threw his book out the window.
When the superannuated old general who was teaching her military
manoeuvers offered her a diagram on which the enemy was represented by
a series of black dots and our soldiers by a series of red dots, she
took the paper and tore it in two. And worst of all when the old scholar
who was teaching her Turkish--for a princess must be able to speak all
languages--dropped his horn spectacles on the floor, she deliberately
stepped on them and broke them.

When the Tsar heard all these things he just _wow-wowed_ something
terrible.

"Lock that young woman in her chamber!" he ordered. "Feed her on bread
and water until she's ready to apologize!"

But the Princess, far from being frightened by this treatment, calmly
announced:

"I won't eat even your old bread and water until you send me some one
who will make me laugh!"

Now this frightened the Tsar because he knew how obstinate the Princess
could be on occasions. (He ought to know, too, for the Princess had that
streak of obstinacy direct from himself.)

"This will never do!" he said.

He hurried to the Princess's chamber. He found her in bed with her
pretty hair spread out on the pillow like a golden fan.

"My dear," the Tsar said, "I was joking. You don't have to eat only
bread and water. You may have anything you want."

"Thank you," the Princess said, "but I'll never eat another bite of
anything until you send me some one who will make me laugh. I'm tired of
living in this gloomy old castle with a lot of old men and old women who
do nothing but instruct me and with a father who always loses his
temper and says, 'Wow! Wow!'"

"But it's a beautiful castle!" the poor Tsar said. "And I'm sure we're
all doing our very best to educate you!"

"But I want to be amused as well as educated!" the little Princess said.
And then, because she felt she was going to cry, she turned her face to
the wall and wouldn't say another word.

What was the Tsar to do? He called together his councilors and asked
them how was the Princess to be made to laugh. The councilors were wise
about state matters but not one of them could suggest a means of amusing
the Princess. The Master of Ceremonies did indeed begin to say something
about a nice young man but instantly the Tsar roared out such a
wrathful, "Wow! Wow!" that the Master of Ceremonies coughed and
pretended he hadn't spoken.

Then the Tsar called together the scholars and the teachers and the
first