enty of
fresh air." So he alighted just between the feet of the Happy Prince.

"I have a golden bedroom," he said softly to himself as he looked round,
and he prepared to go to sleep; but just as he was putting his head
under his wing a large drop of water fell on him. "What a curious
thing!" he cried; "there is not a single cloud in the sky, the stars are
quite clear and bright, and yet it is raining. The climate in the north
of Europe is really dreadful. The Reed used to like the rain, but that
was merely her selfishness."

Then another drop fell.

"What is the use of a statue if it cannot keep the rain off?" he said;
"I must look for a good chimney-pot," and he determined to fly away.

But before he had opened his wings, a third drop fell, and he looked up,
and saw--Ah! what did he see?

The eyes of the Happy Prince were filled with tears, and tears were
running down his golden cheeks. His face was so beautiful in the
moonlight that the little Swallow was filled with pity.

"Who are you?" he said.

"I am the Happy Prince."

"Why are you weeping then?" asked the Swallow; "you have quite drenched
me."

"When I was alive and had a human heart," answered the statue, "I did
not know what tears were, for I lived in the Palace of Sans-Souci, where
sorrow is not allowed to enter. In the daytime I played with my
companions in the garden, and in the evening I led the dance in the
Great Hall. Round the garden ran a very lofty wall, but I never cared to
ask what lay beyond it, everything about me was so beautiful. My
courtiers called me the Happy Prince, and happy indeed I was, if
pleasure be happiness. So I lived, and so I died. And now that I am dead
they have set me up here so high that I can see all the ugliness and all
the misery of my city, and though my heart is made of lead yet I cannot
choose but weep."

"What! is he not solid gold?" said the Swallow to himself. He was too
polite to make any personal remarks out loud.

"Far away," continued the statue in a low musical voice, "far away in a
little street there is a poor house. One of the windows is open, and
through it I can see a woman seated at a table. Her face is thin and
worn, and she has coarse, red hands, all pricked by the needle, for she
is a seamstress. She is embroidering passion-flowers on a satin gown for
the loveliest of the Queen's maids-of-honor to wear at the next
Court-ball. In a bed in the corner of the room her little boy is lying
ill.