and in the swimming bath, and even in my wash-hand
basin--hours at a time I've practised--but I never can keep under more
than two minutes.'

'Oh dear,' said the Princess, 'this is dreadful.'

'It is rather trying,' the Prince answered.

'You're sure you like me,' she asked suddenly, 'now you know that I'm
only pretty once a week?'

'I'd die for you,' said he.

'Then I'll tell you what. Send all your courtiers away, and take a
situation as under-gardener here--I know we want one. And then every
night I'll climb down the jasmine and we'll go out together and seek our
fortune. I'm sure we shall find it.'

And they did go out. The very next night, and the next, and the next,
and the next, and the next, and the next. And they did not find their
fortunes, but they got fonder and fonder of each other. They could not
see each other's faces, but they held hands as they went along through
the dark.

And on the seventh night, as they passed by a house that showed chinks
of light through its shutters, they heard a bell being rung outside for
supper, a bell with a very loud and beautiful voice. But instead of
saying--

'Supper's ready,' as any one would have expected, the bell was saying--

Ding dong dell!
_I_ could tell
Where you ought to go
To break the spell.

Then some one left off ringing the bell, so of course it couldn't say
any more. So the two went on. A little way down the road a cow-bell
tinkled behind the wet hedge of the lane. And it said--not, 'Here I am,
quite safe,' as a cow-bell should, but--

Ding dong dell
All will be well
If you...

Then the cow stopped walking and began to eat, so the bell couldn't say
any more. The Prince and Princess went on, and you will not be surprised
to hear that they heard the voices of five more bells that night. The
next was a school-bell. The schoolmaster's little boy thought it would
be fun to ring it very late at night--but his father came and caught him
before the bell could say any more than--

Ding a dong dell
You can break up the spell
By taking...

So that was no good.

Then there were the three bells that were the sign over the door of an
inn where people were happily dancing to a fiddle, because there was a
wedding. These bells said:

We are the
Merry three
Bells, bells, bells.
You are two
To undo
Spells, spells, spells...

Then the wind who was swinging the bells suddenly thought