’

Then they went away, leaving the Queen very sad, so sad that the King

noticed it, and asked her what was the matter.

The Queen said that she had been sitting too near the fire, and had

burnt all the flax that was upon her distaff.

‘Oh! is that all?’ said the King, and he went up into the garret and

brought her down more flax than she could spin in a hundred years. But

the Queen still looked sad, and the King asked her again what was the

matter. She answered that she had been walking by the river and had

dropped one of her green satin slippers into the water.

‘Oh! if that’s all,’ said the King, and he sent to all the shoe-makers

in his kingdom, and they very soon made the Queen ten thousand green

satin slippers, but still she looked sad. So the King asked her again

what was the matter, and this time she answered that in eating her

porridge too hastily she had swallowed her wedding-ring. But it so

happened that the King knew better, for he had the ring himself, and he

said:

‘Oh! you are not telling me the truth, for I have your ring here in my

purse.’

Then the Queen was very much ashamed, and she saw that the King was

vexed with her; so she told him all that the fairies had predicted

about Rosette, and begged him to think how the misfortunes might be

prevented.

Then it was the King’s turn to look sad, and at last he said:

‘I see no way of saving our sons except by having Rosette’s head cut

off while she is still little.’

But the Queen cried that she would far rather have her own head cut

off, and that he had better think of something else, for she would

never consent to such a thing. So they thought and thought, but they

could not tell what to do, until at last the Queen heard that in a

great forest near the castle there was an old hermit, who lived in a

hollow tree, and that people came from far and near to consult him; so

she said:

‘I had better go and ask his advice; perhaps he will know what to do to

prevent the misfortunes which the fairies foretold.’

She set out very early the next morning, mounted upon a pretty little

white mule, which was shod with solid gold, and two of her ladies rode

behind her on beautiful horses. When they reached the forest they

dismounted, for the trees grew so thickly that the horses could not

pass, and made their way on foot to the hollow tree where the hermit

lived. At first when he saw them coming he was vexed, for he was not

fond of ladies; but when he recognised the Queen, he said:

‘You are welcome, Queen. What do you come to ask of me?’

Then the Queen told him all the fairies had foreseen for Rosette, and

asked what she should do, and the hermit answered that she must shut

the Princess up in a tower and never let her come out of it again. The

Queen thanked and rewarded him, and hastened back to the castle to tell

the King. When he heard the news he had a great tower built as quickly

as possible, and there the Princess was shut up, and the King and Queen

and her two brothers went to see her every day that she might not be

dull. The eldest brother was called ‘the Great Prince,’ and the second

‘the Little Prince.’ They loved their sister dearly, for she was the

sweetest, prettiest princess who was ever seen, and the least little

smile from her was worth more than a hundred pieces of gold. When

Rosette was fifteen years old the Great Prince went to the King and

asked if it would not soon be time for her to be married, and the

Little Prince put the same question to the Queen.

Their majesties were amused at them for thinking of it, but did not

make any reply, and soon after both the King and the Queen were taken

ill, and died on the same day. Everybody was sorry, Rosette especially,

and all the bells in the kingdom were tolled.

Then all the dukes and counsellors put the Great Prince upon a golden

throne, and crowned him with a diamond crown, and they all cried, ‘Long

live the King!’ And after that there was nothing but feasting and

rejoicing.

The new King and his brother said to one another:

‘Now that we are the masters, let us take our sister out of that dull

tower which she is so tired of.’

They had only to go across the garden to reach the tower, which was

very high, and stood up in a corner. Rosette was busy at her

embroidery, but when she saw her brothers she got up, and taking the

King’s hand cried:

‘Good morning, dear brother. Now that you are King, please take me out

of this dull tower, for I am so tired of it.’

Then she began to cry, but the King kissed her and told her to dry her

tears, as that was just what they had come for, to take her out of the

tower and bring her to their beautiful castle, and the Prince showed

her the pocketful of sugar plums he had brought for her, and said:

‘Make haste, and let us get away from this ugly tower, and very soon

the King will arrange a grand marriage for you.’

