the door shut with a bang in the faces of the lions.

The Queen was so confused that at first she did not
notice another little door in the orange tree, but presently
it opened and she found herself in a field of thistles and
nettles. It was encircled by a muddy ditch, and a little
further on was a tiny thatched cottage, out of which came
the Yellow Dwarf with a very jaunty air. He wore wooden
shoes and a little yellow coat, and as he had no hair and
very long ears he looked altogether a shocking little
object.

"I am delighted," said he to the Queen, "that, as you
are to be my mother-in-law, you should see the little
house in which your Bellissima will live with me. With
these thistles and nettles she can feed a donkey which she
can ride whenever she likes; under this humble roof no
weather can hurt her; she will drink the water of this
brook and eat frogs--which grow very fat about here; and
then she will have me always with her, handsome, agreeable,
and gay as you see me now. For if her shadow stays
by her more closely than I do I shall be surprised."

The unhappy Queen. seeing all at once what a miserable
life her daughter would have with this Dwarf
could not bear the idea, and fell down insensible without
saying a word.

When she revived she found to her great surprise that
she was lying in her own bed at home, and, what was