tle mouth, but, alas!
his nose was so enormous that it covered half his face. The Queen was
inconsolable when she saw this great nose, but her ladies assured her
that it was not really as large as it looked; that it was a Roman nose,
and you had only to open any history book to see that every hero has a
large nose. The Queen, who was devoted to her baby, was pleased with
what they told her, and when she looked at Hyacinth again, his nose
certainly did not seem to her _quite_ so large.

The Prince was brought up with great care; and, as soon as he could
speak, they told him all sorts of dreadful stories about people who had
short noses. No one was allowed to come near him whose nose did not
more or less resemble his own, and the courtiers, to get into favor
with the Queen, took to pulling their babies' noses several times every
day to make them grow long. But, do what they would, they were nothing
by comparison with the Prince's.

When he grew older he learned history; and whenever any great prince or
beautiful princess was spoken of, his teachers took care to tell him
that they had long noses.

His room was hung with pictures, all of people with very large noses;
and the Prince grew up so convinced that a long nose was a great beauty
that he would not on any account have had his own a single inch
shorter!

When his twentieth birthday was past, the Queen thought it was time
that he should be married, so she commanded that the portraits of
several princesses should be brought for him to see, and among the
others was a picture of the Dear Little Princess!

Now, she was the daughter of a great King, and would some day possess
several kingdoms herself; but Prince Hyacinth had not a thought to
spare for anything of that sort, he was so much struck with her beauty.
The Princess, whom he thought quite charming, had, however, a little
saucy nose, which, in her face, was the prettiest thing possible, but
it was a cause of great embarrassment to the courtiers, who had got
into such a habit of laughing at little noses that they sometimes found
themselves laughing at hers before they had time to think; but this did
not do at all before the Prince, who quite failed to see the joke, and
actually banished two of his courtiers who had dared to mention
disrespectfully the Dear Little Princess's tiny nose!

The others, taking warning from this, learned to think twice before
they spoke, and one even went so far as to tell the Prince