So I lived my life alone, without anyone that I could really talk to, until I had an accident with my plane in the Desert of Sahara, six years ago. Something was broken in my engine. And as I had with me neither a mechanic nor any passengers, I set myself to attempt the difficult repairs all alone. It was a question of life or death for me: I had scarcely enough drinking water to last a week.

The first night, then, I went to sleep on the sand, a thousand miles from any human habitation. I was more isolated than a shipwrecked sailor on a raft in the middle of the ocean. Thus you can imagine my amazement, at sunrise, when I was awakened by an odd little voice. It said:

“If you please—draw me a sheep!”

“What!”

“Draw me a sheep!”

I jumped to my feet, completely thunderstruck. I blinked my eyes hard. I looked carefully all around me. And I saw a most extraordinary small person, who stood there examining me with great seriousness. Here you may see the best portrait that, later, I was able to make of him. But my drawing is certainly very much less charming than its model.

That, however, is not my fault. The grown-ups discouraged me in my painter's career when I was six years old, and I never learned to draw anything, except boas from the outside and boas from the inside.

Now I stared at this sudden apparition with my eyes fairly starting out of my head in astonishment. Remember, I had crashed in the desert a thousand miles from any inhabited region. And yet my little man seemed neither to be straying uncertainly among the sands, nor to be fainting from fatigue or hunger or thirst or fear. Nothing about him gave any suggestion of a child lost in the middle of the desert, a thousand miles from any human habitation. When at last I was able to speak, I said to him: “But—what are you doing here?”

And in answer he repeated, very slowly, as if he were speaking of a matter of great consequence: “If you please—draw me a sheep…”

When a mystery is too overpowering, one dare not disobey. Absurd as it might seem to me, a thousand miles from any human habitation and in danger of death, I took out of my pocket a sheet of paper and my fountain-pen. But then I remembered how my studies had been concentrated on geography, history, arithmetic, and grammar, and I told the little chap (a little crossly, too) that I did not know how to draw. He answered me:“That doesn't matter. Draw me a sheep…”

But I had never drawn a sheep. So I drew for him one of the two pictures I had drawn so often. It was that of the boa constrictor from the outside. And I was astounded to hear the little fellow greet it with, “No, no, no! I do not want an elephant inside a boa constrictor. A boa constrictor is a very dangerous creature, and an elephant is very cumbersome. Where I live, everything is very small. What I need is a sheep. Draw me a sheep.”

So then I made a drawing.

He looked at it carefully, then he said: “No. This sheep is already very sickly. Make me another.”

So I made another drawing.

My friend smiled gently and indulgently. “You see yourself,” he said, “that this is not a sheep. This is a ram. It has horns.”

So then I did my drawing over once more.

But it was rejected too, just like the others. “This one is too old. I want a sheep that will live a long time.”

By this time my patience was exhausted, because I was in a hurry to start taking my engine apart. So I tossed off this drawing.

And I threw out an explanation with it.

“This is only his box. The sheep you asked for is inside.”

I was very surprised to see a light break over the face of my young judge:

“That is exactly the way I wanted it! Do you think that this sheep will have to have a great deal of grass?”

“Why?”

“Because where I live everything is very small…”

“There will surely be enough grass for him,” I said. “It is a very small sheep that I have given you.”

He bent his head over the drawing:

“Not so small that—Look! He has gone to sleep…”

And that is how I made the acquaintance of the little prince.

我就這么孤獨地活著，沒有遇到過一位我能推心置腹交談的成年人。直到六年前，我的飛機在撒哈拉沙漠發生故障，發動機里不知什么零件壞了。飛機上既沒有機械師，也沒有乘客。我只得單槍匹馬，自己試著進行修理。對我來說，這是一個生死存亡的大考驗。飛機上攜帶的飲用水很有限，只能維持一個星期。

第一天夜晚，我睡在遠離人煙的沙漠里。我比一個漂浮在海面上的遇難者更為孤立無援。可是在太陽升起的時候，有一個奇特而輕微的聲音把我弄醒了。請你們設想一下，當時我是感到多么驚奇。那聲音對我說：

“請你……請你給我畫一只綿羊吧！”

“什么！”

“請給我畫一只綿羊。”

我一下子跳了起來，就像被雷電擊中了似的。我使勁揉揉眼睛，仔細察看四周。我看見了一個非常奇特的小男孩，他正認真地瞧著我。請看，下面就是我后來給他畫得最好的一幅肖像。

當然，我畫的遠不如他本人那么生動。這可不是我的過錯。早在我六歲時，那些大人就斷送了我當畫家的前程，所以，除了蟒蛇整體圖與蟒蛇剖面圖以外，我不會畫任何別的東西了。

我非常驚奇，把眼睛睜得大大的，盯著這顯形的神童。請你們不要忘記，那時我正遠離有人居住的地方十萬八千里，而我眼前這個小人兒，看來并不像是迷了路，他不疲憊，不饑，不渴，也不認生害怕。他絲毫不像一個在荒涼可怕的沙漠中迷了路的小孩。當我定下神來能夠說話時，就對他說：“怎么回事……你在這兒干什么呀？”

他用輕柔的聲音，依然重復著他那個要求：“請你……給我畫一只綿羊。”

神奇奧秘的東西一旦使你感到震驚，你就不敢違抗，盡管當時我覺得自己身陷渺無人跡且有生命危險的地方，遇上此事甚為荒唐可笑，我還是從自己衣袋里拿出一張紙和一支鋼筆。不過，我想起了我過去專攻的課程是地理、歷史、數學和語文，而不是繪畫，就帶點遺憾的心情對那小人兒說，我是不會畫圖畫的。他回答說：“這不礙事。請你只畫一只綿羊。”

因為我從來沒有畫過綿羊，就把我僅僅會畫的那兩幅畫中的一幅，重新畫了出來交給他，也就是那幅蟒蛇整體圖。他的答復使我特別驚訝，他說：“不！不！我不要一頭在蟒蛇肚子里的大象。一條蟒蛇太可怕，一頭大象太龐大、太擁擠。我家里非常狹小，我需要的是一只綿羊。給我畫一只綿羊吧！”

我只好給他畫了一只。

他仔細認真地端詳之后，說：“不行，這只羊已經病病歪歪的了，再給我畫一只！”

我又畫了一只。

我的這位小朋友和善地笑了，他寬宏大量地說：“你瞧……你畫的不是一只綿羊，而是一只公羊，它有角……”

于是，我又重新畫了一只。

但是，這只又遭到了他的否定，就像上兩只一樣。“這一只羊太老了。我要一只能活得很久很久的綿羊。”

一畫再畫，我實在是不耐煩了，因為我急于去修理飛機發動機。

于是，我隨便涂抹了一幅，扔給了他：

“畫上是一只箱子，你要的那只綿羊就在箱子里。”

可是，我的這位小小裁判官卻笑逐顏開了，這真使我感到意外。他對我說：

“這正是我想要的！你說說，這只綿羊要吃很多很多草嗎？”

“你問這干什么？”

“因為我家里很狹小……”

“箱子里的草肯定夠它吃，我給你畫的是一只特小的綿羊。”

他低下頭去看看那張圖畫，說：

“也不是那么小呀……瞧！它在箱子里睡著了……”

我就是這么認識小王子的。