heard her singing, and that her song had
excited such a deep emotion in his heart that he could not rest till he
had seen her. On hearing this Lettice ceased to fear him, and they
talked together for some time, till at length the Prince asked her if
she would take him for a husband. For a time she hesitated, although
she saw that he was young and handsome, and he had told her he was a
prince.

At last she said to herself: "He will certainly love me better than old
Mother Grethel does." So she placed her hand in his, and said: "I would
willingly go with you and be your wife, but I do not know in the least
how to get away from this place. Unless," she added, after a pause,
"you will bring me every day some strong silk cord; then I will weave
a ladder of it, and when it is finished I will descend upon it, and you
shall take me away on your horse."

The Prince readily agreed to this, and promised to come and see her
every evening till the ladder was finished, for the old Witch always
came in the daytime.

The Witch had never seen the Prince; she knew nothing of his visits
till one day Lettice said innocently: "I shall not have such a heavy
weight as you to draw up much longer, Mother Grethel, for the King's
son is coming very soon to fetch me away."

"You wicked child!" cried the Witch; "what do I hear you say? I thought
I had hidden you from all the world, and now you have betrayed me!" In
her wrath she caught hold of Lettice's beautiful hair, and struck her
several times with her left hand. Then she seized a pair of scissors
and cut Lettice's hair, while the beautiful locks, glistening like
gold, fell to the ground. And she was so hard-hearted after this that
she dragged poor Lettice out into the forest, to a wild and desert
place, and left her there in sorrow and great distress.

On the same day on which the poor maiden had been exiled the Witch tied
the locks of hair which she had cut off poor Lettice's golden head into
a kind of tail, and hung it over the window sill.

In the evening the Prince came and cried:

"Lettice, Lettice, let down your hair,
That I may climb without a stair."

Then the Witch let the hair down, and the King's son climbed up; but at
the open window he found not his dear Lettice, but a wicked witch who
looked at him with cruel and malicious eyes.

"Ah!" she cried with a sneer, "you are come to fetch your loving bride,
I suppose; but the beautiful bird has flown from the nest,