When Rosette saw the beautiful garden, full of fruit and flowers, with

green grass and sparkling fountains, she was so astonished that not a

word could she say, for she had never in her life seen anything like it

before. She looked about her, and ran hither and thither gathering

fruit and flowers, and her little dog Frisk, who was bright green all

over, and had but one ear, danced before her, crying ‘Bow-wow-wow,’ and

turning head over heels in the most enchanting way.

Everybody was amused at Frisk’s antics, but all of a sudden he ran away

into a little wood, and the Princess was following him, when, to her

great delight, she saw a peacock, who was spreading his tail in the

sunshine. Rosette thought she had never seen anything so pretty. She

could not take her eyes off him, and there she stood entranced until

the King and the Prince came up and asked what was amusing her so much.

She showed them the peacock, and asked what it was, and they answered

that it was a bird which people sometimes ate.

‘What!’ said the Princess, ‘do they dare to kill that beautiful

creature and eat it? I declare that I will never marry any one but the

King of the Peacocks, and when I am Queen I will take very good care

that nobody eats any of my subjects.’

At this the King was very much astonished.

‘But, little sister,’ said he, ‘where shall we find the King of the

Peacocks?’

‘Oh! wherever you like, sire,’ she answered, ‘but I will never marry

any one else.’

After this they took Rosette to the beautiful castle, and the peacock

was brought with her, and told to walk about on the terrace outside her

windows, so that she might always see him, and then the ladies of the

court came to see the Princess, and they brought her beautiful

presents—dresses and ribbons and sweetmeats, diamonds and pearls and

dolls and embroidered slippers, and she was so well brought up, and

said, ‘Thank you!’ so prettily, and was so gracious, that everyone went

away delighted with her.

Meanwhile the King and the Prince were considering how they should find

the King of the Peacocks, if there was such a person in the world. And

first of all they had a portrait made of the Princess, which was so

like her that you really would not have been surprised if it had spoken

to you. Then they said to her:

‘Since you will not marry anyone but the King of the Peacocks, we are

going out together into the wide world to search for him. If we find

him for you we shall be very glad. In the meantime, mind you take good

care of our kingdom.’

Rosette thanked them for all the trouble they were taking on her

account, and promised to take great care of the kingdom, and only to

amuse herself by looking at the peacock, and making Frisk dance while

they were away.

So they set out, and asked everyone they met—

‘Do you know the King of the Peacocks?’

But the answer was always, ‘No, no.’

Then they went on and on, so far that no one has ever been farther, and

at last they came to the Kingdom of the Cockchafers.

They had never before seen such a number of cockchafers, and the

buzzing was so loud that the King was afraid he should be deafened by

it. He asked the most distinguished-looking cockchafer they met if he

knew where they could find the King of the Peacocks.

‘Sire,’ replied the cockchafer, ‘his kingdom is thirty thousand leagues

from this; you have come the longest way.’

‘And how do you know that?’ said the King.

‘Oh!’ said the cockchafer, ‘we all know you very well, since we spend

two or three months in your garden every year.’

Thereupon the King and the Prince made great friends with him, and they

all walked arm-in-arm and dined together, and afterwards the cockchafer

showed them all the curiosities of his strange country, where the

tiniest green leaf costs a gold piece and more. Then they set out again

to finish their journey, and this time, as they knew the way, they were

not long upon the road. It was easy to guess that they had come to the

right place, for they saw peacocks in every tree, and their cries could

be heard a long way off.

When they reached the city they found it full of men and women who were

dressed entirely in peacocks’ feathers, which were evidently thought

prettier than anything else.

They soon met the King, who was driving about in a beautiful little

golden carriage which glittered with diamonds, and was drawn at full

speed by twelve peacocks. The King and the Prince were delighted to see

that the King of the Peacocks was as handsome as possible. He had curly

golden hair and was very pale, and he wore a crown of peacocks’

feathers.

When he saw Rosette’s brothers he knew at once that they were

strangers, and stopping his carriage he sent for them to speak to him.

