 Chapter 6 Which is the last, and at the same time the most edifying of all. Frawline Ancient was sitting in her room in the deepest sorrow when the door opened, and who should come in but Heramandus Von Nebelstern? All shame and contrition she shed a flood of tears, and in the most weeping accents addressed him as follows. Oh, my darling Amandus, pray forgive what I wrote to you in my blinded state. I was bewitched, and I am so still, no doubt. I am yellow, and I am hideous. May God pity me, but my heart is true to you, and I am not going to marry any king at all. My dear girl, said Amandus, I really don't see what you have to complain of. I consider you one of the luckiest women in the world. Oh, don't mock me, she cried. I am punished severely enough for my absurd vanity in wishing to be a queen. Really and truly, my dear girl, said Amandus, I can't make you out one bit. To tell you the truth, your last letter drove me stark, staring mad. I first thrashed my servant boy, then my poodle, smashed several glasses, and you know a student who's breathing out threatenings and slaughter in that sort of way, isn't to be trifled with. But when I got a little calmer, I made up my mind to come on here as quickly as I could, and see with my own eyes how, why, and to whom I had lost my intended bride. Love makes no distinction of class or station, and I made up my mind that I would make this King Dorcas Carota give a proper account of himself, and ask him if this tale about his marrying you was mere brag, or if he really meant it. But everything here is different to what I expected. As I was passing near the grand marquee that is put up yonder, King Dorcas Carota came out of it, and I soon found that I had before me the most charming prince I ever saw. At the same time he happens to be the first I ever did see, but that's nothing. For just fancy, my dear girl, he immediately detected the sublime poet in me, praised my poems, which he has never read, above measure, and offered to appoint me poet laureate in his service. Now a position of that sort has long been the fairest goal of my warmest wishes, so that I accepted his offer with a thousandfold delight. Oh, my dear girl, with what an enthusiasm of inspiration will I chant your praises. A poet can love queens and princesses, or rather, it is really a part of his simple duty to choose a person of that exalted station to be the lady of his heart. And if he does get rather cracky in the head on the subject, that circumstance of itself gives rise to that celestial delirium, without which no poetry is possible, and no one ought to feel any surprise at a poet's, perhaps somewhat extravagant proceedings. Remember the great Tassau, who must have had a considerable be in his bonnet when in love with the princess Leonore d'Este. Yes, my dear girl, as you are going to be a queen so soon, you will always be the lady of my heart, and I will extol you to the stars in the sublimest and most celestial verses. What? You have seen him, you wicked cobalt, for all I in ancient broke out in the deepest amazement, and he has, but at that moment in came the little gnomish king himself, and said in the tenderest accents, Oh, my sweet darling fiancé, idol of my heart, do not suppose for a moment that I am in the least degree annoyed with a little piece of rather unseemly conduct, which Herod Dapsel von Zabelthau was guilty of. Oh, no, and indeed has led to a more rapid fulfilment of my hopes, so that the solemn ceremony of our marriage will actually be celebrated tomorrow. You will be pleased to find that I have appointed Heramandus von Nebelstern, our poet laureate, and I should wish him at once to favour us with a specimen of his talents, and recite one of his poems. But let us go out under the trees, for I love the open air, and I will lie in your lap while you, my most beloved bride-elect, may scratch my head a little while he is singing, for I am fond of having my head scratched in such circumstances. For all I in ancient turned to stone with horror and alarm made no resistance to this proposal. Dorcas Carota, out under the trees, laid himself in her lap. She scratched his head, and Heramandus, accompanying himself on the guitar, began the first of twelve dozen songs which he had composed and written out in a thick book. It is matter of regret that in the chronicle of Dapselheim, from which all this history is taken, these songs have not been inserted. It being merely stated that the country folk who were passing stopped on their way, and anxiously inquired who could be in such terrible pain in her Dapsel's wood, that he was crying and screaming out in such a style. Dorcas Carota in ancient's lap twisted and writhed, and groaned and whined more and more lamentably, as if he had a violent pain in his stomach. Moreover, for all I in ancient fancied she observed to her great amazement, that Cordoven spits was growing smaller and smaller as the song went on. At last Heramandus sung the following sublime effusion, which is preserved in the chronicle. Gladly sings the bard enraptured, breath of blossoms, bright dream visions, moving through rosy at spaces in heaven, blessed and beautiful, wither away. Wither away, o question of questions, towards that wither the bard is born onward, caring for naught but to love, to believe, moving through rosy at heavenly spaces. Towards this wither, where ere it may