ONCE upon a time there lived in the village of Montignies-sur-
Roc a little cow-boy, without either father or mother. His
real name was Michael, but he was always called the Star Gazer,
because when he drove his cows over the commons to seek for
pasture, he went along with his head in the air, gaping at nothing.

As he had a white skin, blue eyes, and hair that curled all over
his head, the village girls used to cry after him, `Well, Star Gazer,
what are you doing?' and Michael would answer, `Oh, nothing,'
and go on his way without even turning to look at them.

The fact was he thought them very ugly, with their sun-burnt
necks, their great red hands, their coarse petticoats and their
wooden shoes. He had heard that somewhere in the world there
were girls whose necks were white and whose hands were small,
who were always dressed in the finest silks and laces, and were
called princesses, and while his companions round the fire saw
nothing in the flames but common everyday fancies, he dreamed
that he had the happiness to marry a princess.


II


One morning about the middle of August, just at mid-day when
the sun was hottest, Michael ate his dinner of a piece of dry bread,
and went to sleep under an oak. And while he slept he dreamt
that there appeared before him a beautiful lady, dressed in a robe
of cloth of gold, who said to him: `Go to the castle of Beloeil, and
there you shall marry a princess.'