When they had greeted him they said:

‘Sire, we have come from very far away to show you a beautiful

portrait.’

So saying they drew from their travelling bag the picture of Rosette.

The King looked at it in silence a long time, but at last he said:

‘I could not have believed that there was such a beautiful Princess in

the world!’

‘Indeed, she is really a hundred times as pretty as that,’ said her

brothers.

‘I think you must be making fun of me,’ replied the King of the

Peacocks.

‘Sire,’ said the Prince, ‘my brother is a King, like yourself. He is

called “the King,” I am called “the Prince,” and that is the portrait

of our sister, the Princess Rosette. We have come to ask if you would

like to marry her. She is as good as she is beautiful, and we will give

her a bushel of gold pieces for her dowry.’

‘Oh! with all my heart,’ replied the King, ‘and I will make her very

happy. She shall have whatever she likes, and I shall love her dearly;

only I warn you that if she is not as pretty as you have told me, I

will have your heads cut off.’

‘Oh! certainly, we quite agree to that,’ said the brothers in one

breath.

‘Very well. Off with you into prison, and stay there until the Princess

arrives,’ said the King of the Peacocks.

And the Princes were so sure that Rosette was far prettier than her

portrait that they went without a murmur. They were very kindly

treated, and that they might not feel dull the King came often to see

them. As for Rosette’s portrait that was taken up to the palace, and

the King did nothing but gaze at it all day and all night.

As the King and the Prince had to stay in prison, they sent a letter to

the Princess telling her to pack up all her treasures as quickly as

possible, and come to them, as the King of the Peacocks was waiting to

marry her; but they did not say that they were in prison, for fear of

making her uneasy.

When Rosette received the letter she was so delighted that she ran

about telling everyone that the King of the Peacocks was found, and she

was going to marry him.

Guns were fired, and fireworks let off. Everyone had as many cakes and

sweetmeats as he wanted. And for three days everybody who came to see

the Princess was presented with a slice of bread-and-jam, a

nightingale’s egg, and some hippocras. After having thus entertained

her friends, she distributed her dolls among them, and left her

brother’s kingdom to the care of the wisest old men of the city,

telling them to take charge of everything, not to spend any money, but

save it all up until the King should return, and above all, not to

forget to feed her peacock. Then she set out, only taking with her her

nurse, and the nurse’s daughter, and the little green dog Frisk.

They took a boat and put out to sea, carrying with them the bushel of

gold pieces, and enough dresses to last the Princess ten years if she

wore two every day, and they did nothing but laugh and sing. The nurse

asked the boatman:

‘Can you take us, can you take us to the kingdom of the peacocks?’

But he answered:

‘Oh no! oh no!’

Then she said:

‘You must take us, you must take us.’

And he answered:

‘Very soon, very soon.’

Then the nurse said:

‘Will you take us? will you take us?’

And the boatman answered:

‘Yes, yes.’

Then she whispered in his ear:

‘Do you want to make your fortune?’

And he said:

‘Certainly I do.’

‘I can tell you how to get a bag of gold,’ said she.

‘I ask nothing better,’ said the boatman.

‘Well,’ said the nurse, ‘to-night, when the Princess is asleep, you

must help me to throw her into the sea, and when she is drowned I will

put her beautiful clothes upon my daughter, and we will take her to the

King of the Peacocks, who will be only too glad to marry her, and as

your reward you shall have your boat full of diamonds.’

The boatman was very much surprised at this proposal, and said:

‘But what a pity to drown such a pretty Princess!’

However, at last the nurse persuaded him to help her, and when the

night came and the Princess was fast asleep as usual, with Frisk curled

up on his own cushion at the foot of her bed, the wicked nurse fetched

the boatman and her daughter, and between them they picked up the

Princess, feather bed, mattress, pillows, blankets and all, and threw

her into the sea, without even waking her. Now, luckily, the Princess’s

bed was entirely stuffed with phoenix feathers, which are very rare,

and have the property of always floating upon water, so Rosette went on

swimming about as if she had been in a boat. After a little while she

began to feel very cold, and turned round so often that she woke Frisk,

who started up, and, having a very good nose, smelt the soles and

herrings so close to him that he began to bark. He barked so long and

so loud that he woke all the other fish, who came swimming up round the

Princess’s bed, and poking at it with their great heads. As for her,

she said to herself:

‘How our boat does rock upon the water! I am really glad that I am not

often as uncomfortable as I have been to-night.’

