she could, and when
she had lost sight of them, she fell a-crying.

Her godmother, who saw her all in tears, asked her what was the matter.

"I wish I could--I wish I could--" she was not able to speak the rest,
being interrupted by her tears and sobbing.

This godmother of hers, who was a fairy, said to her, "Thou wishest
thou couldst go to the ball; is it not so?"

"Y--es," cried Cinderella, with a great sigh.

"Well," said her godmother, "be but a good girl, and I will contrive
that thou shalt go." Then she took her into her chamber, and said to
her, "Run into the garden, and bring me a pumpkin."

Cinderella went immediately to gather the finest she could get, and
brought it to her godmother, not being able to imagine how this pumpkin
could make her go to the ball. Her godmother scooped out all the inside
of it, having left nothing but the rind; which done, she struck it with
her wand, and the pumpkin was instantly turned into a fine coach,
gilded all over with gold.

She then went to look into the mouse-trap, where she found six mice,
all alive, and ordered Cinderella to lift up a little the trap-door,
when, giving each mouse, as it went out, a little tap with her wand,
the mouse was that moment turned into a fine horse, which altogether
made a very fine set of six horses of a beautiful mouse-colored
dapple-gray. Being at a loss for a coachman,

"I will go and see," says Cinderella, "if there should be a rat in the
rat-trap--we may make a coachman of him."

"Thou art in the right," replied her godmother; "go and look."

Cinderella brought the trap to her and in it there were three huge
rats. The fairy made choice of one of the three which had the largest
beard, and, having touched him with her wand, he was turned into a fat,
jolly coachman, who had the smartest whiskers eyes ever beheld. After
that, she said to her:

"Go again into the garden, and you will find six lizards behind the
watering-pot, bring them to me."

She had no sooner done so than her godmother turned them into six
footmen, who skipped up immediately behind the coach, with their
liveries all bedaubed with gold and silver, and clung as close behind
each other as if they had done nothing else their whole lives. The
Fairy then said to Cinderella:

"Well, you see here an equipage fit to go to the ball with; are you not
pleased with it?"

"Oh! yes," cried she; "but must I go thither as I am, in these nasty
rags?"

Her godmother only