'Shall I save you?' asked the prince. And she answered:

'Yes; but you can't do it. To begin with, how could you break the
chain I am bound with?'

'Oh, that's easy enough,' said he, taking out his sword; and directly
it touched the chain the links fell apart and the princess was free.

'Come!' said the prince, taking her hand. But she drew back.

'No, I dare not!' she cried. 'If we should meet the robbers in the
passage they would kill us both.'

[Illustration: THE PRINCESS OF ARABIA RELEASED FROM THE IRON PILLAR]

'Not they!' said the prince, brandishing his sword. 'But how long
have you been here?' he added quickly.

'About twenty years, I think,' said the princess, reckoning with her
fingers.

'Twenty years!' exclaimed the prince. 'Then you had better shut your
eyes, for when you have been sitting there so long it might hurt you
to go too suddenly into the daylight. So you are the Princess of
Arabia, whose beauty is famous throughout all the world! I, too, am a
prince.'

'Will you not come back to Arabia and marry me, now you have saved my
life?' asked the princess. 'Even if my father is living still, he must
be old, and after his death you can be king.'

'No,' replied the prince, 'I cannot do that--I must live and die in my
own country. But at the end of a year I will follow you and marry
you.' And that was all he would say.

Then the princess took a heavy ring from her finger and put it on his.
Her father's and her mother's names were engraved in it, as well as
her own, and she asked him to keep it as a reminder of his promise.

'I will die before I part from it,' said the prince. 'And if at the
end of a year I am still living, I will come. I believe I have heard
that at the other side of this forest there is a port from which ships
sail to Arabia. Let us hasten there at once.'

Hand in hand they set off through the forest, and when they came to
the port they found a ship just ready to sail. The princess said
good-bye to the prince, and went on board the vessel, and when she
reached her own country there were great rejoicings, for her parents
had never expected to see her again. She told them how a prince had
saved her from the robbers, and was coming in a year's time to marry
her, and they were greatly pleased.

'All the same,' said the king, 'I wish he were here now. A year is a
long time.'

When the princess was no longer before his eyes, the prince
recollected why he had entered the fo