|
The Real Princess
Hans Christian Anderson
There was once a Prince who wished to marry a Princess;
but then she must be a real Princess. He travelled all over the world in hopes
of finding such a lady; but there was always something wrong. Princesses he
found in plenty; but whether they were real Princesses it was impossible for him
to decide, for now one thing, now another, seemed to him not quite right about
the ladies. At last he returned to his palace quite cast down, because he wished
so much to have a real Princess for his wife.
One evening a fearful tempest arose, it thundered and
lightened, and the rain poured down from the sky in torrents: besides, it was as
dark as pitch. All at once there was heard a violent knocking at the door, and
the old King, the Prince's father, went out himself to open it.
It was a Princess who was standing outside the door.
What with the rain and the wind, she was in a sad condition; the water trickled
down from her hair, and her clothes clung to her body. She said she was a real
Princess.
"Ah! we shall soon see that!" thought the old
Queen-mother; however, she said not a word of what she was going to do; but went
quietly into the bedroom, took all the bed-clothes off the bed, and put three
little peas on the bedstead. She then laid twenty mattresses one upon another
over the three peas, and put twenty feather beds over the mattresses.
Upon this bed the Princess was to pass the night.
The next morning she was asked how she had slept. "Oh,
very badly indeed!" she replied. "I have scarcely closed my eyes the whole night
through. I do not know what was in my bed, but I had something hard under me,
and am all over black and blue. It has hurt me so much!"
Now it was plain that the lady must be a real Princess,
since she had been able to feel the three little peas through the twenty
mattresses and twenty feather beds. None but a real Princess could have had such
a delicate sense of feeling.
The Prince accordingly made her his wife; being now
convinced that he had found a real Princess. The three peas were however put
into the cabinet of curiosities, where they are still to be seen, provided they
are not lost.
Wasn't this a lady of real delicacy?
|