The wicked nurse and the boatman, who were by this time quite a long

way off, heard Frisk barking, and said to each other:

‘That horrid little animal and his mistress are drinking our health in

sea-water now. Let us make haste to land, for we must be quite near the

city of the King of the Peacocks.’

The King had sent a hundred carriages to meet them, drawn by every kind

of strange animal. There were lions, bears, wolves, stags, horses,

buffaloes, eagles, and peacocks. The carriage intended for the Princess

Rosette had six blue monkeys, which could turn summer-saults, and dance

on a tight-rope, and do many other charming tricks. Their harness was

all of crimson velvet with gold buckles, and behind the carriage walked

sixty beautiful ladies chosen by the King to wait upon Rosette and

amuse her.

The nurse had taken all the pains imaginable to deck out her daughter.

She put on her Rosette’s prettiest frock, and covered her with diamonds

from head to foot. But she was so ugly that nothing could make her look

nice, and what was worse, she was sulky and ill-tempered, and did

nothing but grumble all the time.

When she stepped from the boat and the escort sent by the King of the

Peacocks caught sight of her, they were so surprised that they could

not say a single word.

‘Now then, look alive,’ cried the false Princess. ‘If you don’t bring

me something to eat I will have all your heads cut off!’

Then they whispered one to another:

‘Here’s a pretty state of things! she is as wicked as she is ugly. What

a bride for our poor King! She certainly was not worth bringing from

the other end of the world!’

But she went on ordering them all about, and for no fault at all would

give slaps and pinches to everyone she could reach.

As the procession was so long it advanced but slowly, and the nurse’s

daughter sat up in her carriage trying to look like a Queen. But the

peacocks, who were sitting upon every tree waiting to salute her, and

who had made up their minds to cry, ‘Long live our beautiful Queen!’

when they caught sight of the false bride could not help crying

instead:

‘Oh! how ugly she is!’

Which offended her so much that she said to the guards:

‘Make haste and kill all these insolent peacocks who have dared to

insult me.’

But the peacocks only flew away, laughing at her.

The rogue of a boatman, who noticed all this, said softly to the nurse:

‘This is a bad business for us, gossip; your daughter ought to have

been prettier.’

But she answered:

‘Be quiet, stupid, or you will spoil everything.’

Now they told the King that the Princess was approaching.

‘Well,’ said he, ‘did her brothers tell me truly? Is she prettier than

her portrait?’

‘Sire,’ they answered, ‘if she were as pretty that would do very well.’

‘That’s true,’ said the King; ‘I for one shall be quite satisfied if

she is. Let us go and meet her.’ For they knew by the uproar that she

had arrived, but they could not tell what all the shouting was about.

The King thought he could hear the words:

‘How ugly she is! How ugly she is!’ and he fancied they must refer to

some dwarf the Princess was bringing with her. It never occurred to him

that they could apply to the bride herself.

The Princess Rosette’s portrait was carried at the head of the

procession, and after it walked the King surrounded by his courtiers.

He was all impatience to see the lovely Princess, but when he caught

sight of the nurse’s daughter he was furiously angry, and would not

advance another step. For she was really ugly enough to have frightened

anybody.

‘What!’ he cried, ‘have the two rascals who are my prisoners dared to

play me such a trick as this? Do they propose that I shall marry this

hideous creature? Let her be shut up in my great tower, with her nurse

and those who brought her here; and as for them, I will have their

heads cut off.’

Meanwhile the King and the Prince, who knew that their sister must have

arrived, had made themselves smart, and sat expecting every minute to

be summoned to greet her. So when the gaoler came with soldiers, and

carried them down into a black dungeon which swarmed with toads and

bats, and where they were up to their necks in water, nobody could have

been more surprised and dismayed than they were.

