Page:Researches respecting the Book of Sindibad and Portuguese Folk-Tales.djvu/62

 40 flowers to present the prince with. She sent back to say that she would very much. The enchanted girl then replied that she should send her, her eyes, and she on her part would send her the flowers. And so it happened. The other girl who was very desirous of presenting the prince with a nosegay sent the enchanted maiden her eyes. What did she do then?—Next day just before the marriage was to take place she dressed herself in deep black and put a veil on. She knocked at the door of the palace, but they would not admit her. At last, after many entreaties, she was allowed to enter, and she went straight into the prince's room and begged him most beseechingly not to marry. The prince replied that he could not put off the marriage as the invited guests had arrived. The maiden reiterated her demand, and stretched out her hand to the prince, the hand which had on the ring that he had given her, the prince seeing which raised up her veil and at once recognized her. As the maiden had with her the divining-rod that the fairies had left her, she touched her clothes with it, and immediately she found herself richly dressed. The prince then went to meet his invited guests and said to them, "I lost something, and instead I bought another. I have now recovered that which I lost. Which ought I to make use of—that which I lost, or what I bought?" They all exclaimed with one accord, "Surely, make use of what you have recovered." The prince then went to his room to seek the enchanted maiden, who related all that had occurred to her to the guests. And it was she whom he married.