"I think he must be quite mad," said the Princess, and she walked away. But when she had taken a few steps, she stopped short, and said: "One must encourage the fine arts, and I am the emperor's daughter. Tell him he may have ten kisses, as before, and the rest he can take from my ladies-in-waiting." "Yes, but we object to that," said the ladies-in-waiting. "That is nonsense," said the Princess. "If I can kiss him, surely you can do the same. Go down at once. Don't I give you board and wages?" So the ladies-in-waiting were obliged to go down to the Swineherd again. "A hundred kisses from the Princess, or each keeps his own." "Stand round me," she said. And all the ladies-in-waiting stood round her, and the Swineherd began to kiss her. "What can all the crowd be down by the pig-sty?" said the Emperor, stepping out onto the balcony. He rubbed his eyes and put on his spectacles. "It is the court ladies up to some of their tricks. I must go down and look after them." He pulled up his slippers, for they were shoes which he had trodden down at heel. Gracious goodness, how he hurried! As soon as he came into the garden, he walked very softly, and the ladies-in-waiting had so much to do counting the kisses, so that everything could be done fairly, and that the Swineherd should get neither too many nor too few, that they never noticed the Emperor at all. He stood on tip-toe. "What is this all about?" he said, when he saw the kissing that was going on, and he hit them on the head with his slipper, just as the Swineherd was getting the eighty-sixth kiss. "Heraus!" said the Emperor, for he was angry, and both the Princess and the Swineherd were turned out of his Kingdom. The Princess wept, the Swineherd scolded, and the rain streamed down. "Oh! wretched creature that I am," said the Princess. "If I had only taken the handsome Prince! Oh, how unhappy I am!" Then the Swineherd went behind a tree, washed the black and brown off his face, threw of his ragged clothes, and stood forth in his royal apparel, looking so handsome that she was obliged to curtsey. "I have learned to despise you," he said. "You would not have an honorable Prince. You could not appreciate a rose or a nightingale, but for a musical toy, you kissed the Swineherd. Now you have your reward." So he went into his Kingdom, shut the door and bolted it, and she had to stand outside singing: "Ach, du lieber Augustin, Alles is weg, weg, weg!" THE NIGHTINGALE. In China, you must know, the Emperor is a Chinaman, and all those around him are Chinamen, too. It is many years since all this happened, and for that very reason it is worth hearing, before it is forgotten.