Part 9

While she was looking at it, the doors of the castle swung open, and a train of attendants came out to meet her. These attendants were all dressed in green, and many of them would have been very handsome except that they themselves were green. Their faces, their hands, their hair, and eyes,--everything about them was green.

They spoke to Sim Ching in a strange language, but soon she understood them and knew they had come to bring her before their King who was waiting for her.

Sim Ching felt no doubt but that this King was the Water Spirit himself, and she was very much frightened, but still she did not hesitate, but went with them willingly, for it was for this purpose she had come hither.

The attendants led her through one room after another, until they came to the place where the Water Spirit sat upon a crystal throne, and he, too, was green, but his crown was of gold, and his garments were set all over with pearls and precious stones.

The King looked at Sim Ching kindly and bade her have no fear. “I intend you no harm,” said he, “and indeed I wished for no sacrifice. My only wish was to punish the rich merchant for his pride, and so it was that I set him a task that I thought impossible for him to perform. But because of your dutifulness and your love for your father, he has been able to make the sacrifice. Now you must stay here patiently for a year and teach the sea-maidens the ways of the world above, and at the end of that time you shall return to the earth, and receive the happiness you deserve.”

Sim Ching listened to him wondering, and when he had made an end of speaking, she gladly agreed to serve for a time in the palace and to teach the sea-people all she knew. So for a twelvemonth Sim Ching stayed there and was very happy, for though the ways and manners of the sea-people were strange to her, they themselves were kind and gentle, so that she soon lost all fear of them.

At the end of the twelve months, the King sent for Sim Ching, and when she had come before him, he said, “Sim Ching, for a year you have served us both faithfully and well, and now the time has come for you to return to the upper world. But in that world there are many dangers, and you have no one to protect you. I have, therefore, caused a great flower to be prepared for you. When you enter into this flower, the leaves will fold about you and hide you, so that none may suspect you are within it. The leaves will afford you food and drink as well as shelter. In this way you can live protected and in safety until fate sends you a husband to love and guard you.”

After speaking thus, the Water Spirit led Sim Ching into another room and there showed her the flower that he had caused to be prepared for her. This flower was very large and of a beautiful rose color, and the leaves were of some rich, thick substance that had a most delicious smell and was good to eat. The juice of the leaves also afforded a delicious drink. Sim Ching, as she examined it, knew not how to express her wonder and admiration.

The King bade her step into the flower. She did so, and at once the leaves closed about her, so that she was completely hidden, and at the same time the most delightful music breathed softly from the flower. It now floated softly up and up, through the roof of the palace, and through the waters above, until it reached the surface of the sea. There it rested, rocking gently with the motion of the waves.

Now it so happened that the place where the flower floated on the sea was not far from the palace of the young King of that country. The morning it arose through the waters, the King was looking from a window across the sea toward a pleasure island where he sometimes went. Suddenly, between himself and the island, he saw something glittering in the sunlight out upon the waters.

He could not make out what the object was, and he ordered that some of the castle servants should row out to it, see what it was, and if possible bring it back with them. This was done and when the rowers returned, they brought the flower with them and carried it in to where the young King was awaiting them.

When the King saw the flower, he was filled with wonder and admiration. Never before had he seen such a blossom. He examined it on all sides and exclaimed over its size and beauty.

“It must be some magic,” said he, “that has created such a flower. A room shall be built for it, and there I will keep it, and if indeed, it has been made by magic, as I suspect, it may be that in time some fruit will come from it that will be even more beautiful than the flower itself.”

The room that was now prepared for the flower was so magnificent that no other apartment in the palace could compare with it. The walls were of gold, overlaid with paintings and hung with silken embroidered hangings. The floors were set with precious stones. There were fountains, and couches heaped with soft cushions, and from the ceiling hung seven alabaster lamps that were kept burning both night and day.

When the room was finished, the King caused the flower to be carefully carried into it and placed in the center upon a raised dais covered with embroidered velvet. After this no one was allowed to enter the room except himself, and he carried the key of it hung on a jeweled chain about his neck. Every day he spent long hours with the flower admiring its beauty, enjoying its delicious perfume, and listening to the delicate music that sometimes breathed out from among its leaves.

All the while Sim Ching lay hidden in the center of the flower without the King’s once suspecting it. All day the leaves were closed about her, and only at night did they open to allow her to come forth.

The first time they unfolded, she was very much surprised to find herself in a room of a palace, instead of out upon the sea as she had supposed. Wondering, she looked about her, and then she stepped from the flower and began, timidly, to examine the apartment to which she had been brought. The beauty of it delighted her. She rested among the soft cushions, and bathed in the fountains, and dressed her hair. But toward morning she reëntered the flower, and the leaves closed about her so that she was again hidden from view.

