ed round.
There was no pony, no grass, no flowers, no bright-birded forest--but
the cottage of the wise woman--and before her, on the hearth of it, the
goddess-child, the only thing unchanged.

She gasped with astonishment.

"You must set out for your father's palace immediately," said the lady.

"But where is the wise woman?" asked Rosamond, looking all about.

"Here," said the lady.

And Rosamond, looking again, saw the wise woman, folded as usual in her
long dark cloak.

"And it was you all the time?" she cried in delight, and kneeled before
her, burying her face in her garments.

"It always is me, all the time," said the wise woman, smiling.

"But which is the real you?" asked Rosamond; "this or that?"

"Or a thousand others?" returned the wise woman. "But the one you have
just seen is the likest to the real me that you are able to see just
yet--but--. And that me you could not have seen a little while
ago.--But, my darling child," she went on, lifting her up and clasping
her to her bosom, "you must not think, because you have seen me once,
that therefore you are capable of seeing me at all times. No; there are
many things in you yet that must be changed before that can be. Now,
however, you will seek me. Every time you feel you want me, that is a
sign I am wanting you. There are yet many rooms in my house you may
have to go through; but when you need no more of them, then you will be
able to throw flowers like the little girl you saw in the forest."

The princess gave a sigh.

"Do not think," the wise woman went on, "that the things you have seen
in my house are mere empty shows. You do not know, you cannot yet
think, how living and true they are.--Now you must go."

She led her once more into the great hall, and there showed her the
picture of her father's capital, and his palace with the brazen gates.

"There is your home," she said. "Go to it."

The princess understood, and a flush of shame rose to her forehead. She
turned to the wise woman and said:

"Will you forgive ALL my naughtiness, and ALL the trouble I have given
you?"

"If I had not forgiven you, I would never have taken the trouble to
punish you. If I had not loved you, do you think I would have carried
you away in my cloak?"

"How could you love such an ugly, ill-tempered, rude, hateful little
wretch?"

"I saw, through it all, what you were going to be," said the wise
woman, kissing her. "But remember you have yet only BEGUN to