“Kiss me!” cried the dragon, which had already devoured many gallant knights for declining to kiss it.
“Give you a kiss,” murmured the prince; “oh, certainly, if that’s all! Anything for a quiet life.”
So saying, he kissed the dragon, which instantly became a most beautiful princess; for she had lain enchanted as a dragon, by a wicked magician, till somebody should be bold enough to kiss her.
“My love! my hero! my lord! how long I have waited for thee; and now I am eternally thine own!”
So murmured, in the most affectionate accents, the Lady Dragonissa, as she was now called.
Though wedded to a bachelor life, the prince was much too well-bred to make any remonstrance.
The Lady Dragonissa, a female of extraordinary spirit, energy, and ambition, took command of him and of his followers, conducted them up the Danube, seized a principality whose lord had gone crusading, set her husband on the throne, and became in course of time the mother of a little prince, who, again, was great, great, great, great-grandfather of our Prince Prigio.
From this adventurous Lady Dragonissa, Prince Prigio derived his character for gallantry. But her husband, it is said, was often heard to remark, by a slight change of his family motto:
“Anything for a Quiet Wife!”
You now know as much as the Author does of the early history of Pantouflia.