The Eleven Wild Swans

Far away from here, in the lands the swallows fly to when we are having winter, there lived a King who had eleven sons and one daughter, Elisa. The eleven brothers, princes they were, went to school with stars on their breasts and swords at their sides. They wrote on gold slates with diamond pencils, and could read backwards as easily as forwards; anybody could see straight off that they were princes. Their sister Elisa sat at home on a little stool made of looking-glass, and had a picture ...