There was once upon a time a Queen who had the ugliest little baby imaginable, so ugly, indeed, that it was almost impossible to believe he was a little boy at all.
A fairy, however, assured his mother that the little baby would be very good and clever, saying that she was also giving him a gift which would enable him to make that person whom he loved the best as clever as himself.
This somewhat consoled the Queen, but still she was very unhappy because her son was so ugly, though no sooner had he begun to speak than he could talk about all sorts of things, and he had such pretty ways that people were charmed with him.
I forgot to say, that, when he was quite a baby, he had a funny little tuft of hair on his head, so he was called Tufty Riquet, for Riquet was the family name.
When Riquet was about seven years old, the Queen of a kingdom near by was given two baby daughters, twins, of which one was so exquisitely beautiful that the Queen nearly died of joy when she saw her, and so the fairy, the same one who had given Riquet his gift of cleverness, to keep the Queen from making herself ill with excitement, told her that this little Princess would not be at all clever, indeed she would be as stupid as she was beautiful.
The Queen was very much grieved at this, and felt still more troubled when she beheld her other daughter, for the second Princess was extremely ugly.
"Do not take it too much to heart, madam," remarked the fairy, "for this second daughter will be so clever that it will scarcely be noticed that she is not beautiful."
"Well, if it must be so, it must," remarked the Queen, "but I should certainly have liked the elder one, who is beautiful, to be just a little bit clever too."