148 PRINCE FILDERKIN

to do as he was asked. There are, how-
ever, some people whom we find, even after
a very short acquaintance, to be so entirely
in sympathy with ourselves, that we cannot
help opening our hearts to them, and trust-
ing them as if we had known them all our
lives. So it came about that the Prince
never for one moment doubted the truth and
honesty of his fair companion, but told her
everything about himself without the slightest
reserve, and made her perfectly acquainted
with the whole of his history.

She listened with great attention, and
when he had finished his tale, told him
something more about herself. She could
not, she said, remember her mother, but she
had been brought up in the palace of the
King her father, and had lived all her life in
that country. Her father was not particularly
kind to her, deeming it a great disgrace that
she should have no hump, although, as she
innocently remarked to the Prince, she really
could not help it.

She was at first rather alarmed at the idea
of the celebrated treasure being stolen, for she
had been brought up to view it as something
so enormously precious as to be really sacred.