een
of the mice was awaiting them. Naturally they began to talk about the
bronze ring.

"Which of us deserves the most credit?" they cried all at once.

"I do," said the blind mouse, "for without my watchfulness our boat
would have drifted away to the open sea."

"No, indeed," cried the mouse with the cropped ears; "the credit is
mine. Did I not cause the ring to jump out of the man's mouth?"

"No, it is mine," cried the lame one, "for I ran off with the ring."

And from high words they soon came to blows, and, alas! when the quarrel
was fiercest the bronze ring fell into the sea.

"How are we to face our queen," said the three mice "when by our
folly we have lost the talisman and condemned our people to be utterly
exterminated? We cannot go back to our country; let us land on this
desert island and there end our miserable lives." No sooner said than
done. The boat reached the island, and the mice landed.

The blind mouse was speedily deserted by her two sisters, who went off
to hunt flies, but as she wandered sadly along the shore she found a
dead fish, and was eating it, when she felt something very hard. At her
cries the other two mice ran up.

"It is the bronze ring! It is the talisman!" they cried joyfully, and,
getting into their boat again, they soon reached the mouse island. It
was time they did, for the captain was just going to land his cargo of
cats, when a deputation of mice brought him the precious bronze ring.

"Bronze ring," commanded the young man, "obey thy master. Let my ship
appear as it was before."

Immediately the genii of the ring set to work, and the old black vessel
became once more the wonderful golden ship with sails of brocade; the
handsome sailors ran to the silver masts and the silken ropes, and very
soon they set sail for the capital.

Ah! how merrily the sailors sang as they flew over the glassy sea!

At last the port was reached.

The captain landed and ran to the palace, where he found the wicked
old man asleep. The Princess clasped her husband in a long embrace. The
magician tried to escape, but he was seized and bound with strong cords.

The next day the sorcerer, tied to the tail of a savage mule loaded with
nuts, was broken into as many pieces as there were nuts upon the mule's
back.(1)

(1) Traditions Populaires de l'Asie Mineure. Carnoy et Nicolaides.
Paris: Maisonneuve, 1889.

PRINCE HYACINTH AND THE DEAR LITTLE PRINCESS

Once upon a time there live