Princess and the Puppy

Princess and the Puppy

Way across the sea, many years ago there was a princess named Falana. She was as pretty as a princess ought to be, but she was very selfish. Princess Falana was unhappy because she was so lonesome, and so she sat in the garden all day looking sad.

Her father, the king, loved Falana very much and wanted to make her happy. (Fathers are like that, you know). First he tried to find her a playmate, but no child in the whole kingdom wanted to come to the palace to play with the selfish princess.

The king decided to find a pet for Falana to play with. He looked for a bird-pet, but every bird he brought to Falana flew away and she became even sadder. Then he brought a little kitten for Falana to play with, but the kitten climbed a tree and would not come down. The next pet the king brought to Falana was a little puppy. The little puppy could not fly away, and could not climb a tree, so he stayed with Falana all the time.

Falana was happy now because she was not lonesome any more. She loved the puppy and played with him all the time. But, because Falana was so selfish, she didn’t take very good care of her puppy, and one day he got sick. Falana was worried about her puppy and wanted to help him. She asked the king what she should do. The king couldn’t tell her what to do because he had never had a puppy.

Then she asked the cook what she should do. The cook didn’t know the answer either, but she had an idea. She told Princess Falana to send the puppy to the village to stay with the doctor for awhile, so the doctor could help him. Selfish Falana didn’t want to send her puppy away, but the puppy kept getting weaker and weaker. Falana knew that if she didn’t do something soon her puppy would die, so she agreed to send the puppy to stay with the doctor.

Now this doctor was a very wise man and he told Falana that the way to make her puppy well was to do a good deed every day for three weeks, without telling anyone what she had done. The doctor knew that the puppy would get well with a little medicine, but he didn’t tell that to Falana. (Doctors are like that sometimes). What a new idea for the selfish princess – she had never done a good deed in her life. But she loved her puppy and wanted him to get well so she went out to the village every day to do a good deed.

As Falana walked around wondering what to do, she saw an old lady carrying a heavy load of laundry and offered to help her carry it. It was heavy and so much work that Falana was surprised how good she felt when she was finished.

The next day, Falana saw a man trying to fix the wheel on his cart. He couldn’t hold the cart up and put the wheel in place at the same time. Falana said that she would put the wheel in place if he would hold the cart, and it worked just fine. She felt very proud that she had been so helpful, and the man gave her a free ride on his cart.
The third day, the princess saw a little girl walking on the road with no shoes. The sun was hot and the stones on the road were burning the little girl’s feet. Falana sat down, took off her own shoes and gave them to the little girl. Now Falana’s feet were getting burned, but it didn’t seem to matter because she felt good inside.

Thus it went for three weeks and every day Falana did a good deed, and never said a word to anyone about what she was doing. The funny thing is, Falana was becoming happier every day, and people were so friendly she was no longer lonesome, and guess what – she had learned to be UNSELFISH.

Finally the three weeks were ended, and the doctor sent the puppy back to the princess. The princess was happy, the puppy was happy, and the king was happy too. But he never did figure out what had happened to make the princess change so much.
The End