HID HW 273H 7 FAIR Bok WILLIAM ANDREWS KE 651 93 200 ruego SHELF... ACCESSIONS... THE BOSTON-LIBRARY SOCIETY. || ORGANIZED 1792. INCORPORATED 1794. 8BQXLSTON. PLACE. 114, NEWBURY STREET, CANCELLED Added Feb 3, 1899.. 1940 To be returned in five weeks. A fine of one cent will be incurred for each day this volume is detained beyond that time. 2 Sa - 作 ​, 。 格 ​ THE NEW FAIRY BOOK. CCCC 11 30 MY INTERVIEW WITH THE KING. (Gerald, skö Gentle Giant.) i cutive WILLIA: . Let's : -výstr. HULL: -, 'E'VS & CO., THE HULL PRESS. WI: LON WARSHALL, HAMILTON, KERT, AND CO., LTD. 1895 1721"?????*^, ???? Y the HIW HIM! A 22 THE NEW FAIRY BOOK. EDITED BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S., Author of “ Bygone England,” etc. HULL: WILLIAM ANDREWS & CO., THE HULL PRESS. LONDON : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT, AND CO., LTD. 1895. KE OSI MARVARD COLLEGE Eet, 8, 1940, LIBRARY HULL: PRINTED BY WILLIAM ANDREWS AND CO., THE HULL PRESS. Introduction. M In the following pages it has been my desire to furnish a fresh collection of fairy stories, written by authors who love children, and know the kind of tales that give them pleasure. Something more than providing enjoyment is attempted. It is hoped that some useful life lessons may be learnt from this book. It may not be out of place to here state that the tales, before printing, have been read to some of my young friends, and have been much appreciated, and now they are brought together in book-form INTRODUCTION. and submitted to a larger audience, I hope they will not fail to win a hearty welcome. In conclusion, I beg to thank my contributors for their kind assistance with pen and pencil. The happy relationship I have had with them will always remain a pleasant memory, and I am hopeful their efforts will not fail to interest my readers, and merit the approbation of the critical press. WILLIAM ANDREWS. THE HULL Press, October 30th, 1894. Contents. PRINCESS BEAUTY - - - - - - - LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE - CINDERINA AND THE ELVES PRINCE FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN . THE TWO PALACES - - - - - . THE POEM OF LIFE THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN THE POEM OF LIFE . . . THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB - - THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA - - LORD HARRY'S GHOST . - . .. WHAT THE ICE-KING SAW AND DID . THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE - THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT . - BROTHER BENEDICT'S BUNS . - . - - - Princess Beauty. ANCE upon a time, in the days which we all love to read and hear about, when mighty kings and beautiful queens reigned over vast and powerful kingdoms, and wore golden crowns studded with brilliant gems upon their Aowing locks, whilst their magnificent robes of velvet and ermine swept the marble floors of their stately palaces ; in those days when beautiful young princesses, with hair of dazzling gold reaching to their knees, won the love of gallant princes who would dare the vengeance of wicked giants, and the fury of fiery dragons, for the sake of their lady loves; when fairy godmothers never wearied in their task of surrounding their loved ones with every happiness and blessing which they could think of, and thought no present too rich PRINCESS BEAUTY. as or splendid to bestow on those whom they took under their special care; in those days when people prospered, and content reigned throughout the land ; in those glorious day of old, there lived a noble young princess called Beauty. She was not christened by this name, but it was the pet name the loving subjects of her father, King Light-heart, bestowed upon her. You see, it was thought necessary to put the baby princess under the protection of some kind and gentle lady, who would always guard her godchild's happiness, and so King Light-heart chose as his daughter's godmother, the Lady Ermentrude Wilhelmina, and, in order to please the old lady more, called the princess after her. But, however grand and powerful a princess may afterwards be, she cannot help being a baby to commence with, and I am sure Ermentrude Wilhelmina is much too grand and long a name for a sweet, tiny baby princess. And this is just what the people of the land thought. The princess's christening was a grand and solemn affair. All the nobility of the land was there. His Grace the Grand Duke brought her Grace the Grand Duchess, my lord the Earl brought my lady the Countess, and the knights PRINCESS BEAUTY. and squires all brought their dames. The most magnificent person present, however, was the godmother, the Lady Ermentrude Wilhelmina. She wore a long robe of purple velvet, and leaned on a high gold stick. Behind her walked a handsome page-boy, who carried the christening present, an enormous branch of pink coral; from the end of each little point there hung a tiny silver bell ; I should think there were quite a hundred of these bells, and they jingled so sweetly that the princess crowed with delight, and showed her first little pearly tooth in such a winning, pretty way that even the gruff and high and mighty Grand Duke talked baby-talk to her. The page-boy was so overcome when his Grace said “Did ums, was ums!” and shook so in his efforts not to burst out laughing, that the bells jingled all the more merrily, and baby's excitement rose to such a high pitch that the clergyman was obliged to sternly ask for silence, and glared at the Grand Duke as though he were a naughty school-boy. A petition had been sent to the king and queen, that after the grand christening the commoner people of the land should be allowed to see the princess, and judge for themselves whether they PRINCESS BEAUTY. thought the name suitable. Besides, they had heard so much about her prettiness that they were eager to see her, for in that country none but beautiful, sweet, and loveable princesses were allowed to reign. The king and queen gave their gracious permission to the request of their faithful subjects, and so, after the christening, Princess Ermentrude Wilhelmina, arrayed in her long flowing robes of purest white, and sitting in her nurse's lap, held her first grand reception. Queens and princesses hold receptions now-a-days, but only the grandest in the land may kiss the royal hand. However, in those days no subject was too poor or too humble to pay their respects to their sovereign. You can tell, therefore, what crowds flocked into the city to see their princess. Everybody made holiday. Swings and Aunt Sallies were put up, whilst the sweet stalls drove a roaring trade, and there was not a boy in all that city who did not manage to hit a cocoanut with one of the wooden balls that day. The soldiers had their work set, I can tell you, to keep order amongst the light-hearted people. That was only outside the palace gates, however, for it was wonderful to see how gentle and respectful the Tas PRINCESS BEAUTY. LO ) amuse people were when once in the presence of the baby princess. All the preparations in her honour, and all the kind faces around her, so amused the princess, that she crowed right graciously, and smiled with such royal grace, that everyone was enchanted, and swore she was a true princess, and worthy to succeed the king and queen, her royal father and mother. To show the exceeding love they bore her, they declared that she should be called Princess Beauty, and should only be known on very state occasions by the stiff and dignified name of Princess Ermentrude Wilhelmina. The affection and adoration which the people showed Princess Beauty that day, lasted throughout her life. “But why do we love her so much ?” they would say. “It is not only because she is so fair to look upon. Queen Proudface was beautiful as a goddess and graceful as a fairy, yet we sent her away because she was cold and haughty. No, it is not her beautiful face, but her sweet and winning ways that bind us so closely to her.” Princess Beauty never seemed at any time to be angry or sulky. When quite a little child, she never thought of herself first, but always of those PRINCESS BEAUTY. she loved, and she loved everybody. When the queen would send up to the nursery to say visitors had come, and would nurse bring down Princess Beauty, she would leave her dolls or her fairy tale, and would let nurse put on a clean pinafore and sash, and brush her golden hair, without showing any temper. Then when she entered the drawing-room, the visitors would all exclaim, “What a sweet, sunny child !” and when Beauty saw her mother's proud face, she would feel amply rewarded for leaving her toys. The land over which King Light-heart ruled was a very fair realm, and the capital, that is the chief town in his kingdom, was still more beautiful. Stately palaces of pure white marble glistened in the sun like rarest jewels ; soft, velvety parks, where the deer loved to browse, stretched far and wide ; old leafy trees formed a welcome shelter from the fierce rays of the mid-day sun; the broad streets were always busy and gay; the shops and bazaars were full of all the most beautiful things imaginable, rich silks and velvets of every hue and description, costly