Produced by John Bechard (JaBBechard@aol.com)
The Light Princess and Other Fairy Stories
by George MacDonald
Once upon a time, so long ago that I have quite forgotten the date,there lived a king and queen who had no children.
And the king said to himself, "All the queens of my acquaintance havechildren, some three, some seven, and some as many as twelve; and myqueen has not one. I feel ill-used." So he made up his mind to be crosswith his wife about it. But she bore it all like a good patient queenas she was. Then the king grew very cross indeed. But the queenpretended to take it all as a joke, and a very good one too.
"Why don't you have any daughters, at least?" said he. "I don't saysons; that might be too much to expect."
"I am sure, dear king, I am very sorry," said the queen.
"So you ought to be," retorted the king; "you are not going to make avirtue of that, surely."
But he was not an ill-tempered king, and in any matter of less momentwould have let the queen have her own way with all his heart. This,however, was an affair of state.
The queen smiled.
"You must have patience with a lady, you know, dear king," said she.
She was, indeed, a very nice queen, and heartily sorry that she couldnot oblige the king immediately.
The king tried to have patience, but he succeeded very badly. It wasmore than he deserved, therefore, when, at last, the queen gave him adaughter—as lovely a little princess as ever cried.
The day drew near when the infant must be christened. The king wroteall the invitations with his own hand. Of course somebody wasforgotten.
Now it does not generally matter if somebody is forgotten, only youmust mind who. Unfortunately, the king forgot without intending toforget; and so the chance fell upon the Princess Makemnoit, which wasawkward. For the princess was the king's own sister; and he ought notto have forgotten her. But she had made herself so disagreeable to theold king, their father, that he had forgotten her in making his will;and so it was no wonder that her brother forgot her in writing hisinvitations. But poor relations don't do anything to keep you in mindof them. Why don't they? The king could not see into the garret shelived in, could he?
She was a sour, spiteful creature. The wrinkles of contempt crossed thewrinkles of peevishness, and made her face as full of wrinkles as a patof butter. If ever a king could be justified in forgetting anybody,this king was justified in forgetting his sister, even at achristening. She looked very odd, too. Her forehead was as large as allthe rest of her face, and projected over it like a precipice. When shewas angry her little eyes flashed blue. When she hated anybody, theyshone yellow and green. What they looked like when she loved anybody, Ido not know; for I never heard of her loving anybody but herself, and Ido not think she could have managed that if she had not somehow gotused to herself. But what made it highly imprudent in the king toforget her was—that she was awfully clever. In fact, she was a witch;and when she bewitched anybody, he very soon had enough of it; for shebeat all the wicked fairies in wickedness, and all the cl