d, where the trees were covered
with golden apples. I gathered one of them, and when I opened it there
came out a lovely princess with a golden skin. That is the wife I want,
and I am going to look for her.'

The Lord of Avesnes was so much astonished that he let his pipe fall to
the ground; then he became so diverted at the notion of his son marrying
a yellow woman, and a woman shut up inside an orange, that he burst into
fits of laughter.

Desire waited to bid him good-bye until he was quiet again; but as his
father went on laughing and showed no signs of stopping, the young man
took his hand, kissed it tenderly, opened the door, and in the twinkling
of an eye was as at the bottom of the staircase. He jumped lightly on
his horse, and was a mile from home before Tubby had ceased laughing.

'A yellow wife! He must be mad! fit for a strait waistcoat!' cried the
good man, when he was able to speak. 'Here! quick! bring him back to
me.'

The servants mounted their horses and rode after the Prince; but as
they did not know which road he had taken, they went all ways except
the right one, and instead of bringing him back they returned themselves
when it grew dark, with their horses worn out and covered with dust.

III

When Desire thought they could no longer catch him, he pulled his horse
into a walk, like a prudent man who knows he has far to go. He travelled
in this way for many weeks, passing by villages, towns, mountains,
valleys, and plains, but always pushing south, where every day the sun
seemed hotter and more brilliant.

At last one day at sunset Desire felt the sun so warm, that he thought
he must now be near the place of his dream. He was at that moment close
to the corner of a wood where stood a little hut, before the door of
which his horse stopped of his own accord. An old man with a white beard
was sitting on the doorstep enjoying the fresh air. The Prince got down
from his horse and asked leave to rest.

'Come in, my young friend,' said the old man; 'my house is not large,
but it is big enough to hold a stranger.'

The traveller entered, and his host put before him a simple meal. When
his hunger was satisfied the old man said to him:

'If I do not mistake, you come from far. May I ask where you are going?'

'I will tell you,' answered Desire, 'though most likely you will laugh
at me. I dreamed that in the land of the sun there was a wood full of
orange trees, and that in one of the oranges I