ty
might please to command. But since you have been so kind as to
think of my sisters, I thank you for the regard you have shewn
them for my sake; and therefore I shall not dissemble, that I had
rather have them than strangers."

The emperor named the queen's two sisters to be her midwives; and
from that time they went frequently to the palace, overjoyed at
the opportunity they should have of executing the detestable
wickedness they had meditated against the queen.

When the queen's time was up she was safely delivered of a young
prince, as bright as the day; but neither his innocence nor
beauty could move the cruel hearts of the merciless sisters. They
wrapped him up carelessly in his cloths, and put him into a
basket, which they abandoned to the stream of a small canal, that
ran under the queen's apartment, and declared that she was
delivered of a little dead dog, which they produced. This
disagreeable intelligence was announced to the emperor, who
became so angry at the circumstance, that he was likely to have
occasioned the queen's death, if his grand vizier had not
represented to him, that he could not, without injustice, make
her answerable for the caprices of nature.

In the mean time, the basket in which the little prince was
exposed was carried by the stream beyond a wall, which bounded
the prospect of the queen's apartment, and from thence floated
with the current down the gardens. By chance the intendant of the
emperor's gardens, one of the principal and most considerable
officers of the kingdom, was walking in the garden by the side of
this canal, and perceiving a basket floating, called to a
gardener, who was not far off, to bring it to shore, that he
might see what it contained. The gardener, with a rake which he
had in his hand, drew the basket to the side of the canal, took
it up, and gave it to him.

The intendant of the gardens was extremely surprised to see in
the basket a child, which, though he knew it could be but just
born, had very fine features. This officer had been married
several years, but though he had always been desirous of having
children, Heaven had never blessed him with any. This accident
interrupted his walk: he made the gardener follow him with the
child; and when he came to his own house, which was situated at
the entrance into the gardens of the palace, went into his wife's
apartment. "Wife," said he, "as we have no children of our own,
God has sent us one. I recommend him