d he stepped on board directly
it came near enough, and put his hand on the little brass wheel.

"Thank you very much," he said as loudly as he could, in the hope that
the owner of the mysterious voice would hear him. Nobody answered him;
but he wondered why an old crab, who was shuffling along the beach,
chose that particular moment to wink at him.

Certainly, no one has ever reached the shore on the opposite side of
the sea so quickly as Prince Perfection in his real steamboat. It was
a pleasure to hear it puff as it cut through the big green waves; and
he stood like a real captain with his hand on the little brass wheel,
and steered it right into a bay that seemed waiting on purpose for it.
It was very sad that it should disappear directly he stepped out of it;
but as it had come from nowhere at all because he wanted it, he could
not complain because it went back to nowhere at all when he had done
with it. So he sighed twice, and then walked straight ahead as before,
up the beach and over a flat grassy plain, covered with yellow poppies
and gorse bushes and purple heather. Nothing could have been easier
than this; and Prince Perfection had not the slightest wish to turn to
the right or the left, until he came suddenly upon a thick clump of
gorse bushes which lay in the very middle of his path. He made two
attempts to clamber over it; but, each time, he was caught in the gorse
bushes and was scratched all over; and even if one is ten years old and
a prince, it is hard to bear being scratched all over by a gorse bush.
Prince Perfection began to wonder if it would be very wrong to follow
the path to the right until he should come to an opening, but before he
had time to decide such a difficult question a shrill voice broke the
silence once more.

"Good-day to you," it said. "Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am Prince Perfection, and I want what you are thinking about,"
answered the Prince, boldly.

"How ridiculous!" laughed the voice. "Why, I am thinking about a
cannon, a real cannon that will fire real gunpowder. Surely, you can
want nothing so useless as that?"

"Indeed, I do," said the Prince; and there stood the most perfect
little real cannon, loaded with real shot, and in his hand was a
lighted match ready to fire it with. He lost no time in pointing it
straight at the clump of furze bushes, and the real gunpowder made a
flash and a splutter, and the shot went right into the middle of the
ye