Page:Old time stories (Perrault, Robinson).djvu/182

 Old-Time Stories with messages of condolence, and when the ceremonies proper to these occasions were at length over, he proclaimed a period of peace. He released his subjects from military service, and devoted himself to giving them every assistance in the development of commerce.

Of all this the queen knew nothing. A little princess had been born to her in the meantime, and her beauty did not belie the Frog's prediction. They gave her the name of Moufette, but the queen had great difficulty in persuading the Witch to let her bring up the child, for her ferocity was such that she would have liked to eat it.

At the age of six months Moufette was a marvel of beauty, and often, as she gazed upon her with mingled tenderness and pity, the queen would say:

'Could your father but see you, my poor child, how delighted he would be, and how dear you would be to him! But perhaps even now he has begun to forget me: doubtless he believes that death has robbed him of us, and it may be that another now fills the place I had in his affections.'

Many were the tears she shed over these sad thoughts, and the Frog, whose love for her was sincere, was moved one day by the sight of her grief to say to her:

'If you like, Madam, I will go and seek your royal husband. It is a long journey, and I am but a tardy traveller, but sooner or later I have no doubt I shall get there.'

No suggestion could have been more warmly approved, the queen clasping her hands, and bidding little Moufette do the same, in token of the gratitude she felt towards the good Frog for offering to make the expedition. Nor would the king, she declared, be less grateful. 'Of what advantage, however,' she went on, 'will it be to him to learn 152