jewels, curious ivory boxes, fans and cases, in fact everything that most delights the eye was to be bought. Dotted here and there through the city were fountains, which PRINCESS BEAUTY. threw up jets of water like diamond sprays flashing in the sun ; beautiful statues gleamed through the trees. At night, myriads of fairy lights hung in the trees, and, as they were of every colour, orange, red, blue, green, yellow, purple, etc., one could almost imagine one lived in fairyland. In fact, so happy and content were the people, that I am almost tempted to believe it was fairyland after all. Whether it was or not I can't say, but I know that nowhere else did the sun shine so brightly, the birds sing so merrily, the fruit seem so abundant and delicious, the people so rich and prosperous, the king and queen so good and thoughtful and anxious for the well-being of their subjects, as in that fair land. Princess Beauty was one day out walking in the park. The nurse had met a friend, and the two were busily talking, either about the queen and the duchess, their respective mistresses, or about their charges, or arranging an appointment for their next evening out, or exchanging their opinions on the splendid uniform and military bearing of the soldiers who were drilling on the grass. Whatever they were saying, however, it did not interest Princess Beauty, who began looking about her, first at the carriages and PRINCESS BEAUTY. horses, then at the trees, swaying in the breeze, then she followed the course of a beautiful butterfly, as it chased a fluttering leaf. Tired of this, she gazed at the people passing. · Her attention was at length caught by a little boy, standing on the kerbstone, offering matches to the passers-by. She noticed that as each fashionably dressed person refused to buy, and would perhaps push the boy aside, a sad, wistful look crept into the boy's eyes, but would speedily give place to an eager, hopeful expression as another person approached. Ten times, whilst she looked, was he disappointed, till at length little Beauty's heart was ready to break with disappointment too. She stole up to the boy, and putting her tiny hand sympathetically into his, she said softly : “ I'm so sorry!" The boy turned his dark eyes on the little face upturned to his. His lip trembled, so touched was he by her kind tone. “Nobody speaks like that to me now, but once I never heard any but soft, gentle voices.” Here the poor little fellow could get no further, and he burst into tears. “ Tell me all about it,” whispered Beauty. “I live with an old woman called Dame PRINCESS BEAUTY. Tantrum ; I don't know who she is, or how I came to live with her, I only know she hates me, and can never make me miserable enough. She never gives me plenty to eat, and what I do have is seldom anything but dry bread. I sleep on straw in a corner of the room at night, and all day Dame Tantrum sends me out to sell matches, and if I do not bring home plenty of pennies, she beats me, and sends me to bed without any supper. What makes it all the harder is that she does not need my pennies, for she always has dainty things to eat, and sleeps on a beautiful soft bed.” “ Your Royal Highness must not speak to dirty little street boys,” here put in nurse, who had now finished her conversation with the duchess's nurse, and had time to notice what her usually good and quiet little charge was doing. "I wonder what Her Majesty, your mamma, would say. Come, come along.” Princess Beauty stopped to shake hands with the match-boy. “I will come and see you again soon,” she said, with the winning, sunny smile that made all the people love her so. Beauty walked along quietly by her nurse's side. At any other time she would have stopped IO PRINCESS BEAUTY. 10 to pick an unusually bright flower, or have chased a darting butterfly, and all the time would have kept up a constant stream of prattle ; asking such unheard-of questions, that nurse would be puzzled to answer, and so with a very wise shake of the head, advise the little princess to wait till she grew up, which is never a very satisfactory way of answering questions. To-day, however, nurse was delighted with Beauty's silence, and, as they approached the gates of the palace, told her that she had behaved like a princess should. But Beauty was not thinking of behaving as a princess ought. No, her brain was far too busy trying to think how best she could help the poor little match-boy. Now, to whom do children go when they want advice in their troubles? I think we all know that. They do not go to nurse, for however kind she is, she does not quite understand. They do not go to father, for he is generally too busy. It is to mother they all go. To mother when they cut their fingers, or bruise their knees, or have done something naughty, or are puzzled by something which they want to do, but do not quite know how to set about it. So as soon as Beauty entered the palace she PRINCESS BEAUTY. II slipped quietly away from nurse, and ran to Queen Loveall, as she sat in the drawing-room with some fancy work in her hand. “Mother, dear, let's be cosy,” said Beauty, nestling in her mother's arms. “When my little girl comes for a cosy talk, I know there is something serious to be told, so tell me all about it, dear, and we will see what can be done.” Then Princess Beauty told Queen Loveall the whole story of the match-boy. “And that is why you look so sad," said the queen, kissing her daughter tenderly. “ Yes, I am so sad because I am happy while other people have no kind father and mother, no beautiful home, no nice clothes to wear, no good food to eat. Fancy being always, always hungry! I don't think I have ever been really hungry. Then everybody is so good and kind to me, while that little boy is hated by the old woman, who ill-treats him so.” “Beauty must not be unhappy because others are miserable,” said the queen. “You must think how best to help them.” “Yes,” answered Beauty, “ I've been thinking about that, and I want to give that little boy 12 PRINCESS BEAUTY. my dinner to-day, so that he may not be so hungry." “But then,” said the queen, “you would be hungry, and I could not allow that.” Beauty's face fell, and the tears stood in her eyes. The queen, seeing her distress, kissed the anxious little face, and then said, whilst gently stroking the princess's long golden hair : “I have thought of a good plan, dear. It means a little self-denial, so if you think it too hard, you must say so. I only want to know how far my little girl wants to do good. Now this is what I propose. You have bread and milk for breakfast, don't you?” “Yes.” “And nurse sprinkles sugar on it, doesn't she ?” “ Yes.” “And you have sugar with your pudding at dinner?” “ Yes,” again answered Beauty. “Is the sugar necessary ?" said the queen. “No, it makes the bread and milk and pudding nicer though,” said Beauty thoughtfully. “If you did not eat this sugar, which is not quite necessary, you might save a penny a day, I should think." PRINCESS BEAUTY. 13 Then the queen paused and looked at her little daughter. “Do all children have sugar with their bread and milk?" at last asked Beauty slowly. "Oh no! you have sugar because you are a princess.” Beauty's face broke into a sunny smile. “Then it is a lovely idea, mother, for I want to give him something of my own, and what I earn will be, won't it? Papa would give me pennies whenever I asked, but then that would be his present, not mine, and I want to give poor Matchie something of my own.” If Beauty had been a bright, sweet, jolly little princess before, I really don't know how to describe her now. The feeling that she had it in her power to make some one happier, made her happier too, and she was like a frolicsome sunbeam in the palace. Her merry laugh was a much pleasanter sound than the silver bells of her godmother's fine present; everyone who heard it laughed too, and the stiff and grand Grand Duke would steal from the council chamber where state matters of great importance were being discussed, and, creeping up to the nursery, would go on his hands and feet and growl like a surly old bear, 14 PRINCESS BEAUTY. whom indeed on all other occasions he greatly resembled without being obliged to go on his hands and feet, and chase Beauty round the nursery, much to her delight. The duke's growls and the princess's shrieks of laughter would bring the king and all the courtiers from the council chamber, and then the nursery was turned into a regular menagerie. The king would imitate a lion, someone else a tiger, this courtier would bark like a dog, that one-crow like a cock. The queen and her maids of honour, hearing the uproar, would come up too, and the proceedings would wax merrier than ever, for with so many beautiful, charming ladies, the courtiers all felt put on their mettle, and growled and roared, barked and crowed, brayed and neighed, baa'd and maa’d, and in fact proved themselves the jolly good fellows they were. Then a game of blind man's buff would be suggested by a maid of honour to amuse the princess, and I am not so sure but more than the princess were amused; at any rate the exercise would make the maids of honour look very pretty and rosy, and smiling and laughing. Every day before going out for her walk, Princess Beauty would receive from the queen the penny which she had earned. When once used PRINCESS BEAUTY. 