her great-great-grandmother, you came home quite angry with her,
and said there was nothing in the place but an old tub, a heap of
straw - oh, I remember your inventory quite well! - an old tub, a
heap of straw, a withered apple, and a sunbeam. According to your
eyes, that was all there was in the great, old, musty garret. But
now you have had a glimpse of the old princess herself!'

'Yes, Mother, I did see her - or if I didn't -' said Curdie very
thoughtfully - then began again. 'The hardest thing to believe,
though I saw it with my own eyes, was when the thin, filmy creature
that seemed almost to float about in the moonlight like a bit of
the silver paper they put over pictures, or like a handkerchief
made of spider threads, took my hand, and rose up. She was taller
and stronger than you, Mother, ever so much! - at least, she looked
so.'

'And most certainly was so, Curdie, if she looked so,' said Mrs
Peterson.

'Well, I confess,' returned her son, 'that one thing, if there were
no other, would make me doubt whether I was not dreaming, after
all, wide awake though I fancied myself to be.'

'Of course,' answered his mother, 'it is not for me to say whether
you were dreaming or not if you are doubtful of it yourself; but it
doesn't make me think I am dreaming when in the summer I hold in my
hand the bunch of sweet peas that make my heart glad with their
colour and scent, and remember the dry, withered-looking little
thing I dibbled into the hole in the same spot in the spring. I
only think how wonderful and lovely it all is. It seems just as