Tiger Tales #64 - The Princess of Whereyouwill

“The Princess of Whereyouwill”
By Ruth Plumly Thompson
Author of The Cowardly Lion of Oz, "The Wizard of Pumperdink", "King, King! Double King!", etc.

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, February 24, 1918.

Whereyouwill is a lovely Kingdom just around the corner from the Realm of Reasonableness and I might as well tell you right away that it was ruled by the delightfulest Princess in the world. What’s that you say? There are not many Princesses in the world? Pshaw, pshaw, but there are, though, more Princesses than you have any idea of, indeed, yes!

If I close my eyes I can see that lovely Kingdom with its deep, green forests and winding roads, its red-roofed cottages and the Princess’s Castle set high on Happy Hill Top.

The King of Reasonableness used to peer through a chink in the wall and mutter and shake his head. He said the Princess’s subjects fiddled their time away; just the same he kept peeking over to see them at it!

Now Reasonableness was a dull, level country, very neat and prim, but with no cozy nooks or winding roads, or jolly crooked little paths. Everything was straight and orderly; even the trees were set in rows, and there wasn’t a hill or a forest in the whole kingdom. “I can keep it all under my eye!” declared the knowing King of Reasonableness, and indeed it was like a checkerboard and the poor people were little better than checkers whom he ordered about. Things fixed so remarkably well, ’tis a wonder he was not satisfied, but satisfied he was not. Though he was really a kind-hearted fellow, he was so busy telling his subjects what to do that they were glad enough to be rid of him when their tasks were done, and as for talking to him, or calling upon, him it never entered their heads. “I guess,” said he one evening to himself, “I guess I’m lonely!” And I guess that he was. At any rate he decide to fix things in his usual reasonable fashion. If a man were lonely, even though he be a King, the thing for him to do was to marry. “I shall marry!” said the King, and gave orders for the castle to be put in order for the Queen.

Now, with hardly a thought, he found himself turning his horse toward Whereyouwill, and the Princess, who just happened to glance out of the window, saw him galloping up to her castle door. “Too bad,” she whispered to her looking glass, “that he is so handsome!” And what she meant by that I should like to know. Forgetting all about her dignity as Queen, and remembering only her duty as hostess, she tripped down the stairs to meet him, and before he could more than say how do you—(he never did get in the do), she had called the fiddlers and the Lord High Mightinesses and ordered up a ball and a feast.

“This will all be changed when she is my wife!” murmured the King to himself, and resolved to ask for her hand at once. But there seemed never to be an opportunity and he rode away without accomplishing his errand. As for the Princess, she looked over the wall at the Kingdom of Reasonableness and then, with a big sigh, walked back to her castle.

The next day the King came again, and this time he enjoyed himself so much—learning a new court quadrille—that he forgot all about asking the mighty question till he reached the Kingdom of Reasonableness. It seemed very quiet and dull. “I’ll be married long enough,” thought he to himself. “And I’ll just enjoy visiting the Princess a while.” You see he had decided that once he married the Princess he would turn the two Kingdoms into one and make hers as orderly as his own. Meanwhile the Princess was even more delightful than usual and all of her subjects were so kind and jolly, and so ready to talk to his serene Highness without bows or embarrassment, that the King of Reasonableness spent more time in Whereyouwill than he did at home.

And one day, when there just happened to be no one about, he asked the Princess to marry him and accompany him back to his Kingdom. The Princess looked very thoughtful, and said that if he would stay in her Kingdom she would marry him. “But—“ the King looked astonished. “But it would never do to go on in this haphazard fashion without any rules or reasons—all the time—why the Kingdom would go to pieces!”

The Princess said it had always been like this, and that they were all happy, and that she didn’t see any pieces, and she couldn’t live where everything was straight and there were no forests to picnic in and people did things because they were told to and not because they wanted to. Then she looked through the wall at the Kingdom of Reasonableness and shook her head, at which the King was very much insulted and went galloping home.

It seemed duller than ever, and when he thought of the lovely little Princess he had to exert all of his reasonableness to keep from galloping right back again.

Things went on in this fashion for some time, then one day the Princess, who had come down to peek through in hopes of seeing the King, and the King, who had come for the same reason, looked straight into each other’s eyes, and then each started to climb over the wall as fast as possible, so that instead of meeting, they changed sides.

“If you give up your Kingdom, I’ll give up mine!” wept the little Princess. “but don’t ever leave me again!” The King, however, had just had a sudden idea, “We’ll build a castle in the middle, and live happily every afterward!” laughed the little Princess. And they did.

THE FORGETFUL POET
By Ruth Plumly Thompson
Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, February 24, 1918.

Reasonable Riddles

I told the Forgetful Poet that I never heard of a reasonable riddle, but he says that they are the most reasonable things in the world, because they can always be answered.

“Then just kindly answer the ones you gave us last week!” I suggested, for to tell the truth more than one of his verses had puzzled me. “Certainly, certainly,” said this singular gentleman, and rattled off the following: “Date, loaf, meat, bran, pear, jam, rye, preserves and bread.”

“Do you know any more like that?” I asked, gloomily, “because—“

“There once was a man
Who felt aw’fly bad--
Such a terrible deep chested
-------? had er--”

Before he could start another one, I hastened to finish my sentence which had been cut short by his verse. “Because, if yo do, I hope you forget them!”

Without paying the slightest attention he rattled off another--

“Who’ll -------- the depths of knowledge must
Go through a lot that’s dry as dust!”

“Just fill in the places where I said blank with something to drink and something to eat!” he chuckled. “And now if you’ll just excuse me, I’ll be getting hence!” Which he proceeded to do. Can you tell me now what the the three finest letters in the alphabet? And can you tell me the sentence written here?

C U R 1 2 X L.

And the following words: y10--oacccc--z 10 u 8? R K D A.

For the neatest and most correctly spelled answer there will be a surprise. Send your letters to the Forgetful Poet, care of the Ledger.

[Answers next time. This is a historical presentation of Ruth Plumly Thompson's writing. Please don't send in any answers--no surprise will be awarded.]

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