THERE was once a little princess who could not cry. That wouldn’t have mattered so very much, but the trouble was that she laughed at everything, often on the most unsuitable occasions, and this was an extremely vexing and awkward habit, especially for a princess.
Her parents were very troubled about it, and they called in a wise old fairy in order to get her advice. She went into the matter thoroughly, and finally told them that if the princess could only once be made to cry, the spell would be broken for ever and she would thenceforward be just like other people.
This wasn’t particularly helpful, but it gave them some hope, and they immediately set about the task of making the princess weep. Of course it was a rather difficult matter, because naturally they didn’t want her to be really miserable, and they hardly knew how to begin. Finally they offered a reward of five hundred crowns to anybody who should succeed in making their daughter cry without doing her any harm.
[20]Wise men came from all over the kingdom to see what they could do, and many things were tried, but all to no purpose.
One of them suggested that she should be shut up in a room by herself and fed on bread and water for a whole week. The queen thought this very cruel, but the king persuaded her to try it. She insisted, however, that at any rate it should be bread and milk. But every time they came to bring the princess her basin of bread and milk they found her laughing, and at the end of the week she was still as cheerful as ever.
“Look,” she said, “my feet have grown so thin that I can’t keep my slippers on.” And she kicked her foot into the air and sent her slipper flying across the room, and laughed to see the scandalised face of the butler.
But her mother burst into tears. “My poor starved lamb,” she said, “they shall not treat you so any longer.” And she rushed into the kitchen and ordered soup and chicken and pink jelly to be sent up to the princess for her next meal.
Another wise man came who said that for six months he had been practising pulling the most awful faces and making the most terrible noises imaginable, in order to be able to cure the princess. Children, he said, were so frightened by him that they had to be carried shrieking and howling from the room, and even grown-up people were[21] so terrified that they wept aloud. He requested that he might be left alone with the princess; but the queen waited outside the door and listened.
 
She trembled with anxiety as she stood there, for the noises the wise man made were so bloodcurdling that she could hardly bear to hear them herself, and it seemed dreadful that her child should be left alone to endure such a trial. But in a few minutes she heard peals of laughter coming from inside the room, and presently the wise man opened the door. He was quite done up, and blue in the face, with the efforts he had been making. “It’s no use,” he said rather crossly. “No use at all,” and went away looking much annoyed.
The princess came running out to her mother.
[22]“Oh, he was a funny man,” she said. “Can’t he come and do it again?”
Another wise man suggested that all her favourite toys should be broken up. But when he went into the nursery and began smashing her beautiful dolls and playthings, the princess clapped her hands and jumped about and laughed more heartily than ever.
“What fun, what fun,” she said, and she too began throwing the things about. So that plan had to be given up also.
Other wise men came, but as many of their suggestions were cruel and unkind ones, naturally the king and queen would not hear of them, and at last they began to fear that nothing could be done.
Now in a small village on the borders of the king’s great park, there lived a widow with her little daughter Marigold.
They were very poor, and the mother earned what she could by doing odd jobs of washing, sewing, or cleaning for her neighbours. But she fell ill, and poor Marigold was in great trouble, for she had no money to buy comforts for her mother.
Their little savings had to go for food to keep them alive, and every day these grew less and less.
Marigold knew all about the little princess at the castle. She had often heard speak of her, and[23] had even seen her sometimes riding about the roads on her white pony. And one day as she was cooking the midday meal an idea came into her head.
As soon as dinner was over, she put on her hat and cloak and told her mother that she was going up to the king’s palace to see if she could make the princess cry and so earn the five hundred crowns.
Her mother did her best to persuade her not to go.
“How can you hope to succeed,” she said, “when so many clever people have tried and failed? You are my own dear little Marigold, but it is useless for you to attempt such a task. Give it up, my child.”
But Marigold was determined, and when her mother saw this she said no more, but lay and watched her rather sadly as she set bravely off for the castle with her little basket over her arm.
When Marigold came to the castle gates she felt frightened. The gates were so big and she was so small. But she thought of her mother and of the five hundred crowns which would buy her everything she needed, and she stood on tiptoe on the top step and pulled the bell handle so hard that she was quite frightened at the noise it made.
A very grand footman opened the door, and when he saw Marigold standing there in her[24] woollen frock and cloak with her little basket, he said, “Back entrance!” in a loud, cross voice, and shut the door in her face.
So she went round to the back entrance. This time the door was opened by a red-faced kitchen-maid. “We’ve no dripping to give away to-day,” she said, and she too was about to shut the door.
But the queen happened to be in the kitchen giving her orders for the day, and she saw Marigold through the window. She came to the window and called to her.
“What is it, my child?” she asked, for Marigold stood there looking the picture of unhappiness.
“I’ve come to make the princess cry, please your Majesty,” she said, and made a curtsey, for the queen looked very magnificent with her crown on her head and her lovely ermine train held up over her arm to keep it off the kitchen floor.
When the queen heard what Marigold had come for, she smiled and shook her head, for how could a little country girl hope to do what so many wise men had been unable to accomplish? But Marigold was so earnest and so sure that she could make the princess cry that at last the queen promised to let her attempt it.
“You won’t hurt her?” she said. But she smiled as she said it. Marigold had such a kind[25] little face; she did not look as if she could hurt any one.
She was taken to the princess’s apartments, and the queen went with her into the nursery and introduced her to the princess and explained why she had come.
The princess was delighted to see a nice little rosy-cheeked girl instead of the dull old men who so often came to visit her. The queen shut the door and left them alone together.
By this time the news of the little village girl who had come to make the princess cry, had spread all over the palace; and presently a whole crowd of people were standing anxiously waiting outside the nursery door.
“It’s such nonsense,” said the Chamberlain to the Prime Minister. “A village child. I don’t suppose she’s ever been outside the village.”
“Quite ridiculous,” whispered the ladies-in-waiting to the court pages. “Do you think she knows how to make a correct curtsey?”
At last the king and queen could stand the suspense no longer. They quietly opened the door and peeped in. And what do you think they saw? The princess, standing at the table in the middle of the room with Marigold’s basket in front of her, busily peeling onions as hard as she could go, while the tears streamed down her face all the while. She was crying at last!
[26]The king and queen rushed in and clasped her in their arms, onions and all. The ladies-in-waiting stood with their perfumed handkerchiefs pressed to their noses, the pages tittered, and the cook, who was standing at the bottom of the stairs, muttered to himself when he heard the news, “Well, I could have done that,” while the Prime Minister rushed about the room with his wig on one side and shook everybody violently by the hand, exclaiming, “Wonderful, wonderful! And so simple! We must get out a proclamation at once. Where are my spectacles? Where is my pen?”
And so the princess was cured, and from that time she became like everybody else and cried when she was unhappy and laughed when she was glad, though I am pleased to say that she always laughed a great deal more than she cried.
As for Marigold, she got her five hundred crowns, of course, and was able to give her mother everything she needed, so that she was soon quite well. The king and queen were most grateful, and often invited her up to the palace to play with their little daughter, and loaded her with presents.
Because she was sweet and modest she didn’t get spoiled, but grew up charming, kind and beautiful. I did hear that in the end she married a king’s son and that they had an onion for their crest, but I’m not at all sure about that.