be, singeth the bard in a tumult of rapture, ever becoming a radiant em. At this point, Dorcas Carota uttered a loud, croaking cry, and now dwindled into a little, little carrot, slipped down from ancient's lap and into the ground, leaving no trace behind. Upon which the great gray fungus, which had grown in the night-time beside the grassy bank, shot up and up. But this fungus was nothing less than Heradapsel von Zabelthau's gray-felt hat, and he himself was under it, and fell stormily on Heramandus' breast, crying out in the utmost ecstasy. Oh my dearest best, most beloved Heramandus von Nebelstern, with that mighty song of conjuration you have beaten all my cabalistic science out of the held. What the profoundest magical art, the utmost daring of the philosopher fighting for his very existence, could not accomplish, your verse is achieved, passing into the frame of the deceitful Dorcas Carota, like the deadliest poison, so that he must have perished of stomachache in spite of his gnomish nature, if he had not made off into his kingdom. My daughter Anna is delivered. I am delivered from the horrible charm which held me spellbound here in the shape of a nasty fungus, at the risk of being hewn to pieces by my own daughter's hands, for the good soul hacks them all down with her spade, unless their edible character is unmistakable, as in the case of the mushrooms. Thanks, my most heartfelt thanks, and I have no doubt your intentions as regards my daughter have undergone no change. I am sorry to say she has lost her good looks through the machinations of that inimical gnome, but you are too much of a philosopher, too. Oh, dearest Papa, cried ancient overjoyed, just look there! The silken palace is gone. The abominable monster is often away with all his tribe of salad princes, cucumber ministers, and lord knows what all. And she ran away to the vegetable garden delighted, hair daps all following as fast as he could. Heramandus went behind them muttering to himself, I am sure I don't know quite what to make of all this, but this I maintain, that that ugly little carrot creature is a vile, prosaic lubber, and none of your poetical kings or my sublime lay wouldn't have given him the stomach ache, and sent him scuttling into the ground. As Frawline Ancient was standing in the vegetable garden, where there wasn't the trace of a green blade to be seen, she suddenly felt a sharp pain in the finger which had on the fateful ring. At the same time a cry of piercing sorrow sounded from the ground, and the tip of a carrot peeped out. Guided by her inspiration she quickly took the ring off. It came quite easily this time. Stuck it onto the carrot, and the latter disappeared, while the cry of sorrow ceased. But oh wonder of wonders, all at once Frawline Ancient was as pretty as ever, well proportioned, and as fair and white as a country lady can be expected to be. She and her father rejoiced greatly, while Amandus stood puzzled not knowing what to make of it all. Frawline Ancient took the spade from the maid, who had come running up, and flourished it in the air with a joyful shout of, Now let's get to work, in doing which she was unfortunate enough to deal Heramandus such a thwack on the head with it, just at the place where the sensorium commune is supposed to be situated, that he fell down as one dead. Ancient threw the murderous weapon far from her, cast herself down beside her beloved, and broke out into the most despairing lamentations, while the maid poured the contents of a watering pot over him, and Heradapsel quickly ascended the astronomical tower to consult the stars with as little delay as possible as to whether Heramandus was dead or not. But it was not long before the latter opened his eyes again, jumped to his legs, clasped Frawline Ancient in his arms and cried with all the rapture of affection, Now my best and dearest Anna, we are one another again. The very remarkable, scarcely credible effect of this occurrence on the two lovers very soon made itself perceptible. Frawline Ancient took a dislike to touching a spade, and she did really reign like a queen over the vegetable world. In as much as, though taking care that her vassals were properly supervised and attended to, she set no hand to the work herself, but entrusted it to maids in whom she had confidence. Heramandus, for his part, saw now that everything he had ever written in the shape of verses was wretched, miserable trash, and burying himself in the works of the real poets, both of ancient and modern times, his being was so soon filled with the beneficent enthusiasm that no room was left for any consideration of himself. He arrived at the conviction that a real poem has got to be something other than a confused jumble of words, shaken together under the influence of a crude jejeune delirium, and through all his own, so-called poetry, of which he had had such a tremendous opinion into the fire, becoming once more quite the sensible young gentleman, clear and open in heart and mind, which he had been originally. And one morning Heradapsel did actually come down from his astronomical tower to go to church with Frawline Ancient and Heramandus von Nebelstern on the occasion of their marriage. They led an exceedingly happy wedded life, but as to whether Heradapsel's union with the self-feed Nahabela ever actually came to anything, the chronicle of Dapselheim is silent.