THE FAIRY OF THE DAWN
Once upon a time what should happen DID happen; and if it had not happened this tale would never have been told.
There was once an emperor, very great and mighty, and he ruled over an empire so large that no one knew where it began and where it ended. But if nobody could tell the exact extent of his sovereignty everybody was aware that the emperor’s right eye laughed, while his left eye wept. One or two men of valour had the courage to go and ask him the reason of this strange fact, but he only laughed and said nothing; and the reason of the deadly enmity between his two eyes was a secret only known to the monarch himself.
And all the while the emperor’s sons were growing up. And such sons! All three like the morning stars in the sky!
Florea, the eldest, was so ta
