he tower had windows on all sides,
so the Princess as she sat at her embroidery frame could look out north,
east, south, and west.

The clouds sailed by in the sky, the wind blew and at once the leaves in
the treetops began murmuring and whispering among themselves, and the
birds that went flying all over the world would often alight on some
branch near the tower and sing to the Princess as she worked or chatter
some exciting story that she could almost understand.

"What!" the Princess would think to herself as she looked out north,
east, south, and west. "Leave my tower and my beautiful embroidery to
become the wife of some conceited young man! Never!"

From this remark you can understand perfectly well that the particular
young man of whom her father spoke had not yet come along. And I'm sure
you'll also know that shutting herself up in the tower-room and bolting
the trap-door was not going to keep him away when it was time for him to
come. Yet I don't believe that you'd have recognized him when he did
come any more than the Princess did. This is how it happened:

One afternoon when as usual she was working at her embroidery and
singing as she worked, suddenly there was a flutter of wings at the
eastern window and a lovely Pigeon came flying into the room. It circled
three times about the Princess's head and then alighted on the
embroidery frame. The Princess reached out her hand and the bird,
instead of taking fright, allowed her to stroke its gleaming neck. Then
she took it gently in her hands and fondled it to her bosom, kissing its
bill and smoothing its plumage with her lips.

"You beautiful thing!" she cried. "How I love you!"

"If you really love me," the Pigeon said, "have a bowl of milk here at
this same hour to-morrow and then we'll see what we'll see."

With that the bird spread its wings and flew out the western window.

The Princess was so excited that for the rest of the afternoon she
forgot her embroidery.

"Did the Pigeon really speak?" she asked herself as she stood staring
out the western window, "or have I been dreaming?"

The next day when she climbed the winding stairs she went slowly for she
carried in her hands a brimming bowl of milk.

"Of course it won't come again!" she said, and she made herself sit down
quietly before the embroidery frame and work just as though she expected
nothing.

But exactly at the same hour as the day before there was a flutter of
wings at the eastern w