Daughter of a king

“ And the warm blood flushed through the Monarch's daughter,
And lo! she fell on his neck with a cry.
Many there be by land and water,
(Wait and watch ye patiently)
That gave their love to a Monarch's daughter,
That bound their heart in the days gone by.
Hope is little by land or water,
Wait and watch ye patiently.
Gold wins not a Monarch's daughter,
Neither jewels nor bravery.
Get ye fame by land and water,
That your name live and do not die,
And ye win the love of a Monarch's daughter... ”

“ A king's daughter she must be, or the child of some good spirit. Of late she has spoken much of a change to come in her life, of a Prince's son, and of many other things which we have not understood, but our hearts have been sad within us, fearing lest the girl prophesied her marriage and separation from us who love her more than all else in the whole world. ”

“ Doth it contain a complaint of oppression or demand for the price of the stuff?' 'Out on thee!' answered the princess. 'There is none of this in it, nought but words of love and gallantry. This is all through thee: else how should this devil know me?' 'O my lady,' rejoined the old woman, 'thou sittest in thy high palace and none may win to thee, no, not even the birds of the air. God keep thee and keep thy youth from blame and reproach! Thou art a princess, the daughter of a king, and needest not reck of the barking of dogs. ”

“ I brought you here to inform me whether the queen will have a daughter or son?" "She is pregnant of a daughter," replied the fairy, "who will be the most beautiful and most accomplished princess that has ever been seen, and the queen will wish to see her placed in the highest possible situation of rank and honour." "If she is not very beautiful and accomplished," said the king, "I will hang her mother to a tree, with the child at her neck, and nothing shall prevent it." ”

“ The Queen remained sad and thoughtful. "Why should I wish," she said, "for a daughter who will cost me many tears and sighs? should I not be happier without any children?" The presence of the King, whom she loved dearly, a little dissipated her grief, and when she found that she should soon become a mother, all her care was to desire her friends, the moment the Princess should be born, to lay on her head the hawthorn flower, which she kept in a box of gold covered with diamonds, as the most valuable thing she possessed. ”

“ In consequence the little girl was the apple of her parents' eyes; they loved her above everything else in the world, and their dearest thought was the pleasure they would take in her when she was older. But the unexpected often happens; for before the king's daughter began to grow up, the queen her mother fell ill and died. It is not hard to imagine the grief that reigned, not alone in the royal castle, but throughout the land; for the queen had been beloved of all. The king grieved so that he would not marry again, and his one joy was the little princess. ”

“ The king sat high on his royal throne,
⁠Though his hairs were grey, his arm was strong,
“Good cousin,” he said, in a jocund tone,
⁠“Is it thou or thy steed that has stay’d so long?
“But it boots not now—Bring forth the bride!
⁠Thou hast never yet my daughter seen;
A woeful fate it is thine to bide,
⁠For her hair is red and her eyes are green!
The brido came forth in a costly veil,
⁠And nought of her face could Alfred see;
But his cheek grew yet more deadly pale,
⁠And he fell down faltering upon his knee:
“Pardon! pardon! my liege, my king! ”

“ The despair of our young lovers cannot be described. Constancia then first comprehended the whole extent of her misfortune. To be a king's daughter, rightful owner of immense dominions, and to languish in the power of a cruel queen, who banished her son for fear of his affection for her—a princess who was his equal every way, and whose hand would be ardently desired by the greatest sovereigns in the world! ”

“ Comfort yourselves, King and Queen; your daughter shall not die of the wound. It is true that I have not sufficient power to undo entirely what my elder has done. The Princess will pierce her hand with a spindle, but, instead of dying, she will only fall into a deep sleep, which will last a hundred years, at the end of which time a king's son will come and wake her. ”

