Tales of the Wonder Club, Volume I

by M. Y. Halidom

Great was the uproar and surprise at this scene, and the crowd were ready to tear the twin princesses to pieces; but the arch-priest commanded them to forbear, and the ceremony proceeded without opposition.

Suddenly a soft music was heard throughout the cathedral, and a perfume as of incense arose. Then a sunbeam from one of the upper windows in the church revealed an innumerable multitude of little fairies, two of which carried a little crown between them, just big enough for the head of the pigmy queen.

The multitude was struck with awe and the two sisters filled with fury at the sight; but the ceremony passed off quietly. Nevertheless, the twin princesses, dreading the mob, stepped hastily into their respective carriages, and drove back to the palace.

When King Hans and Queen Bertha drove off in their carriage, which, by the way, was made by the fairies themselves for the occasion, the mob was half-blinded by the brilliancy of the jewels with which it was inlaid, and our new sovereigns were cheered by the crowd till they arrived at the palace door.

Now, the two princesses, instead of yielding up the palace to the rightful owners, had ordered the door to be barricaded and entrance refused to the royal pair, which, when Bertha discovered, she immediately waved her wand in front of the palace, and changed it into a prison filled with gloomy cells, and the gay clothes of the people within into the squalid garments of prisoners, while the golden bracelets of the princesses became manacles for their wrists, and their garters fetters for their feet.

Then, waving her wand in the direction of the prison in which her husband had been confined, which stood not far off, it became a magnificent palace, equal, if not superior, in grandeur to that which she erected upon the ruins of the wizard's castle, so that all wondered, and shouted, "Welcome to Queen Bertha, and down with the twin princesses!"

The man who had attempted the life of Prince Hans with his lasso on the day before was publicly hanged with his own rope on the roof of the prison where the two princesses now languished as an example to all rebels.

After the wicked princesses had been imprisoned for a week the tiny queen released them on condition that they should flee the country and not show their faces again. The sisters heard their sentence in sullen silence, and quitted the country shortly afterwards, amid the curses of the crowd, and established themselves in a foreign land, where, out of spite, they gave themselves over to witchcraft, and leagued with the queen of the witches, who was also exiled there, to work all sorts of spells upon their sister from afar; but they all failed, as the pigmy queen was too powerfully protected by the fairies.

King Hans grew in wisdom every day under the sage counsel of his spouse, till at length his subjects bestowed on him the name of "The wisest and the bravest king living."

In proportion as Hans' intelligence and good manners improved, grew the love of Bertha for her husband. They soon knew how to appreciate and respect each other, till at length there was not a more loving couple in the whole world.