Atondido Stories
or left, till he reached the centre and plucked the tallest ear, but
as he turned homewards a thousand sweet voices rose behind
him, crying in tenderest accents, "Pluck me too! oh, please pluck
me too!" He looked back, and lo! there was nothing left of him
but a little heap of ashes!
Now as time passed by and the lad did not return, the old
hag grew uneasy, remembering the message "his blood shall be
as your blood"; so she set off to see what had happened.
Soon she came to the heap of ashes, and knowing by her arts
what it was, she took a little water, and kneading the ashes into a
paste, formed it into the likeness of a man; then, putting a drop
of blood from her little finger into its mouth, she blew on it, and
instantly the son of seven Queens started up as well as ever.
"Don't you disobey orders again!" grumbled the old hag, "or
next time I'll leave you alone. Now be off, before I repent of my
kindness!"
So the son of seven Queens returned joyfully to his seven
mothers, who, by the aid of the million-fold rice, soon became
the richest people in the kingdom. Then they celebrated their
son's marriage to the clever Princess with all imaginable pomp;
but the bride was so clever, she would not rest until she had
made known her husband to his father, and punished the wick-
ed white witch. So she made her husband build a palace exactly
like the one in which the seven Queens had lived, and in which
the white witch now dwelt in splendour. Then, when all was
prepared, she bade her husband give a grand feast to the King.
Now the King had heard much of the mysterious son of seven
Queens, and his marvellous wealth, so he gladly accepted the in-
vitation; but what was his astonishment when on entering the
palace he found it was a facsimile of his own in every particular!
And when his host, richly attired, led him straight to the private
485