15 to it, the bread and milk was quite, or very nearly, as nice without the sprinkling of sugar. Then what a pleasure it was to be able to say "Yes!” when the queen would say, “You've earned another penny, Beauty ?” and to see the glad pleased smile of her mother, and to know that she thought her unselfish and good. "Well, your Royal Highness, where shall we go to-day ?” nurse would say, when Beauty joined her in the hall with her penny, and Beauty would always answer, “ To see Matchie first.” This was the name the princess had bestowed upon her little friend. So satisfied were they both with it that it never struck Beauty to ask his real name, or the match-boy to tell it. And how Matchie looked out for his “fairy princess ” as he called her! He had never been so happy as now, for he knew he had some one to sympathise with him in all his troubles. When Dame Tantrum was more cross than usual, and would send him to bed without any supper, he would comfort his sad little heart by the thought of how sorry Princess Beauty would be to hear of his troubles, and how her soft little hand would steal into his. When he started in the morning he would dance along the pavement to his SC 16 PRINCESS BEAUTY. accustomed corner, whistling joyfully, for soon he knew his princess would also come that way. As he stood holding out his matches to the passers by, so bright and happy did he look, that people would stare in astonishment that such a ragged, thin little piece of humanity could smile so radiantly. Ah! they did not know his secret, the grand secret that had changed his sad life, as the bright sun chases away the dull, leaden clouds, and leaves the sky blue and clear. How astonished they would have been had they known that the only person who loved that ragged little match-boy was the princess of the land, that the only one who ever spoke kindly to him was the beloved Princess Beauty. If Matchie's face turned once to gaze down the long avenue, I should think it did one hundred times, during the course of the morning, to see if Princess Beauty were coming. Then at length a dainty little girl with long, golden, curly hair, eyes of deepest blue, and lovely dimpling face, would appear dancing down the broad avenue across the park, singing in her clear, childish voice, or chattering and laughing merrily with her nurse. When she reached the match-boy, “Well, Matchie,” she would say, “have you sold many PRINCESS BEAUTY. matches ? No, I see you have not. Here is my penny, and look, mamma has sent you this nice piece of cake for your lunch. I hope the old woman is not in her tantrums to-day.” THE PRINCESS AND MATCHIE. Then Matchie would tell his experiences of the night before, but somehow his troubles never seemed so bad when the princess was by. 18 PRINCESS BEAUTY. . But then, when Princess Beauty skipped away once more, how all the joy disappeared from his face. The sun no longer seemed to shine so brightly, nor the birds to sing so sweetly. The people no longer noticed his merry face, but thought he was the ordinary sad little match-boy. Then he would remember the cake and penny in his hand, and he would kiss them tenderly. It seemed wicked to him to eat the cake which she had held, and he used to keep it as long as ever his hunger would allow him. As for the penny, how he hated to put it into the grasping, greedy hand of the old woman, Dame Tantrum. He used to be sorely tempted to let it lie snugly in his pocket, but his sense of honour never allowed the temptation to triumph, and he always gave it up. Now, it happened that one day the princess's nurse had a holiday, as she wanted very much to visit her mother who lived in the country, and was very old and ill. So ill was she in fact that for many years she had never left her bed, and the only pleasure she ever had was seeing her daughter, and hearing of all the grand things which happened in the palace. The queen, who was good-hearted, and always considered the happiness PRINCESS BEAUTY. 19 of servants as well as the maids of honour and great ladies who surrounded her, used to let the nurse have a holiday as often as possible to visit her mother, who had nursed the queen when she was a little girl. On these occasions the queen, who was very simple in her habits, and liked to imitate humbler mothers, would herself take her little daughter for a run in the park, and would race and scamper with Beauty, that is, if no one were looking, for of course it would not do for a queen to be seen skipping about like a young girl. They generally chose a very quiet corner of the park, where no one would disturb them, but this time Beauty was eager to take her mother to see Matchie, and the queen good-naturedly consented. Queen Loveall was much struck by the handsome, dark face of the poor match-boy, and asked him many questions about himself, which he answered frankly and clearly. “And what is your name, my boy?" said the queen. “Her Royal Highness always calls you Matchie, but of course you have a proper one.' “ Yes, your Majesty, my name is Rufred.” “Rufred? That is a fine name, and somehow seems to me familiar.” 20 PRINCESS BEAUTY. Then after a few more kind words, the queen and princess said good-bye. “Mamma,” said Beauty, as they walked along, "don't you think we might do something more for Matchie ? It does seem a pity that he should live with that cross Dame Tantrum when he is so gentle and sweet himself.” “Yes, my dear,” answered Queen Loveall. “I must see what papa says. I am sure he will be able to do something for him.” So that night when the king and queen were enjoying a pleasant chat together after everyone else had gone to bed, Queen Loveall told her husband the whole story of the little match-boy. “And do you know,” she ended by saying, “his name, which is very uncommon, sounds quite familiar to me. Can I have heard it anywhere else ?" The king thought deeply for a few minutes, then a bright idea seemed to strike him. “Why," he exclaimed, joyously embracing the queen, “why, my love, I do believe that between you two, you have discovered the long-lost son of oor King Sadman.” hapſing Sadman, I must tell you, was king over good-hıntry next to King Light-heart's, and was PRINCESS BEAUTY. . 21 quite as powerful and mighty a monarch. All his greatness, however, did not please him nor satisfy him. One great sorrow had crushed his whole Juliullinattiluriயாயாயாய 08 umu Kuum >>> www.cena VWR de KING SADMAN. life, and made him a gloomy, wretched creature. So miserable was he, that for ten years he had never been seen to smile, although his subjects did everything in their power to make him. 22 PRINCESS BEAUTY. W Organs were always grinding outside his palace windows, and the monkeys who accompanied the organs were put through their funniest tricks, but King Sadman smiled not. The jester never wearied in making jokes, at which the courtiers fairly roared with laughter, but King Sadman never moved a muscle. Clowns, actors, ven- triloquists, conjurors, singers, dancers, were encouraged to show off before the king, but no one ever succeeded in amusing him. So anxious were the courtiers to amuse him, that the city was always making holiday, and laughing and cheering. So gay were the people for their king's sake that strangers were always flocking into the city to share in the merriment, but nothing had any effect on King Sadman. The cause of King Sadman's sadness was in this way. When he was a young man he married a princess whose loveliness had never been equalled, and never were people happier than these two. A beautiful, dark-eyed prince was born, and every- thing looked bright and prosperous, when one sad day the queen died. King Sadman's heart would have been broken had it not been for the baby prince, whose laughter cheered the king as nothing else could have done. PRINCESS BEAUTY. 23 Now there lived in that city a wicked old witch who was never happy unless doing evil to somebody. So many people had she injured that at length the people asked the king to punish her, and so the king ordered that she should be locked up. She was therefore shut up in a dark cell, with a jailer to keep watch over her. But one night when the jailer had fallen asleep, worn out by listening to her savage screams, the witch managed to escape. That same night the king's son, Prince Rufred, was stolen from his cradle, and was never heard of again. It was always supposed that the witch had carried him off, and perhaps killed him. And this is why poor King Sadman never smiled nor seemed happy; he was always thinking of his dead wife and lost son. One night a grand ball was held in King Sadman's palace. Lovely ladies and noble knights were dancing in the lofty hall, and King Sadman was sitting on his throne, gazing sadly on the gay scene, and thinking of the days when his young queen was the fairest lady at any ball. Suddenly the music ceased, and everyone turned to the door to see who was coming. The PRINCESS BEAUTY. chamberlain announced in a loud voice, “A Herald from King Light-heart.” King Sadman called the Herald to him, and received from his hand a letter, which he opened and read. As he read, his courtiers were astounded to perceive that their king's melancholy seemed to vanish, and over his face there spread an expression of great joy. The courtiers pressed forward to hear the good news, for they knew that it must be something very good to so move King Sadman. The king rose joyfully from his throne. “Rejoice with me, good people! King Light- heart thinks he has found my long-lost son! If this is true, once more life will be full of pleasures for me; if not, ah! I cannot, will not, believe that so cruel a disappointment is in store for me.” The courtiers were as pleased as King Sadman, and made haste to prepare for the journey to King Light-heart's palace. When they arrived there, the next evening, King Sadman begged to be taken at once to his son, and so the two kings set off alone for the witch's house. The old witch was seated crooning over the fire, and gazing now and again into the depths of a cauldron, in which she was stewing some dainty morsel for her supper. Little Rufred lay asleep a C PRINCESS BEAUTY. 