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THE GIRL WITH A
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THE VENETIAN PARTY
THAT night there was a small evening party in the palace gardens. The avenues of white sand were lined with motionless fireflies, wide-eyed like torches serving as lamps. In the pond, little serenading frogs coaxed the "Moonlight Nocturne", accompanied by the cries of thousands of little crickets. The prince walked around the garden in the company of the little girl and then invited her for a gondola ride. Off they went in a gondola made of mother-of-pearl, rowed by twelve seahorses.
They sailed over the water, lulled by the beautiful verses that a poet dragonfly recited to the sound of a tiny harp played by Master Mantis.
