So it happened that he came presently to a great plain, across which he rode all day long without seeing a single house, and horse and rider were terribly hungry, when, as the night fell, the Prince caught sight of a light, which seemed to shine from a cavern.

He rode up to it, and saw a little old woman, who appeared to be at least a hundred years old.

She put on her spectacles to look at Prince Hyacinth, but it was quite a long time before she could fix them securely because her nose was so very short.

The Prince and the Fairy (for that was who she was) had no sooner looked at one another than they went into fits of laughter, and cried at the same moment, “Oh, what a funny nose!”

“Not so funny as your own,” said Prince Hyacinth to the Fairy; “but, madam, I beg you to leave the consideration of our noses—­such as they are—­and to be good enough to give me something to eat, for I am starving, and so is my poor horse.”

“With all my heart,” said the Fairy.  “Though your nose is so ridiculous you are, nevertheless, the son of my best friend.  I loved your father as if he had been my brother.  Now he had a very handsome nose!”

“And pray what does mine lack?” said the Prince.

“Oh! it doesn’t lack anything,” replied the Fairy.  “On the contrary quite, there is only too much of it.  But never mind, one may be a very worthy man though his nose is too long.  I was telling you that I was your father’s friend; he often came to see me in the old times, and you must know that I was very pretty in those days; at least, he used to say so.  I should like to tell you of a conversation we had the last time I ever saw him.”

“Indeed,” said the Prince, “when I have supped it will give me the greatest pleasure to hear it; but consider, madam, I beg of you, that I have had nothing to eat to-day.”

“The poor boy is right,” said the Fairy; “I was forgetting.  Come in, then, and I will give you some supper, and while you are eating I can tell you my story in a very few words—­for I don’t like endless tales myself.  Too long a tongue is worse than too long a nose, and I remember when I was young that I was so much admired for not being a great chatterer.  They used to tell the Queen, my mother, that it was so.  For though you see what I am now, I was the daughter of a great king.  My father——­”

“Your father, I dare say, got something to eat when he was hungry!” interrupted the Prince.

“Oh! certainly,” answered the Fairy, “and you also shall have supper directly.  I only just wanted to tell you——­”

“But I really cannot listen to anything until I have had something to eat,” cried the Prince, who was getting quite angry; but then, remembering that he had better be polite as he much needed the Fairy’s help, he added: 

“I know that in the pleasure of listening to you I should quite forget my own hunger; but my horse, who cannot hear you, must really be fed!”