"My poor child," the King said, "I hope now you realize that the Pigeon
Prince is gone forever. Think no more about him. Go back to your
embroidery and when the roses begin blooming in your cheeks again we'll
find some young prince for you who isn't enchanted."

But the Princess shook her head.

"Let me try one thing more, father," she begged, "and then if I don't
find my love I'll do as you say."

The King agreed to this.

"Well, then," the Princess said, "build a public bath-house and have the
heralds proclaim that the King's daughter will sit at the entrance and
will allow any one to bathe free of charge who will tell her the story
of the strangest thing he has ever heard or seen."

So the King built the bath-house and sent out his heralds far and wide.
Men and women from all over the world came and bathed and told the
Princess stories of this marvel and that, but never, alas, a word of an
enchanted pigeon.

The days went by and the Princess grew more and more discouraged.

"Isn't it sad," the courtiers began whispering, "how the Princess has
lost her looks! Do you suppose she ever was really beautiful or did we
just imagine it?"

And the neighboring kings when they heard this remarked softly among
themselves:

"It's just as well we didn't hurry one of our sons into a marriage with
this young woman!"

[Illustration: _The Princess Kissed Its Coral Beak_]

Now there was a poor widow who lived near the bath-house. She had a
daughter, a pretty young girl, who used to sit at the window and watch
the Princess as people came and told her their stories.

"Mother," the girl said one day, "every one in the world goes to the
bath-house and I want to go, too!"

"Nonsense!" the mother said. "What story could you tell the Princess?"

"But everybody else goes and I don't see why I can't!"

"Well, my dear," the mother promised, "you may just as soon as you see
or hear something strange. Talk no more about it now but go, fetch me a
pitcher of water from the town well."

The girl obediently took an empty pitcher and went to the town well.
Just as she had filled the pitcher she heard some one say:

"Mercy me, I fear I'll be late!"

She turned around and what do you think she saw? A rooster in wooden
shoes with a basket under his wing!

"I fear I'll be late! I fear I'll be late!" the rooster kept repeating
as he hurried off making a funny little clatter with his wooden shoes.

"How strange!" the girl thought