e window straying,
Had fallen into earnest talk that put an end to playing;
And the weary King smiled once again to hear what they were saying;
"It is I who love our father best," the eldest daughter said;
"I am the oldest princess," and her pretty face grew red;
"What is there none can do without? I love him more than bread."
Then said the second princess, with her bright blue eyes aflame;
"Than bread, a common thing like bread! Thou hast not any shame!
Glad am I, it is I, not thou, called by our mother's name;
I love him with a better love than one so tame as thine,
More than--Oh! what then shall I say that is both bright and fine?
And is not common? Yes, I know. I love him more than wine."
Then the little youngest daughter, whose speech would sometimes halt,
For her dreamy way of thinking, said, "Nay, you are both in fault.
'Tis I who love our father best, I love him more than salt."
Shrill little shrieks of laughter greeted her latest word,
As the two joined hands exclaiming. "But this is most absurd!"
And the King, no longer smiling, was grieved that he had heard,
For the little youngest daughter, with her eyes of steadfast grey,
Could always move his tenderness, and charm his care away;
"She grows more like her mother dead," he whispered day by day,
"But she is very little and I will find no fault,
That while her sisters strive to see who most shall me exalt,
She holds me nothing dearer than a common thing like salt."

The portly cook was standing in the courtyard by the spring,
He winked and nodded to himself, "That little quiet thing
Knows more than both the others, as I will show the King."
That afternoon, at dinner, there was nothing fit to eat.
The King turned angrily away from soup and fish and meat,
And he found a cloying sweetness in the dishes that were sweet;
"And yet," he muttered, musing, "I cannot find the fault;
Not a thing has tasted like itself but this honest cup of malt."
Said the youngest princess, shyly: "Dear father, they want salt."

A sudden look of tenderness shone on the King's dark face,
As he sat his little daughter in the dead queen's vacant place,
And he thought: "She has her mother's heart; Ay, and her mother's grace;
Great love through channels will find its surest way.
It waits not state occasions, which may not come or may;
It comforts and it blesses, hour by hour, and day by day."

CHAPTER XXII.