Atondido Stories
into the King's garden and sung a song, and each night the
youngest princess has come to me and asked me who I am, and
whence I came, and I have answered nothing. What shall I do
now?" The horse said, "Next time she asks you who you are, tell
her you are a very poor man, and came from your own country
to find service here."
The boy then went home to the grain merchant, and at night,
when every one had gone to bed, he went to the King's garden
and sang his sweet song again. The youngest princess heard
him, got up, dressed, and came to him. "Who are you? Whence
do you come?" she asked.
"I am a very poor man," he answered. "I came from my own
country to seek service here, and I am now one of the grain mer-
chant's servants." Then she went away. For three more nights the
boy sang in the King's garden, and each night the princess came
and asked him the same questions as before, and the boy gave
her the same answers.
Then she went to her father, and said to him, "Father, I wish
to be married; but I must choose my husband myself." Her father
consented to this, and he wrote and invited all the Kings and Ra-
jas in the land, saying, "My youngest daughter wishes to be mar-
ried, but she insists on choosing her husband herself. As I do not
know who it is she wishes to marry, I beg you will all come on a
certain day, for her to see you and make her choice."
A great many Kings, Rajas, and their sons accepted this invi-
tation and came. When they had all arrived, the little princess's
father said to them, "To-morrow morning you must all sit to-
gether in my garden" (the King's garden was very large), "for
then my youngest daughter will come and see you all, and
choose her husband. I do not know whom she will choose."
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