CHAPTER I.

Never were such rejoicings heard of before as those which took place at the Court of King Katzekopf when it was announced that Queen Ninnilinda had got a little boy. It was what everybody had been wishing for, hoping for, expecting, year after year, but no little boy came; and so, at length, folks began to despair, and to settle it in their own minds that, whenever King Katzekopf died, the crown would go to his second cousin nine times removed, one of the Katzekopfs of Katzenellenbogen-Katzevervankotsdarsprakenluftschlosser, whom nobody knew or cared about.

So when Queen Ninnilinda had an heir, the nation almost went beside itself with joy. The church bells rang till they cracked; the guns of the citadel were fired till they grew so hot that they went off of themselves; oxen were roasted whole in the great square (my dear reader, never attempt to roast an ox _whole_, either on your own birthday, or on that of anybody else; the thing is an impossibility, half the meat is sure to be raw, and the other half burnt, and so good beef is spoiled); the two chief conduits of the city no longer poured forth water, but one spouted out cowslip-wine, and the other raspberry-vinegar; the lake in front of the palace was filled with small beer (this, however, was a failure, as it killed the fish, and folks said that the beer tasted muddy); an air-balloon hovered over the principal streets, and showered down carraway comfits and burnt almonds; Punch was exhibited all day for nothing; the prisons were all thrown open, and everybody paid the debts of everybody else.

Such being the state of things out of doors, you will readily believe that within the palace, the joy was of the most exuberant kind. Everything was in confusion; people ran up-stairs and down-stairs, jostling against one another, and always forgetting whither they were going, and for what they had been sent. Some were laughing, and some were crying, but the greater part were all talking at once, each making his own remarks, and nobody listening to his neighbour. The lords of the bed-chamber were laying wagers upon the likelihood of a new creation of peers; the maids of honour were discussing the probable colour of the infant prince’s eyes; the pages were speculating upon an increase of salary; nay, the very scullions were counting on a brevet for the kitchen.

But if all his court were thus in such a frenzy of pleasurable emotion, what must have been the condition of King Katzekopf himself? It must be confessed, that, in the main, his Majesty was one of those easy, indolent, careless sort of folks, who are content to let things take their own course, and who can very seldom be roused to make an exertion of any kind. But the birth of an heir had thrown even him into a state of excitement. Happily, he was a king, and so he had it in his power to give vent to his emotions in the manner which was most agreeable to him, for if such unwonted exhilaration had been pent up too long, there is no saying what the consequences might not have been. Fortunately, however, there was a safety-valve, through which he was enabled to let off the steaming overflow of his spirits.

So first he sent for the Yeoman of the Mouth, and bespoke a roast goose, with plenty of sage and onions, for his dinner; then he summoned the Master of the Robes, and ordered himself four new suits of clothes; then the head Confectioner was commanded to prepare materials for the manufacture of the largest christening-cake that the world had ever seen; and, lastly, he called together his Privy Council, and having created the new born infant Commander in Chief, and Lord High Admiral, Inspector General of everything and everybody, and settled on him the Crown revenues accruing from the sale of shrimps and periwinkles, his Majesty in a fervour of patriotism and paternal pride, rang the bell, and desired that the nurse, Mrs. Yellowlily, should bring the heir apparent into the Council-chamber.

Accordingly, in a few moments, the folding doors were thrown open, and nurse Yellowlily appeared with her precious charge swathed in a mantle of sky-blue taffety and silver, supported by two of the royal rockers.

“No indeed!” said the Lord Chancellor, dropping his mace and the great seal, and clasping his hands, as he fixed his eyes on the ceiling, “never was such a lovely infant seen!”

“Wait a moment, my Lord,” said nurse Yellowlily, “and you shall have a peep at his Royal Highness:”—for as yet the Chancellor had not beheld him.

With that she gently turned back the mantle, and the Privy Councillors crowded round her. “There, my Lord,” she exclaimed, “you can now see his blessed little nose.”

Everybody was delighted: it was the most exquisite nose ever beheld. The King was so gratified, that he instantly created the nurse a Baroness in her own right; upon which she curtsied three times, walked backwards till she trod upon the Lord Chamberlain’s gouty foot, and then retired with the rockers, who, as they proceeded down the corridor, chanted the softest of lullabies.

The Privy Councillors listened till the last faint echoes of the melody had died away, when King Katzekopf thus addressed them.

“My Lords,” said he, “I have called you together on the present auspicious occasion, for the purpose of making you acquainted with certain measures which I am about to take with reference to the Prince, my son. And first, my Lord Chamberlain, I have to announce to you my intention of giving a most magnificent fête on the occasion of his Royal Highness’s christening. You will be pleased to send out cards of invitation according to this list, which I believe contains the name of every person of reputation in the kingdom.”

Here his Majesty handed a book to the Lord Chamberlain, which that functionary received with reverence, and proceeded to inspect with great attention. Having turned over five or six pages, the Chamberlain suddenly nodded his head as if a thought had struck him. This was so uncommon an event that the Lord Steward of the Household immediately inquired in a whisper what it was that had attracted his attention. The Chamberlain pointed to the list of names, and said in an under tone, “Look through the A’s, my Lord, and see if there is not a very important name omitted.”

