"Well, Hans," said the princess, "thou art not far wrong in not trusting
to every dream, or in believing there are certain privileged individuals
to whom dreams are given as a warning, as consolation, or as prediction
of good fortune; but thou oughtest no longer to doubt, after what thou
hast seen and gone through; that thou thyself since thy nuptials hast
been under the protection of the good fairies. "Has not everything gone right so long as thou didst hearken to my
voice; and did not thy good luck desert thee solely when thou didst
refuse to listen to my warning?" "Well, wife," said Hans, "I believe thou art about right; d---- me if
I'll ever be such a fool again." "Hush, sir!" said his spouse. "No oaths in the presence of royalty, if
you please. Such language befits not the mouth of a king." "Well, well, have it thine own way," said Hans. "I'll try to improve,
only let me have a little sleep now--I am tired." "That's right, husband mine," said the princess, seeing that her husband
was more docile; "I do not quite despair of thee yet. Thou mayest be the
right man after all. The fairies know better than I. Sleep, and arise
to-morrow a wiser man. Yet another thing thou must bear in mind,
however, thou must try to unlearn that horrid peasant's brogue of thine. Dost hear?" "Ay, that will I, royal spouse," replied Hans, in a brogue as broad as
before. Then, turning on his side, was soon fast asleep. The princess,
however, slept not a wink that night; the excitement of the day and the
thoughts of what might possibly occur on the morrow kept her wide awake,
and thus she remained until the morning, when she was suddenly alarmed
by the sound of footsteps, and four men entered. Bertha instantly made herself invisible again. The foremost of these men
advancing, and shaking Hans roughly out of his sleep, informed him that
it was the pleasure of the princesses that he should be brought
instantly before them. Hans started up, and would have been violent, but
his chains prevented him. "Where is the princess?" asked he, looking round him. "What princess?" asked the man. "The Princess Bertha--our future queen, and my lawful wife," replied
Hans. "The Princess Bertha!" exclaimed one. "Your wife!" laughed another. "Why, the man's mad, or else is not quite sober yet," cried a third. "Stay," said the fourth; "it is possible he has got the dwarf princess
concealed about his person. So much the better, we shall get them both
together, and divide the reward between us. Let us search him." "Ha! is that so?" said the first. A rigid search was made on the person of Hans, but they found not the
princess. "Hold there, ruffians!" cried Hans. "Ye shall do the princess no harm. Do you hear; for, besides being your rightful queen, she is my wife." A general laugh ensued. Hans was no less puzzled than the men themselves
at her disappearance. "Where can she be?" quoth he. "All last night she was watching beside
me, like a true wife, and now----"

"Come, the fellow is dreaming still, or else trying to befool us," cried
one of the men, at length. "Let us hasten with him to the princess." Hans was then conducted into the palace, and led into an amphitheatre,
where the late king was wont to listen to stage plays, singing,
recitations, and such like. The theatre was crowded, and in a conspicuous place he noticed the
Princess Clothilde and her sister Carlotta. "Welcome, Sir Peasant Knight. Welcome, Sir Woodchopper," said the
princesses, mockingly. "We have heard of your great deeds of yesterday, Sir Knight," said the
Princess Clothilde. "Surely such bravery deserves a reward." Then, turning to one of the men who accompanied Hans, she added: "Give
the brave knight the reward he merits." The men had previously been instructed how Hans was to be treated, so
one of them proceeded to strip him to the waist, whilst another took
from behind a column a cat-o'-nine-tails, with which he belaboured the
naked shoulders of our knight with such force that he drew blood at
every stroke, while the spectators applauded and the princesses laughed. Hans bore his flogging without wincing, though his back was streaming
with blood. The Princess Bertha was with her husband all the while,
though invisible. She was touched at the cruel spectacle, and her blood
rose in indignation against her sisters, yet she would not yet come
forward to assist her husband. He had been in the wrong, and he must
take the consequences of his folly. She pitied him from her heart; she
admired, too, the fortitude with which he endured such pain and
indignity; but she had his good in view. She knew that, as a child is taught to know better another time by one
good flogging, so her husband, who was nothing but a child in mind, must
be cured by the same remedy. "The loss of a little blood, as our leeches say, is good for the health
occasionally," remarked Clothilde. "Besides, as your knighthood is well
aware, a knight, whose trade it is to shed blood, must not wince if now
and then a little of his own is shed." "How thinkest thou, Sir Knight," asked Carlotta, "that a back _sanglant_
would look in thine escutcheon?" These, and such like gibes were thrown at Hans, who treated them all
with silent contempt. At length Bertha, observing by the countenance of her spouse that he had
had enough, thought it high time that the tables should be turned, and
the spectators punished for their barbarity, so she whispered thus in
her husband's ear:--

"I am with thee. Now that thou hast suffered the consequences of thy
disobedience, take thy revenge upon thine enemies." So saying, she touched his fetters with her wand, and they snapped. Hans needed not this prompting. Finding himself free, his suppressed
wrath having increased his natural strength to that of a Titan, he
sprang up the steps of the amphitheatre, and seizing the throat of the
Princess Clothilde with his right hand and that of her sister with his
left, he squeezed them with such force, that it was a wonder both were
not killed outright. However, they certainly would have been, had not
one of the lords, whom Hans recognised as the same false lord who had
invited him to his house, and afterwards drugged him, instantly
interfered. Hans left go the throats of the princesses, who fell, to all
appearances, dead, and who did not recover till long after, and, seizing
the sword of the false lord, which he had drawn against him, he snapped
it in two across his knee, and threw the pieces into the arena. Then,
seizing the lord himself by the collar and by the seat of his hose, he
flung him with such violence over the heads of the people, that he fell
headforemost after his sword, and his brains were dashed out. Shouts of "Murder!" and "Treason!" were heard on all sides. "Seize the miscreant!"