baby's cradle, and while her sisters were working in the room below,
there came to the palace door a man in a long black dress, who said
that he was a Fakir, and came to beg. The servant said to him, "You
cannot go into the palace-the Raja's sons have all gone away; we think
they must be dead, and their widows cannot be interrupted by your
begging." But he said, "I am a holy man, you must let me in. Then the
stupid servants let him walk through the palace, but they did not know
that this was no Fakir, but a wicked Magician named Punchkin.

Punchkin Fakir wandered through the palace, and saw many beautiful
things there, till at last he reached the room where Balna sat singing
beside her little boy's cradle. The Magician thought her more
beautiful than all the other beautiful things he had seen, insomuch
that he asked her to go home with him and to marry him. But she said,
"My husband, I fear, is dead, but my little boy is still quite young; I
will stay here and teach him to grow up a clever man, and when he is
grown up he shall go out into the world, and try and learn tidings of
his father. Heaven forbid that I should ever leave him, or marry yon."
At these words the Magician was very angry, and turned her into a
little black dog, and led her away; saying, "Since yon will not come
with me of your own free will, I will make you." So the poor Princess
was dragged away, without any power of effecting an escape, or of
letting her sisters know what had become of her. As Punchkin passed
through the palace gate the servants said to him, "Where did yon get
that pretty little dog?" And he answered, "One of the Princesses gave
it to me as a present." At hearing which they let him go without
further questioning.

Soon after this, the six elder Princesses heard the little baby, their
nephew, begin to cry, and when they went upstairs they were much