Well, the King and Rosa lived very happily together for some time; but her troubles were not over, for her wicked sisters had not yet done their worst to her. They had for long feared to go near the palace again, and nearly a year passed before they learned what had been the result of their last visit. One day, however, in order to make quite sure that Rosa was dead, they once more stood at their window, and cried, "Sun, shining Sun, who wanderest all over the earth, tell us if thou hast, since our youngest sister died, seen any maiden fairer than we?" But the Sun only replied as before, "I am beautiful; you, too, are both beautiful; but your youngest sister is the fairest of all." "But Rosa is dead!" "No, Rosa lives, and she is the wife of the King of the neighboring country." Well, if these wicked women could not bear that their sister should be considered fairer than they, still less could they allow her to be a Queen. So, disguised as two old women, they set off at once for Rosa's palace. When they arrived in the royal city, great rejoicings were going on because a baby prince had just been born. "That is good news," said the elder to the younger when she heard this, "for now we will be the nurses." So they went to the Queen-Mother and gave themselves out to be wonderfully clever nurses from the neighboring country who had nursed the princes there; and the Queen-Mother, deceived by their story, put them in charge of her daughter-in-law and the baby. On the pretext of keeping the young Queen and her child free from evil spells, the make-believe nurses sent away all the other attendants from her apartments; and when they were left alone with their sister, they stack into her head an enchanted pin. She was immediately changed into a bird, and flew away out of the window; and her eldest sister laid herself down on her bed in her place. When the King came in to see his wife, he could hardly believe his eyes. This could not be his wife. The false Queen, guessing his thoughts, said, "You find me changed, dear husband? It is because I have been so ill." The King, however, pretended not to have observed anything, but his heart froze within him as he looked on the object of this pretended transformation. It was his custom to breakfast alone every day in the garden; and one day while he was sadly musing there, a pretty bird flew down, perched on a branch overhead, and said, "Tell me, my lord, have the King, and the Queen-Mother, and the little Prince slept well?" The King smiled and nodded, and the bird continued, "May they ever sleep sweetly. But may she whom they call the young Queen sleep the sleep that knows no waking, and may all things over which I fly wither away!"