to him, and he couldn't bear to be seen with
it.

'But you'll get rid of it for me some day, my boy,' he used to say. 'No
one but the seventh son of a seventh son and an honest boy can do it. So
all the doctors say.'

So Sep grew up. And when he was twenty-one--straight as a lance and
handsome as a picture--the old lord said to him.

'My boy, you've been like a son to me, but now it's time you got married
and had sons of your own. Is there any girl you'd like to marry?'

'No,' said Sep, 'I never did care much for girls.'

The old lord laughed.

'Then you must set out again and seek your fortune once more,' he said,
'because no man has really found his fortune till he's found the lady
who is his heart's lady. Choose the best horse in the stable, and off
you go, lad, and my blessing go with you.'

So Sep chose a good red horse and set out, and he rode straight to the
great city, that shone golden across the plain, and when he got there he
found every one crying.

'Why, whatever is the matter?' said Sep, reining in the red horse in
front of a smithy, where the apprentices were crying on to the fires,
and the smith was dropping tears on the anvil.

'Why the Princess is dying,' said the blacksmith blowing his nose. 'A
nasty, wicked magician--he had a spite against the King, and he got at
the Princess when she was playing ball in the garden, and now she's
blind and deaf and dumb. And she won't eat.'

'And she'll die,' said the first apprentice.

'And she _is_ such a dear,' said the other apprentice.

Sep sat still on the red horse thinking.

'Has anything been done?' he asked.

'Oh yes,' said the blacksmith. 'All the doctors have seen her, but they
can't do anything. And the King has advertised in the usual way, that
any one who can cure her may marry her. But it's no good. King's sons
aren't what they used to be. A silly lot they are nowadays, all taken up
with football and cricket and golf.'

'Humph,' said Sep, 'thank you. Which is the way to the palace?'

The blacksmith pointed, and then burst into tears again. Sep rode on.

When he got to the palace he asked to see the King. Every one there was
crying too, from the footman who opened the door to the King, who was
sitting upon his golden throne and looking at his fine collection of
butterflies through floods of tears.

'Oh dear me yes, young man,' said the King, 'you may _see_ her and
welcome, but it's no good.'

'We can but try,' said Sep. So he w