25 on the floor, his handsome face looking pale and worn, his dark curly hair untidy and neglected, his clothes in rags. When the witch recognised King Sadman, she uttered a scream of terror, and rushed from the room. As no one ever heard of her again, it was supposed that she died of cold, by running out into the night air without her shawl and goloshes, and that the big fierce black cat which always followed her, buried her with the feathers of the dear little birds he had killed. The joy of Sadman was great at once more finding his son, and he could not sufficiently thank the king. “But my little daughter, Princess Beauty, is the one you must thank,” said Lightheart, laughing, and then he told King Sadman the whole story. Sadman was charmed at Beauty's kindness, and when they returned to the palace he presented her with magnificent jewels. But the presents did not please the little princess half so much as the thought that Prince Rufred's happiness was due to her. When Rufred was dressed in princely garments he looked so handsome and gallant that Beauty was prouder of him than ever, and the two were never so happy as when together. 26 PRINCESS BEAUTY. So fond of each other did they become, in fact, that when they were older they married, and never was there a happier couple than King Rufred and Queen Beauty. What made them so very happy was that they never wearied in trying to make others as happy as they were themselves, and I think they succeeded, for all their subjects seemed cheerful and contented, and the rich, copying the king and queen, always helped the poor, so that throughout that vast land there was no misery or wretchedness, but content and plenty reigned everywhere. EVELYN INGLEBY. 2.0 LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. very poor, and could not easily afford another pitcher, she covered her face with her little brown hands, and all her sunny curling hair fell over her eyes. Now, just above the well grew a large bunch of foxeyes, and peeping from amongst the sweet pink flowers was a little lady clad in a lily leaf gown, on her head was a buttercup, and in her tiny hand she held a wand of fairy-grass. As she watched Lovelocks weeping, she slowly waved her wand to and fro, and from out every fern-frond and dog-daisy, wild-rose and ox-tongue, stepped forth curious little people, all clothed in flower petals and leaves; more and more they came, until the grassy bank above the well and the stone rim were crowded. Then said the queen, who wore the buttercup crown, “This good child has happened a misfortune, she is an orphan, and lives with her grandmother, who is very poor. What shall we do for her ?” One little man, who had on an oak-leaf mantle, said, “This is the child who climbed the tall tree to put back the fledglings that had fallen from the nest. That tells us she has a good heart.” A little lady, who leaned upon a hardhead for a LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. staff, said, “I, too, saw her take a thorn from a lambkin's foot.” So the queen held council. Just then another fairy arrived, he was seated in an acorn-carriage drawn by four golden-winged moths, four may - 2 2 2 LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. flies were servants, two driving, and two standing behind. When the queen saw him, she waved her wand, and lo! a splendid royal equipage, with powdered servants, and seated within, a handsome 30 LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. prince. As he drove past the well, he saw Lovelocks, and ordered the horses to stand. Then he called to her, and asked her why she wept so sadly, and very humbly Lovelocks told him the story of the broken pitcher, and how poor her grandmother was. The prince told her to dry her tears, and gave her two golden coins, saying, “Spend one upon thyself, the other give away, as both are charmed.” Then smiling kindly upon her, he called to his servants, and drove away. With joy Lovelocks returned home, and told her grandmother of her wonderful adventure. And all unknown to her, the fairies followed to see if she would fulfil the prince's commands concerning the coins. As Lovelocks and her grandmother were starting out to buy another pitcher, seated by their door they saw a poor old man, very lame and almost blind. He was so weary, he told them he could not walk any further, and begged them to allow him to rest a little while within the cottage. Lovelocks led him in, and gave him. a bowl of milk; and when he was refreshed, she took the golden coin the prince had given her, and placed it in his trembling hand. The old Ce Saw was O W LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. 31 m was - man lifted up his eyes in astonishment, and called for blessings upon Lovelocks. After buying the pitcher, some money was left, and this the grandmother spent in silkworms, and Lovelocks helped her to feed and tend them. And as the years passed, good fortune was with them, and the grandmother became known as a clever silk grower. One day an old man asked to see Love- locks, and lo! she knew him to be the poor old man to whom she had given the charmed coin. The maiden, who wept by the well in the bygone days was now grown into a beautiful woman. And she took the old man's hand, and led him towards the well-furnished house she and her grandmother now occupied. As she turned to bid him welcome, lo! in place of the old man, there stood before her the handsome prince who had befriended her. And when her grandmother appeared, the prince told her he had come to ask for the hand of Lovelocks in marriage with his son Goodheart, who was a mighty soldier, and returned victorious from distant wars. “For,” said he, “she who has pity for the 32 LOVELOCKS AND THE PRINCE. LOVILO sad and needy, should rejoice with the rich and noble.” Then he called for his carriage with the four horses and powdered servants, and took away Lovelocks to her reward. And that was how the sweet hare-bells came to ring such merry wedding peals. Patty HONEYWOOD. ers Cinderina and the Elves. MINDERINA was first cousin to Cinderella, as you may guess from the name, yet she was no slut, but a pretty blue-eyed girl, with cheeks like roses, and curls like-well, gold, or the yellow-rayed sunflower that shook its great round face in at the open lattice with every wave of July air that Aowed through the garden, and tossed the flowers together to rob them of their perfume. No fairy godmother had Cinderina, but to whisper the truth-and it must go no further- her godmother was not a very sweet tempered old lady: her chin and nose !—well we must refer you to Punch, or a pair of nut-crackers. Poor Cinderina! it had been oh! so hot all the morning; and she had been up since four o'clock, before the dew was dry on the grass. With her pretty arms in the suds, twirling the dolly-stick, hanging out the clothes, she had got through the washing, and the snow-white linen > d CINDERINA AND THE ELVES. was heaped up in a great basket on the table. It was two o'clock; godmother Dorothy had had a nap, had put on her steeple hat and her crimson cloak (enough to set the village on fire that hot July day), had filled her horn with snuff, and with her crutch-handled stick in her hand, had set off to visit Miss Scandal, to enjoy a good gossip over a dish of hot tea. Her last words to Cinderina were, “Now Cindy, I shall be back by seven, and you must wash the floor, take up the cinders, and have all the clothes ironed before I come back.” I don't like selfish people, do you? and a godmother is not to be spoken of behind her back; but“ if I had such a godmother as Cinderina, wouldn't I—.” What would you do, eh? The large yellow sunflower turned pale, and would have shed quite a sugary tear for Cinderina, if the great greedy humble bees had not been busy all day robbing it of its nectar. Cinderina, hot and tired, sat down to rest; and although she was a good, cheerful girl, I think the great tears gathered in her eyes; but she was too brave to let them trickle down her nose, and make a guy of her, and a bright sunbeam dancing CINDERINA AND THE ELVES. 