The Princess and the Pea by Hans Christian Andersen

None but a real Princess could have had such a delicate sense of feeling. Now it was plain that the lady must be a real Princess, since she had been able to feel the three little peas through the twenty mattresses and twenty feather beds. I do not know what was in my bed, but I had something hard under me, and am all over black and blue.

“I have scarcely closed my eyes the whole night through. The next morning she was asked how she had slept. Upon this bed the Princess was to pass the night. She then laid twenty mattresses one upon another over the three peas, and put twenty feather beds over the mattresses. “Ah! we shall soon see that!” thought the old Queen-mother however, she said not a word of what she was going to do but went quietly into the bedroom, took all the bed-clothes off the bed, and put three little peas on the bedstead. What with the rain and the wind, she was in a sad condition the water trickled down from her hair, and her clothes clung to her body. It was a Princess who was standing outside the door. All at once there was heard a violent knocking at the door, and the old King, the Prince’s father, went out himself to open it. One evening a fearful tempest arose, it thundered and lightened, and the rain poured down from the sky in torrents: besides, it was as dark as pitch. At last he returned to his palace quite cast down, because he wished so much to have a real Princess for his wife. Princesses he found in plenty but whether they were real Princesses it was impossible for him to decide, for now one thing, now another, seemed to him not quite right about the ladies. He travelled all over the world in hopes of finding such a lady but there was always something wrong. There was once a Prince who wished to marry a Princess but then she must be a real Princess.

The Princess and the Pea by Hans Christian Andersen