Knjigice
Fairy tale · Classic fairy tales
The Princess and the Pea
How one single pea found a real princess
Also in: Kraljična na zrnu graha (Slovenian) · Princezná na hrášku (Slovak)
Once upon a time there was a prince who wanted to marry a princess — but she had to be a real princess. He travelled the whole world to find one. There were princesses enough everywhere, but something was always a little wrong: this one laughed too loudly, that one didn't care for soup… Was she a real one? He could never be quite sure. And so he came home again, sad at heart.
1
One night a terrible storm broke over the castle. Lightning flashed, thunder rolled, and the rain poured down in buckets. And through all that din — knock, knock, knock! — someone was at the town gate. "Who on earth is out in weather like this?" wondered the old king. He lit his lantern and went to open it himself.
2
Outside the gate stood a girl, soaked to the skin. The rain ran down her hair and her dress, water trickled into her shoes at the heels and out again at the toes. She looked like a drowned mouse — and yet she stood up straight as a candle. "I am a real, true princess," she said. "May I stay the night with you?"
3
"A real princess, of course!" thought the old queen. "We shall soon see about that." Out loud she said nothing. Quiet as a cat she slipped into the guest bedroom, lifted the bedding and laid on the bare boards — one single, tiny little pea. Nobody saw her. Nobody knew a thing. Only the queen smiled a mysterious smile.
4
Then the queen ordered twenty mattresses to be brought and piled them on top of the pea. On the mattresses she laid twenty featherbeds of the softest down. The bed grew and grew until it nearly reached the ceiling. The princess had to climb a ladder just to get up onto it at all. "Good night," said the queen. "Sleep sweetly!"
5
But that night the princess did not sleep a wink. She turned to the left and to the right, counted sheep, sighed and flipped her pillow over. "Whatever is in this bed?" she muttered. Something hard kept pressing into her, however she lay — through all twenty mattresses and all twenty featherbeds! Only towards morning did she doze off for a moment, worn out.
6
In the morning everyone asked how she had slept. "Oh, terribly, just terribly!" said the princess. "I hardly closed my eyes all night. Goodness knows what was in that bed! I was lying on something so hard that I am black and blue all over. Simply dreadful!" The king, the queen and the prince looked at one another — and all three burst out laughing for joy.
7
Now there was no doubt left at all: this was a real, true princess! For only a real princess has skin so tender that she can feel one single pea through twenty mattresses and twenty featherbeds of the softest down. "I've found her!" cheered the prince, jumping for joy. "I searched the whole world for her, and she was waiting right at our own front gate!"
8
Soon there was a wedding such as had never been seen. The bells sang, the tables groaned under good things, and the whole country danced. The prince and the princess held hands and laughed — he because he had found a real princess after all, she because she had found a home where she was loved. And from then on she slept sweetly every single night.
9
And what became of the pea? They certainly didn't throw it away, of course not! It was no ordinary pea — it was the pea that found a princess. They took it to the museum and laid it in a glass case, where anyone who likes may look at it. It is lying there still — unless somebody has taken it. And look: that was a real, true story.
10The End
