The Wise Princess
Once upon a time lived a King whose wife was dead and who had one little daughter who was named Fernanda. She was very good and pretty, but when she was a child she vexed all her ladies by asking them questions about everything she saw.
“Your Highness should not wish to know too much,” they told her, whereat Princess Fernanda threw up her little head, and said,
“I want to know everything.”
As she grew up she had masters and mistresses to teach her, and learnt every language and every science; but still she said, “It is not enough; I want to know more.”
In a deep cave underground there lived an old Wizard who was so wise that his face was well-nigh black with wrinkles, and his long white beard flowed to his feet. He knew all sorts of magic, and every day and night sat poring over his books till now there seemed to be nothing left for him to learn.
One night after everyone was asleep, Princess Fernanda rose and slipped softly down the stairs and out of the palace unheard by anyone, and stole away to the Wizard’s cave.
The old man was sitting on his low stool reading out of an immense book by a dim green light, but he raised his eyes as the Princess entered at the low doorway, and looked at her. She wore a blue and silver robe, but her bright hair was unbound, and fell in ripples to her waist.
“Who are you, and what do you want with me?” he asked shortly.
“I am the Princess Fernanda,” she said, “and I wish to be your pupil. Teach me all you know.”
“Why do you wish for that?” said the Wizard: “you will not be better or happier for it.”
“I am not happy now,” said the Princess sighing wearily. “Teach me and you shall find me an apt pupil, and I will pay you with gold.”
“I will not have your gold,” said the Wizard, “but come to me every night at this hour, and in three years you shall know all I do.”
So every night the Princess went down to the Wizard’s cave while all the court were sleeping. And the people wondered at her more and more, and said, “How much she knows! How wise she is!”
When the three years had gone by the Wizard said to her, “Go! I can teach you no more now. You are as wise as I.” Then the Princess thanked him and went back to her father’s palace.
She was very wise. She knew the languages of all animals. The fishes came from the deep at her call, and the birds from the trees. She could tell when the winds would rise, and when the sea would be still. She could have turned her enemies to stone, or given untold wealth to her friends. But for all that, when she smiled, her lips were very sad, and her eyes were always full of care. She said she was weary, and her father thought she was sick, and would have sent for the physicians, but she stopped him.
“How should physicians help me, my father,” she said, “seeing that I know more than they?”
One night, a year after she had taken her last lesson from the Wizard, she arose and returned to his cave, and he raised his eyes and saw her standing before him as formerly.
“What do you want?” he said. “I have taught you all I know.”
“You have taught me much,” she said, falling on her knees beside him, “yet I am ignorant of one thing—teach me that also—how to be happy.”
“Nay,” said the Wizard with a very mournful smile; “I cannot teach you that, for I do not know it myself. Go and ask it of them who know and are wiser than I.”
Then the Princess left the cave and wandered down to the seashore. All that night she spent sitting on a rock that jutted out into the sea, watching the wild sky and the moon coming and going behind the clouds. The sea dashed up around her, and the wind blew, but she did not fear them, and when the sun rose the waters were still and the wind fell. A skylark rose from the fields and flew straight up to heaven, singing as though his heart would burst with pure joy.
“Surely that bird is happy,” said the Princess to herself; and she called it in its own tongue.
“Why do you sing?” she asked.
“I sing because I am so happy,” answered the lark.
“And why are you so happy?” asked the Princess.
“So happy?” said the lark. “God is so good. The sky is so blue, and the fields are so green. Is that not enough to make me happy?”
“Teach me, then, that I may be happy too,” said Princess Fernanda.
“I cannot,” said the lark; “I don’t know how to teach;” and then he rose, singing, into the blue overhead, and Princess Fernanda sighed and turned back towards the palace.
Outside her door she met her little lapdog, who barked and jumped for joy on seeing her.
“Little dog,” she said; “poor little dog, are you so glad to see me? Why are you so happy?”
“Why am I so happy?” said the little dog, surprised. “I have plenty to eat, and a soft cushion to rest upon, and you to caress me. Is not it enough to make me happy?”
“It is not enough for me,” said the Princess, sighing; but the little dog
