]
Once upon a time a wicked nobleman rose in rebellion against his
rightful king, and taking the royal forces by surprise, defeated them
and seized the kingdom. The dethroned King, who had been severely
wounded in battle, was cast in prison, where he soon died; but his
widow, the Queen, managed to escape from the palace before the usurper
could lay hands upon her.
Into the dark forest which lay behind the palace ran the Queen, holding
her baby daughter in her arms. It was winter time, and a heavy snow had
hidden the foot-paths and the roads. Presently the Queen realized that
she was lost. All afternoon, however, she trudged bravely on through the
silence and the cold, her heart sinking as mile after mile revealed no
sign of a house or a shelter.
But late in the afternoon, when the red shield of the sun could scarcely
be seen through the tangle of the wild wood-branches, she perceived a
light coming from a little grove of cedars by the shore of a frozen
lake. The Queen made her way toward this light, and discovered a little
thatched hut in the silent wood; it was the house of one of the dwarfs
of the forest.
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