In the middle of the storm somebody knocked at the town gate, and the old King himself went to open it.

It was a princess who stood outside, but she was in a terrible state from the rain and the storm.  The water streamed out of her hair and her clothes; it ran in at the top of her shoes and out at the heel, but she said that she was a real princess.

‘Well we shall soon see if that is true,’ thought the old Queen, but she said nothing.  She went into the bedroom, took all the bedclothes off and laid a pea on the bedstead:  then she took twenty mattresses and piled them on the top of the pea, and then twenty feather beds on the top of the mattresses.  This was where the princess was to sleep that night.  In the morning they asked her how she had slept.

‘Oh terribly badly!’ said the princess.  ’I have hardly closed my eyes the whole night!  Heaven knows what was in the bed.  I seemed to be lying upon some hard thing, and my whole body is black and blue this morning.  It is terrible!’

They saw at once that she must be a real princess when she had felt the pea through twenty mattresses and twenty feather beds.  Nobody but a real princess could have such a delicate skin.

So the prince took her to be his wife, for now he was sure that he had found a real princess, and the pea was put into the Museum, where it may still be seen if no one has stolen it.

Now this is a true story.

THE GARDEN OF PARADISE

There was once a king’s son; nobody had so many or such beautiful books as he had.  He could read about everything which had ever happened in this world, and see it all represented in the most beautiful pictures.  He could get information about every nation and every country; but as to where the Garden of Paradise was to be found, not a word could he discover, and this was the very thing he thought most about.  His grandmother had told him, when he was quite a little fellow and was about to begin his school life, that every flower in the Garden of Paradise was a delicious cake, and that the pistils were full of wine.  In one flower history was written, in another geography or tables; you had only to eat the cake and you knew the lesson.  The more you ate, the more history, geography and tables you knew.  All this he believed then; but as he grew older and wiser and learnt more, he easily perceived that the delights of the Garden of Paradise must be far beyond all this.

[Illustration:  His grandmother had told him, when he was quite a little fellow and was about to begin his school life, that every flower in the Garden of Paradise was a delicious cake, and that the pistils were full of wine.]

’Oh, why did Eve take of the tree of knowledge?  Why did Adam eat the forbidden fruit?  If it had only been I it would not have happened! never would sin have entered the world!’

This is what he said then, and he still said it when he was seventeen; his thoughts were full of the Garden of Paradise.