Now the moment the Princess opened her eyes every one and everything in the palace began to awake too. The King and Queen walked with stately tread through the hail, the cook gave the scullion a sounding box on his ear. The scullion roared with his mouth wide open, the horses went on eating their corn, the pigeons strutted about on the roof, the flies walked busily up and down the ceiling.
And the great hedge of briar-roses sank down and down till it vanished in the earth, and not even a bud was left.
‘But what does it matter if the roses are gone ?’ said the Prince, ‘since I have got my own Briar-Rose, who is fairest of them all.’
And so they were married and lived happily ever after.
