The Little Prince

 

27 

 

"I am not a weed," the flower replied, sweetly.   

"Please excuse me..."   

"I am not at all afraid of tigers," she went on, "but I have a horror of drafts. I 

suppose you wouldn't have a screen for me?"   

"A horror of drafts-- that is bad luck, for a plant," remarked the little prince, 

and added to himself, "This flower is a very complex creature..."   

"At night I want you to put me under a glass globe. It is very cold where you 

live. In the place I came from--"   

 

But she interrupted herself at that point. She had come in the form of a seed. 

She could not have known anything of any other worlds. Embarassed over 

having let herself be caught on the verge of such a na

飗

e untruth, she 

coughed two or three times, in order to put the little prince in the wrong.   

"The screen?"   

"I was just going to look for it when you spoke to me..."   

---

 

28 

Then she forced her cough a little more so that he should suffer from remorse 

just the same.   

So the little prince, in spite of all the good will that was inseparable from his 

love, had soon come to doubt her. He had taken seriously words which were 

without importance, and it made him very unhappy.   

"I ought not to have listened to her," he confided to me one day. "One never 

ought to listen to the flowers. One should simply look at them and breathe 

their fragrance. Mine perfumed all my planet. But I did not know how to take 

pleasure in all her grace. This tale of claws, which disturbed me so much, 

should only have filled my heart with tenderness and pity."   

And he continued his confidences:   

"The fact is that I did not know how to understand anything! I ought to have 

judged by deeds and not by words. She cast her fragrance and her radiance 

over me. I ought never to have run away from her... I ought to have guessed 

all the affection that lay behind her poor little strategems. Flowers are so 

inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her..." 

 

 

 

 

---

 

29 

 Chapter 9   

  the little prince leaves his planet 

I believe that for his escape he took advantage of the migration of a flock of 

wild birds. On the morning of his departure he put his planet in perfect order. 

He carefully cleaned out his active volcanoes. He possessed two active 

volcanoes; and they were very convenient for heating his breakfast in the 

morning. He also had one volcano that was extinct. But, as he said, "One 

never knows!" So he cleaned out the extinct volcano, too. If they are well 

cleaned out, volcanoes burn slowly and steadily, without any eruptions. 

Volcanic eruptions are like fires in a chimney.   

On our earth we are obviously much too small to clean out our volcanoes. 

That is why they bring no end of trouble upon us.   

 

The little prince also pulled up, with a certain sense of dejection, the last little 

shoots of the baobabs. He believed that he would never want to return. But 

on this last morning all these familiar tasks seemed very precious to him. And 

when he watered the flower for the last time, and prepared to place her under 

the shelter of her glass globe, he realised that he was very close to tears.   

"Goodbye," he said to the flower.   

But she made no answer.   

"Goodbye," he said again.   

The flower coughed. But it was not because she had a cold.   

---

 

30 

"I have been silly," she said to him, at last. "I ask your forgiveness. Try to be 

happy..."   

He was surprised by this absence of reproaches. He stood there all 

bewildered, the glass globe held arrested in mid-air. He did not understand 

this quiet sweetness.   

"Of course I love you," the flower said to him. "It is my fault that you have not 

known it all the while. That is of no importance. But you-- you have been just 

as foolish as I. Try to be happy... let the glass globe be. I don't want it any 

more."   

"But the wind--"   

"My cold is not so bad as all that... the cool night air will do me good. I am a 

flower."   

"But the animals--"   

"Well, I must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if I wish to 

become acquainted with the butterflies. It seems that they are very beautiful. 

And if not the butterflies-- and the caterpillars-- who will call upon me? You 

will be far away... as for the large animals-- I am not at all afraid of any of 

them. I have my claws."   

And, na

飗

ely, she showed her four thorns. Then she added:   

"Don't linger like this. You have decided to go away. Now go!"   

For she did not want him to see her crying. She was such a proud flower... 

 

 

 

---

 

31 

 Chapter 10   

  the little prince visits the king 

He found himself in the neighborhood of the asteroids 325, 326, 327, 328, 

329, and 330. He began, therefore, by visiting them, in order to add to his 

knowledge.   

The first of them was inhabited by a king. Clad in royal purple and ermine, he 

was seated upon a throne which was at the same time both simple and 

majestic.   

"Ah! Here is a subject," exclaimed the king, when he saw the little prince 

coming.   

And the little prince asked himself:   

"How could he recognize me when he had never seen me before?"   

He did not know how the world is simplified for kings. To them, all men are 

subjects.   

"Approach, so that I may see you better," said the king, who felt consumingly 

proud of being at last a king over somebody.   

The little prince looked everywhere to find a place to sit down; but the entire 

planet was crammed and obstructed by the king's magnificent ermine robe. 

So he remained standing upright, and, since he was tired, he yawned.   

"It is contrary to etiquette to yawn in the presence of a king," the monarch said 

to him. "I forbid you to do so."   

"I can't help it. I can't stop myself," replied the little prince, thoroughly 

embarrassed. "I have come on a long journey, and I have had no sleep..."   

"Ah, then," the king said. "I order you to yawn. It is years since I have seen 

anyone yawning. Yawns, to me, are objects of curiosity. Come, now! Yawn 

again! It is an order."   

"That frightens me... I cannot, any more..." murmured the little prince, now 

completely abashed.   

"Hum! Hum!" replied the king. "Then I-- I order you sometimes to yawn and 

sometimes to--"   

---