“ Even of your mettle, of your very blood;
Of all one pain, save for a night of groans
Endured of her, for whom you bid like sorrow.
Your children were vexation to your youth,
But mine shall be a comfort to your age.
The loss you have is but a son being King,
And by that loss your daughter is made Queen.
I cannot make you what amends I would;
Therefore accept such kindness as I can.
Dorset your son, that with a fearful soul
Leads discontented steps in foreign soil,
This fair alliance quickly shall call home
To high promotions and great dignity. ”

“ Was she that king's dead daughter?
Oh curlew crying again:
Oh reeds that sob in the waters!
They are human tears that make this rain
That darkens the marshes and fills the plain.
Our loves are all kings' daughters! ”

“ When the King heard this, he thought to kill him and said, “How camest thou to be careless of my daughter and let this demon come at her?” Then he betook himself to the Princess’s palace, where he found her slave-women standing to await him and asked them, “What is come to my daughter?” “O King,” answered they, “slumber overcame us and, when we awoke, we found a young man sitting upon her couch in talk with her, as he were the full moon; never saw we aught fairer of favour than he. So we questioned him of his case and he declared that thou hadst given him thy daughter in marriage. ”

“ Here the queen endeavoured to calm the princess by soft words. 'Daughter,' said she, 'how could any man come to you?' But instead of hearing her, the princess interrupted her, and flew out into such violence as obliged the queen to leave her, and retire in great affliction to inform the king of all that had passed. ”

“ At these words she embraced the queen, then she kissed the little vermilion mouth of the infant princess, and said, "My pretty little girl, you shall henceforth be your mother's consolation; you shall be richer than your father; you shall live an hundred years without illness, wrinkles, or old age." The enraptured queen returned thanks, and begged that the fairy would take Juliet away, and be careful of her, adding at the same time, "I give her to be your daughter." ”

“ She thinks there never was so perfect a being in the world as her mother. She cannot quite persuade herself that she was ever Queen, because she knew the Queen too well, who always called her daughter, and treated her better than her sisters; I cannot tell why, because she was not the most amiable of them.
It is quite true that there is little sympathy between my son’s wife and me; but we live together as politely as possible. Her singular conduct shall never prevent me from keeping that promise which I made to the late King in his last moments. ”

“ Then the princess crept into the stove, and, weeping and lamenting, she poured forth her whole heart, saying—
"I am alone in the whole world, though I am a king's daughter. A treacherous waiting-maid has taken my place and compelled me to put off my royal dress, and even taken my place with my bridegroom, while I have to work as a goose-girl. ”

“ Once upon a time there reigned a king who had an only daughter. The girl had been spoiled by everybody from her birth, and, besides being beautiful, was clever and wilful, and when she grew old enough to be married she refused to have anything to say to the prince whom her father favoured, but declared she would choose a husband for herself. ”

“ It did not take the peasant long to take her home, and when the Queen and the King saw their daughter in her own form again they fell on their knees before the peasant youth and thanked him.
But the Princess did not understand what it all meant, and said: “Why do you kneel to him? He should kneel to you! Are you not King and Queen of this land, and this man a poor peasant?”
Before the King could explain to the Princess the youth said: “I have brought you your daughter, but you must keep her. I could never marry a maid who thought herself above me. Give me gold and let me go back to my home!” ”

“ The King loves this black Princess dearly as an only daughter; but the priests have misled him, and persuaded him to send her away from the Court and city, and to keep her confined in a palace built under a stream; for they have a prophecy, according to which, at the time when the white summit of that mountain, which lies to the north-east from the tower of the palace and from the cupola of the temple, can be seen to smoke, a man shall come to the kingdom who shall marry the King's daughter, and put all the worshippers of the serpent to fire and sword. ”

“ For a long time the King went sorrowing for his wife, for he had loved her exceedingly; but at last he grew tired of living alone, and married a Queen who was a widow, and she also had a daughter, who was just as ill-favoured and wicked as the other was good and beautiful. The stepmother and her daughter were envious of the King’s daughter because she was so pretty, but so long as the King was at home they dared do her no harm, because his love for her was so great. ”

