Tell me, Brother, what have they done ?" "When Ruggedo first captured me I was very handsome.

Don't you remember, Shaggy ?" "Not very well, Brother; you were so young when I left home.

But I remember that mother thought you were beautiful." "She was right! I am sure she was right," wailed the prisoner.

"But Ruggedo wanted to injure me--to make me ugly in the eyes of all the world--so he performed a wicked enchantment.

I went to bed beautiful--or you might say handsome--to be very modest I will merely claim that I was good-looking--and I wakened the next morning the homeliest man in all the world! I am so repulsive that when I look in a mirror I frighten myself." "Poor Brother!" said Shaggy softly, and all the others were silent from sympathy.
"I was so ashamed of my looks," continued the voice of Shaggy's brother, "that I tried to hide; but the cruel King Ruggedo forced me to appear before all the legion of nomes, to whom he said: 'Behold the Ugly One!' But when the nomes saw my face they all fell to laughing and jeering, which prevented them from working at their tasks.