For some time life went on in this manner. All day Sim Ching slept in the flower, and only at night did she come forth, and as the King only visited the room in the daytime he never saw her, nor even guessed that a living maiden was inclosed by the leaves of the flower he admired so greatly.

But it so happened that one night the King could not sleep, and he took a fancy to visit the flower and see it by the light of the lamps. He therefore made his way along the corridors, and fitting the key into the lock, he turned it without having made a sound.

What was his surprise, when he opened the door, to see a maiden of surpassing beauty sitting beside a fountain and amusing herself by catching the water in her hands.

When Sim Ching saw the King, she gave a cry, and would have run back into the flower to hide, but the King called to her gently, bidding her stay.

“I will not harm you,” said he. “Do but tell me who you are and how you have come here. It must be you are some spirit or fairy, for no human being could be as beautiful as you.”

“I am no spirit, nor am I a fairy,” answered Sim Ching, “but only the daughter of a poor blind beggar, and as to how I came here I know not. I was placed inside that flower by a Water Spirit, but who has brought the flower here, or why, I cannot tell.”

The King then told her of how he had seen the flower floating on the sea, and how he had had it brought to the palace, and had ordered this room to be built for it, and after he had made an end of speaking, Sim Ching told him her history from the time her father had become blind and fallen into the pit, to the hour when the Water Spirit had bade her enter the flower and the leaves had closed about her.

The young King listened and wondered. “Yours is indeed a strange story,” said he, “and this mischievous priest shall be sought out and punished as he deserves. And yet it may be his promises shall all come true, and you shall indeed be exalted to the highest place in the kingdom.”

He then told Sim Ching he loved her and desired nothing in the world so much as to make her his wife.

To this Sim Ching joyfully consented for the young King was so handsome and gracious, and spoke so well and wisely, that she could not but love him with all her heart, even as he loved her.

All night they sat and talked together, and in the morning he opened the door of the chamber and led her forth, and called the courtiers and nobles together, and told them she was to be his bride.

Then there was great rejoicing, and every one who saw Sim Ching wondered at her beauty and loved her for her gentle and gracious manner.

Soon after she and the King were married, and they loved each other so dearly that Sim Ching would have been perfectly happy except for the thought of her old father and his griefs and sorrows.

Immediately after she was married, she sent messengers to the village where she had lived, bidding them find her father and bring him to her, but the old man had disappeared, and no one knew what had become of him.

Then the Queen had a great feast prepared and sent word throughout the length and breadth of the Kingdom that all who were both poor and blind were bidden to the palace to eat of it. All would be welcome, and none should be turned away.

Then from far and near the blind and poor came flocking to the palace, scores and hundreds of them. The tables for the feast were laid in a great hall, and the young King and Queen sat on raised thrones at one end of it. All who came to the feast were obliged to pass before this throne before they might take their places at the table, and as each one passed, the Queen looked at him eagerly, hoping to recognize her father, but none of all the multitude was the one she sought. At last every one was seated; the attendants were about to close the doors, when another beggar, the last of all, came stumbling into the hall. He was so feeble and so old that he could scarcely make his way to the throne, but no sooner did the Queen see him than she knew him as her father.

Then she gave a great cry, and came down from the throne, and threw her arms about him, and wept over him.

“It is I, oh, my father! It is thy daughter, Sim Ching,” she wept.

Then her father knew her voice and cried aloud with joy. “Oh, my daughter, I had thought thee dead,” he cried, “and now thou art alive and I can feel thy arms about me.”

As he spoke the tears of joy ran down his cheeks, and these tears washed away the mists of sorrow that had clouded his eyes and he found he could see again.

Then there was great rejoicing, and the King called the old man father and made him welcome, and in due time he who had been blind and now could see was raised to great wealth and honor, and so the words of the priest, that he had spoken without believing, came true.

But as for the priest himself, the King had him sought for, and when he was found, he was thrown into prison and punished as he deserved for his greed and cruelty.

THE OAT CAKE

A SCOTCH STORY

One time the farmer’s wife made two oat cakes. She shaped them, and patted them and put them down in front of the fire to bake. “They will do for the good man’s dinner,” said she.

Then said one cake to the other cake, “It is all very well for the woman to say that, but I have no wish to be eaten. I will wait until I am baked hard, and then I shall set out to see the world.”

“That is a poor way to talk, brother,” replied the other. “Oat cakes were made to be eaten, and you should be proud to think the master himself is to have you for dinner.”

“Master or no master, I have no wish to be eaten,” repeated the first oat cake.

Not long after that, the farmer came home, and he was very hungry. First he ate the oat cake that wished to be eaten, and after he had finished it, he stretched out his hand for the other, but it slipped through his fingers and away it rolled, out of the door and on down the road.

