Original
WHOEVER CAN MAKE
THE
PRINCESS
GIGGLE
SHALL WIN HER FOR
HIS BRIDE.
Cambrinus R.
But nobody came!
Every one thought it was hopeless to get a laugh from the Passing Belle. Then the King, who was a very religious man, determined to take her to the shrine of Saint Calixtus. Of course, if the Saint could make her smile, she would become a nun, and perhaps, in the long run, would have been as solemn and lugubrious as ever.
Original
CHAPTER XI.
Original
LL the Court came, and all the Court nearly died with laughing at the procession of the halt, and lame, and blind. ‘Go it, ye cripples,’ cried his Majesty, in convulsions of merriment! Some of the people were like X’s, and some like Y’s, and some like Z’s, and plenty of K’s and S’s, all the cross letters were there, all the letters but straight upright I. Meanwhile the courtiers held their sides and screamed, and the tears came into their eyes; but the Princess yawned like a pretty little trout out of water! She did not see what there was to laugh at!
Besides, if she had laughed, perhaps they would have made her marry a man with a hump upon his back, or two wooden legs and a glass eye.
The fun was over, the King got up, the courtiers all rose, when past came Johnny and the golden goose and all his company.
Now when the Princess beheld our Johnny, and the landlord’s three daughters, and the fat Vicar, and the thin Beadle, and the two Curates, and the Organist, the violin-player, the man with the comet, and all the wicked little choir-boys, all stuck fast together, and all treading on each other’s heels, she fell into such convulsions of laughter that she dropped into the Queen’s arms, and chuckled till she was nearly dead.
The King, wild with delight, threw his royal arms around the neck of our Johnny, shouting, ‘Take her, you dog; she is yours, my bonny boy!’ and all the courtiers, falling on each other’s breasts, cried
Hooray, hooray,
She’s laughed to-day!
Original
But our Johnny moved on, quite grave, to the altar of Saint Calixtus, and there he laid the golden goose, after which all the people who followed him were able to get free. The charm was broken.
Original
Next day was the marriage. They ate a whole flock of roast geese from Hergnies, and they drank two vats of the local beer. In short, merrier times never were, in all the merry country of Flanders, where the beer is so excellent.
Original
CHAPTER XII.
FTER the King died, Johnny succeeded to the vacant throne, and the Chronicles report that he did not govern less wisely than other monarchs, prime ministers, and politicians generally, before or since.
Original
The people of his own good town of Valenciennes had a statue made of Johnny Nut, in walnut-wood, and a statue of his wife, and there they stand on a tower, and strike time on the big clock; so you see this story is quite true. Do not you believe any learned man who tells you that Johnny is the Sun, and that the Goose is the Sun, and that the Passing Belle is the Moon, or nonsense of that kind, which, my dear children, is too common!
MORAL.
I think the Moral is that we should always be kind to animals, respectful to Old Age, and, above all, that we should be Easily Amused.