第7章

HOW PRINCESS ANGELICA TOOK A LITTLE MAID

One day, when the Princess Angelica was quite a little girl, she was walking in the garden of the palace, with Mrs.Gruffanuff, the governess, holding a parasol over her head, to keep her sweet complexion from the freckles, and Angelica was carrying a bun, to feed the swans and ducks in the royal pond.

They had not reached the duck-pond, when there came toddling up to them such a funny little girl! She had a great quantity of hair blowing about her chubby little cheeks, and looked as if she had not been washed or combed for ever so long.She wore a ragged bit of a cloak, and had only one shoe on.

'You little wretch, who let you in here?' asked Mrs.Gruffanuff.

'Div me dat bun,' said the little girl, 'me vely hungy.'

'Hungry! what is that?' asked Princess Angelica, and gave the child the bun.

'Oh, Princess!' says Mrs.Gruffanuff, 'how good, how kind, how truly angelical you are! See, Your Majesties,' she said to the King and Queen, who now came up, along with their nephew, Prince Giglio, 'how kind the Princess is! She met this little dirty wretch in the garden--I can't tell how she came in here, or why the guards did not shoot her dead at the gate!--and the dear darling of a Princess has given her the whole of her bun!'

'I didn't want it,' said Angelical'But you are a darling little angel all the same,' says the governess.

'Yes; I know I am,' said Angelical 'Dirty little girl, don't you think I am very pretty?' Indeed, she had on the finest of little dresses and hats; and, as her hair was carefully curled, she really looked very well.

'Oh, pooty, pooty!' says the little girl, capering about, laughing, and dancing, and munching her bun; and as she ate it she began to sing, 'Oh, what fun to have a plum bun! how I wis it never was done!' At which, and her funny accent, Angelica, Giglio, and the King and Queen began to laugh very merrily.

'I can dance as well as sing,' says the little girl.'I can dance, and I can sing, and I can do all sorts of ting.' And she ran to a flower-bed, and pulling a few polyanthuses, rhododendrons, and other flowers, made herself a little wreath, and danced before the King and Queen so drolly and prettily, that everybody was delighted.

'Who was your mother--who were your relations, little girl?' said the Queen.

The little girl said, 'Little lion was my brudder; great big lioness my mudder; neber heard of any udder.' And she capered away on her one shoe, and everybody was exceedingly diverted.

So Angelica said to the Queen, 'Mamma, my parrot flew away yesterday out of its cage, and I don't care any more for any of my toys; and I think this funny little dirty child will amuse me.

I will take her home, and give her some of my old frocks.'

'Oh, the generous darling!' says Mrs.Gruffanuff.

'Which I have worn ever so many times, and am quite tired of,'

Angelica went on; 'and she shall be my little maid.Will you come home with me, little dirty girl?'

The child clapped her hands, and said, 'Go home with you--yes!

You pooty Princess!--Have a nice dinner, and wear a new dress!'