Chapter XII

All night Prince Vance trudged on in the starlight, and did not stop even to take breath till he saw the sky begin to grow red with the coming sunrise; then, clambering over a hedge, he laid himself down in its shelter, and instantly fell into a deep and heavy sleep.

The sun was high above him when he woke, and at once he became aware of a great ringing of bells, blowing of horns, and beating of drums, as if he were in the midst of some holiday celebration. He started up, rubbing his eyes, and found that he had fallen asleep in a field which was now gay with hundreds of merry-makers. Flags were flying from tents and booths; bands of musicians were playing; glass-blowers and jugglers were performing their tricks; peasants in gay dresses were singing, dancing, and feasting; and there were all manner of shows and swings and merry-go-rounds, enough to have turned your head entirely, had you been there to see. As to the Prince, he was so delighted as even to forget for a while both hunger and weariness, and walked about from sight to sight, crying "Hurrah!" as the jugglers and rope-dancers performed their curious and daring tricks.

At length he came to a booth in which an old woman was preparing over her fire a kettle of steaming stew, which to the hungry Prince seemed to send forth the most delicious odor of any stew he ever had known in his life.

"Ah," he exclaimed eagerly, "that smells exceedingly savory, good mother!"

"Ay," replied the old woman; "and truly it ought, for it has in it blue pigeons, a fine fat cock, three wild hares, and every vegetable and savory herb known in all Jolliland. Will you have a bowl?"

"Ay," said the Prince, "that I will; and let the bowl be a large one!" he added, as he watched the old woman filling a goodly wooden basin with the stew.

"There!" she exclaimed as she held it toward him, "there it is; and good enough eating for a royal prince, if I do say it who made it. One silver bit and 'tis yours, my fine young fellow!"

"But," stammered the Prince, his mouth watering as the fragrant steam reached his nostrils,--"but I have no silver bit. If you will only trust me for it, I will pay you as soon as ever I find the Crushed Straw--"

He stopped speaking suddenly, for he saw that the woman was laughing at him. She had snatched the basin of stew as it were from his very mouth; and as she laughed loudly and shrilly, she pointed at the Prince with her fat forefinger.

Drawn by the noise she was making, all the peasants flocked around, crying out,--

"What is it, Mother Michael? What is the joke? Tell us, that we may laugh too; for you know we must laugh. It is our duty to laugh."

"He wants to be trusted for a basin of broth," tittered the old dame, "and he says that he will pay me when he finds the Crushed Strawberry Wizard!"

At this all the peasants laughed in chorus till the very hills echoed.

"I don't see what you are laughing at," cried the poor Prince, hotly; "I think you are very silly indeed."

"Of course we are!" answered the laughing peasants. "It is our duty to be silly. If we cannot laugh at something, we laugh at nothing, since this is Sillyburg, the merriest town in Jolliland."

"But," asked the Prince, in vexation, "does nobody here know anything? Has nobody any sense?"

"Of course not!" said the peasants. "Who cares about knowing anything, and what's the good of having sense? We have a good time in the world, and that's enough for us."

The Prince would have reproved the peasants for talking so foolishly, but that the words seemed to have a strangely familiar sound; and he suddenly remembered that he had used them himself at one time when his tutor was urging him to learn common fractions.

In the mean time the peasants, always eager for any new thing, had become very anxious to know what was in the mysterious box which the Prince carried.

"If it is a show," they cried, "open the box and set it out. We are weary for something new to laugh at."

But the Prince hardly thought it would please the King and Queen to be laughed at by a crowd of gaping rustics. To be sure, he had shown them before, but that was in private and not as a real exhibition at a public fair. Some days ago this would not have troubled the Prince at all; but trial and hardship were fast making Vance into a very different sort of boy from the Prince who was the despair of his poor tutor and the torment of the entire palace.

However, the poor wayfarer reflected that as food was only to be had for money, money must be earned in some way, or the Court and himself were certain to starve. It also occurred to him that if his family still had any feelings they must be such exceedingly small ones that they were not of much importance; and accordingly he opened his box and proceeded to show off his tiny relatives, the peasants screaming with laughter at the airs and graces of the little Courtiers, and offering them all manner of cakes, fruits, and bonbons for the sake of seeing them eat. The Court Priest pleased the rustics particularly, as he seized the only sugared almond and ran away with it into a corner, pursued by the entire Court, all squabbling and quarrelling in the most undignified manner possible. This sight so delighted the peasants that they gave Vance plenty of good silver bits, and thus he was able at last to buy himself a breakfast, though you may be quite sure he did not get it of the old woman who had made sport of him before.

When he had finished his meal, which was eaten sitting on the grass before a chicken-pasty booth, he rose and asked the peasants politely the way to the Funny Man's house.

"The house is far away," they cried, "but the Funny Man is here at the Fair if you can only find him. You can't always find him."

"This is the Funny Man," cried a jolly gay voice. "This is I! Here I be. Why don't you catch me?"