‘I would kiss you on every one of your thousand spears,’ she said, ‘to give you what you wish.’
[p123]
‘Oh, you can’t go on being a hedge-pig for ever,’ she said, ‘it’s not fair. I can’t bear it. Oh Mamma! Oh Papa! Oh Benevola!’
And there stood Benevola before them, a little dazzling figure with blue butterfly’s wings and a wreath of moonshine.
‘Well?’ she said, ‘well?’
‘Oh, you know,’ said the Princess, still crying. ‘I’ve thrown away my life-wish, and he’s still a hedge-pig. Can’t you do anything!’
‘I can’t,’ said the Fairy, ‘but you can. Your kisses are magic kisses. Don’t you remember how you cured the King and Queen of all the wounds the hedge-pig made by rolling itself on to their faces in the night?’
‘But she can’t go kissing hedge-pigs,’ said the Queen, ‘it would be most unsuitable. Besides it would hurt her.’
But the hedge-pig raised its little pointed face, and the Princess took it up in her hands. She had long since learned how to do this without hurting either herself or it. She looked in its little bright eyes.
‘I would kiss you on every one of your thousand spears,’ she said, ‘to give you what you wish.’