to be tied to a goat all my life? No, no! nothing will induce me
to become the laughing-stock of my subjects for the sake of a
goat-faced girl!'

When they reached his own country he shut Renzolla up in a little
turret chamber of his palace, with a waiting-maid, and gave each
of them ten bundles of flax to spin, telling them that their task
must be finished by the end of the week.

The maid, obedient to the king's commands, set at once to work
and combed out the flax, wound it round the spindle, and sat
spinning at her wheel so diligently that her work was quite done
by Saturday evening. But Renzolla, who had been spoilt and petted
in the fairy's house, and was quite unaware of the change that
had taken place in her appearance, threw the flax out of the
window and said: ‘What is the king thinking of that he should
give me this work to do? If he wants shirts he can buy them. It
isn't even as if he had picked me out of the gutter, for he ought
to remember that I brought him seven thousand golden guineas as
my wedding portion, and that I am his wife and not his slave. He
must be mad to treat me like this.'

All the same, when Saturday evening came, and she saw that the
waiting-maid had finished her task, she took fright lest she
should be punished for her idleness. So she hurried off to the
palace of the fairy, and confided all her woes to her. The fairy
embraced her tenderly, and gave her a sack full of spun flax, in
order that she might show it to the king, and let him see what a
good worker she was. Renzolla took the sack without one word of
thanks, and returned to the palace, leaving the kind fairy very