At this moment King Katzekopf’s attention was attracted by the whispering, and he graciously exclaimed, “Well, my Lords, what’s the matter?”

“I apprehend,” said the Chamberlain with becoming diffidence, “that your Majesty has caused these names to be written in alphabetical order.”

“Certainly, my Lord,” replied the King.

“I speak with all possible deference,” rejoined the Chamberlain, “but I presume that your Majesty did not intend that the Lady Abracadabra should be excluded from the invitations.”

“Humph,” said the King, “I never thought about her.”

“But she is your Majesty’s consort’s great aunt,” observed the Chamberlain.

“And a very powerful Fairy,” suggested the Steward of the Household.

“And, if I may say it without offence, rather capricious in her temper at times; at least she turned an acquaintance of mine into a tadpole,” remarked the Groom of the Stole.

“And your Majesty,” said the Keeper of the Records, interposing, “cannot have forgotten the very untoward event which took place in your Majesty’s family, some centuries ago, when all the misfortunes that occurred to your Majesty’s ancestress, the Sleeping Beauty, arose from her Fairy relative not being invited to the christening.”

King Katzekopf would have rather preferred the Lady Abracadabra’s room to her company, for he was very much afraid of the Fairies, but then, on the other hand, the bare thought of having the Hope of his House turned into a tadpole, or put to sleep in a castle in a wood for a hundred and fifty years, was most alarming. His Majesty grew red and pale alternately, shifted from one side of his throne to the other, and was evidently in a state of great anxiety.

“But how is the Lady Abracadabra to be found?” said he at length. “Who can tell where to look for her? One moment she may be a thousand miles off, and the next she may bob up through a crack in the floor, as if she had passed the night in the cellar.”

“He! he! he!” cried a shrill tiny voice in the distance, as though the owner of the said voice was greatly amused at something it had just heard.

“How the mice are squeaking behind the arras to-day!” exclaimed the King. “My Lord Chamberlain, you must send for a cat, and when she has caught the mice, we will set her to catch the Lady Abracadabra. Ha! ha! ha!” continued his Majesty, laughing at his own wit.

But the Keeper of the Records, who, from his study of the archives of the kingdom, knew better than most people what a dangerous thing it is to speak disrespectfully of the Fairies, and who was supposed to have acquired a smattering of the black art himself, immediately endeavoured to repress King Katzekopf’s laughter, by saying,—“So please you, my Liege, I apprehend that there would be little difficulty in sending an invitation to the Lady Abracadabra. If one of the Government messengers will bury it under a fairy-hill, next Wednesday morning, any time before noon, turning his face to the East, and calling her by her name three times....”

At this point the Keeper of the Records stopped short, for all of a sudden, a very strange sound was heard at the keyhole of the Council-chamber door, a scratching, rustling, noise, followed by a violent blast, such as might issue from the nozzle of a blacksmith’s bellows.

The President of the Council looked up to see what was the matter, but was immediately struck on the nose by a pellet of closely squeezed paper, which was immediately followed by another, and another, as the blowing at the keyhole was repeated. At length, when another blast had produced a shrill whistle, which showed that the aperture was clear, a little object, about the size of a hornet, darted through it, and increasing instantaneously in dimensions, presented the appearance of an old woman, some three feet high, by the time it had reached the floor.

Whether the Lady Abracadabra (for of course it was she) had been a beauty in the days of her youth, some eight or nine hundred years before, there is, at present, no means of ascertaining; but certainly, when she stood upon the floor of the Council-chamber, her appearance was anything but prepossessing. Perhaps, gentle reader, you have been in the habit of supposing that all the Fairies are dainty, little, airy beings, with butterfly wings, and vests of green and gold, who hide themselves in a blue-bell, and lose themselves among the petals of a peony. And such, no doubt, are the elves that live among the green hills, and who love to dance by moonlight, in the glades of the forest, or beside the pleasant water-courses. But there are others who mingle more with the human race, and adopt their habits, and hence, it may be, they become more subject to the changes which affect mortals. Perhaps this was the cause why the Lady Abracadabra’s face had become so brown, and shrunken, and covered with deep-set wrinkles; or perhaps it was the having had her own way so much; or those long journeys in which she travelled at the rate of a thousand miles a minute, might have spoiled her complexion; or perhaps, having arrived at (what even among the Fairies is allowed to be) _a certain age_, she could not help looking like an old woman. But be this as it may, she did look very old, and the effect of her short black velvet jacket, and yellow satin petticoat, did not mend matters. She wore on her head a tall, steeple-crowned hat, of the same material as her jacket; had high-heeled shoes with diamond buckles, and bore in her hand a pliant rod of ebony, with a small star of living light at each end of it.

It was evident that she was very angry, for she scowled at the Privy Councillors, stamped vehemently on the floor, and every muscle of her face quivered with passion, as she addressed the King.

