" said the monarch.

"It is an untradesman-like and an unusual thing to decline an order; and
if your Majesty asked for my heart's blood, I am ready to shed it, not to
speak of anything in the line of my business--namely, boot and shoe
making. But keep a secret from my wife, I fairly own to your Majesty
that I can _not_."

Herr Schmidt went down on his knees and wept.

{Herr Schmidt went down on his knees: p52.jpg}

"Rise, Herr Schmidt," said the king, taking him by the hand. "A more
honourable and chivalrous confession of an amiable weakness, if it is to
be called a weakness, I never heard. Sir, you have been true to your
honour and your prince, in face of what few men can bear, the chance of
ridicule. There is no one here, I hope, but respects and will keep the
secret of Herr Schmidt's confession?"

The assembled shopkeepers could scarcely refrain from tears.

"Long live King Prigio the Good!" they exclaimed, and vowed that
everything should be kept dark.

"Indeed, sire," said the swordmaker, "all the rest of us are bachelors."

"That is none the worse for my purpose gentlemen," said his Majesty; "but
I trust that you will not long deprive me of sons and subjects worthy to
succeed to such fathers. And now, if Herr Schmidt will kindly find his
way to the buttery, where refreshments are ready, I shall have the
pleasure of conducting you to the scene of your labours."

Thus speaking, the king, with another magnificent bow, led the way
upstairs to a little turret-room, in a deserted part of the palace.
Bidding the tradesmen enter, he showed them a large collection of
miscellaneous things: an old cap or two, a pair of boots of a sort long
out of fashion, an old broadsword, a shabby old Persian rug, an ivory spy-
glass, and other articles. These were, in fact, the fairy presents,
which had been given to the king at his christening, and by aid of which
(and his natural acuteness) he had, in his youth, succeeded in many
remarkable adventures.

The caps were the Wishing Cap and the Cap of Darkness. The rug was the
famous carpet which carried its owner through the air wherever he wished
to go. The sword was the Sword of Sharpness. The ivory glass showed you
anyone you wanted to see, however far off. The boots were the
Seven-league Boots, which Hop-o'-my-Thumb stole from the Ogre about 1697.
There were other valuable objects, but these were the most useful and
celebrated. Of course the king did not tell the