n which were these words:

"Not to be cured, yet not incurable!
The only remedy that remains
Is the blood that flows from a maiden's veins,
Who of her own free will shall die,
And give her life as the price of yours!"

"A strange remedy, indeed," said the false physician, "and one which you
will never be able to try. However, I have with me here a wonderful
draught which cures all pain--will you not taste it?"

Prince Henry hesitated, but finally drank from the crystal flask which
Lucifer gave him. The evil spirit disappeared with mocking laughter and
Prince Henry fell to the ground in a swoon. The magic draught which the
false doctor had given him was nothing but an enchantment destined to
work still more harm on the victim. The next morning the unfortunate
Prince was found by his attendants stretched on the floor of the tower
chamber and seemingly lifeless. When he began to recover, further
troubles were in store for him. He was summoned to appear in church
before a council of priests, who pronounced him to be a leper and an
outcast, and decreed that henceforth he was to be looked upon as one
dead. The burial service was read over him and then Prince Henry,
clothed in a cloak of hodden gray, and carrying a beggar's wallet, was
thrust from the door of the church into perpetual banishment.

A lonely exile, Prince Henry wandered through the land till he came to
a farm in the Odenwald, where dwelt the worthy peasant Gottlieb, with
his wife, Dame Ursula, and his daughter, Elsie, a beautiful maiden of
fifteen summers. These good people took compassion on their Prince and
begged him to dwell with them and share all they had. Glad to find a
resting-place among kindly folk, the Prince stayed for some months at
the farm, but each day he seemed to become a little weaker. The disease
from which he was suffering had made such rapid progress that he felt
his death rapidly drawing near. In these days of weakness and despair
the Prince tried to console himself by reading the old legends, and
watching Elsie as she flitted about the garden, gathering flowers to lay
at the shrine of her favorite saint. He would read aloud to her, and she
would give him some of her flowers and try in her gentle way to make her
dear Prince forget his heavy troubles.

Gradually Elsie grew to love the Prince with such devotion that it
seemed to her that no task could be too difficult, no sacrifice too
great for her to make, if only