<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
<div class='chaptertitle'>THE PRINCESS LOSES HERSELF</div>
<div class='cap'>I HAVE said the Princess Irene was about eight years old
when my story begins. And this is how it begins.</div>
<p>One very wet day, when the mountain was covered
with mist which was constantly gathering itself together
into rain-drops, and pouring down on the roofs of the great
old house, whence it fell in a fringe of water from the eaves
all round about it, the princess could not of course go out.
She got very tired, so tired that even her toys could no longer
amuse her. You would wonder at that if I had time to describe
to you one half of the toys she had. But then you
wouldn't have the toys themselves, and that makes all the
difference: you can't get tired of a thing before you have it.
It was a picture, though, worth seeing—the princess sitting
in the nursery with the sky-ceiling over her head, at a great
table covered with her toys. If the artist would like to draw
this, I should advise him not to meddle with the toys. I am
afraid of attempting to describe them, and I think he had
better not try to draw them. He had better not. He can do
a thousand things I can't, but I don't think he could draw
those toys. No man could better make the princess herself
than he could, though—leaning with her back bowed into the
back of the chair, her head hanging down, and her hands in
her lap, very miserable as she would say herself, not even
knowing what she would like, except to go out and get very<span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</SPAN></span>
wet, catch a particularly nice cold, and have to go to bed and
take gruel. The next moment after you see her sitting there,
her nurse goes out of the room.</p>
<div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG src="images/col01.jpg" width-obs="429" height-obs="600" alt="She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then began to be afraid." title="" />
<span class="caption">She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then began to be afraid.</span></div>
<p>Even that is a change, and the princess wakes up a little,
and looks about her. Then she tumbles off her chair, and
runs out of the door, not the same door the nurse went out
of, but one which opened at the foot of a curious old stair of
worm-eaten oak, which looked as if never any one had set
foot upon it. She had once before been up six steps, and that
was sufficient reason, in such a day, for trying to find out what
was at the top of it.</p>
<p>Up and up she ran—such a long way it seemed to her! until
she came to the top of the third flight. There she found
the landing was the end of a long passage. Into this she ran.
It was full of doors on each side. There were so many that
she did not care to open any, but ran on to the end, where she
turned into another passage, also full of doors. When she had
turned twice more, and still saw doors and only doors about
her, she began to get frightened. It was so silent! And all
those doors must hide rooms with nobody in them! That was
dreadful. Also the rain made a great trampling noise on the
roof. She turned and started at full speed, her little footsteps
echoing through the sounds of the rain—back for the
stairs and her safe nursery. So she thought, but she had lost
herself long ago. It doesn't follow that she <i>was</i> lost, because
she had lost herself though.</p>
<p>She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then
began to be afraid. Very soon she was sure that she had lost
the way back. Rooms everywhere, and no stair! Her little<span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</SPAN></span>
heart beat as fast as her little feet ran, and a lump of tears was
growing in her throat. But she was too eager and perhaps too
frightened to cry for some time. At last her hope failed her.
Nothing but passages and doors everywhere! She threw herself
on the floor, and began to wail and cry.</p>
<p>She did not cry long, however, for she was as brave as could
be expected of a princess of her age. After a good cry, she
got up, and brushed the dust from her frock. Oh what old
dust it was! Then she wiped her eyes with her hands, for princesses
don't always have their handkerchiefs in their pockets
any more than some other little girls I know of. Next, like
a true princess, she resolved on going wisely to work to find
her way back: she would walk through the passages, and look
in every direction for the stair. This she did, but without
success. She went over the same ground again and again
without knowing it, for the passages and doors were all alike.
At last, in a corner, through a half-open door, she did see a
stair. But alas! it went the wrong way: instead of going down,
it went up. Frightened as she was, however, she could not
help wishing to see where yet further the stair could lead.
It was very narrow, and so steep that she went up like a four-legged
creature on her hands and feet.</p>
<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><SPAN name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</SPAN></span></p>
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