he called to them as loudly as he could, and they heard him, but how could he reach them? While he was endeavouring to find out some way, the Fairy Lioness disappeared. He ran along the edge of the lake; but when he had nearly reached the transparent palace on one side, it receded from him with an astonishing swiftness to the other, and his expectations were thus continually frustrated. The Queen, fearing that he would at last become weary of this work, cried out to him not to lose courage; for the Fairy's object was to tire him, but that true love was not to be rebutted by any difficulties; and with that she and Moufette stretched out their hands to him, and made all manner of supplicating actions. At this sight the King was more than ever affected. He raised his voice, and swore by the rivers Styx and Acheron to remain for the rest of his life in those miserable regions, rather than return without them.
He must have been endued with wonderful perseverance. He passed his time as sadly as any king in the world. The ground, full of brambles and covered with thorns, was his bed; he had nothing to eat but the wild fruits, bitterer than gall; and he had continually to defend himself against assaults from the monsters of the lake. A husband who could go through all this in order to recover his wife, must certainly have lived in the time of Fairies; and his proceedings sufficiently mark the epoch of my story.[1]
Three years passed without the King's perceiving any hope of success. He was nearly mad. A hundred times he was on the point of throwing himself into the lake; and he would have done so, if he could have imagined this last step would have released the Queen and Princess from their sorrows. He was running one day as usual, first on one side of the lake and then on the other, when a horrible Dragon called to him, and said, "If you will swear to me by your crown and by your sceptre, by your royal mantle, by your wife and your daughter, to give me a certain tit-bit to eat, which I am very fond of, and will ask you for when I want it, I will take you on my wings, and in spite of all the monsters who cover the lake, and who guard this crystal castle, I promise you that we will carry away the Queen and Princess Moufette."
- ↑ This pleasantry is repeated in the verses that terminate the tale.
