towards Charming's kingdom. After walking on and on for eight
days and eight nights, she came at last to a tremendously high
hill of polished ivory, so steep that it was impossible to get a
foothold upon it. Fiordelisa tried a thousand times, and
scrambled and slipped, but always in the end found herself
exactly where she started from. At last she sat down at the foot
of it in despair, and then suddenly bethought herself of the
eggs. Breaking one quickly, she found in it some little gold
hooks, and with these fastened to her feet and hands, she mounted
the ivory hill without further trouble, for the little hooks
saved her from slipping. As soon as she reached the top a new
difficulty presented itself, for all the other side, and indeed
the whole valley, was one polished mirror, in which thousands and
thousands of people were admiring their reflections. For this was
a magic mirror, in which people saw themselves just as they
wished to appear, and pilgrims came to it from the four corners
of the world. But nobody had ever been able to reach the top of
the hill, and when they saw Fiordelisa standing there, they
raised a terrible outcry, declaring that if she set foot upon
their glass she would break it to pieces. The Queen, not knowing
what to do, for she saw it would be dangerous to try to go down,
broke the second egg, and out came a chariot, drawn by two white
doves, and Fiordelisa got into it, and was floated softly away.
After a night and a day the doves alighted outside the gate of
King Charming's kingdom. Here the Queen got out of the chariot,
and kissed the doves and thanked them, and then with a beating
heart she walked into the town, asking the people she met where
she could see the King. But they only laughed at her, crying:

'See the King? And pray, why do you want to see the King, my