Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17): Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy TalesVarious
General
Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17): Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales
Various
Children's literature
All this she did because she was brave and loved him. She stood in the
dark and blew kisses to the four winds, and then listened, and by and by
came a noise like great wings, and all the air was filled with strange,
sweet odors, the like of which that Princess never smelled again.
As for Little Boy, he was aware of a Giant who was as tall as the tower.
"Sir," said the Giant, "it is told me that you must keep your eyes shut
until I bid them to open. I have brought the Kiss Queen to pay you a
visit. No man has ever seen her; for if he did he could never, never
kiss or be kissed of any mortal lips."
"Sir," said Little Boy, "the Princess is more sweet than any that kiss
in Fairy-land."
"Prince," said the Giant, "your education has been but slight, or else
you would know that all kisses are made in Fairy-land. But shut your
eyes and stir not."
Then Little Boy did close his two eyes. At once he felt a tiny kiss from
lips that might have been as long as one's fingernail, and once he was
kissed on each cheek and once on his chin, and then he felt faint for a
moment. All was still for a while, until the Giant said: "You are lucky.
Open your eyes, Fair Sir," and went away.
Next day all the people came to see the King try Little Boy. When Little
Boy saw his mother he was almost ready to cry, but he kept still and
waited. Then the King said to her: "Tell me, is this your son? and do
not deceive me, or dreadful things will happen to you and to him."
At this the good woman looked at him with care. "This looks like my
son," she said; "but it is not my son, because this young man has a
dimple on each cheek and one on his chin. Who ever saw any one with
three dimples?"
When the King heard this and Little Boy's father declared also that his
lost son had no dimples, the King bade them all go free, and said he had
been now nine years angry about those bricks, and that whoever would
find the bad brick-maker should marry the Princess. When Prince Little
Boy heard this he said that he was the bad boy who had made those
bricks. But the King was as good as his word, and ordered that the
Prince should marry the Princess, and not have his head cut off, because
the Princess did wisely say that a husband with no head wasn't much good
as a husband. Therefore they were married that minute, and I have heard
that they spent their honeymoon in Fairy-land. And this is the end of
the Story of Prince Little Boy.
THE BEE-MAN OF ORN[E]
BY FRANK R. STOCKTON
In the ancient country of Orn there lived an old man who was called the
Bee-man, because his whole time was spent in the company of bees. He
lived in a small hut, which was nothing more than an immense bee-hive,
for these little creatures had built their honeycombs in every corner of
the one room it contained--on the shelves, under the little table, all
about the rough bench on which the old man sat, and even about the
head-board and along the sides of his low bed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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