Twilight Land, Howard Pyle [easy books to read .TXT] 📗

time it was a cup made of a single ruby, and filled to the brim with gold money. And the wonder of the cup was this: that no matter how much money you took out of it, it was always full. “Take this,” said Jacob Stuck, “to remind you of me.” Then the clock struck twelve, and instantly all was darkness, and the Genie carried the princess home again.

But the princess had brought her piece of chalk with her, as the prime-minister had advised; and in some way or other she contrived, either in coming or going, to mark a cross upon the door of Jacob Stuck’s house.

But, clever as she was, the Genie of Good Luck was more clever still. He saw what the princess did; and, as soon as he had carried her home, he went all through the town and marked a cross upon every door, great and small, little and big, just as the princess had done upon the door of Jacob Stuck’s house, only upon the prime-minister’s door he put two crosses. The next morning everybody was wondering what all the crosses on the house-doors meant, and the king and the prime-minister were no wiser than they had been before.

But the princess had brought the ruby cup with her, and she and the king could not look at it and wonder at it enough.

“Pooh!” said the prime-minister; “I tell you it is nothing else in the world but just a piece of good luck—that is all it is. As for the rogue who is playing all these tricks, let the princess keep a pair of scissors by her, and, if she is carried away again, let her contrive to cut off a lock of his hair from over the young man’s right ear. Then to-morrow we will find out who has been trimmed.”

Yes, the princess would do that; so, before evening was come, she tied a pair of scissors to her belt.

Well, Jacob Stuck could hardly wait for the night to come to summon the Genie of Good Luck. “I want to sup with the princess again,” said he.

“To hear is to obey,” said the Genie of Good Luck; and, as soon as he had made everything ready, away he flew to fetch the princess again.

Well, they feasted and drank, and the music played, and the candles were as bright as day, and beautiful girls sang and danced, and Jacob Stuck was as happy as a king. But the princess kept her scissors by her, and, when Jacob Stuck was not looking, she contrived to snip off a lock of his hair from over his right ear, and nobody saw what was done but the Genie of Good Luck.

And it came towards midnight.

Once more the door opened, and the beautiful serving-lad came into the room, carrying the tray of silver with something upon it wrapped in a napkin. This time Jacob Stuck gave the princess an emerald ring for a keepsake, and the wonder of it was that every morning two other rings just like it would drop from it.

Then twelve o’clock sounded, the lights went out, and the Genie took the princess home again.

But the Genie had seen what the princess had done. As soon as he had taken her safe home, he struck his palms together and summoned all his companions. “Go,” said he, “throughout the town and trim a lock of hair from over the right ear of every man in the whole place;” and so they did, from the king himself to the beggar-man at the gates. As for the prime-minister, the Genie himself trimmed two locks of hair from him, one from over each of his ears, so that the next morning he looked as shorn as an old sheep. In the morning all the town was in a hubbub, and everybody was wondering how all the men came to have their hair clipped as it was. But the princess had brought the lock of Jacob Stuck’s hair away with her wrapped up in a piece of paper, and there it was.

As for the ring Jacob Stuck had given to her, why, the next morning there were three of them, and the king thought he had never heard tell of such a wonderful thing.

“I tell you,” said the prime-minister, “there is nothing in it but a piece of good luck, and not a grain of virtue. It’s just a piece of good luck—that’s all it is.”

“No matter,” said the king; “I never saw the like of it in all my life before. And now, what are we going to do?”

The prime-minister could think of nothing.

Then the princess spoke up. “Your majesty,” she said, “I can find the young man for you. Just let the herald go through the town and proclaim that I will marry the young man to whom this lock of hair belongs, and then we will find him quickly enough.”

“What!” cried the prime-minister; “will, then, the princess marry a man who has nothing better than a little bit of good luck to help him along in the world?”

“Yes,” said the princess, “I shall if I can find him.”

So the herald was sent out around the town proclaiming that the princess would marry the man to whose head belonged the lock of hair that she had.

A lock of hair! Why, every man had lost a lock of hair! Maybe the princess could fit it on again, and then the fortune of him to whom it belonged would be made. All the men in the town crowded up to the king’s palace. But all for no use, for never a one of them was fitted with his own hair.

As for Jacob Stuck, he too had heard what the herald had proclaimed. Yes; he too had heard it, and his heart jumped and hopped within him like a young lamb in the spring-time. He knew whose hair it was the princess had. Away he went by himself, and rubbed up his piece of blue glass, and there stood the Genie.

“What are thy commands?” said he.

“I am,” said Jacob Stuck, “going up to the king’s palace to marry the princess, and I would have a proper escort.”

“To hear is to obey,” said the Genie.

He smote his hands together, and instantly there appeared a score of attendants who took Jacob Stuck, and led him into another room, and began clothing him in a suit so magnificent that it dazzled the eyes to look at it. He smote his hands together again, and out in the court-yard there appeared a troop of horsemen to escort Jacob Stuck to the palace, and they were all clad in gold-and-silver armor. He smote his hands together again, and there appeared twenty-and-one horses—twenty as black as night and one as white as milk, and it twinkled and sparkled all over with gold and jewels, and at the head of each horse of the one-and-twenty horses stood a slave clad in crimson velvet to hold the bridle. Again he smote his hands together, and there appeared in the ante-room twenty handsome young men, each with a marble bowl filled with gold money, and when Jacob Stuck came out dressed in his fine clothes there they all were.

Jacob Stuck mounted upon the horse as white as milk, the young men mounted each upon one of the black horses, the troopers in the gold-and-silver armor wheeled their horses, the