THE TRIUMPH OF VIRTUE;
or,
The Bad Fairy Foiled.
A certain King and Queen had one daughter, to whose christening they invited a large company, forgetting as usual a particularly important and bad-tempered Fairy, who signified her annoyance in the usual manner.
The attendants of the little Princess (having read their story-books) were preparing dolefully enough to fall asleep for a hundred years, when the Fairy, with a contemptuous sniff, remarked that the spell would not take effect for some time yet.
They breathed again and had almost forgotten the affair by the time the Princess had grown up. But the Fairy had so arranged it that the spell fell upon the Princess at the time when she was engaged in making her choice of a husband from among the suitors who had arrived at her father's Court.
The Princess was now bewitched in this way—that good men appeared bad, ugly men handsome, and vice versâ. The Fairy had hoped that she would thus make a mess of her matrimonial affairs and live unhappily ever after.
But she had reckoned without the disposition of the Princess, a kind good girl with an overpowering sense of duty. When pressed to choose, she replied firmly, "I will have no other than Prince Felix."
To her his ugliness seemed pathetic and his character evidently needed reformation so urgently that she longed to be at the job. No one wondered at her choice, for he was, of course, the most handsome and excellent of men.
Ultimately the Fairy broke her spell in a fit of exasperation, but without any gratifying result. The Princess seemed happier than ever and would sometimes say to a slightly puzzled friend:—