Oh, I’m getting used to thorns! As for these fellows, look at them! Everyone of them a human pin-cushion! Well, they certainly made a valiant battle for the rose!
Mentor.
The rose, the rose, always the rose! Haven’t you got that old tale out of your mind yet?
The Prince.
How can I, when I was brought up on it? It is true, nurses in long succession were dismissed for attempting to tell me fairy-tales, but these things will out! There was a jackdaw who used to sit on the barn door and talk to himself about it, hour after hour. Then in the pond were two venerable frogs who told me that in their tadpole youth they had been to the palace itself to carry a mug as christening present for the Rose!
Mentor.
Fudge! Have you any sandwiches left?
[The Prince offers him the lunch-box that he carries, also a flask, then proceeds with his discourse.]
The Prince.