"Children, Isal must know of this. We took her away on the Old Brown Coat. My great-great-great grandfather made the coat. He was called Phoenix the Tailor." It was very hard for the Phoenix to avoid speaking of this whenever the Old Brown Coat was mentioned, and he continued for some time to wander upon the subject, till they all thought he was through, and the Tufter, who had once been rash asked: "And who shall tell Isal?" The Phoenix was not really through, though. He was just in the midst of the sentence, "The world is growing very degenerate--" only the last word stuck in his throat--and he was exceedingly vexed that he should be interrupted by an upstart Tufter. "You--" are a goose, he tried to say, but the difficulty in his throat occurred again, and prevented any word beyond the first, and the Tufter taking it for a command to carry the news--he was too quick sometimes,--set off for the palace as fast as his wings could carry him. "How provoking!" said the oldest; "he will spoil it all with his rashness!" The Phoenix now recovered himself, and having finished his two broken sentences together, "degenerate--are a goose," for he never left anything undone, told Rosedrop to fly faster and carry the news before the other. Rosedrop sped swiftly, and overtaking her brother, went with him in company and soon persuaded him, for he was a good-natured fellow, to let her undertake the message. So when they reached the palace garden, while her brother remained without, Rosedrop flew in at the open window where she had tapped nearly five years ago, and hovering over Isal as she lay asleep, told her the sad message, and flying out rejoined her bother. "Did she hear you?" asked he. "Oh, yes," said Rosedrop. "I told her all about it, and she looked very sad indeed. How sorry I am for her. I am sure I shall feel dreadfully when the Phoenix dies." Now Isal really did hear all that Rosedrop told her; for as the Tufter flew through the open window, a suggestion entered the open window of her mind as she lay asleep, and this is what it showed her:--A lonely woodman's hut in the forest upon the bank of a great blue river; in the hut a solitary man, pale and thin, worn out with sickness and sorrow stretched upon a bed; not a living thing about the house; the axe lying rusty from disuse by the trunk of a fallen tree; one little bed deserted in the other corner of the room, toward which the sick man is turned with longing look, while his lips move but refuse to speak the name his heart dwells upon. And just as the Tufter flew out, having told her message, so did the picture vanish from Isal's mind, and in its place followed others in quick succession, all of them centering about one person--a maiden, who is now playing by the same hut, now surrounded mysteriously by strange birds, now waking to find herself kissed by a noble-looking man, who marries her and makes her Queen of the land. With this she awoke, and saw the Prince leaning over her.