back, sometimes on foot, sometimes by sea, sometimes
by land, wandering; evermore after her beloved King Charming. One
day, stopping beside a fountain, she let her hair fall loose, and
dipped her weary feet in the cool water, when an old woman, bent, and
leaning on a stick, came by.

"My pretty maiden, what are you doing here all alone?"

"Good mother," replied the queen, "I have too many troubles to be
pleasant company for anybody."

"Tell me your troubles, and I may be able to soften them."

Florina obeyed, and told her whole history, and how she was travelling
over the world in search of the Blue Bird. The little woman listened
attentively, and then, in the twinkling of an eye, became, instead of
an old woman, a beautiful fairy.

"Incomparable Florina, the king you seek is no longer a bird; my
sister Soussio has restored him to his proper shape, and he reigns in
his own kingdom. Do not afflict yourself; happiness will yet be yours.
Take these four eggs, and whenever you are in trouble, break them, and
see what ensues." So saying, the fairy vanished.

Florina, greatly comforted, put the eggs in her sack, and turned her
steps towards the country of King Charming. She walked eight days and
nights without stopping, and then came to a mountain made entirely of
ivory, and nearly perpendicular. Despairing of ever climbing it, she
sank down at the foot, prepared to die there, when she bethought
herself of the eggs. "Let me see," said she, "if the fairy has
deceived me or not." So she broke one, and inside it were little
hooks of gold, which she fitted on her feet and hands, and by means of
which she climbed the mountain with ease. Arrived at the summit she
found new difficulties; for the valley below was one large smooth
mirror, in which sixty thousand women stood admiring themselves. They
had need, for the charm of the mirror was that each saw herself
therein, not as she was, but as she wished to be; and the grimaces
they made were enough to cause a person to die of laughter. Not one of
them had ever gained the top of the mountain; and when they saw
Florina there, they all burst into angry outcries, "How has this woman
got up the hill? If she descends upon our mirror her first footstep
will crack it into a thousand pieces."

The queen, uncertain what to do, broke the second egg, and there flew
out two pigeons harnessed to a fine chariot, in which Florina mounted,
and descended lightly over the mirror to the valley's