threatened, and Turritella wept and raged for twenty days and
twenty nights. At last the Fairy Mazilla said furiously (for she
was quite tired out by his obstinacy), 'Choose whether you will
marry my goddaughter, or do penance seven years for breaking your
word to her.'

And then the King cried gaily: 'Pray do whatever you like with
me, as long as you deliver me from this ugly scold!'

'Scold!' cried Turritella angrily. 'Who are you, I should like to
know, that you dare to call me a scold? A miserable King who
breaks his word, and goes about in a chariot drawn by croaking
frogs out of a marsh!'

'Let us have no more of these insults,' cried the Fairy. 'Fly
from that window, ungrateful King, and for seven years be a Blue
Bird.' As she spoke the King's face altered, his arms turned to
wings, his feet to little crooked black claws. In a moment he had
a slender body like a bird, covered with shining blue feathers,
his beak was like ivory, his eyes were bright as stars, and a
crown of white feathers adorned his head.

As soon as the transformation was complete the King uttered a
dolorous cry and fled through the open window, pursued by the
mocking laughter of Turritella and the Fairy Mazilla. He flew on
until he reached the thickest part of the wood, and there,
perched upon a cypress tree, he bewailed his miserable fate.
'Alas! in seven years who knows what may happen to my darling
Fiordelisa!' he said. 'Her cruel stepmother may have married her
to someone else before I am myself again, and then what good will