ses. He soon learned all that could be learned about the
princess. He went nearly distracted; but after roaming about the lake
for days, and diving in every depth that remained, all that he could do
was to put an extra polish on the dainty pair of boots that was never
called for.

For the princess kept her room, with the curtains drawn to shut out the
dying lake. But she could not shut it out of her mind for a moment. It
haunted her imagination so that she felt as if the lake were her soul,
drying up within her, first to mud, then to madness and death. She thus
brooded over the change, with all its dreadful accompaniments, till she
was nearly distracted. As for the prince, she had forgotten him.
However much she had enjoyed his company in the water, she did not care
for him without it. But she seemed to have forgotten her father and
mother too. The lake went on sinking. Small slimy spots began to
appear, which glittered steadily amidst the changeful shine of the
water. These grew to broad patches of mud, which widened and spread,
with rocks here and there, and floundering fishes and crawling eels
swarming. The people went everywhere catching these, and looking for
anything that might have dropped from the royal boats.

At length the lake was all but gone, only a few of the deepest pools
remaining unexhausted.

It happened one day that a party of youngsters found themselves on the
brink of one of these pools in the very centre of the lake. It was a
rocky basin of considerable depth. Looking in, they saw at the bottom
something that shone yellow in the sun. A little boy jumped in and
dived for it. It was a plate of gold covered with writing. They carried
it to the king.

On one side of it stood these words:--

"Death alone from death can save.
Love is death, and so is brave.
Love can fill the deepest grave.
Love loves on beneath the wave."

Now this was enigmatical enough to the king and courtiers. But the
reverse of the plate explained it a little. Its writing amounted to
this:--

"If the lake should disappear, they must find the hole through which
the water ran. But it would be useless to try to stop it by any
ordinary means. There was but one effectual mode.--The body of a living
man could alone stanch the flow. The man must give himself of his own
will; and the lake must take his life as it filled. Otherwise the
offering would be of no avail. If the nation could not provide one
hero, it was t