It rolled along and rolled along until it came to a neat, tidy house with a thatched roof.

“This looks like a good and proper place for me to stop,” said the oat cake, so it rolled on in through the doorway.

There inside were a tailor and his two apprentices, all of them sitting cross-legged and sewing away; and the tailor’s wife stood by the fire, stirring the porridge.

When the tailor and the boys saw the oat cake come rolling in across the floor so boldly, they were frightened, and jumped up and hid behind the woman.

“Now out upon you! To be frightened by an oat cake!” cried the good wife. “Quick! Catch hold of it and divide it among you, and I’ll give you some milk to drink with it.”

When the tailor and his apprentices heard this, they took courage and ran out and tried to catch the oat cake; but it dodged them and rolled under the table and under the chairs, and while they were chasing it and the woman watching them, the porridge boiled over into the fire and was burned.

But the oat cake escaped them, and rolled out through the door, and on down the road again. “I’d better go a bit farther before I settle down for the night,” it thought to itself.

Presently it came to a little small house. “I’ll try how it is in here,” said the oat cake, and in it rolled.

There sat a weaver at his loom, and his wife was winding some yarn.

“What’s that that just came in at the door?” asked the weaver, for his eyesight was not very good.

“It’s an oat cake!” said his wife staring.

“Catch it woman! Catch it, before it rolls away again!” cried the weaver.

The woman chased the oat cake up and down and round about, and the weaver left his work and joined in the chase, but the oat cake was too lively for them. Every time they thought they had it, it slipped through their fingers as though it were buttered.

“Throw your yarn over it and snare it,” cried the weaver.

The woman threw her yarn over the oat cake, but the cake tangled up the yarn so that later on it took the woman a good two days to straighten it out again. But the oat cake escaped and rolled out and down the road.

“That’s too lively a place for me to stay,” said the oat cake to itself.

At the next place where the oat cake stopped, a woman was churning.

“Oh, the dear little, pretty little oat cake!” cried she. “I have good thick cream to-day, and plenty of it, and the oat cake will taste good with it.”

“But first you must catch me,” said the oat cake.

It rolled round and round the churn, and the woman ran after it, and in the end she fell against the churn and upset it.

While she was cleaning up the mess, the oat cake set out on further adventures.

“So far I’ve found no place in the world where an oat cake can rest in peace and quiet,” said the cake. “But, there must be such a place somewhere, and if there is, I mean to find it.”

Soon it came to a bit of a stream, with a mill beside it.

The oat cake rolled into the mill, and there stood a miller at work, and he was all white with flour. “Oat cake and a bit of cheese taste well together,” said the miller. “The cheese I already have. Come in, come in and make the other half of the feast.”

But the oat cake was frightened and rolled on out, and the miller never bothered his head further about it.

The next place the oat cake stopped was at a smithy. The smith was busy beating out a horseshoe, but when he saw the oat cake he laid aside the shoe.

“Welcome! Welcome! I like an oat cake and a drink of ale as well as the next man. Come in and let us feast together.”

“Not I,” cried the oat cake, and away it rolled in haste, and as the road was downhill now, it made good time.

The smith ran after it, and when he found the cake was going too fast for him, he threw his hammer after it, and the hammer fell into a thicket, and the smith had a great time finding it.

But the oat cake hid in a crack between two rocks, and lay there quiet until the smith had found his hammer and gone back to his smithy again grumbling. Then out it came and away it rolled, but it was getting tired now.

“Maybe it would have been better if I had gone to rest in the good man’s stomach,” said the oat cake, “but here we go, and I have no mind to be eaten by the first stranger who takes a fancy to me,--no, nor by the second either.”

In the next house the oat cake entered, the good wife was cooking supper, and her husband sat plaiting straw rope.

“Look at that!” cried the woman. “You’re always asking me for oat cake, and there is one ready to your hand. Quick! Quick! Shut the door and catch it.”

The man jumped up to shut the door, but he caught his foot in the rope he was plaiting and fell flat on the floor. The woman threw her porridge stick at the cake, but away it went and off down the road.

“Now I’ll have to find some place to sleep,” said it to itself. “No knowing what will happen if I lay me down by the roadside.”

It saw an open door, and in it rolled. The good man of the house had just taken off his breeches, and the woman was tucking the children into bed.

“Look! Look!” cried the woman. “There is an oat cake rolling in at the door, and no one coming after to claim it. Catch it before it can get away again.”

The good man jumped up and threw his breeches at it. They fell on the oat cake and almost smothered it, but it managed to roll out from under them and away it went, with the man and his wife in full chase after it, and the children crying after them.

