ore magnificently than the night before.
The king's son was continually by her side, and said the most obliging
things imaginable to her. The charming young creature was far from being
tired of all the agreeable things she met with. On the contrary, she was
so delighted with them that she entirely forgot the charge her godmother
had given her. Cinderella at last heard the striking of a clock, and
counted one, two, three, on till she came to twelve, though she thought
that it could be but eleven at most. She got up and flew as nimbly as a
deer out of the ball-room. The prince tried to overtake her; but poor
Cinderella's fright made her run the faster. However, in her great
hurry, she dropped one of her glass slippers from her foot, which the
prince stooped down and picked up, and took the greatest care of it
possible. Cinderella got home tired and out of breath, in her old
clothes, without either coach or footmen, and having nothing left of her
magnificence but the fellow of the glass slipper which she had dropped.
In the mean while, the prince had inquired of all his guards at the
palace gates, if they had not seen a magnificent princess pass out, and
which way she went? The guards replied, that no princess had passed the
gates; and that they had not seen a creature but a little ragged girl,
who looked more like a beggar than a princess. When the two sisters
returned from the ball, Cinderella asked them if they had been as much
amused as the night before, and if the beautiful princess had been
there? They told her that she had; but that as soon as the clock struck
twelve, she hurried away from the ball room, and in the great haste she
had made, had dropped one of her glass slippers, which was the prettiest
shape that could be; that the king's son had picked it up, and had done
nothing but look at it all the rest of the evening; and that every body
believed he was violently in love with the handsome lady to whom it
belonged.

This was very true; for a few days after, the prince had it proclaimed,
by sound of trumpet, that he would marry the lady whose foot should
exactly fit the slipper he had found. Accordingly the prince's
messengers took the slipper, and carried it first to all the princesses,
then to the duchesses, in short, to all the ladies of the court. But
without success. They then brought it to the two sisters, who each tried
all she could to squeeze her foot into the slipper, but saw at last that
this was quit