The Victorian Fairy Tale Book (Pantheon Fairy Tale & Folklore Library) by Michael Patrick Hearn

delighted with his works; for even Countess Gruffanuff looked young and Glumboso good-humoured in his pictures. “He flatters very much,” some people said. “Nay!” says Princess Angelica, “I am above flattery, and I think he did not make my picture handsome enough. I can’t bear to hear a man of genius unjustly cried down, and I hope my dear papa will make Lorenzo a knight of his Order of the Cucumber.”
    The Princess Angelica, although the courtiers vowed her Royal Highness could draw so
beautifully
that the idea of her taking lessons was absurd, yet chose to have Lorenzo for a teacher, and it was wonderful,
as long as she painted in his studio
, what beautiful pictures she made! Some of the performances were engraved for the Book of Beauty: others were sold for enormous sums at Charity Bazaars. She wrote the
signatures
under the drawings, no doubt, but I think I know who did the pictures—this artful painter, who had come with other designs on Angelica than merely to teach her to draw.
    One day, Lorenzo showed the Princess a portrait of a young man in armour, with fair hair and the loveliest blue eyes, and an expression at once melancholy and interesting.
    “Dear Signor Lorenzo, who is this?” asked the Princess. “I never saw any one so handsome,” says Countess Gruffanuff (the old humbug).
    “That,” said the painter, “that, madam, is the portrait of my augustyoung master, his Royal Highness Bulbo, Crown Prince of Crim Tartary, Duke of Acroceraunia, Marquis of Poluphloisboio, and Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Pumpkin. That is the Order of the Pumpkin glittering on his manly breast, and received by his Royal Highness from his august father, his Majesty King P ADELLA I., for his gallantry at the battle of Rimbombamento, when he slew with his own princely hand the King of Ograria and two hundred and eleven giants of the two hundred and eighteen who formed the King’s body-guard. The remainder were destroyed by the brave Crim Tartar army after an obstinate combat, in which the Crim Tartars suffered severely.”
    What a Prince! thought Angelica: so brave—so calm-looking—so young—what a hero!
    “He is as accomplished as he is brave,” continued the Court Painter. “He knows all languages perfectly: sings deliciously: plays every instrument: composes operas which have been acted a thousand nights running at the Imperial Theatre of Crim Tartary, and danced in a ballet there before the King and Queen; in which he looked so beautiful, that his cousin, the lovely daughter of the King of Circassia, died for love of him.”
    “Why did he not marry the poor Princess?” asked Angelica, with a sigh.
    “Because they were
first cousins
, madam, and the clergy forbid these unions,” said the Painter. “And, besides, the young Prince had given his royal heart
elsewhere.
”
    “And to whom?” asked her Royal Highness.
    “I am not at liberty to mention the Princess’s name,” answered the Painter.
    “But you may tell me the first letter of it,” gasped out the Princess.
    “That your Royal Highness is at liberty to guess,” says Lorenzo.
    “Does it begin with a Z?” asked Angelica.
    The Painter said it wasn’t a Z; then she tried a Y; then an X; then a W, and went so backwards through almost the whole alphabet.
    When she came to D, and it wasn’t D, she grew very much excited; when she came to C, and it wasn’t C, she was still more nervous; when she came to Be,
and it wasn’t
B, “O dearest Gruffanuff,” she said, “lend me your smelling-bottle!” and, hiding her head in the Countess’s shoulder, she faintly whispered, “Ah, Signor, can it be A?”
    “It was A; and though I may not, by my Royal Master’s orders, tell your Royal Highness the Princess’s name, whom he fondly, madly, devoutedly, rapturously loves, I may show you her portrait,” says the slyboots: and leading the Princess up to a gilt frame, he drew a curtain which was before it.
    O goodness! the frame contained A