But the oat cake was too quick, even for the two of them. It outran them both, and

the man and his wife had to go back home without it, the man with his bare legs, and the neighbors peeking out at him from behind their window curtains.

By this time it was dark. “I’ll have to hurry if I want to find a place to-night where I can sleep in quiet,” said the oat cake.

So now it rolled along more briskly, and presently it came to a pasture, and it leaped and bounded across it at a great rate, for it was all downhill, and then suddenly--plunk!--it fell down into a fox’s hole.

The fox was at home and half asleep, but as soon as he saw the oat cake, he was wide awake again in a moment. The fox had had nothing to eat all day, and he did not stop to look twice at the oat cake, but bit it in half and swallowed it down in a trice and with no words about it.

So the oat cake slept quiet after all its wanderings, but it might as well have been eaten by the farmer in the first place.

THE DREAMER

AN ENGLISH STORY

There once lived a man and his wife, named Peter and Kate, and they were so poor that they had scarcely enough bread to put in their mouths. They lived in a wretched, miserable hut, and in front of the hut was a river, and back of it a patch of ground and a gnarled old apple tree.

One night when Peter was sleeping he dreamed a dream, and in this dream a tall old man dressed in gray, and with a long gray beard came to him and said, “Peter, I know that you have had a hard life, and have neither grumbled nor complained, and now I have a mind to help you. Follow down the river until you come to a bridge. On the other side of the river you will see a town. Take up your stand on the bridge and wait there patiently. It may be that nothing will happen the first day, and it may be that nothing will happen the second day either, but if you do not lose courage, but still wait patiently, some time during the third day some one will come to you, and tell you something that will make your fortune for you.”

In the morning, when Peter awoke, he told his dream to Kate, his wife. “It would be a curious thing if I should do as the old man told me and really become rich,” said he.

“Nonsense!” answered his wife. “Dreams are nothing but foolishness. Do you go over to Neighbor Goodkin and see whether he has not some wood to be cut, so you can earn a few pence to buy meal for to-morrow.”

So Peter did as his wife told him, and went over to his neighbor’s and worked there all day, and by evening he had almost forgotten his dream.

But that night, as soon as he fell asleep, the old man appeared before him again. “Why have you not done as I told you, Peter?” said he. “Remember, good luck will not wait forever. To-morrow do you set out for the bridge and town I told you of, and believe, for it is the truth; if you wait there for three days and make the best of what will then be told you you will become a rich man.”

When Peter awoke the next morning, his first thought was to set out in search of the bridge and town of which the old man had told him, but still his wife dissuaded him.

“Do not be so foolish,” said she. “Sit down and eat your breakfast and be thankful that you have it. You earned a few pence yesterday, and who knows but what you may be lucky enough to earn even more to-day.”

So Peter did not set out on his journey in search of fortune that day either.

But the next night for the third time the old man appeared before him, and now his look was stern and forbidding. “Thou fool!” said he. “Three times have I come to thee, and now I will come no more. Go to the bridge of which I have spoken and listen well to what is there said to thee. Otherwise want and poverty will still be thy portion, even as they have been heretofore.”

With this the old man disappeared, and Peter awoke. And now it was of no use for his wife to scold and argue. As the old man had commanded so Peter would do. He only stopped to put some food in his stomach and more in his pockets, and off he set, one foot before another.

For a long time Peter journeyed on down the river till he was both footsore and weary, and then he came to a bridge that crossed the stream, and on the other side was a town, and Peter felt almost sure this was the place to which the old man of his dreams had told him to come.

So he took his stand on the fridge and stayed there all day. The passers-by stared at him, and some of them spoke to him, but none of them said to him anything that might, by any chance, lead him on to fortune. All that day he waited on the bridge, and all of the day after, and by the time the third day came, he had eaten all the food he had brought with him except one hard, dry crust of bread. Then he began to wonder whether he were not a simpleton to be loitering there day after day, all because of a dream, when he might, perhaps, be earning a few pennies at home in one way or another.

Now just beyond this bridge there was a tailor’s shop, and the tailor who lived there was a very curious man. Ever since Peter had taken his stand on the bridge the tailor had been peeping out at him, and wondering why he was standing there, and what his business might be; and the longer Peter stayed the more curious the tailor became. He fussed and he fidgeted, and along toward the afternoon of the third day he could bear it no longer, and he put aside his work and went out to the bridge to find out what he could about Peter and what he was doing there.

When he came where Peter was he bade him good-day.

“Good-day,” answered Peter.

“Are you waiting here on the bridge for some one?” asked the tailor.

“I am and I am not,” replied Peter.

“Now what may be the meaning of that?” asked the tailor. “How can you be waiting and still not be waiting all at one and the same time?”