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Updated: May 8, 2025
But the moment she opened her mouth to speak, her wicked tongue was silenced for ever; for the magician turned her into a trout, which he flung out of the window into the stream that flowed through the castle garden. As for King Charming and Queen Florina, delivered out of all their sorrows, and given to one another, their joy was quite inexpressible, and it lasted to the end of their lives.
"What have I done to thee, that thou shouldst forget me and marry Troutina?" sobbed she; and the king, who this time was wide awake, heard her. He could not make out whose voice it was, or whence it came, but it somehow reminded him of his dearest Florina, whom he had never ceased to love.
Besides, he is going to-morrow to the temple with the Princess Troutina, whom he has at last agreed to marry." Florina sat down on a door-step, and hid her face under her straw hat and her drooping hair. "Alas!" she cried, "my Blue Bird has forsaken me."
The night was so dark that King Charming never found out the difference, but made to Troutina all the tender speeches that he meant for Florina, offering her his crown and his heart, and ending by placing his own ring on her finger, as a pledge of eternal fidelity.
But he did not, being overwhelmed with the ceremonious reception given him by the queen, who presented to him Troutina, all blazing with jewels, yet so ugly that King Charming involuntarily turned away his eyes. "But, madam, is there not another princess called Florina?"
Flying from tree to tree, he sang melancholy songs about her and himself, and wished he were dead many a time. The fairy Soussio sent back Troutina to her mother, who was furious. "Florina shall repent having pleased King Charming!" cried she; and dressing her own daughter in rich garments, with a gold crown on her head, and King Charming's ring on her finger, she took her to the tower.
Indeed, she was altogether ugly and disagreeable; and when contrasted with Florina, the difference between the two made the mother so envious, that she and Troutina spared no pains to make the princess's life unhappy, and to speak ill of her to her father.
This scheme succeeded so well, that Florina was persuaded to promise she would speak to him for a few moments next night, from a small window at the bottom of the tower. But the faithless lady-in-waiting betrayed her to the queen, who locked her up in her chamber, and determined to send her own daughter to the window instead.
Meantime, from the window the Blue Bird, who had the eye of a lynx, sang aloud, "Beware, Florina!" "You see, madam," said Florina, "even the spirits of the air take pity upon me." "I see that you are in league with demons; but your father shall judge you;" and, very much frightened, the queen left her, and went to hold counsel with Troutina as to what was to be done.
But on the third night, hearing a noise, she wakened, and saw by the light of the moon the Princess Florina sitting at the window with a beautiful Blue Bird, who warbled in her ear and touched her gently with his beak. The spy listened and heard all their conversation, very much astonished that a princess could be so fond of a mere bird.
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