; the richest carpets were on the floor, and the walls
were covered with cloth of gold and silver, and the place was full of
grand company, and the very beautiful prince she saw in her dreams was
there, and it wasn't a moment till he was on one knee before her, and
telling her how much he loved her, and asking her wouldn't she be his
queen. Well, she hadn't the heart to refuse him, and married they were
the same evening.

'Now, my darling,' says he, when they were left by themselves, 'you
must know that I am under enchantment. A sorceress, that had a beautiful
daughter, wished me for her son-in-law; but the mother got power over
me, and when I refused to wed her daughter she made me take the form of
a bear by day, and I was to continue so till a lady would marry me of
her own free will, and endure five years of great trials after.'

Well, when the princess woke in the morning, she missed her husband from
her side, and spent the day very sadly. But as soon as the lamps were
lighted in the grand hall, where she was sitting on a sofa covered with
silk, the folding doors flew open, and he was sitting by her side the
next minute. So they spent another happy evening, but he warned her that
whenever she began to tire of him, or ceased to have faith in him,
they would be parted for ever, and he'd be obliged to marry the witch's
daughter.

She got used to find him absent by day, and they spent a happy
twelvemonth together, and at last a beautiful little boy was born; and
happy as she was before, she was twice as happy now, for she had her
child to keep her company in the day when she couldn't see her husband.

At last, one evening, when herself, and himself, and her child were
sitting with a window open because it was a sultry night, in flew an
eagle, took the infant's sash in his beak, and flew up in the air with
him. She screamed, and was going to throw herself out the window after
him, but the prince caught her, and looked at her very seriously. She
bethought of what he said soon after their marriage, and she stopped the
cries and complaints that were on her tongue. She spent her days very
lonely for another twelvemonth, when a beautiful little girl was sent to
her. Then she thought to herself she'd have a sharp eye about her this
time; so she never would allow a window to be more than a few inches
open.

But all her care was in vain. Another evening, when they were all so
happy, and the prince dandling the baby, a beaut