The Snarling Princess

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Title:     The Snarling Princess
Author: Juliana Horatia Ewing [More Titles by Ewing]

(_Freely adapted from the German._)

Ever so long ago there lived a certain king, at whose court great rejoicings were held for the birth of a child. But this joy was soon turned to sorrow, when the young queen died, and left her infant daughter motherless. As the body of the young queen lay in state, wrapped in a shroud of gold all embroidered with flowers, and with so sweet a smile upon her face that she looked like one who dreams happy dreams in sleep, the sorrowing king took the child in his arms, and kneeling by the bier vowed never to marry again, but to make his wife's only child the heir of his crown and kingdom. This promise he faithfully fulfilled, and remaining a widower, he devoted his life to the upbringing of his daughter.

It is true that the young princess had a fairy godmother--a distant cousin of the deceased queen--but the king could not endure that any one but himself should have a voice in the management of his child, and the fairy godmother, who was accustomed to the utmost deference to her opinions, very soon quitted the court in a huff, and left the king as supreme in the nursery as he was in the council-chamber.

When the precious baby was washed, this was done with no common care. The bath itself was made of gold, and the two chief physicians of the kingdom assisted the king by their counsels. When hot water of crystal clearness had been poured into the bath, the more celebrated of the two physicians dipped the tip of his little finger in, and looking inquiringly at his colleague, said "_Hum_." On which the physician of lesser degree dipped in his little finger and said "_Hem_." And after this the water always proved to be of the right temperature, and did the young princess no harm whatever. The king himself on these occasions always dropped--with much state--a few drops of exquisite scent into the bath, from a golden flask studded with diamonds. The chief lady-in-waiting brought the baby, wrapped in gorgeous robes, and put it into the bath. The court doctors laid their fingers on their noses, and looked very important, whilst the king--who was short-sighted--put on his spectacles to enjoy the sight of the little princess, who gambolled in the water like a fish. The rest of her toilette was carried out with no less formality, and as the same scrupulous care watched over every incident of her daily life, the child grew every day more healthy and beautiful.

Time passed on without lessening the king's devotion to his daughter. Her beauty was the standing theme of conversation in every corner of the palace where the king was likely to overhear it, and the courtiers rivalled each other in trying to read the wishes of the little princess in her blue eyes, and in endeavouring to forestall them.

No wonder the little lady grew up exceedingly self-willed, and with no thought of any one's pleasure but her own.

The king hired governesses, it is true, but he strictly forbade them ever to say a harsh word to his darling; and one who had so far transgressed this order as to reprove the princess for some fault, was dismissed in disgrace. Thus it came about that the child grew daily more and more wilful and capricious. Do what every one would, it was impossible to please her, and as she was allowed to fly into a rage about the most trifling matters, and as she sulked and scolded, and growled and grumbled for the smallest annoyances, her voice gradually acquired a peculiar snarling tone, which was as painful to listen to as it was unbecoming in a young and pretty princess.

The whole court suffered from the depressing effects of the young lady's ill-temper. Behind the king's back, the courtiers complained pretty freely, but before his face no one dared show his annoyance, and two old court ladies, whose nerves were not so strong as they had been, and who feared to betray themselves, were obliged to employ a celebrated professor of cosmetics to paint smiles on their faces that could not be disturbed by the snarling and grumbling of the princess; but the Lord Chamberlain concealed his feelings by a free use of his gold snuff-box, and snuffed away his annoyance pretty successfully.

As his daughter grew up, the king was not without his share of suffering from her ill-temper. But he bore it all very patiently,--"She will be a queen," said he to himself, "and it is fit that she should have a will of her own." The king himself was of an imperious temper, but such was his love for his only child, that he bent it completely to her caprices.

In private, the courtiers were by no means so indulgent in their views, and the future queen was known amongst them, behind her back, as the Snarling Princess.

In spite of her ill-temper and unpleasing voice, however, she was so beautiful, that--being also heir to the throne of a large kingdom--many princes sought her hand in marriage. But the Snarling Princess was resolved to reign alone, and she refused every suitor who appeared.

The princess's rooms were, of course, the most beautiful in the palace. One of these, which looked out on to the forest, was her favourite chamber, but it was also the source of her greatest vexation.

Never did she look out of the window towards the wood without snarling in her harshest tone, "Hateful! Intolerable!"

