ey entered together into the fairy-palace, and
she told her godmother privately how all had happened, and how she had
won King Charming, begging the fairy to pacify him when he found out
his mistake.

"My child," replied the godmother, "that is more easily said than
done; he is too deeply in love with Florina."

Meantime the king was left waiting in a chamber with diamond walls, so
thin and transparent, that through them he saw Troutina and Soussio
conversing together. He stood like a man in a dream: "What! am I
betrayed? Has this enemy to my peace carried away my dear Florina?"

How great was his despair, when Soussio said to him in a commanding
voice, "King Charming, behold the princess Troutina, to whom you have
promised your faith: marry her immediately!"

"Do you think me a fool?" cried the king; "I have promised her
nothing. She is--"

"Stop--if you show me any disrespect--"

"I will respect you as much as a fairy deserves to be respected, if
you will only give me back my princess."

"Am not I she?" said Troutina. "It was to me you gave this ring; to me
you spoke at the window."

"I have been wickedly deceived!" cried the king; "come, my winged
frogs, we will depart immediately."

"You cannot," said Soussio; and, touching him, he found himself fixed
as if his feet were glued to the pavement.

"You may turn me into stone!" exclaimed he; "but I will love no one,
except Florina."

Soussio employed persuasions, threats, promises, entreaties. Troutina
wept, groaned, shrieked, and then tried quiet sulkiness; but the king
uttered not a word. For twenty days and twenty nights he stood there,
without sleeping, or eating, or once sitting down--they talking all
the while.

At length, Soussio, quite worn out, said, "Choose seven years of
penitence and punishment, or marry my goddaughter."

"I choose," answered the king; "and I will not marry your
goddaughter."

"Then fly out of this window, in the shape of a Blue Bird."

Immediately the king's figure changed. His arms formed themselves into
wings; his legs and feet turned black and thin, and claws grew upon
them; his body wasted into the slender shape of a bird, and was
covered with bright blue feathers; his eyes became round and beady;
his nose an ivory beak; and his crown was a white plume on the top of
his head. He began to speak in a singing voice, and then uttering a
doleful cry, fled away as far as possible from the fatal palace of
Soussio.

But,