, it was the cat."

"The cat? Impossible. The cat brought a vessel of milk to the middle of
the room and upset it there?"

"No! no! father, it was I that did it; in carrying it, I accidentally
overturned it."

Rosalie spoke in a low voice, and dared not look at her father.

"Take the broom, Rosalie, and sweep up this cream."

"There is no broom, father."

"No broom! there was one when I left the house."

"I burned it, father, accidentally, by---- by----"

She paused--her father looked fixedly at her, threw a searching unquiet
glance about the room, sighed and turned his steps slowly towards the
little house in the garden.

Rosalie fell sobbing bitterly upon a chair; the mouse did not stir. A
few moments afterwards, Prudent entered hastily, his countenance marked
with horror.

"Rosalie! unhappy child! what have you done? You have yielded to your
fatal curiosity and released our most cruel enemy from prison."

"Pardon me, father! oh pardon me!" she cried, throwing herself at his
feet; "I was ignorant of the evil I did."

"Misfortune is always the result of disobedience, Rosalie; disobedient
children think they are only committing a small fault, when they are
doing the greatest injury to themselves and others."

"But, father, who and what then is this mouse, who causes you this
terrible fear? How, if it had so much power, could you keep it so long a
prisoner and why can you not put it in prison again?"

"This mouse, my unhappy child, is a wicked fairy, but very powerful. For
myself, I am the genius Prudent and since you have given liberty to my
enemy, I can now reveal to you that which I should have concealed until
you were fifteen years old.

"I am, then, as I said to you, the genius Prudent; your dear mother was
a simple mortal but her virtues and her graces touched the queen of the
fairies and also the king of the genii and they permitted me to wed her.
I gave a splendid festival on my marriage-day. Unfortunately I forgot to
invoke the fairy Detestable, who was already irritated against me for
having married a princess, after having refused one of her daughters.
She was so exasperated against me that she swore an implacable hatred
against me, my wife and my children. I was not terrified at her threats,
as I myself had a power almost equal to her own and I was much beloved
by the queen of the fairies. Many times by the power of my enchantments,
I triumphed over the malicious hatred of the fairy Detestab