The source of her annoyance was this:

On the edge of the forest, clearly to be seen from her window, there stood a tiny cottage, in which lived an aged woman who was known amongst the poor folks of the neighbourhood as the "Three-legged Wood-wife." This was because of a wooden staff on which she leaned to eke out the failing strength of her own limbs. The wood-wife was both feared and hated by the people, amongst whom she bore the character of a very malicious witch. The king's daughter hated not only her, but her tumble-down house, and had sent again and again, with large offers of gold, to try and purchase the cottage. But the wood-wife laughed spitefully at the messengers, and only replied that the cottage suited her, and that for no money would she quit it whilst she lived.

The poor have their rights, however, as well as the rich, and even the Snarling Princess was obliged to submit to the disappointment at which she could only grumble.

At one time she resolved never to go into her favourite room again. But she could not keep her resolution. Back she went, and some irresistible power always seemed to draw her to the window to irritate herself by the sight of the wretched hovel which belonged to the Three-legged Witch.

At last, however, by constantly snarling and complaining to the king, she induced him to turn the old woman by force out of her cottage. The king, who was just and upright, did so very unwillingly, and he built her a new and much better cottage elsewhere.

The wood-wife could not resist, but she never put her foot across the threshold of the new house. Meanwhile the old hovel was swept away as fast as possible, and by the princess's wish a pretty summer-house was built on the spot where it had stood, and there she and her court ladies were wont to amuse themselves on warm summer evenings to their hearts' content.

One evening the princess strolled out by herself into the forest. She had been in several distinct rages; first with her court ladies, secondly with her dressmaker, thirdly with the sky, which, in spite of her wishes for fine weather, had become overcast with clouds.

[Illustration]

In this ill-humour nothing in all the beautiful green forest gave her any satisfaction. She snarled at the birds because they sang so merrily. The rustling of the green fir-tops in the evening breeze annoyed her: "Why should pine-trees have needles instead of leaves?" she asked angrily; and then she grumbled because there were no roses on the juniper bushes. Still snarling, she wandered on, till she came to a spot where she stood still and silent in sheer amazement.

In an open space there was a circle of grotesque-looking stones, strangely linked together by creeping plants and ferns of curious growth. And as the Snarling Princess looked at them, it seemed to her that the stones took dwarf-like shapes, and glared about them with weird elfin faces. The princess seemed rooted to the spot. An invisible power appeared to draw her towards the group, and to attract her by a beautiful flower, whose calyx opened at her approach. Unable to resist the impulse, she stepped into the circle and plucked the flower.

No sooner had she done so than her feet took deep root in the earth, her hair stiffened into fir-needles, and her arms became branches. She was now firmly fixed in the centre of the group of stones, a slender, swaying pine-tree, which creaked and croaked, and snapped and snarled with every gust of wind, as the princess had hardly ever done in her most ill-tempered moments. And as her limbs stiffened under their magical transformation, the hideous figure of the wood-wife might have been seen hovering round the charmed circle, her arms half changed into bird's wings, and her hands into claws. And as the king's daughter fairly turned into a pine-tree, the wood-wife took the form of an owl, and for a moment rested triumphantly on her branches. Then with a shrill "Tu-whit! tu-whoo!" it vanished into the forest.

When the princess did not return to the palace, and all search after her proved utterly vain, the poor old king fell into a state of the deepest melancholy, and spent most of his time in the summer-house, bewailing the mysterious loss of his only child.

One day, many months afterwards, he wandered into the forest. A storm was raging, of which he took no heed. But suddenly he stopped beneath a pine-tree, and looked up--"How like my poor dear daughter's voice!" said he; "especially when she was the least bit in the world--" He did not like to finish the sentence, but sat down under the tree and wept bitterly. And for every tear he shed, the pine-tree dropped a shower of needles. For the Snarling Princess recognized her father, and heartily lamented the pain he suffered now, and had so often suffered before on her account.

"Tu-whit! tu-whoo!" said a voice, from a hole beneath the pine-tree.

"Who speaks?" said the king.

"It is I, cousin," said the owl, hopping into the daylight, and gradually assuming the form and features of the fairy godmother. "You did not know me as the Three-legged Wood-wife, whom you so unjustly sacrificed to your daughter's caprices. But I have had a hand in her education after all! For twelve months has she croaked and creaked, snapped and snarled, beneath the summer heat, the winter snow, and the storms of spring and autumn. Her punishment--and yours--is over."

As the fairy godmother spoke, the pine-tree became a princess once more, and fell into her father's arms.

But the wood-wife took again the shape of an owl, and the enchanted stones became bats, and they all disappeared into the shadows of the forest.

And as the princess shortly afterwards married a very charming prince, she no doubt changed her name.

Certainly she was never more known as the Snarling Princess.

[The end]
Juliana Horatia G Ewing's short story: Snarling Princess

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