The Grateful Prince, part 1 · page 21 2101The girl made a sign to him to follow her, and, throwing open a door, nodded to him to go in.102He would have lingered a moment, for he thought she looked sad, but dared not do so, for fear of the old man’s anger.103‘It is impossible that she can be his daughter!’ he said to himself, ‘for she has a kind heart.104I am quite sure she must be the same girl who was brought here instead of me, so I am bound to risk my head in this mad adventure.’105He got into bed, but it was long before he fell asleep, and even then his dreams gave him no rest.106He seemed to be surrounded by dangers, and it was only the power of the maiden who helped him through it all.107When he woke his first thoughts were for the girl, whom he found hard at work.108He drew water from the well and carried it to the house for her, kindled the fire under the iron pot, and, in fact, did everything that came into his head that could be of any use to her.109In the afternoon he went out, in order to learn something of his new home, and wondered greatly not to come across the old grandmother.110In his rambles he came to the farmyard, where a beautiful white horse had a stall to itself; in another was a black cow with two white-faced calves, while the clucking of geese, ducks, and hens reached him from a distance.111Breakfast, dinner, and supper were as savoury as before, and the prince would have been quite content with his quarters had it not been for the difficulty of keeping silence in the presence of the maiden.112On the evening of the second day he went, as he had been told, to receive his orders for the following morning.113‘I am going to set you something very easy to do to-morrow,’ said the old man when his servant entered.114‘Take this scythe and cut as much grass as the white horse will want for its day’s feed, and clean out its stall.checked by a teacher115If I come back and find the manger empty it will go ill with you.116So beware!’117The prince left the room, rejoicing in his heart, and saying to himself, ‘Well, I shall soon get through that!118If I have never yet handled either the plough or the scythe, at least I have often watched the country people work them, and know how easy it is.’1 2← previousThe Lute Playernext →The Grateful Prince, part 2↑ back to The Violet Fairy BookThis page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg641/9/page/2/