At that all the courtiers whose eyelids had been drooping with the summer heat and with dreams of romance, looked up, and the Princess Myrtle withdrew her gaze from Prince Merlin, and fastened her sweet eyes upon the Wizard. "You must not care what the minstrels sing," she said. "We are all so happy here, that we love songs of sorrow."
"Sweet Princess," said the Wizard, "King Theophile intends to make war upon you, and I have come to tell you that already your subjects have built a fine invisible wall of good deeds and sacrifices; but they must not perform all the labor and have all the pain while the nobles jest and feast. For the wall must have a stone in it from every kind of man, rich or poor, high or low, else it will not endure. And you, the Princess, must put in the strongest stone of all, since the ruler of a country must be its protector."
All the courtiers smiled at this, but the Princess did not smile, because she was as wise as she was fair. She looked down at her peach-colored robe of satin and her little slippers embroidered with seed-pearls, and she drew a long-stemmed rose from the jade bowl near her throne to pass back and forth across her lips, as was her manner when thinking.
"Prince Merlin," she said at last, "if this strange tale be true, what stone wilt thou place in the invisible wall?"
"I will go for a month to the Council Chamber instead of lingering near thee while the minstrels sing," replied her husband.
"Spoken like a prince!" cried the Wizard. "And what wilt thou do,
Princess?"
"I will go to the Council Chamber with milord," she answered. "And read most heavy papers of State; for if he shares my play I must share his work."
"To attend to the duties of sovereignty instead of listening to minstrels in a scented room is a fitting stone for the Princess to place in the invisible wall," commented the Wizard; then he looked around at the courtiers.
Now after the manner of courtiers they wanted to imitate their Prince and Princess, but they thought this invisible wall a great joke not worth making sacrifices for. The Wizard read their thoughts and said to them: "If the ruler works alone, he is like a bird with a crippled wing. He can only rule wisely and well if all the wisest and best help him. You are placed high that you may serve. Give me each his vow of sacrifice that the wall may be strong!"
The knights and nobles looked at each other, then at the Princess Myrtle; and she bowed her head and thus addressed them: