candles; but of them there was so great a number, that they made it one perpetual day. All the masters whom the Princess required to perfect her education were conducted to this place. Her intelligence, her quickness, and her skill enabled her generally to comprehend beforehand what they intended teaching her; and they were all of them in one continual admiration of the surprising things she said, at an age when others were hardly able to pronounce the name of their nurse; but certainly one who is endowed by fairies is not expected to be stupid and ignorant.
If her wit charmed all who approached her, the effects from her beauty were not less powerful. She enraptured the most insensible people; and the Queen her mother would never have lost sight of her, if her duty had not obliged her to be near the King. The good fairies every now and then went to see the Princess; they took her matchless rarities—dresses so cleverly invented, so costly, and so elegant, that they seemed to have been made for the nuptials of a young princess[1] not less amiable than she of whom I speak. But of all the fairies, who protected her, Tulip loved her the most, and most carefully impressed upon the Queen the necessity of not allowing her to see daylight before she was fifteen years old. "Our sister of the fountain is vindictive," said she; "whatever care we may take of this child, she will do it some mischief, if she can. Therefore, Madam, you cannot be too vigilant in that matter." The Queen promised to be incessantly watchful upon such an important affair; but as the time drew near for her dear daughter to leave the palace, she made her sit for her picture, and her portrait was taken to the greatest courts of the universe. There was not a prince who could avoid being struck with admiration at the sight of it; but there was one who was so moved by it that he could never leave it. He placed it in his closet, shut himself up with it, and talked to it, as though it were sensible and could understand him; he said the most passionate things in the world to it.
The King, who now hardly ever saw his son, inquired how he was occupied, and what it could be that prevented his appearing as cheerful as usual. Some of the courtiers, too eager to speak,—for there are many of that sort,—told him they feared that the Prince would go out of his mind; for he
- ↑ This allusion is probably explained by the note to p. 413.
