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THE QUEEN FAIRY BOOK. |
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ALLERLEIRAUH; OR, THE MANY FURRED
CREATURE. |
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There was once upon a time a king who had a wife with golden hair, and she was so beautiful that you couldn't mid any one like her in the world. It happened that she fell ill, and when she felt that she must soon die she sent for the king and said: "If you want to marry after my death, make no one queen unless she is just as beautiful as I am and has just such golden hair as I have. Promise me this." After the king had promised her this she closed her eyes and died.
For a long time the king was not to be comforted, and he did not even think of taking a second wife. At last his councilors said: "The king must marry again, so that we may have a queen." So messengers were sent far and wide to seek for a bride equal to the late queen in beauty. But there was no one in the wide world, and if there had been she could not have had such golden hair. Then the messengrs came home again, not having been able to find a queen.
Now, the king had a daughter who was just as beautiful as her dead mother and had just such golden hair. One day, when she had grown up, her father looked at her and saw that she was exactly like her mother, so he said to his councilors: "I will marry my daughter to one of you and she shall be queen, for she is exactly like her dead'mother, and when I die her husband shall be king." But when the princess heard of her father's decision she was not at all pleased and said to him: "Before I do your bidding I must have three dresses; one as golden as the sun, one as silver as the moon, and one as shining as the stars. Besides these, I want a cloak made of a thousand different kinds of skin. Every animal in your kingdom must give a bit of his skin to it." But she thought to herself, |
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