Page:The jade story book; stories from the Orient (IA jadestorybooksto00cous).pdf/149

Rh My father—who is rather hasty—ordered him to be thrown downstairs. The wretch not long after managed to approach me under another form; one day when I was in the garden I asked for some refreshment, and he brought me—in the disguise of a slave—a draught which changed me at once to this horrid shape. Whilst I was fainting with terror he transported me here, and cried to me with his awful voice: 'There shall you remain, lonely and hideous, despised even by the brutes, till the end of your days, or till someone of his own free will asks you to be his wife. Thus do I avenge myself on you and your proud father.'

"Since then many months have passed away. Sad and lonely do I live like any hermit within these walls, avoided by the world and a terror even to animals; the beauties of nature are hidden from me, for I am blind by day, and it is only when the moon sheds her pale light on this spot that the veil falls from my eyes and I can see." The owl paused, and once more wiped her eyes with her wing, for the recital of her woes had drawn fresh tears from her.