rribly frightened when a man came in, for she
had never seen one before; but the Prince spoke to her so kindly, and
told her at once that his heart had been so touched by her singing, that
he felt he should know no peace of mind till he had seen her. Very
soon Rapunzel forgot her fear, and when he asked her to marry him she
consented at once. 'For,' she thought, 'he is young and handsome, and
I'll certainly be happier with him than with the old Witch.' So she put
her hand in his and said:

'Yes, I will gladly go with you, only how am I to get down out of the
tower? Every time you come to see me you must bring a skein of silk with
you, and I will make a ladder of them, and when it is finished I will
climb down by it, and you will take me away on your horse.'

They arranged that till the ladder was ready, he was to come to her
every evening, because the old woman was with her during the day. The
old Witch, of course, knew nothing of what was going on, till one day
Rapunzel, not thinking of what she was about, turned to the Witch and
said:

'How is it, good mother, that you are so much harder to pull up than the
young Prince? He is always with me in a moment.'

'Oh! you wicked child,' cried the Witch. 'What is this I hear? I thought
I had hidden you safely from the whole world, and in spite of it you
have managed to deceive me.'

In her wrath she seized Rapunzel's beautiful hair, wound it round and
round her left hand, and then grasping a pair of scissors in her right,
snip snap, off it came, and the beautiful plaits lay on the ground. And,
worse than this, she was so hard-hearted that she took Rapunzel to
a lonely desert place, and there left her to live in loneliness and
misery.

But on the evening of the day in which she had driven poor Rapunzel
away, the Witch fastened the plaits on to a hook in the window, and when
the Prince came and called out:

'Rapunzel, Rapunzel,
Let down your golden hair,'

she let them down, and the Prince climbed up as usual, but instead
of his beloved Rapunzel he found the old Witch, who fixed her evil,
glittering eyes on him, and cried mockingly:

'Ah, ah! you thought to find your lady love, but the pretty bird has
flown and its song is dumb; the cat caught it, and will scratch out
your eyes too. Rapunzel is lost to you for ever--you will never see her
more.'

The Prince was beside himself with grief, and in his despair he jumped
right down from the tower, and, though