man to ask questions!" said his beloved, laughing and
blushing. "Is it not enough that I am your beloved?"

"More than enough, yet not nearly enough," said the King, "for there is
nothing of yourself which you must not tell me in time, from the moment
when you first stole barley sugar behind your father's back, down to
that in which you first loved me."

"Then I had best begin at once," she smiled, "or a lifetime will not be
long enough. I am eighteen years old and my name is Viola. I was born
in Falmer, and my father was the best smith in all Sussex, and because
he had no other child he made me his bellows-boy, and in time, as you
know, taught me his trade. But he was, as you also know, a stern
master, and it was not until, on my sixteenth birthday, I forged a shoe
the equal of your last, that he said I could not make a better.' And
so saying he died. Now I had no other relative in all the world except
my Great-Aunt, the Wise Woman of the Bush Hovel, and her I had never
seen; but I thought I could not do better in my extremity than go to
her for counsel. So, shouldering my father's tools, I journeyed west
until I came to her place, and found her trying to break in a new
birch-broom that was still too green and full of sap to be easily
mastered; and she was in a very bad temper. Good day, Great-Aunt,' I
said, I am your Great-Niece Viola.' I have no more use for great
nieces,' she snapped, than for little ones.' And she continued to
tussle with the broomstick and took no further notice of me. Then I
went into the Hovel, where a fire burned on the hearth, and I took out
my tools and fashioned a bit on the hob; and when it was ready I took
it to her and said, This will teach it its manners'; and she put the
bit on the broom, which became as docile as a lamb. Great-Niece,' said
she, it appears that I told you a lie this morning. What can I do for
you?' Tell me, if you please, how I am to live now that my father is
dead.' There is no need to tell you,' said she; you have your living
at your fingers' ends.' But women cannot be smiths,' said I. Then
become a lad,' said she, and ply your trade where none knows you; and
lest men should suspect you by your face, which fools though they be
they might easily do, let it be so sooted from week's end to week's end
that none can discover what you look like; and if any one remarks on
it, put it down to your trade.'

But Great-Aunt,' I said, I could not bear to go dirty