“ I thought if it had been the king who had married my lass he would not have done so.
“When I came hame that night I asked my girl how it was. And she told me it was from fear of his mother, who had set her heart on his marrying the daughter of a duke. The daughter of a duke, indeed. What was the daughter of a duke compared to the beauty and the angel of the whole world, as kings and princes would ha’ fought for, if they had only seen her? But it was all a lie, for my lady countess, she had set her heart on his never marrying anybody so long as she should live. ”

“ Lords of the Earth, it is with us an ancient and honourable custom that the daughters of kings make choice of a husband suitable to their degree and royalty; nor do we force them to unchosen marriages. And this is known as the swayamvara of a king’s daughter. ”

“ Promise me, I beg of you, that you will marry according to my wishes’; and he then named the daughter of a neighbouring King who he was anxious should be his son’s wife. The Prince was so overwhelmed with grief that he could think of nothing but his father, and exclaimed: ‘Yes, yes, dear father, whatever you desire shall be done.’ Thereupon the King closed his eyes and died. ”

“ In process of time the lords and knights of the kingdom counselled the King (as he was young) to live no longer as he had done, but to take a wife; which counsel prevailing, they chose him a rich and beautiful princess to be his consort—a neighbouring King’s daughter, of whom he was very fond. Not long after, the Queen had a fine son, which caused great feasting and rejoicing at the Court, insomuch that the late Queen, in a manner, was entirely forgotten. That fared well, and King and Queen lived happy together for several years. ”

“ The king bade her go on, and heard her narrative from beginning to end with astonishment. The princess on finishing said to him, "Sir, though women do not easily comply with the liberty assumed by men to have several wives; yet if your majesty will consent to give your daughter the princess Haiatalnefous in marriage to the prince, I will with all my heart yield up to her the rank and quality of queen, which of right belongs to her, and content myself with the second place. ”

“ The king informs his wife that she too must be killed, as she can never become a princess, but will always remain a peasant girl. The unhappy mother once more bows her head to the will of the king, who, however, consigns his son and daughter, not to an executioner, but to his sister, that they may receive all the attentions due to their royal pedigree and standing. Years pass away; the little prince and princess grow up beautiful, healthy, good, and happy, and pass adolescence. ”

“ Now, it is not often that one gets a chance of playing with a King's daughter, so it is no wonder that, when the Princess followed her royal parents into the great hall on the appointed day, she found it filled from end to end with all the little princes and princesses and all the little counts and countesses and all the little dukes and duchesses that the surrounding kingdoms could produce. ”

“ Now in countries where the royal blood was traced through women only, and where consequently the king held office merely in virtue of his marriage with an hereditary princess, who was the real sovereign, it appears to have often happened that a prince married his own sister, the princess royal, in order to obtain with her hand the crown which otherwise would have gone to another man, perhaps to a stranger. May not the same rule of descent have furnished a motive for incest with a daughter? ”

“ They told him it was because the King's only daughter refused to marry; therefore when her father died there would be no heir to the throne. They greatly feared she must be out of her mind, for though every good-looking young man in the kingdom had been shown to her, she declared she would only marry one who was the son of seven mothers, and who had ever heard of such a thing? The King, in despair, had ordered every man who entered [page 440] the city gates to be led before the Princess ”

“ I thought of that sad-faced king, the absolute lord of millions, surrounded by all that the heart of man can desire, by vast wealth, by hundreds of lovely wives, by loving children, by countless armies, by all the glory of the arts, ruling over the fairest empire on the earth, with every pleasure to his hand, a god in all things save his mortality, and worshipped as a god, and yet a victim to fear and superstition, and more heavy hearted than the meanest slave about his palaces. ”

“ My sister, the queen, would certainly hesitate to exclude her own son from the crown, for the vanity of being called queen-regnant; the more especially as, in reality, she will be so, as long as the young king is a minor. ”