Tales of the Wonder Club Volume I Part 28

Hans then threw down his gauntlet, which was immediately picked up by Clothilde's champion.

Our little princess took refuge once more in her husband's helmet, and whispered in his ear to keep his lance steadily directed towards the breast of his foe, and then, touching him with the wand again, she rendered him proof against all mortal harm.

The adversaries charged together, and so violent was the shock with which Hans came upon his foe, and so accurately did he direct his lance, that the deadly weapon pierced through the ma.s.sive breast plate of his enemy and came out at his back.

Hans, whose natural strength was terrific, and which was increased ten-fold by the magical touch he had received from his spouse, whirled the dead champion at the point of his lance two or three times round his head, and then flung the body to an incredible distance over the heads of the crowd.

The champion of the Princess Carlotta, seeing the fate of the other champion, would fain have drawn back, for he thought Hans could be none other than the foul fiend himself.

But the crowd cried out to him, "Thou, too, votest for the Princess Carlotta."

"Ay," he was constrained to say.

"Do battle for her, then," said Hans.

Carlotta's champion sullenly laid his lance in rest, and aimed at a portion of Hans' vast body which seemed least protected; but the point of his lance got entangled in the shirt of mail that Hans wore beneath his plate armour without doing further injury to him, while Hans' lance pierced through the left eye of his foe, and pa.s.sing through the back of his skull, helmet and all, pinned him to the ground, whilst his horse galloped off through the crowd.

Now, the news of the return of their sister and the defeat of their champions soon reached the ears of the twin princesses, who knew not how to contain their rage; but the Princess Clothilde, the more wily and wicked of the two, bribed her followers with large sums of money to feign to vote for the Princess Bertha, and thus make friends with this stranger knight, and invite him into their houses, to offer him a cup of wine after the fatigue of the combat, which, when un.o.bserved, she commanded them to drug, and as soon as he was insensible he was to be carried off to prison and loaded with chains, care being taken to secure the Princess Bertha at the same time.

Hereupon all those who had formerly voted for the Princess Clothilde commenced to shout, "Long live the Princess Bertha!"

But the little princess, suspecting treachery--for she recognised the faces of the men who now shouted for her as being the same as before shouted for her sister--warned her spouse not to receive any man's hospitality but the arch-priest's, telling him that if he disobeyed her command it might cost him his life.

Hans promised to obey, but when he saw so many well-dressed gentlemen of the court come forward to offer him their congratulations and invite him so cordially to their houses, being very simple and unsuspicious, he forgot the warning of his spouse, though she did all in her power by pinching and biting him to make him remember, and he accepted the invitation of a certain lord, imagining his spouse's vehement urging to be nothing more than the bite of a flea.

"Fool!" cried the princess, "you will ruin both yourself and me;" but Hans paid no attention, for he was hungry and thirsty.

The great lord who had invited Hans to his mansion possessed all the polished manners of a courtier, though he had a very black heart, and easily working himself into Hans' affections, he locked his arm within the arm of Hans, and led him to his home.

"May I also have the honour of entertaining Her Royal Highness the Princess Bertha?" asked the n.o.bleman.

"Oh, yes," said Hans in his simple manner; "she is inside my helmet.

I'll bring her, too. You see, she being small and I being large, it is the only way we can discourse together."

"Ha! ha!" laughed the n.o.bleman; "an original idea. By all means let me have the honour of entertaining my princess."

Hans was charmed at the affable manners of the n.o.bleman, and arrived at the mansion, took a seat at the lord's table, where he was introduced to other men of high rank, who all congratulated him on his prowess, and expressed their delight at having made his acquaintance.

A meal was speedily prepared, and wine handed round.

"Drink not," whispered the princess. But Hans, deaf to all counsel in the presence of so many genial companions, accepted gla.s.s after gla.s.s, until he was in a state bordering on intoxication. Now, Hans was a good man, and a true, but he had one small failing, which was an inclination to tipple.

He could never refuse a good gla.s.s of wine when he was among boon companions. He had also a most ravenous appet.i.te, and afforded the other guests much amus.e.m.e.nt by the clownish manner in which he devoured his food, as well as by his brutal stupidity and broad peasant's brogue.

When the wine had loosened his tongue a little he soon informed the n.o.bleman of his former condition, saying he was no knight of the court, but a humble woodcutter, and would take no notice of the signs made to him by the princess to keep quiet (who now, by the by, was seated on the table before him, Hans having unbuckled his helmet) but went on eating and drinking, and chatting and laughing, in a manner ill-suited to his dignity as champion, to say nothing of husband to the princess.

The Princess Bertha was treated with the respect due to her rank, and was pressed to partake of something, but she refused, pleading no appet.i.te.

When the host observed that the wine had got into Hans' head, he motioned to some of the guests to engage the princess in conversation while he administered the drug.

Then, taking a paper containing a powder from his pocket, he emptied it into a goblet of wine which he offered to Hans.

But the princess, who observed this, said to the host, "May it please your lordship to drink first this toast--'to the prosperity of our kingdom.'"

