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168 will uncricket me. Ah! if I find my shepherdess there, what will be wanting to my happiness?"

The cricket hastened to leave the fatal palace, and without knowing which way he should go, commended himself to the protection of the Fairy Benigne, and set off without ceremony or weapons, for a cricket fears neither robbers nor accidents. At his first resting-place, which was a hole in the trunk of a tree, he found a grasshopper, so very melancholy she could not sing. The cricket, never imagining that she was a reasoning and intellectual creature, said to her, "Where art thou bound to, neighbour grasshopper?" "And you, neighbour cricket, where are you going to?" she asked in her turn. This reply astonished greatly the enamoured cricket. "How!" said he; "can you speak?" "Why, you speak well enough," cried she; "do you think a grasshopper has less right to talk than a cricket?" "I can talk," said the cricket, "because I am a man." "And by the same rule," said the grasshopper, "I ought to talk more than you, because I'm a woman." "You have then suffered a fate similar to mine?" said the cricket. "No doubt," answered the grasshopper. "But, once more, whither go you?" rejoined the cricket; "I should be delighted to find we were likely to remain a long time together." "I heard an unknown voice," replied she, "in the air; it said, 'Leave all to Fate, and seek the Golden Branch!' I fancied this could only be addressed to me, and without pausing, set out on my journey, though I have no idea whither I should go."

Their conversation was interrupted by two mice, who came running as fast as they could, and making for the hole at the foot of the tree, and flinging themselves in head foremost, nearly smothered neighbour cricket and neighbour grasshopper, who got out of their way as best they could, into a little corner. "Ah, Madam," exclaimed the biggest mouse, "I have got a pain in my side with running so fast. How fares your highness?"—"I have pulled my tail off," replied the younger mouse, "otherwise I must still have remained upon the old sorcerer's table. But did you note how he pursued us? How happy are we to have escaped from his infernal palace!"—"I am rather afraid of the cats and the mousetraps, my princess," continued the large mouse; "and I pray fervently that we may soon arrive at the Golden