Opening, part 5 · page 21 2101It was a magnificent ceremony, and the bride and bridegroom walked hand in hand under a canopy of purple velvet embroidered with little pearls.102Then there was a State Banquet, which lasted for five hours.103The Prince and Princess sat at the top of the Great Hall and drank out of a cup of clear crystal.104Only true lovers could drink out of this cup, for if false lips touched it, it grew grey and dull and cloudy.105“It’s quite clear that they love each other,” said the little Page, “as clear as crystal!” and the King doubled his salary a second time.106“What an honour!” cried all the courtiers.107After the banquet there was to be a Ball.108The bride and bridegroom were to dance the Rose-dance together, and the King had promised to play the flute.109He played very badly, but no one had ever dared to tell him so, because he was the King.110Indeed, he knew only two airs, and was never quite certain which one he was playing; but it made no matter, for, whatever he did, everybody cried out, “Charming! charming!”111The last item on the programme was a grand display of fireworks, to be let off exactly at midnight.112The little Princess had never seen a firework in her life, so the King had given orders that the Royal Pyrotechnist should be in attendance on the day of her marriage.113“What are fireworks like?” she had asked the Prince, one morning, as she was walking on the terrace.114“They are like the Aurora Borealis,” said the King, who always answered questions that were addressed to other people, “only much more natural.115I prefer them to stars myself, as you always know when they are going to appear, and they are as delightful as my own flute-playing.116You must certainly see them.”117So at the end of the King’s garden a great stand had been set up, and as soon as the Royal Pyrotechnist had put everything in its proper place, the fireworks began to talk to each other.118“The world is certainly very beautiful,” cried a little Squib.119“Just look at those yellow tulips.120Why! if they were real crackers they could not be lovelier.121I am very glad I have travelled.122Travel improves the mind wonderfully, and does away with all one’s prejudices.”123“The King’s garden is not the world, you foolish squib,” said a big Roman Candle; “the world is an enormous place, and it would take you three days to see it thoroughly.”124“Any place you love is the world to you,” exclaimed a pensive Catherine Wheel, who had been attached to an old deal box in early life, and prided herself on her broken heart; “but love is not fashionable any more, the poets have killed it.125They wrote so much about it that nobody believed them, and I am not surprised.126True love suffers, and is silent.127I remember myself once—But it is no matter now.128Romance is a thing of the past.”1 2← previousOpening, part 4next →Opening, part 6↑ back to The Happy Prince, and Other TalesThis page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg902/5/page/2/