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"No," said the Prince, "no man can be in two different
pairs of boots at one and the same time! That's mathematics!"
He then hunted about in the lumber room again till he
found a small, shabby, old Persian carpet, the size of a
hearthrug. He went to his own room, took a portmanteau in
his hand, sat down on the carpet, and said: "I wish I were in
Gluckstein!"
In a moment there he found himself; for this was mat
famous carpet which Prince Hussein bought long ago, in the
market at Bisnagar, and which the fairies had brought with
the other presents to the christening of Prince Prigio.
When he arrived at the house where the ball was going on,
he put the magical carpet in the portmanteau, and left it in the
cloakroom, receiving a numbered ticket in exchange. Then he
marched in all his glory (and of course without the cap of
darkness) into the room where they were dancing. Everybody
made place for him. bowing down to the ground, and the
loyal band struck up The Prince's March:
56 Andrew Long
Heaven bless our Prince Prigio!
What is there he doesn't know?
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Greek, Swiss, German (High and Low),
And the names of the mountains in Mexico,
Heaven bless the Prince!
He used to be very fond of this march, and the words some
people said he had made them himself. But now, somehow,
he didn't much like it. He went straight to the Duke of
Stumpfelbahn, the Hereditary Master of the Ceremonies, and
asked to be introduced to the beautiful young lady. She was
the daughter of the new English Ambassador, and her name
was Lady Rosalind. But she nearly fainted when she heard
who it was that wished to dance with her, for she was not at
all particularly clever; and the Prince had such a bad character
for snubbing girls, and asking them difficult questions. How-
ever, it was impossible to refuse, and so she danced with the
Prince, and he danced very well. Then they sat out in the
conservatory, among the flowers, where nobody came near
them; and then they danced again, and then the Prince took
her down to supper. And all the time he never once said:
"Have you read thisT' or "Have you read that?" or "What!
you never heard of Alexander the Great?" or Julius Caesar,
or Michelangelo, or whoever it might be horrid,' difficult
questions he used to ask. That was the way he used to go on:
but now he only talked to the young lady about herself; and
she quite left off being shy or frightened, and asked him all
about his own country, and about the Firedrake shooting, and
said how fond she was of hunting herself. And the Prince
said: "Oh, if you wish it, you shall have the horns and tail of
a Firedrake to hang up in your hall, tomorrow evening!"
Then she asked if it was not very dangerous work, Fire-
drake hunting; and he said it was nothing, when you knew the
trick of it; and he asked her if she would not give him a rose
out of her bouquet; and, in short, he made himself so agree-
able and unaffected that she thought him very nice indeed.
For even a clever person can be nice when he likes above
all when he is not thinking about himself. And now the
Prince was thinking of nothing in the world but the daughter
PRINCE PRIGIO 57
of the English Ambassador, and how to please her. He got
introduced to her father too, and quite won his heart; and at
last he was invited to dine next day at the embassy.
In Pantouflia, it is the custom that a ball must not end
while one of the royal family goes on dancing. This ball
lasted till the light came in, and the birds were singing out of
doors, and all the mothers present were sound asleep. Then
nothing would satisfy the Prince but that they all should go
home singing through the streets: in fact, there never had
been so merry a dance in alt Pantouflia. The Prince had made
a point of dancing with almost every girl there; and he had
suddenly become the most beloved of the royal family. But
everything must end at last; and the Prince, putting on the cap [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]