‘This is a dismal kind of wedding,’ they said; ‘what can have happened

that we should be treated like this? They must mean to kill us.’

And this idea annoyed them very much. Three days passed before they

heard any news, and then the King of the Peacocks came and berated them

through a hole in the wall.

‘You have called yourselves King and Prince,’ he cried, ‘to try and

make me marry your sister, but you are nothing but beggars, not worth

the water you drink. I mean to make short work with you, and the sword

is being sharpened that will cut off your heads!’

‘King of the Peacocks,’ answered the King angrily, ‘you had better take

care what you are about. I am as good a King as yourself, and have a

splendid kingdom and robes and crowns, and plenty of good red gold to

do what I like with. You are pleased to jest about having our heads cut

off; perhaps you think we have stolen something from you?’

At first the King of the Peacocks was taken aback by this bold speech,

and had half a mind to send them all away together; but his Prime

Minister declared that it would never do to let such a trick as that

pass unpunished, everybody would laugh at him; so the accusation was

drawn up against them, that they were impostors, and that they had

promised the King a beautiful Princess in marriage who, when she

arrived, proved to be an ugly peasant girl.

This accusation was read to the prisoners, who cried out that they had

spoken the truth, that their sister was indeed a Princess more

beautiful than the day, and that there was some mystery about all this

which they could not fathom. Therefore they demanded seven days in

which to prove their innocence. The King of the Peacocks was so angry

that he would hardly even grant them this favour, but at last he was

persuaded to do so.

While all this was going on at court, let us see what had been

happening to the real Princess. When the day broke she and Frisk were

equally astonished at finding themselves alone upon the sea, with no

boat and no one to help them. The Princess cried and cried, until even

the fishes were sorry for her.

‘Alas!’ she said, ‘the King of the Peacocks must have ordered me to be

thrown into the sea because he had changed his mind and did not want to

marry me. But how strange of him, when I should have loved him so much,

and we should have been so happy together!’

And then she cried harder than ever, for she could not help still

loving him. So for two days they floated up and down the sea, wet and

shivering with the cold, and so hungry that when the Princess saw some

oysters she caught them, and she and Frisk both ate some, though they

didn’t like them at all. When night came the Princess was so frightened

that she said to Frisk:

‘Oh! Do please keep on barking for fear the soles should come and eat

us up!’

Now it happened that they had floated close in to the shore, where a

poor old man lived all alone in a little cottage. When he heard Frisk’s

barking he thought to himself:

‘There must have been a shipwreck!’ (for no dogs ever passed that way

by any chance), and he went out to see if he could be of any use. He

soon saw the Princess and Frisk floating up and down, and Rosette,

stretching out her hands to him, cried:

‘Oh! Good old man, do save me, or I shall die of cold and hunger!’

When he heard her cry out so piteously he was very sorry for her, and

ran back into his house to fetch a long boat-hook. Then he waded into

the water up to his chin, and after being nearly drowned once or twice

he at last succeeded in getting hold of the Princess’s bed and dragging

it on shore.

Rosette and Frisk were joyful enough to find themselves once more on

dry land, and the Princess thanked the old man heartily; then, wrapping

herself up in her blankets, she daintily picked her way up to the

cottage on her little bare feet. There the old man lighted a fire of

straw, and then drew from an old box his wife’s dress and shoes, which

the Princess put on, and thus roughly clad looked as charming as

possible, and Frisk danced his very best to amuse her.

The old man saw that Rosette must be some great lady, for her bed

coverings were all of satin and gold. He begged that she would tell him

all her history, as she might safely trust him. The Princess told him

everything, weeping bitterly again at the thought that it was by the

King’s orders that she had been thrown overboard.

‘And now, my daughter, what is to be done?’ said the old man. ‘You are

a great Princess, accustomed to fare daintily, and I have nothing to

offer you but black bread and radishes, which will not suit you at all.

Shall I go and tell the King of the Peacocks that you are here? If he

sees you he will certainly wish to marry you.’

