smoked glasses date
from that time.

What was the Princess to do? Never had so beautiful and so artistic a
robe been seen. She was dumb-founded, and pretending that its
brilliance had hurt her eyes she retired to her chamber, where she
found the Fairy awaiting her.

On seeing the dress like the sun, the Lilac-fairy became red with
rage. "Oh! this time, my child," she said to the Princess, "we will
put the King to terrible proof. In spite of his madness I think he
will be a little astonished by the request that I counsel you to make
of him; it is that he should give you the skin of that ass he loves
so dearly, and which supplies him so profusely with the means of
paying all his expenses. Go, and do not fail to tell him that you want
this skin." The Princess, overjoyed at finding yet another avenue of
escape; for she thought that her father could never bring himself to
sacrifice the ass, went to find him, and unfolded to him her latest
desire.

Although the King was astonished by this whim, he did not hesitate to
satisfy it; the poor ass was sacrificed and the skin brought, with due
ceremony, to the Princess, who, seeing no other way of avoiding her
ill-fortune, was desperate.

At that moment her godmother arrived. "What are you doing, my child?"
she asked, seeing the Princess tearing her hair, her beautiful cheeks
stained with tears. "This is the most happy moment of your life. Wrap
yourself in this skin, leave the palace, and walk so long as you can
find ground to carry you: when one sacrifices everything to virtue the
gods know how to mete out reward. Go, and I will take care that your
possessions follow you; in whatever place you rest, your chest with
your clothes and your jewels will follow your steps, and here is my
wand which I will give you: tap the ground with it when you have need
of the chest, and it will appear before your eyes: but haste to set
forth, and do not delay." The Princess embraced her godmother many
times, and begged her not to forsake her. Then after she had smeared
herself with soot from the chimney, she wrapped herself up in that
ugly skin and went out from the magnificent palace without being
recognised by a single person.

The absence of the Princess caused a great commotion. The King, who
had caused a sumptuous banquet to be prepared, was inconsolable. He
sent out more than a hundred gendarmes, and more than a thousand
musketeers in quest of her; but the Lilac-fairy made her invisible