“'To him who carries the kingdom on his shoulders, the castle is a helmet, and the arms a crest,' said he, and demanded the hand of the princess. As he spoke, the sword in his hand became a sceptre, and the king, bowing low, with a reverence in which knelt the proud humility of the dethroned sovereign, said, 'Brave prince, we can only have what we earn. I have no power to say that what you have earned you shall not have. You have won it; Heaven grant you a long life to keep it. Long last the throne whose wood the king's own hand hath hewn!' “Then he placed the princess's hand in his, and gave him, what he already had, yet what without her were not worth having, the kingdom, for her dowry. “At the marriage which took place, the maids of honor were affianced each to her favored suitor, who loved her no less than if she had been the princess for whom he had mistaken her; and each was better pleased to be the princess of a province than to play at being princess of a kingdom. For to each was given, with the consent of the bridegroom, a province in the dowry of the princess, with a recommendation by him to each restored ruler, who was to hold it in trust to observe the words inscribed upon his castle gate, and to stay at home hereafter and attend to his own department. “But before the marriage was completed, the father of the bride drew the prince aside, and reminded him that he had sworn his daughter should have no name until one should come who should give her his own. “'Names are for commoners,' he said; 'kings have none. Know then that the kingdom which I have again made good from the foot, has come down to me from the head, and that the princess's ancestry and mine go back until they meet in the same name. But let her whose name is profaned by all, be ever nameless for me; and lest her maidens again compromise her by assuming it, let them keep it for a surname, and I will couple it with a distinction.' “Then he named each of them from the name of her province, and their mistress is never spoken of by them but under the title of their queen.” “Now, Ella,” said Fanny. “The beginning of Anna's story will do for mine with the change of a word. There was once a brother, the most critical who had ever been seen--” “It must have been mine,” interrupted Kate. “Did you ever venture to tell him a story? If you have, you may know how much spirit I must feel at the idea of repeating mine. But as my brother has so large a part in it, I may as well tell you something about him.” “O,” said Fanny, “if we get on the subject of brothers, we shall never come to your story.” “But as without mine we never should have come to it at all, as you will see, he is a part which cannot be left out,” said Ella.