The Princess and the Goblin | Page 7

today.'
'I wonder why nursie never told me.'
'Nursie doesn't know. She never saw me.'
'But somebody knows that you are in the house?'
'No; nobody.'
'How do you get your dinner, then?'
'I keep poultry - of a sort.'
'Where do you keep them?'
'I will show you.'
'And who makes the chicken broth for you?'
'I never kill any of MY chickens.'
'Then I can't understand.'
'What did you have for breakfast this morning?' asked the lady.
'Oh! I had bread and milk, and an egg - I dare say you eat their eggs.'
'Yes, that's it. I eat their eggs.'
'Is that what makes your hair so white?'
'No, my dear. It's old age. I am very old.'
'I thought so. Are you fifty?'

'Yes - more than that.'
'Are you a hundred?'
'Yes - more than that. I am too old for you to guess. Come and see my
chickens.'
Again she stopped her spinning. She rose, took the princess by the hand,
led her out of the room, and opened the door opposite the stair. The
princess expected to see a lot of hens and chickens, but instead of that,
she saw the blue sky first, and then the roofs of the house, with a
multitude of the loveliest pigeons, mostly white, but of all colours,
walking about, making bows to each other, and talking a language she
could not understand. She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose
such a flapping of wings that she in her turn was startled.
'You've frightened my poultry,' said the old lady, smiling.
'And they've frightened me,' said the princess, smiling too. 'But what
very nice poultry! Are the eggs nice?'
'Yes, very nice.' 'What a small egg-spoon you must have! Wouldn't it
be better to keep hens, and get bigger eggs?'
'How should I feed them, though?'
'I see,' said the princess. 'The pigeons feed themselves. They've got
wings.'
'Just so. If they couldn't fly, I couldn't eat their eggs.'
'But how do you get at the eggs? Where are their nests?'
The lady took hold of a little loop of string in the wall at the side of the
door and, lifting a shutter, showed a great many pigeon-holes with
nests, some with young ones and some with eggs in them. The birds
came in at the other side, and she took out the eggs on this side. She
closed it again quickly, lest the young ones should be frightened.

'Oh, what a nice way!' cried the princess. 'Will you give me an egg to
eat? I'm rather hungry.'
'I will some day, but now you must go back, or nursie will be miserable
about you. I dare say she's looking for you everywhere.'
'Except here,' answered the princess. 'Oh, how surprised she will be
when I tell her about my great big grand-grand-mother!'
'Yes, that she will!' said the old lady with a curious smile. 'Mind you
tell her all about it exactly.'
'That I will. Please will you take me back to her?'
'I can't go all the way, but I will take you to the top of the stair, and
then you must run down quite fast into your own room.'
The little princess put her hand in the old lady's, who, looking this way
and that, brought her to the top of the first stair, and thence to the
bottom of the second, and did not leave her till she saw her half-way
down the third. When she heard the cry of her nurse's pleasure at
finding her, she turned and walked up the stairs again, very fast indeed
for such a very great grandmother, and sat down to her spinning with
another strange smile on her sweet old face.
About this spinning of hers I will tell you more another time.
Guess what she was spinning.
CHAPTER 4
What the Nurse Thought of It
'Why, where can you have been, princess?' asked the nurse, taking her
in her arms. 'It's very unkind of you to hide away so long. I began to be
afraid -' Here she checked herself.
'What were you afraid of, nursie?' asked the princess.

'Never mind,' she answered. 'Perhaps I will tell you another day. Now
tell me where you have been.'
'I've been up a long way to see my very great, huge, old grandmother,'
said the princess.
'What do you mean by that?' asked the nurse, who thought she was
making fun.
'I mean that I've been a long way up and up to see My GREAT
grandmother. Ah, nursie, you don't know what a beautiful mother of
grandmothers I've got upstairs. She is such an old lady, with such
lovely white hair - as white as my silver cup. Now, when I think of it, I