Sleeping Beauty, sweet Cinderella, and the little mermaid are but a few of the young noblewomen chronicled in A Charming Princess Collection. Though they often find themselves in peril, the girls in each story sparkle with courage and majestic grace. This anthology includes beloved favorites, such as Snow White by the Brothers Grimm and Louisa May Alcott's The Brownie and the Princess. This delightful treasury of happily–ever–afters, with its glittery tiara charm, is sure to awaken the princess inside us all!

A Charming Princess Collection Book and Charm

HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Chapter One

Sleeping Beauty

The Brothers Grimm (1812)

A long time ago, there lived a king and queen who said every day, "Ah, if only we had a child!" but they never had one.

Then one day, when the queen was bathing, a frog crept out of the water onto the land and said to her, "Your wish shall be fulfilled. Before a year has gone by, you shall have a daughter."

What the frog had said came true, and the queen had a little girl who was so pretty that the king could not contain himself for joy and ordered a great feast. He invited not only his kindred, friends, and acquaintances, but also the Wise Women, in order that they might be kind and well-disposed toward the child. There were thirteen Wise Women in his kingdom, but, as he had only twelve golden plates for them to eat out of, one of them had to be left at home.

The feast was held with all manner of splendor. When it came to an end the Wise Women bestowed their magic gifts upon the baby: one gave virtue, another beauty, a third riches, and so on until she had been given everything in the world that one can wish for.

When eleven of the Wise Women had made their promises, the thirteenth suddenly entered. She wished to avenge herself for not having been invited, and without greeting or even looking at anyone, she cried with a loud voice, "The king?s daughter shall in her fifteenth year prick herself with a spindle and fall down dead!" And, without saying a word more, she turned around and left the room.

They were all shocked; but the twelfth Wise Woman, whose good wish still remained unspoken, came forward. She could not undo the evil sentence, only soften it, so she said, "It shall not be death, but a deep sleep of a hundred years, into which the princess shall fall."

The king, who would fain keep his dear child from the misfortune, gave orders that every spindle in the whole kingdom should be burnt. Meanwhile, the gifts of the Wise Women were plentifully bestowed. The young girl was so beautiful, modest, good-natured, and wise that everyone who saw her was bound to love her.

Now it happened that upon the very day when the princess was fifteen years old the king and queen were not at home, and the maiden was left in the palace quite alone. So she went exploring into all sorts of places, looked into rooms and bedchambers just as she liked, and at last came to an old tower. She climbed up the narrow winding staircase and reached a little door. A rusty key was in the lock, and when she turned it the door sprang open, and there in a little room sat an old woman with a spindle, busily spinning her flax.

"Good day, old dame," said the king?s daughter. "What are you doing there?"

"I am spinning," said the old woman, and nodded her head.

"What sort of thing is that, that rattles around so merrily?" said the girl, and she took the spindle and wanted to spin, too. But scarcely had she touched the spindle when the magic decree was fulfilled, and she pricked her finger with it.

And, in the very moment when she felt the prick, she fell down upon the bed that stood there and lay in a deep sleep. This sleep extended over the whole palace. The king and queen, who had just come home and had entered the great hall, began to go to sleep, and the whole of the court with them. The horses, too, went to sleep in the stable, the dogs in the yard, the pigeons upon the roof, the flies upon the wall; even the fire that was flaming upon the hearth became quiet and slept, the roast meat left off sizzling, and the cook, who was just going to pull the hair of the scullery boy because he had forgotten something, let him go and went to sleep. The wind fell, and upon the trees before the castle not a leaf moved again.

Soon around the castle there began to grow a hedge of thorns. Every year it became higher, until at last it grew close up around the castle and all over it, so that there was nothing of it to be seen, not even the flag upon the roof. The story of the beautiful Sleeping Beauty -- for so the princess was named -- went about the country, so that from time to time kings? sons came and tried to get through the thorny hedge into the castle.

But they found it impossible, for the thorns held fast together, as if they had hands. The youths got caught in them, could not get loose again, and died miserable deaths.

After many, many years a king?s son came again to that country. He had heard an old man talking about the thornhedge, and about a castle that was said to stand behind it, in which a wonderfully beautiful princess named Sleeping Beauty had been asleep for a hundred years, along with the king and queen and the whole court. The old man had heard, too, from his grandfather that many kings? sons had already come and had tried to get through the thorny hedge, but they had remained sticking fast in it and had died a pitiful death.

When he heard this, the youth said, "I am not afraid, I will go and see the beautiful Sleeping Beauty." The good old man tried hard to dissuade him, but the king?s son did not listen to his words.

Now at this time the hundred years had just passed, and the day had come when Sleeping Beauty was to awaken again. When the king?s son came near to the thornhedge, it was nothing but large and beautiful flowers, which parted from one another of their own accord and let . . .

Excerpted from A Charming Princess Collection Book and Charmby Barbara Various Copyright © 2005 by Barbara Various. Excerpted by permission.
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