Proofed and corrected from the original edition for enjoyable reading. (Worth every penny spent!)
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'Once upon a time,' in the earlier part of the seventeenth century, was born Charles Perrault. We pass over his boyhood and youth to the period when, after having long filled the situation of Commissioner of Public Buildings, he fell into disgrace with his patron, the prime minister Colbert, and was obliged to reaign his situation. Fortunately he had not been unmindful of prudential economy during the days of prosperity, and had made some little savings, on which be retired to a small house in the Bue St Jacques, and devoted himself to the education of his children.
About this time he composed his fairy tales. He himself attached little literary importance to productions destined to be handed down to posterity, ever fresh and ever new. He usually wrote in the morning the story intended for the evening's amusement. Thus were produced in their turn 'Cinderella,' 'Little Bed Riding-Hood,' 'Blue Beard,' 'Puss in Boots,' 'Sleeping Beauty,' and many other wondrous tales which men now, forsooth, pretend to call fictions.
When surrounded by his grandchildren, Perrault related stories he had formerly invented for his children. One evening, after having repeated for the seventh or eighth time the clever tricks of 'Puss in Boots,' Mary, a pretty little girl of seven years of age, climbed up on her grandfather's knee, and giving him a kiss, put her little dimpled hands into the curls of the old man's hair.
'Grandpapa,' said she, 'why don't you make beautiful stories for us as you used to do for papa and my uncles?'
'Yes,' exclaimed the other children, 'dear grandpapa, you must make a story entirely for ourselves.'
Charles Perrault smiled, but there was a touch of sadness in the smile. 'Ah, dear children,' said he, 'it's been very long since I wrote a fairy tale, and I am not as young as I was then. Now I need a walking-stick so I can get along, and am bent almost double, and can walk but very very slowly. My eyes are so dim, I can hardly distinguish your little merry faces; my ear can hardly catch the sound of your voices; nor is my mind what it was. My imagination has lost its rigour and newness; memory has nearly deserted me, but I love you dearly, and like to give you pleasure. However, I doubt if my poor bald head could now make a fairy tale for you, so I will tell you one which I heard so often from my mother that I think I can repeat it word for word.'
The children joyfully gathered around the old man, who passed his hands for a moment across his wrinkled brow, and began his story.
