[Illustration: MAKING AN ENTRANCE FOR THE KING THROUGH THE MELON IN
FRONT OF THE PALACE GATE.]

And the silly boy was happy.

Meanwhile, the poor, faithful old king, who cheerfully had given up
all for his people, was hammering and stitching and digging away on
Jim's cobbler-bench off in the village; and Jim's mother, whom the
naughty boy, in his strange elevation, had forgotten all about,
tenderly cared for the humbled old monarch.

Before long, the elfin queen saw how patient the old king and Jim's
mother were, and how badly Nimble Jim was behaving now he was king,
for he was given up to all sorts of wickedness and tyranny, was fast
becoming hated by every one, and himself was beginning to see that he
was not nearly so happy as he had been while he was a cobbler.

Jim was really good at heart, only his unreasonable discontent with
his lot had got him into all this misery. At last, he began to repent,
and, one moonlight night when he was walking alone on the palace
terrace, he said:

"I wish I could see that little elfin queen, and I would ask her to
let me go back home again."

"Well, here I am!" said the silvery voice; and, sitting on a moonbeam
beside him, there she was. "Tired of being king, Jim?" she asked.

"Yes, your majesty, indeed I am," he replied.