“So, nephew! you are determined to keep _me_ out of your palace at any rate, I see. Let who will come to court, I am to be excluded. There is always greater difficulty in getting into your house than anybody’s else.”

King Katzekopf stammered forth an apology, assured his kinswoman that he was delighted to see her, that he had just been speaking of sending her an invitation, and that he had given general orders that she should be admitted at all times.

“No such thing!” cried the little lady angrily. “You use me abominably. You know I always make it a rule to come through the keyhole, and there it is that you always try to stop me. Either I find a plate of metal over the opening, or else the key is left in the lock, and so my ruff gets crumpled to pieces. But the insult you have exposed me to to-day is intolerable: blocking up the passage with scraps of dirty paper, squeezed together by fingers of some greasy yeoman of the guard.—Oh it’s atrocious!” And the Lady Abracadabra shook her quilted petticoat as if she never should be clean again.

The King looked at his Ministers, and the Ministers looked at the King; but neither seemed to know how to excuse themselves. At length, the President of the Council, trembling exceedingly (for he expected to be changed into a tadpole, or some such reptile), ventured to assure the Lady, that he was the person in fault; for that, finding that the door-keeper had got into the habit of applying his ear to the keyhole of the Council-chamber, and fearing lest state-secrets should thus get wind prematurely, he had himself obstructed the passage in the manner already described.

“The varlet! the knave!” exclaimed the Fairy, as she heard of the door-keeper’s delinquency, “I’ve a great mind to hang him up by his ears to the vane of the church steeple. Go look for him, my Lord, and tell him from me, that if ever he puts his ear to a keyhole again, I’ll blow mushroom spawn into his brains, and cause his ears to vegetate, instead of to listen.”

Fairies, as all the world knows, are hasty and capricious; but it is only a very few who are spiteful and malignant. And to this class the Lady Abracadabra had never belonged. If she was angry one moment, she was pacified the next, and she much more frequently used her supernatural powers in acts of kindness, than to gratify her freaks of mischief.

It was so on the present occasion. After the little ebullition just recorded, she speedily recovered her equanimity. Her eyes no longer sparkled with passion, and so agreeable an expression came over her countenance, that nobody thought about her wrinkles, or the unbecomingness of her yellow petticoat.

“I was taking an airing on Mount Caucasus a quarter of an hour ago,” said she, “when one of our people told me of your good fortune; so here I came wind-speed to congratulate you, and to see if I could not find some lucky gifts for my great-great-nephew.”

King Katzekopf thanked her for her condescension, and immediately proposed to escort her to the royal nursery.

“Ha! ha! ha!” cried the Lady Abracadabra, almost choking with laughter at the absurdity of the suggestion. “You don’t suppose I came to talk to you before I had seen the baby, do you? Why, I’ve been sitting by his cradle these ten minutes!”

“You have?” exclaimed the King in astonishment.

“Aye, marry,” said the lady, “and have pulled the chair from under the Baroness Yellowlily, and, he! he! he! have given her such a bump. She was going to feed the child with pap that would have scalded it; but it will be cool enough, I warrant me, now, before she has done rubbing her bruised elbows. Well, nephew, and so you’re going to have a grand christening, are you? Who are to be sponsors besides myself?”

It had never entered into King Katzekopf’s imagination to ask the Lady Abracadabra to be godmother to the young prince. And now she had taken it as a matter of course, and it would never do to affront her! Was there ever such a distress? And what would Queen Ninnilinda say, and what would the Arch-duchess of Klopsteinhesseschloffengrozen say, when, after a direct invitation, she found an old Fairy was to be substituted in her place?

The King was so nervous and frightened that he did not know what to answer. He could only stammer out something about final arrangements being as yet undetermined.

“Well, but, at any rate, I suppose you have settled the child’s name,” continued the Lady Abracadabra, approaching the Council-table. “Hoity toity! what is this?” she added, snatching up one of his Majesty’s memoranda: “Conrad-Adalbert-Willibald-Lewis-Hildebrand-Victor- Sigismund-Belvidere-Narcissus-Adonis Katzekopf? I never heard such a string of silly, conceited names in my life. I shan’t allow it, I can tell you that,” and she stamped on the floor till her diamond buckles glanced like lightning. “If _I_ am to have anything to do with the child, I shall give him what name I think proper. Stay; I’ve watched him for ten minutes, and can read his whole character, and a more wilful little brat I never saw. You shall call him Eigenwillig. There! that’s to be his name; Eigenwillig, and nothing else!”[1]

Footnote 1:

It is mentioned in the Chronicle of Carivaldus of Cologne, from which this veracious tale has been extracted, that the word “Eigenwillig,” in the ancient Teutonic tongue, bears the meaning of Self-willed; a statement which is the more credible, since it has a corresponding signification in the modern language of Germany.

And then, not waiting for a reply, the Lady Abracadabra gathered her yellow satin habiliments round her, threw out her arms, brought them together above her head, sprung from the floor, shrunk up to nothing in a moment, and darted through the keyhole of the Council-chamber door.