"Oh, look at the little baby! Who will save it?"
But the cradle sailed on, while the trees often bent beneath the wave. The boiling eddies of the current swallowed many objects, and caught the cradle, and spun it about in circles as if it had been a walnut shell, until the baby cried with fear; but then a friendly wave was sure to rescue it, and once more bear it onward.
Ah, at last! The poor baby must be drowned. A great tree had fallen into the river, with all its tangled roots high in the air, and the stream snapped off the smaller twigs and branches as it moved along. Every moment it struck some floating object with its gnarled roots and forest of branches; occasionally the shock was so great that the trunk rolled from side to side; but the object always sank, whether broken boat or dead animal; while the tree floated on. The baby's cradle was alone on the waste of waters; the tree approached slowly and surely. The cradle tossed up and down, and then--the forked branches caught and held it firmly just above the water-line. The tree became a raft.
The young King Alfonso of Spain stood on the shore, near a town, surrounded by officers in brilliant uniforms. Large boats full of his guards had ventured out from shore to try to save objects swept down from the country. They saw a tree with a cradle caught in the branches. Was the cradle empty? No, a little black head could be distinguished inside. Bravely the boat approached; the tree swerved about, and struck it so rudely that it nearly upset; but at that moment the soldier in the bow leaned over, and caught the baby by his little gown. Away whirled the tree on the swift tide, and the cradle, detached by the shock, drifted apart, overturned.
How the people ran about and talked! How the women cried, and caressed the little stranger thus safely brought to shore! The King saw it all, and approached.
"He shall be my child, and I will adopt him," he said.
"May he grow up to serve you, sire!" said one of the councillors, who wore a glittering star on his breast.
Then the "King's Baby," saved in a little wooden cradle from the perils of the night, crowed and smiled.
He was black as the ace of spades, you see, And scarcely as high as a tall man's knee; He wore a hat that was minus a brim, But that, of course, mattered nothing to him; His jacket--or what there was left of it-- _Scorned_ his little black shoulders to fit; And as for stockings and shoes, dear me! Nothing about such things knew he.