Peggy sank—down, down—until she reached a beautiful grotto, where, on a throne of coral and shells, sat her frog-lover. He looked at her reproachfully, and said:
"If you had not three times deceived me, Peggy, I should not have carried you off in this way. Now that you are here, try to be resigned to me, and say that you will be my wife."
"Never, never," screamed Peggy; "you are so horrible to look at with your goggle eyes."
The goggle eyes filled with tears as Peggy spoke, and the frog shook his head mournfully.
"I see that it is of no use," he said sorrowfully, and ordered Peggy to be taken to a beautiful sea-garden, where she lived and amused herself for a long time, gradually forgetting all about her home on land. Every evening the frog came and talked to Peggy through a wall of white coral; and in time, she grew so fond of listening to his voice, that if he was a minute late she would cry for him to come.
Once when it was rather dark, the frog asked Peggy if she could bear to look at him again. Peggy said yes, and he appeared before her. Somehow he did not seem so ugly as before, and when, in a trembling voice, he invited her to sit upon his knee, she at once did so. Instantly his leg broke with a loud snap; and, as poor Peggy sprang to her feet in great remorse, she beheld, instead of her frog suitor, a beautiful young prince, holding out his arms to her!
The prince told her he had been bewitched by a frog godmother, who condemned him to remain in that horrid shape until a young girl could be found who would either consent to marry him or sit upon his knee. Peggy was very glad to have such an ending of her adventure. So they were married at once, and were then very happy. When they went back for a wedding visit to Peggy's mother, they found she had taken all the gold and silver and moved away to a distant country; and they never saw the wicked woman more.