The n.o.bleman looked confused, and stammered out that he hoped that Her Royal Highness would excuse him, as he, a humble individual, could not think of tasting the cup before so ill.u.s.trious a guest.

"Then you refuse to do me this small favour, my lord?" said Bertha.

But before the host had time to reply Hans had already grasped the goblet greedily and drained it dry. The effect was not immediate, but after about twenty minutes Hans fell back in his chair in a state of the most perfect insensibility.

"I am afraid," said the host, "that your Royal Highness's brave champion has partaken a little too freely of the contents of my cellar. It is an accident that is apt to befall the best of us. I am sorry for his state, though I cannot but feel it a compliment to my wine."

The princess answered not save by a look of scorn. Then, fearing that the n.o.bleman would offer to remove her to another room while he procured men to remove the helpless body of her spouse, as well as secure her person, and bring her, in spite of herself, into her sister's power, who was sure to make away with her secretly, she touched herself with her wand, and instantly she became invisible.

The lord searched the chamber in every corner, for his first object was to make himself master of the person of the princess, but failing in finding her, he next began to unbuckle Hans' armour, and examined every plate as he stripped him of it in his careful search for the tiny princess. He grew more puzzled than ever at not finding her, and ordered the other lordlings to search the house. This they did for an hour or more without success, when, fearing that Hans might awaken from his trance, he ordered a litter to be brought, upon which he securely bound our champion.

The helpless knight was then borne upon the shoulders of four strong men, and carried to the common prison, where he was fettered hand and foot, and left in a dungeon, deep, damp and chilly, being in a state of unconsciousness all the while. The princess, however, though invisible, followed her husband. If she had chosen, she could have rendered him also invisible, and spirited him away out of harm's reach, but she would not.

"No," she said to herself, "let him reap the fruits of his folly. He will learn better by experience than by my precepts. I will not come forward to help him until the last."

Now, when Hans was left alone in his cell--that is to say, alone save the invisible presence of his spouse--it was already getting late. The effect of the potion was to last for five hours, during the whole of which time--and who knew how much longer--the princess was doomed to breathe the damp air of a dungeon and to wallow in the filth therein, shivering with cold; without a fire, without her supper, and frightened to death lest the large rats that infested the prison should make their supper off her or her husband; but she recollected the wand.

The first thing she wanted was a light, for it was pitch dark, not merely because it was night but because the dungeon was underground.

Feeling a stone at her foot, she touched it with her wand, and it became a candle, so brilliant as to light up the whole cell perfectly; but what should she do for a fire? There was no fireplace or stove, no place where the smoke might escape.

"With this wand, I shall want for nothing," she said, and touching the wall of the prison, that part of it was instantly converted into a magnificent fireplace, with a chimney and a most comfortable fire.

She proceeded to warm herself, but soon she felt there lacked something.

She was hungry, so she touched the ground, and instantly there arose a little table spread with a white tablecloth, and a little chair just big enough for herself. Still, there was nothing on the table as yet, save empty plates, with knives and forks, but at that moment she noticed a great rat gnawing her husband's toe. She hastened to drive it away, and in doing so touched it with her wand, when it became a roast hare.

Then, touching a stone, it became a loaf of bread. A piece of bottle gla.s.s that she found on the dungeon floor became a bottle of wine; and finding there were no vegetables, she changed a blue-bottle fly into a dish of spinach; a spider into some turnips, and a handful of earth from the floor into some salt, after which she proceeded to carve.

Having partaken sufficiently of the first course, she changed the remains of the hare into an apple tart, and the vegetables into different sorts of fruit. Thus she obtained all she required.

Having finished her supper, the princess waved her wand, and the supper table, with everything on it, chair and all, disappeared through the floor; then, seating herself by the fire, she waited for her spouse to awake.

In about three hours her worse half opened his eyes, and stretching his gigantic limbs, gazed about him in stupefied astonishment.

"Where am I?" he asked, with a yawn.

"Where thou deservest to be," answered the princess, with severity, drawing herself up to her full height. "A pretty position, I ween, for the queen's consort--drugged and cast into prison! Maybe that another time thou wilt pay more attention to my words; but the worst has not come yet. Thou art to be handed over to the malice of my two sisters.

Who knows in what manner they may reek their vengeance? If thou escapest with thy life, thou wilt be fortunate.

"Prepare, then, for thou hast brought all this on thyself by despising my counsels. What! is a man like thee to be at the head of the realm?

_Thou_, with thy brutish appet.i.te, thy dense stupidity and deafness to the voice of wisdom? A pretty example to thy subjects, forsooth! Or thinkest thou that the strength of thine arm alone will suffice to govern the kingdom? I tell thee, brainless boor, that whatever your besotted notion of a king may be, it is a post that is no easy task to fill, and woe to him who aspires to the t.i.tle and is not able to discharge the duties belonging to it.

"Knowest thou not futurity will judge thy action, that thy name is destined either to honour or disgrace the page of history? That a king must not only be brave, but wise, just, good, merciful, temperate?"