,' answered the princess. 'Oh, how surprised she will be
when I tell her about my great big grand-grand-mother!'

'Yes, that she will!' said the old lady with a curious smile. 'Mind you
tell her all about it exactly.'

'That I will. Please will you take me back to her?'

'I can't go all the way, but I will take you to the top of the stair,
and then you must run down quite fast into your own room.'

The little princess put her hand in the old lady's, who, looking this
way and that, brought her to the top of the first stair, and thence to
the bottom of the second, and did not leave her till she saw her
half-way down the third. When she heard the cry of her nurse's
pleasure at finding her, she turned and walked up the stairs again,
very fast indeed for such a very great grandmother, and sat down to her
spinning with another strange smile on her sweet old face.

About this spinning of hers I will tell you more another time.

Guess what she was spinning.

CHAPTER 4

What the Nurse Thought of It

'Why, where can you have been, princess?' asked the nurse, taking her
in her arms. 'It's very unkind of you to hide away so long. I began to
be afraid--' Here she checked herself.

'What were you afraid of, nursie?' asked the princess.

'Never mind,' she answered. 'Perhaps I will tell you another day. Now
tell me where you have been.'

'I've been up a long way to see my very great, huge, old grandmother,'
said the princess.

'What do you mean by that?' asked the nurse, who thought she was making
fun.

'I mean that I've been a long way up and up to see My GREAT
grandmother. Ah, nursie, you don't know what a beautiful mother of
grandmothers I've got upstairs. She is such an old lady, with such
lovely white hair--as white as my silver cup. Now, when I think of it,
I think her hair must be silver.'

'What nonsense you are talking, princess!' said the nurse.

'I'm not talking nonsense,' returned Irene, rather offended. 'I will
tell you all about her. She's much taller than you, and much prettier.'

'Oh, I dare say!' remarked the nurse.

'And she lives upon pigeons' eggs.'

'Most likely,' said the nurse.

'And she sits in an empty room, spin-spinning all day long.'

'Not a doubt of it,' said the nurse.

'And she keeps her crown in her bedroom.'

'Of course--quite the proper place to keep her crown in. She wears it
in bed, I'll be bound.'

'She didn't say that. And I don't think she does. Tha