id I not return your
love, and marry you! Still, death will be less bitter, if only you
regret me a little."

While she spoke, she saw through the blank darkness a glimmer of
light; it came through a little door. She remembered what Percinet had
said: that she would never return to the fairy palace, until after she
was buried. Perhaps this final cruelty of Grognon would be the end of
her sorrows. So she took courage, crept through the little door, and
lo! she came out into a beautiful garden, with long alleys,
fruit-trees, and flower-beds. Well she knew it, and well she knew the
glitter of the rock-crystal walls. And there, at the palace-gate,
stood Percinet, and the queen, his mother, and the princesses, his
sisters. "Welcome, Graciosa!" cried they all; and Graciosa, after all
her sufferings, wept for joy.

The marriage was celebrated with great splendour; and all the fairies,
for a thousand leagues round, attended it. Some came in chariots drawn
by dragons, or swans, or peacocks; some were mounted upon floating
clouds, or globes of fire. Among the rest, appeared the very fairy who
had assisted Grognon to torment Graciosa. When she discovered that
Grognon's poor prisoner was now Prince Percinet's bride, she was
overwhelmed with confusion, and entreated her to forget all that had
passed, because she really was ignorant who she had been so cruelly
afflicting.

"But I will make amends for all the evil that I have done," said the
fairy; and, refusing to stay for the wedding-dinner, she remounted her
chariot, drawn by two terrible serpents, and flew to the palace of
Graciosa's father. There, before either king, or courtiers, or
ladies-in-waiting could stop her--even had they wished to do it, which
remains doubtful--she came behind the wicked Grognon, and twisted her
neck, just as a cook does a barn-door fowl. So Grognon died and was
buried, and nobody was particularly sorry for the same.

THE IRON STOVE.

In the days when magic was still of some avail, a king's son was
enchanted by an old witch, and compelled to spend his life sitting
inside a great Iron Stove in a wood. There he passed many years, and
nobody could release him.

Once a king's daughter came into the wood. She had gone astray, and
could not find her father's kingdom again; and having wandered about
for nine days, at last she stood before the Iron Stove. Then a voice
came out of it, and said, "Whence do you come, and where do you want
to go?"