But the king looked angrily at her, and said again: "What you have
promised you must perform. The frog is your companion."

It was no use to complain; whether she liked it or not, she was obliged
to take the frog with her up to her little bed. So she picked him
up with two fingers, hating him bitterly the while, and carried him
upstairs: but when she got into bed, instead of lifting him up to her,
she threw him with all her strength against the wall, saying, "Now you
nasty frog, there will be an end of you."

But what fell down from the wall was not a dead frog, but a living young
prince, with beautiful and loving eyes, who at once became, by her own
promise and her father's will, her dear companion and husband. He told
her how he had been cursed by a wicked sorceress, and that no one but
the king's youngest daughter could release him from his enchantment and
take him out of the well.

The next day a carriage drove up to the palace gates with eight white
horses, having white feathers on their heads and golden reins. Behind it
stood the servant of the young prince, called the faithful Henry. This
faithful Henry had been so grieved when his master was changed into a
frog that he had been compelled to have three iron bands fastened round
his heart, lest it should break. Now the carriage came to convey the
prince to his kingdom, so the faithful Henry lifted in the bride and
bridegroom and mounted behind, full of joy at his lord's release. But
when they had gone a short distance, the prince heard behind him a noise
as if something was breaking. He cried out, "Henry, the carriage is
breaking!"

But Henry replied: "No, sir, it is not the carriage but one of the bands
from my heart, with which I was forced to bind it up, or it would have
broken with grief while you sat as a frog at the bottom of the well."

Twice again this happened, and the prince always thought the carriage
was breaking; but it was only the bands breaking off from the heart of
the faithful Henry, out of joy that his lord, the frog-prince, was a
frog no more.

CLEVER ALICE

ONCE upon a time there was a man who had a daughter who was called
"Clever Alice," and when she was grown up, her father said, "We must see
about her marrying."

"Yes," replied her mother, "whenever a young man shall appear who is
worthy of her."

At last a certain youth, by name Hans, came from a distance to make a
proposal of marriage; but he required one condition, t