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THE THREE ROBES
Long, long ago, a king and queen reigned over a large and powerful country. What their names were nobody knows, but their son was called Sigurd, and their daughter Lincik, and these young people were famed throughout the whole kingdom for their wisdom and beauty.
There was only a year between them, and they loved each other so much that they could do nothing apart. When they hogan to grow up the king gave them a house of their own to live in, with servants and carriages, and everything they could possibly want.
For many years they all lived happily together, and then the queen fell ill, and knew that she would never get better.
‘Promise me two things, she said one day to the king; one, that if you marry again, as indeed you must, you will not choose as your wife a woman from some small state or distant island, who knows nothing of the world, and will be taken up with thoughts of her grandeur. But rather sock out a princess of some great kingdom, who has been used to courts all her life, and holds them at their true worth. The other thing I have to ask is, that you will never cease to watch over our children, who will soon become your greatest joy.’
These were the queen’s last words, and a few hours later she was dead. The king was so bowed down with sorrow that he would not attend even to the business of the kingdom, and at last his Prime Minister had to tell him that the people were complaining that they had
