surely I have found the flower of your heart. See the
beautiful rose! Give it then to me to wear always, as your very ownest
Prince."

But the Princess, glancing at the rose, would shake her head and say,--

"Nay! I love the roses, too. But my heart is not there, O Prince. You
are not to be my lord, or you would have chosen better."

Then she would retire into her chamber, to be no more seen while that
Prince remained in the palace. Presently he would depart, riding
sorrowfully down the hill on his gorgeous steed, amid the laughing
flowers. And the Princess would be left to enjoy her garden in peace
until the next prince should arrive.

It might be that this one would guess the glorious nodding poppy to be
his lady's choice. But he would be no nearer than the other. A later
comer would perhaps choose a gay tulip; another a fair and quiet lily;
still another earnest soul would select the passion-flower, noble and
mysterious. But at all of these the Princess shook her head and denied
them. There had never yet come a prince to the hill who found her
heart's true flower. And the Princess lived on among her posies, very
happy and very content, growing fairer and fairer, sweeter and sweeter,
with their bloom upon her cheek and their fragrance in her breath. There
never was seen a more beautiful princess than Fleurette.

Now the Princess loved to rise very early in the morning, before any of
her people were awake, and to steal down by a secret staircase into the
garden while it was yet bright with dew and newly wakened happiness. She
loved to put on a gown of coarse green stuff, wherein she herself looked
like a dainty pink and white flower in its sheath, and with a little
trowel to dig in the fragrant mould at the roots of her plants, or train
the vines with her slender fingers.

No one suspected that she did this, and she would not have had them
suspect it for the world. For if the palace people had known, they
would have followed and annoyed her with attentions and suggestions.
They would have brought her gloves to protect her pretty hands, and a
veil, and parasol, and a rug upon which to kneel--if kneel she
must--while weeding the flower-beds. Indeed, they would scarcely have
allowed her to do anything at all. For were there not gardeners to
attend to all this; and why should she bother herself to do anything but
enjoy the blossoms when they were picked for her? They did not know,
poor things, that the greatest joy