Oh, If I Could But Shiver!

" And just then it struck twelve and the old man vanished, leaving the youth in the dark. "I must help myself out here," said he, and groping round he found his way back to his room and went to sleep by the fire.

The next morning the King came and inquired, "Now have you learnt to shiver?" "No," replied the youth; "what is it? My dead cousin came here, and a bearded man, who showed me a lot of gold down below; but what shivering means, no one has showed me!" Then the King said, "You have won the castle, and shall marry my daughter."

"That is all very fine," replied the youth, "but still I don't know what shivering means."

So the gold was fetched, and the wedding was celebrated, but the young Prince (for the youth was a Prince now), notwithstanding his love for his bride, and his great contentment, was still continually crying, "If I could but shiver! if I could but shiver!" At last it fell out in this wise: one of the chambermaids said to the Princess, "Let me bring in my aid to teach him what shivering is." So she went to the brook which flowed through the garden, and drew up a pail of water full of little fish; and, at night, when the young Prince was asleep, his bride drew away the covering and poured the pail of cold water and the little fishes over him, so that they slipped all about him. Then the Prince woke up directly, calling out, "Oh! that makes me shiver! dear wife, that makes me shiver! Yes, now I know what shivering means!"