selves at her feet, calling her the Liberator of Kings. She then discovered that her brothers, deceived by her dress, did not at all recognise her; she instantly took off her helmet, held out her arms to them, and embraced them a hundred times: she then asked the other princes with much kindness who they were; each of them told her their own adventure, and offered to accompany her wherever she wished to go: she replied, that though the laws of chivalry might give her a right over the liberty she had just restored to them, she should not think of taking advantage of it. She then retired with the Princes, that they might relate to each other what had happened to them since their separation.
The little green bird that tells everything interrupted them, to entreat Belle-Etoile to set him free; she immediately sought the dove to ask her advice, but she could not find her anywhere; she told the bird that she had suffered too much trouble and anxiety on his account to enjoy her conquest for so short a time. All four then mounted their horses, leaving the emperors and kings to walk, for as they had been there between two and three hundred years, their horses had perished.
The Queen-Mother, relieved from all the anxiety that the return of her lovely children had given her, renewed her attempts to persuade the King to marry again, and urged him so strongly, that she at last induced him to make choice of a princess of his own family. As it would be necessary to dissolve his marriage with the poor Queen Blondine, who had lived at her mother's country-house, with the three dogs, which she had named Chagrin, Mouron,[1] and Douleur, in consequence of all the misery they had caused her, the Queen-Mother sent for her; she got into the carriage, taking the whelps with her; she was dressed in black, with a long veil which fell down to her feet.
In this apparel she looked more beautiful than the sun, although she had become pale and thin, for she scarcely ever slept, and never ate but from complaisance, and every one pitied her poor mother; the King was so much affected that
- ↑ Mouron is the herb called Pimpernel or Burnet. I have not been able to find any property attributed to it, or superstition attached to it, that would account for Blondine's so naming one of her dogs. It may be simply from its similarity in sound to mourrant.
