“You wish first,” said the prince, who had not quite made up his mind what he wished, and wanted time to think. “You are the younger, and you are a girl. What do you wish?”
“Well, I wish that all the snow were sugar and all the mud were chocolate. Don’t you?”
“No, of course not. Why, you couldn’t coast! The runners would stick, and if you ran and fell upon your sled you would go heels over head, and like as not you would break your neck. Besides, there wouldn’t be any sugar in summer, and there would be no chocolate except when it rained.”
“I never thought of that,” said the princess. “What do you wish?”
“I wish that—that—my Christmas stocking were as tall as this house and I had to take a ladder to get up to it and another ladder to get down into it. Don’t you?”
“Why, no, of course not.”
“Why not?”
“Why, because the Christmas stocking is just the same size as all your other stockings, and if your Christmas stocking were as big as the house, all your other stockings would be as big as the house, and you never could get one on; and if you did get it on it would go clear over your head.”
“That’s so,” said the prince; “I never thought of that. Well, what do you wish?”
“Well, I wish—that every day was Christmas, and there wasn’t any school. Don’t you?”