‘Oh no!’ cried Rosette, ‘he must be wicked, since he tried to drown me.

Don’t let us tell him, but if you have a little basket give it to me.’

The old man gave her a basket, and tying it round Frisk’s neck she said

to him: ‘Go and find out the best cooking-pot in the town and bring the

contents to me.’

Away went Frisk, and as there was no better dinner cooking in all the

town than the King’s, he adroitly took the cover off the pot and

brought all it contained to the Princess, who said:

‘Now go back to the pantry, and bring the best of everything you find

there.’

So Frisk went back and filled his basket with white bread, and red

wine, and every kind of sweetmeat, until it was almost too heavy for

him to carry.

When the King of the Peacocks wanted his dinner there was nothing in

the pot and nothing in the pantry. All the courtiers looked at one

another in dismay, and the King was terribly cross.

‘Oh well! ‘he said, ‘if there is no dinner I cannot dine, but take care

that plenty of things are roasted for supper.’

When evening came the Princess said to Frisk:

‘Go into the town and find out the best kitchen, and bring me all the

nicest morsels that are being roasted upon the spit.’

Frisk did as he was told, and as he knew of no better kitchen than the

King’s, he went in softly, and when the cook’s back was turned took

everything that was upon the spit, As it happened it was all done to a

turn, and looked so good that it made him hungry only to see it. He

carried his basket to the Princess, who at once sent him back to the

pantry to bring all the tarts and sugar plums that had been prepared

for the King’s supper.

The King, as he had had no dinner, was very hungry and wanted his

supper early, but when he asked for it, lo and behold it was all gone,

and he had to go to bed half-starved and in a terrible temper. The next

day the same thing happened, and the next, so that for three days the

King got nothing at all to eat, because just when the dinner or the

supper was ready to be served it mysteriously disappeared. At last the

Prime Minister began to be afraid that the King would be starved to

death, so he resolved to hide himself in some dark corner of the

kitchen, and never take his eyes off the cooking-pot. His surprise was

great when he presently saw a little green dog with one ear slip softly

into the kitchen, uncover the pot, transfer all its contents to his

basket, and run off. The Prime Minister followed hastily, and tracked

him all through the town to the cottage of the good old man; then he

ran back to the King and told him that he had found out where all his

dinners and suppers went. The King, who was very much astonished, said

he should like to go and see for himself. So he set out, accompanied by

the Prime Minister and a guard of archers, and arrived just in time to

find the old man and the Princess finishing his dinner.

The King ordered that they should be seized and bound with ropes, and

Frisk also.

When they were brought back to the palace some one told the King, who

said:

‘To-day is the last day of the respite granted to those impostors; they

shall have their heads cut off at the same time as these stealers of my

dinner.’ Then the old man went down on his knees before the King and

begged for time to tell him everything. While he spoke the King for the

first time looked attentively at the Princess, because he was sorry to

see how she cried, and when he heard the old man saying that her name

was Rosette, and that she had been treacherously thrown into the sea,

he turned head over heels three times without stopping, in spite of

being quite weak from hunger, and ran to embrace her, and untied the

ropes which bound her with his own hands, declaring that he loved her

with all his heart.

Messengers were sent to bring the Princes out of prison, and they came

very sadly, believing that they were to be executed at once: the nurse

and her daughter and the boatman were brought also. As soon as they

came in Rosette ran to embrace her brothers, while the traitors threw

themselves down before her and begged for mercy. The King and the

Princess were so happy that they freely forgave them, and as for the

good old man he was splendidly rewarded, and spent the rest of his days

in the palace. The King of the Peacocks made ample amends to the King

and Prince for the way in which they had been treated, and did

everything in his power to show how sorry he was.

The nurse restored to Rosette all her dresses and jewels, and the

bushel of gold pieces; the wedding was held at once, and they all lived

happily ever after—even to Frisk, who enjoyed the greatest luxury, and

never had anything worse than the wing of a partridge for dinner all

the rest of his life.[7]

[7] Madame d’Aulnoy.