The Princess and the Pea

Once upon a time there was a prince who wanted to marry a princess, but she would have to be a real princess. He traveled all over the world to find one, but there was always something wrong. There were plenty of princesses, but whether they were real ones he could never quite determine. So he came home again and was very sad, for he so much wanted to have a real princess.

One evening a terrible storm blew up. Lightning flashed, thunder rolled, and rain poured down in torrents. Suddenly a knock came at the city gate, and the old king himself went to open it. There stood a princess, bedraggled and dripping wet. The water ran in streams from her hair and her clothes, and yet she declared she was a real princess. Well, we shall see about that, thought the old queen. But she said nothing. She went into the bedroom, took all the bedding off, and placed a single green pea at the very bottom of the bedstead.

Then she took twenty mattresses and laid them on top of the pea, and then twenty feather beds on top of the mattresses. On this the princess had to lie all night. In the morning she was asked how she had slept. 'Oh, terribly badly!' said the princess. 'I have hardly closed my eyes all night. Heaven knows what was in the bed. I was lying on something hard, and I am black and blue all over. It is simply dreadful!'

Now they could see that she was a real princess, because she had felt the pea through twenty mattresses and twenty feather beds. Nobody but a real princess could be so sensitive. So the prince took her for his wife, for now he knew that he had found a true princess. And the pea was put in the royal museum, where it may still be seen, if no one has taken it. And that was a true story.