35 through the lattice kissed them clear away before they could fall. Swayed by the breeze, a convolvulus bell na T CINDERINA. peeped in at the open casement, and perched inside of it was the prettiest little fairy that ever I saw, or you either. As she listened to god- CINDERINA AND THE ELVES. 37 such a dream, all about a handsome little prince, who loved her, just as dearly as you love sugar plums at Christmas, or ice cream in July. Down fluttered the fairy, light as thistle-down or December snow-flake. Putting her tiny hands to her rosy lips she gave the most musical little hillo! hillo! that I ever heard. Then in silvery tones she sang : “ Hither my brown elves one and all. Quickly troop at your lady's call! Cinderina, gentle and true, Sleeps, and her housework you must do.” Not very good verse, but they have no laureate in Fairyland, at least they had not when I was there; but that was when I wore pinafores-a long, long time ago. Such fun followed. In an instant scores of little odd brown fellows, with bright black eyes, and peaked red beards and top knots, came jauntily dancing up, their tools in their hands- tiny Italian and flat irons, sweeping brushes, hand-brushes, dust-pans, buckets, scrubbing and black-lead brushes, mops, and floor-cloths. They came thronging to the open door, but there they stood, grimacing and shaking their heads at a great rate--for godmother Dorothy had CINDERINA AND THE ELVES. nailed a horse-shoe over the door, and neither good nor bad elves could cross the thres- hold. The little fairy laughed merrily at their dis- comfiture, then mounting Miss Moth, she went flying through the casement, and pointed the way to the elves. Like a swarm of big brown bees they poured through the window, and filled the great old-fashioned kitchen. You never saw a floor scrubbed in such fashion, with two elves scrubbing at each brick as if for dear life, while it took a whole gang of workers to pass the buckets of water through the window, and dash and splash them on the floor, while the mops and floor-cloths sopped it up in a thrice. The eye could scarcely follow the movements of the elves. It was rare fun to see a hundred of them squatted on the hearth, with hand-brushes and dust-pans, clearing away the ashes and cinders, washing it clean, and laying on the yellow stone in the neatest and most artistic style. You would have thought the black-leaders had been in training a thousand years,-.perhaps they had,--they worked so deftly. You may as easily follow a flash of lightning as the swift movement Se CINDERINA AND THE ELVES. 39 of their brushes. It took all hands to swing the old iron kettle on to the crane, and then a hundred of them danced off to the well, a bucket in each hand, and filled up the old kettle, laughing and chatting merrily all the time. It was the richest fun to see them do the ironing: they had fifty portable stoves ranged at one end of the kitchen, and fifty elves at each end to blow the bellows, heat the heaters, and pass the irons on. It took a hundred elves to get up one of godmother Dorothy's frilled caps; to iron the crown, and Italian iron the frills ; and if the old lady had heard the jokes they cracked over their work, she would not have slept a wink all that night. Such pulling and folding of sheets, towels, pillow-cases, and what-not, was never seen before: they sprinkled the linen from the tiniest of watering-cans, and were up to every wrinkle of the laundresses' craft. By a quarter past two all the work was done, the beds made, and Cinderina's tea set ready for her. When the tools had all been packed up, the little elves formed circle within circle, twenty deep, with the little fairy in the midst, and went whirling and dancing like mad, round and round, again and again, singing :- TO LO CINDERINA AND THE ELVES “To elves hard work is only fun, Cinderina your work is done ; Fairy Princess your elves have wrought All your bidding of word or thought ; Hard work to elves is only play, Our task is done !—Away ! Away!” Head over heels, topsy-turvey; with the most comical antics, the elves went flying through the window ; then like a cloud of brown bees shot through the sunbeams, and disappeared in the distance. Then the fairy princess allowed Miss Moth to hide her sleepy head under the green leaves, and took a nap herself in the convolvulus, but was astir in time to enjoy the puzzled amazement of Cinderina when she awoke from her nap, and found all her work so quickly and perfectly done. EDWARD LAMPLOUGI. kong Prince Florimel and the Serpent-Woman. PIN that long ago period which we sometimes speak of as “once upon a time,” there lived in a lonely little island on the sea that washes the shores of Greece an old man, who, if all the stories told about him were true, was a magician of no small power. The habitation of the old man was a marble tower on the highest part of the island, and there he lived alone, save for the society of his only daughter-his only child, indeed—and the presence of their servants. He had dwelt upon the island for many years, and his daughter had grown up from infancy into a beautiful woman, when the few poor fisher- men and cultivators of the soil who lived on the lower parts of the island saw one day, with much surprise, the servants come down the steep and winding path that led from the tower to the beach, carrying heavy boxes, which they placed aboard a small vessel that had cast anchor off the 42 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. as landing-place the night before. Their surprise was not lessened, but rather increased to a degree to which they were unable to give expression, when they saw the old magician descend the path alone, and go on board the vessel, which shortly afterwards sailed away to the eastward. The islanders were not sorry that he was gone but they were very much concerned about his daughter, whom they all loved for her kind heart, and who appeared to have been left in the old tower on the summit of the island. What a lonely existence it would be for her, they said to one another. And why had she been left and all the servants departed with their master? It was very odd; but they thought she would come down to their cottages to see them, and then, perhaps, they would hear all about it. In this, however, they were doomed to be disappointed, for day after day passed away, and the young lady failed to make her appearance amongst them. The wondering islanders often looked up the steep path that meandered up the hill to the tower on its summit, and strained their eyes in the hope of seeing her walking in the terraced gardens around it; but they never saw her. It was very odd, they said again. They FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 43 VII S soon began to think she must be dead; dead, probably, before her father and the servants left the island. That, they thought at last, must be the solution of the mystery. One of the boldest among them proposed that they should go up to the tower and ascertain the truth. But the reputation of its owner as a magician prompted all the others to cross themselves and declare that they would not venture to enter the tower for all the treasures of the Greek emperor. So the weeks grew into months, and the months into years, until at length the fate of the Lady Zeneyda,—that was the name of the magician's daughter,—like that of the unfortunate young lady who found a living tomb in an old oak chest on her wedding day, "was told as a sorrowful tale long past.” One night, a long time after her mysterious dis- appearance, in the midst of a fearful storm, a small vessel was seen from the island battling with the wild waves that were breaking in white foam over her, and threatening her with destruction. One moment she was lost in the darkness, and the next a flash of lightning showed her still struggling to hold on her course. But the fight of her crew with the wind and waves came to an end with a crash, and 44 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. na as a cry of terror and despair that told the watchers on the beach that she had struck upon a rock, and become a wreck. There was only one survivor of the disaster, a young man, who swam ashore, reaching the beach in a very exhausted condition. The islanders carried him into one of their houses, and marvelled much at his fine clothes and his white hands, which showed that he was not one of the seamen. On the following day, when he had somewhat recovered, he asked many questions concerning the island and its inhabitants, as was natural for one who was likely to have to wait some time for a ship aboard which he might continue his voyage; but he gave no information concerning himself. “ I suppose yonder tower is the residence of the chief man of the island,” he remarked to his host, on the first day he was able to leave the cottage, looking as he spoke towards the deserted tower on the summit. " It was,” returned his host, “but he left it, and left the island, a good time ago, and no one, not even a servant, has lived there III. since.” " Yet it looks as if it might be a desirable FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 45 abode,” observed the young stranger, with his gaze still fixed on the tower. "It was so," said the islander" but—,” he hesitated a moment, and then added, “but not one of us, poor as we are, would care to live there now.” “How is that ?" the stranger asked, turning to his host, and speaking in a tone that showed how strongly his curiosity had been excited by the latter's last remark. “There is a mystery about it,” was the reply. "The saints be between us and all evil!” The man crossed himself, and continued, “ The owner had a beautiful daughter, and she was as good as she was beautiful. She did not leave the island with her father, and she has never been seen since.” “ That is strange, certainly,” observed the stranger, again looking towards the tower. “You have excited my curiosity so much that I shall not rest until I have been up there, and had a look at the place. The mystery, it seems to me, can only be solved on the spot.” His host shrugged his shoulders, but did not attempt to dissuade the young man from the adventure. On the following day, therefore, the s neve 46 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. shipwrecked stranger, feeling much stronger, left the cottage, and ascended the steep path leading from the landing-place to the tower. As he had already learned that all the present inhabitants of the island lived in the cottages along the beach, he did not expect to meet any human creature on his way, and he saw nothing that particularly attracted his attention until he reached a broad flight of marble steps below the lowest terrace of the private grounds by which the tower was surrounded. As he ascended these, and approached the tower, he saw many signs of long neglect. Moss grew in the crevices of the marble steps, the paths were clothed with grass, the shrubberies were tangled with wild climbing plants, and the gardens were over-run with weeds. No human foot appeared to have trodden the paths since the old magician and his servants had left the island. The tower wore outwardly the like marks of desertion and neglect with the grounds. He observed, with surprise, that the door that appeared to be the principal entrance was open, and by this he ventured to enter, after listening for a few moments without hearing the slightest sound that would indicate the presence in the FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 47 rem nal building of a human occupant. He found himself in a lofty hall, floored with marble of various colours, and having a door on each of its four sides, and broad stairs leading to the upper rooms. He opened one of the doors, and looked into the apartment, which appeared to have been the dining room. Dust alone now covered the table, from which the silver and napery had been removed after the late occupant of the tower had taken his last meal there, before abandoning it to the bats and owls. A long time had evidently passed since any human foot had passed the threshold of the deserted place, for all the rooms which the stranger entered were in the same condition. The furniture remained, but it was covered with dust, and spiders had made their webs in every corner. As the tower offered better accommodation than could be obtained in the cottages near the beach the visitor, who had been accustomed to even better surroundings, resolved to make it his home until some passing vessel afforded the means of leaving the island. He strolled about the neglected grounds until nightfall, therefore, and then laid him down to rest upon a couch in one of . the upper rooms. nea 48 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. There are many persons who court sleep in vain when they have to pass the night in a strange room, and of this number was the young stranger whom the disaster of shipwreck had thrown upon this lonely island. “He heard strange noises in the hours of darkness. Such are not uncommon in old houses, and naturally attract more attention in the silence of night than they would in day- light. Trailing ivy Alapped against the windows, creaking sounds issued from the old furniture, rats scampered across the floor. He fancied, too, that he heard sounds from the stairs, as if some animal was slowly and heavily ascending them ; but this may have been, in part at least, the effect of imagination. Unable to obtain more than very brief intervals of sleep, he quitted the couch as soon as the first beams of the rising sun shone into the room, and looked out from the window upon the gardens and groves around the tower, the fields on the slope of the hill, and the blue sea beyond, the wavelets of which were tipped with red by the dawning light from the east. No sail was in sight, the trees were motionless in the calm, and no sound of life came up from the cottages below. came FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 49 Higher rose the sun, and as the morning tints of sea and sky changed from crimson to gold, the solitary watcher became conscious of a move- ment among the rank herbage below the window at which he stood. As he had not seen even a cat about the place, his curiosity was excited as to what might be the cause of that undulating motion, and he looked intently downward. To his surprise the cause was presently revealed in the unexpected form of an enormous serpent ! Slowly it glided over the weed-choked flower- beds of the terraces, and disappeared among the tangled shrubbery beyond. Wondering very much to see so large a serpent on the island, he left the window, and descended to the hall, intending to visit his friends below, in order to ascertain if the creature had been seen by any of them, and to make arrangements to receive from them a daily supply of food and wine. As may be supposed, he looked carefully to the right and left as he descended the marble steps leading from one terrace to another, lest he should run into the gaping jaws of the huge reptile he had seen from the window; but he reached the steep path that wound down the hill without seeing or hearing it. 52 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. can supply me with, brought up to the tower every day while I remain there, and I will pay you for whatever you bring.” The cottagers looked at each other, as if holding a silent consultation, before one of them ventured to give any undertaking of the kind suggested. "Well, I suppose, sir, if no harm comes to you there, it will be safe for any of us to venture at least as far as the lower terrace,” one of them at length said. "Send what you can this morning, then,” said the new dweller of the tower, who then turned as if to retrace his steps up the path, but in a moment faced about again.” “Are there any serpents on the island ?” he asked. “Only some small vipers,” one of the men replied. “I thought I saw a rather large one this morning, and I have a great horror of them,” said the stranger. “But if there are, as you say, no very large ones, I must have been mistaken.” He knew that he had not been, however, and the denial of the existence of any large members of the reptile family, after what he had seen that FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 53 morning, rather troubled him as he walked slowly up the steep path. He looked about him warily as he advanced, his ears listening as intently for the hiss that would warn him of the terrible creature's presence as his eyes watched for its yellow and brown folds. Suddenly, as he reached the upper terrace, he paused, and a shudder shook him from head to foot as he saw the serpent coiled upon a flowery bank, as if in quiet enjoyment of the warm sun- beams. For more than a minute he stood motionless, for he feared to arouse the reptile, which appeared to be sleeping, and he could not enter the tower without passing it. Then with noiseless tread, he crossed the terrace quickly and sprang up the marble steps. “ How am I to live here?' he asked himself, when he had reached the dining-room, and had thrown himself upon a couch." That creature will be too terrible a neighbour. I dare not leave a door, or window open, and if it has a fancy for basking on the terrace it will keep me a prisoner here." He had scarcely uttered the last words when a sound at one of the windows, such as would be sou f us V 54 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. produced by a person tapping on it with the fingers, caused him to look in that direction, when, to his surprise and horror, he saw the serpent looking into the room. The tapping had been caused by its head touching the glass, or whatever substitute was used for it in those days. He started to his feet, when the glistening dark eyes of the serpent drew him, without his will, as it were, towards the window. The creature lowered its head as he approached, but not before he had seen, with surprise, tears dropping from its eyes. He had heard of “crocodile's tears,” without a very strong belief in such signs of emotion on the part of a reptile, and these undoubted evidences of something like human feelings in a serpent were startling. “Fair sir, the saints have surely sent you to my relief.” "Who speaks?” exclaimed the startled young man on hearing these words, which evidently proceeded from some person outside and near the window. “ Be not alarmed,” continued the voice, which he now found, to his increased surprise, proceeded from the mouth of the serpent, “I am not what I re seem.” FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 55 “ In the name of everything wonderful, who and what are you then ?” he inquired. “I am the unfortunate daughter of Marsyas, ah HI “HE SAW THE SERPENT LOOKING IN AT THE WINDOW." the great magician, transformed by him into a serpent because I refused to marry the son of the Sultan of Egypt,” the creature replied. 56 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. “ Then from my heart I pity you,” said he, wondering more and more as he heard this strange explanation. "Ah, fair sir, if you pity me—.” The head of the serpent-woman was raised for a moment as she uttered these words, but as she paused her dark eyes fell again, and for a moment she seemed unable to proceed. “ But,” she con- tinued, “you shall hear all my sad story, and then, perhaps,—but I will not-I fear to anticipate the result, for disappointment would be too terrible.” She paused, and our hero, no longer feeling afraid of her, sat down by the window, which he partly opened, the better to hear the promised story. In a few moments she proceeded. “When my father had exhausted all his powers of persuasion, and had found that even threats failed to obtain compliance with his wish that I should marry the Egyptian prince, he cursed me in his wrath, and pronounced the spell which changed my natural form into what you see. I fled from him in horror into the gardens, and for a time was unable to realise what had happened. Then, as my brain recovered from the awful shock it had received, I began to bewail my terrible fate. FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 57 Presently I felt a hand touch me, and I looked up, expecting to see my father, who, I thought, might have relented, and come to restore me to my natural form. But instead it was a being of another world that I beheld, a tiny creature, human in form, indeed, but with gauzy wings, like those of the dragon-fly. She evidently knew of my transformation, for she regarded me pitifully, rather than with fear or aversion, and proceeded, in soft and gentle accents, to give me hope. There was a charm, she said, that would prove an antidote to the wicked spell laid upon me by my unnatural father. I might be restored to my proper form when a young man should come to the island who, influenced by Christian charity alone, would kiss my lips.” Her sad and wonderful story ended, the serpent-woman bowed her head, not daring to add another word to this statement. Our young hero rose from his seat by the window, and after a shuddering glance at the scaly head, began to pace the room in much perturbation of mind. Pity urged him one way, a feeling of repulsion which he found difficult to overcome, restrained him from it. “ Alas!” said the unfortunate daughter of 58 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. Marsyas, with a despairing sigh, “I could scarcely hope for relief on such a condition. Forget, fair sir, that you have seen me, or heard my story." “Stay!” cried he, as she was about to withdraw from the window. “ It shall never be said that Florimel resisted the appeal of an unfortunate woman in the name of Christian charity.” He leaned forward, approaching his face to the forepart of the serpent's head, but he was unable to quite repress a shudder, and he felt constrained to close his eyes. A little closer he advanced his face, shuddered again as his lips touched those of the serpent, and then fell back upon the couch. “The blessing of all the saints be your reward, fair sir,” said Zeneyda, her voice sounding now even more soft and musical than when it came from the mouth of the serpent. For when Florimel opened his eyes he saw that she was a serpent no longer, and that it was a young and beautiful woman who now stood before him. “I can now bid you welcome to my father's tower,” she said, with a sweet smile. “In which I have been a trespasser,” he rejoined, as he stepped out upon the terrace, and I FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 59 took the small white hand she extended to him in his own. “Let me know the name of the good young man to whom I am indebted for my release from that horrible spell,” said she. “I am Florimel, a son of the King of Armenia," he replied. “I was voyaging to Constantinople, to the court of the Emperor, when the vessel in which I had embarked was caught in a storm off this island, and became a wreck. I am the sole survivor of that disaster, which I no longer regret,-except on account of the poor seamen who lost their lives,-since it has procured the pleasure of making your acquaintance and restor- ing you to your proper form.” “For which service I can never sufficiently show my gratitude,” said Zeneyda. “You must be my guest until the means of continuing your voyage offer themselves. Give me your arm, Prince, and we will go down to the cottages, where the poor people of the island will be rejoiced to see me.” “Of that I am sure,” returned Florimel. “ They have been profuse in their praises of you and regrets for your disappearance, which they attribute to death.” never 60 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. "How glad they will be to know that I am alive and well !” said Zeneyda. “But look! Is not that a ship?" she asked, stopping suddenly on the lower terrace, and looking towards the sea. “It is !” exclaimed Florimel. “And it is coming this way.” “ It is seldom that a vessel touches at this island,” observed his companion, who had suddenly become pale with fear. “Suppose my father is returning in yonder bark! I tremble at the possibility of such an encounter." “Why should it be him ?” said the Prince. "But if it should be so, I will protect you.” As they descended the path leading to the cottages near the beach, the vessel drew nearer to the island, and attracted to it the attention of the people, who were seen standing in groups, watching the white sails that were wafting it to their shores. Presently the sound of footsteps coming down the path reached their ears, and cries of mingled surprise, joy, and wonder were raised as they recognised the magician's daughter in the companion of the shipwrecked stranger. The story of Zeneyda's transformation, and her restoration to her natural form, was told, and was heard by the islanders with many crossings of FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. 61 themselves, as an accompaniment to their expressions of wonder. The approaching vessel had by that time dropped her anchor, and a boat soon afterwards left her side, and was pulled towards the shore. As it came near the island, an old man was seen seated in the bows, whom the watchers recognised as the owner of the tower, Marsyas, the magician. . “My father!” exclaimed Zeneyda, and she immediately fled in terror towards the tower. Florimel remained behind, in the hope of learning the purpose of the magician in returning to the island. The boat presently touched the beach, and the old man landed, and, without stopping to speak to any of the people of the island, threw a wondering glance towards the Prince, and hurried up the path. Florimel followed in order to protect Zeneyda in the event of her requiring protection. The young lady was soon seen ascending the hill before them, and her unexpected appearance caused the old man to halt, regarding her retreating form with mingled surprise and perplexity, and then turning to Florimel. "Who is that lady?” he asked, “and who, if I may ask, are you, sir?”. 62 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. “That lady is the daughter of the owner of the island, and I, sir, am the son of the King of Armenia,” replied Florimel. "Stay, Zeneyda !-stay, I emplore you !” cried Marsyas, clasping his hands, and extending them towards his daughter. “Stay, you bad man!” exclaimed a tiny glistening form which at that moment appeared on the path in front of them. “Thus I punish you for your wicked transformation of your daughter.” The fairy touched him with her wand, and he was instantly transformed into a toad. . The imploring tone in which her father had called to her, prompted Zeneyda to pause in her flight and look back. Thus it was that she saw what had taken place. “Good fairy,” she exclaimed, running back to the spot, “do not, I pray, lay so heavy a burden upon him. I have forgiven him.” “At the intercession of your much-injured daughter, I will take off the spell on one condition,” said the fairy, addressing the transformed Marsyas. “Promise to give her in marriage to this young prince, to whom she owes her restoration, and I will release you from that form.” ، مهم امی گرد اط مهر ته / و را ہے ۔ مردم * بے سے ر مر ----- * م های جر -م * - وا * مرده به این را مهار ا ت ہے سے ۔ ۔ ۔ دسر - MARSYAS TRANSFORMED INTO A TOAD. 64 FLORIMEL AND THE SERPENT-WOMAN. “I promise,” came from the mouth of the toad. “Remorse has driven me back to the island to undo my unnatural work.” " Rise, then,” said the fairy, touching the toad with her wand, and in a moment Marsyas again stood before them, holding out one hand to his daughter, and the other to Florimel. There is little more to be told. Zeneyda became the wife of the Armenian prince, and they lived happy in each other's love for many years. THOMAS Frost. VVVNNA alcon The Two Palaces. LGIE was not the sort of boy you wanted to kiss as soon as you saw him, he was altogether too old- looking and proper for that. He was the kind of boy whom every one called “so very well-behaved.” Even 6 the servants could find no fault with him, the boot-boy never found mud on Master Algie's boots, unless the roads were almost impassable, and he was forced to go through it. His cousin Dick, with saucy, dirty face, and yellow curls always in a tangle, was, strange to say, far more of a favourite, why, nobody could tell. He tore his clothes, he walked through mud puddles whenever he could, in fact he could find mud when it had not rained for a week. He hid behind doors, and rushed out to make people jump, and did all sorts of such-like improper things. But then he had such a smile on his roguish face, and he would sit on the kitchen table, kicking his heels (another naughty trick he had), and amusing the boot-boy 66 THE TWO PALACES. while he cleaned all the boots, that the long- suffering boy forgot to be sulky. Now, outwardly, Algie was always good, always noiseless, always obedient, but yet the two old fairies, sitting up by the chimney in the cool of the day, knew that he had faults, and they talked over them as they smoked their pipes. Very ugly old fairies they were, but then they had lived so very long that their beauty had faded hundreds of years before. Now they lived only to watch the doings of little boys and girls, and wag their huge caps together over them. “Dick is seldom good,” observed Fairy Yellow-as-Gold. “ Algie is seldom naughty,” said Fairy Green- as-Grass. “But yet he has a conceited heart, and he is selfish.” “Yes, he is. He wants taking to the Palace of the Looking Glass,” said Fairy Green-as-Grass. “I shall take him.” “Yes, and I will take Dick to the Great Palace of Come-Day Go-Day. Come along." And waving a couple of wands, after putting away their pipes, the two ugly fairies dropped right down in front of the two boys, who were sitting THE TWO PALACES. 67 roWS on a garden seat, learning their lessons for to-morrow. They were eight years of age, Algie was learn- ing words of four syllables, whilst Dick was hopelessly stuck in words of two. Dick was sucking his thumb, and watching the crows in the high trees before him. Algie was studying, to all appearance, with great earnestness. Just then, in a squeaky voice, Fairy Green-as- Grass said, “ Arise, Algie, and follow me.” And Fairy Yellow-as-Gold said just the same to Dick. Then the old women waved their wands, and away they flew up into the air, after a time separating, until Dick and Fairy Yellow-as-Gold could not see the other two at all, but went on at a great speed through the warm evening air. Dick was afraid for a time, but, being a brave boy, soon found courage to ask where they were going. “ You will see, you will see, only have patience,” said the fairy. Very soon Dick saw they were nearing a wonderful palace. As they approached, he saw there were pools of water, and many half-broken boats lying about. The marble steps were green and mouldy, the wide doors were falling off their 68 THE TWO PALACES. golden hinges. Passion flowers had once been trained all over the walls, now they trailed in the dust, mingled with weeds and climbing plants. As they entered, Dick saw everything was the same, pearl tables and fairy chairs all tumbled in wild confusion on the floors. Gold and silver ornaments, covered with the dust of years, were in every direction. “What a splendid palace; but where are the people?” whispered Dick, holding his dirty finger to his chin, and looking very solemn. “I couldn't tell you, I'm sure,” said the old fairy. “Perhaps asleep. This is the Palace of Come-Day Go-Day. Every one pleases himself. So if you want anything, you must seek someone and wake him up. You are to stay here for a while by yourself.” Then with a whirr like a frightened blackbird, this funny old woman whizzed out of sight. For a while Dick was happy, he could do as he liked here. He pulled the flowers and grapes, and touched the wonderfully pretty things without a creature to object. But after a time he grew hungry for supper, and wondered where the people were. He hunted through lonely corridors and empty rooms for a long time. At Wom man THE TWO PALACES. 69 last he found a large wide hall, with many lazy- looking people, asleep mostly. Some few were yawning and stretching their arms. Dick went up to one, and asked where the servants were. "I'm awfully hungry, and would like supper,” he said. The man turned over and looked curiously at the new comer, and said sleepily:- “We have no servants, every one here does as he likes, we only do what we are really forced to do.” Dick felt very queer, and he hurried away into the gardens, leaving the strange people to sleep. He thought of the orderly gardens at home, he half wished he could meet nurse, though she would scold about his dirty face and torn clothes. He wandered away amongst the broken-down summer seats, and remembered how he had often said he wished the gardens at home were left untidy, so that he could do as he liked in them, but now he wished these poor flowers could be all tied up as they once had been, and the trees could be fastened over the arbours, and the long grass that kept tripping him up could be made velvety like the grass in his own garden was. Who was that wandering about over at the 70 THE TWO PALACES. other side of the grounds of the Great Palace of Come-Day Go-Day. It looked like Algie, but he was walking with his head down and a look of shame about him. Dick put his hands to his mouth and made that awful noise he had been punished so often for making. A very ugly old kelpie dropped from a tree, and looked so fierce, he did not repeat it, but ran away after the boy he had seen in the twilight. He found it was his cousin after all, and how glad they were to meet you can well imagine. “Oh, Dick,” gasped Algie, after he had got over his surprise a little, “that bad old woman took me away to the Palace of The Looking Glass, do you see it over there? Its towers all gleaming with light.” “How lovely,” said Dick, gazing at the Great Palace domes of shining glass, lighted from within and without by a myriad lamps. “Don't say lovely, Dick," and Algie shuddered. “ I have been round and round the awful rooms till I was nearly frightened to death. I thought at first the walls were made of looking-glass, like we have at home, but they arn’t. And there was a boy in the walls who looked like me, and he did not do just as I did at the time, but like I have done THE TWO PALACES. 71 many a day since. He seemed to be reading, and he was watching out of his eyecorners if anybody saw him, and how good he could be.” “Oh, Algie, but you didn't never do that?” said Dick grammatically. “Yes, and he strutted when he walked, and looked scornfully at other children because they didn't read like him, and couldn't say “The boy stood on the burning deck' right through, and after that an old man hobbled by, and begged for a copper, and my other self in the glass laughed at him and called him a horrid old thing.” “But you don't, Algie?”. Algie nodded with a red face, and went on :- "Its walls are like great eyes looking at you. Don't you wish we were back, Dick? I'll never tell about you when you do bad things again, just so I may look good against you.” "Well,” said Dick solemnly, “my palace hasn't been any better than yours, the folks are all dirty and lazy, everything is broken and spoiled, nothing mended. I say, don't you think nurse must be horrid tired of tidying up after us?” “After you, you mean,” said Algie sharply. “No, I didn't mean that, I am as bad as you, only not your way.” . 72 THE TWO PALACES. Just then a very beautiful little creature, with white dress of shining silver, golden hair, with a star in it, sprang out of the ground, and in a sweet little voice like a linnet singing, said:—“Ah, I see, you have been brought here by the naughty old fairies, Yellow-as-Gold and Green-as-Grass.” “Yes, beautiful fairy,” said Algie. “We are lost, and want to go home.” "You have been to the Palace of the Looking Glass,” she said, and Algie nodded. “ And you to the Great Palace of Come-Day Go-day,” she said, laughing into Dick’s dirty face. “Come with me.” The boys took hold of hands and followed the lovely fairy all through the wonderful gardens of the Palace of the Looking Glass, until they reached a great door, with shining letters over it, “ School for Children of the Fairies." “Come in," said the Fairy of the Star. They entered a large garden filled with coloured fountains, gay birds darted here and there, arbours were covered with flowering trees, and velvety grass stretched far away, under the great yellow moon. Fairy lamps hung to every bough, and gleamed softly over the hundreds of shining little fairy children grouped about. THE TWO PALACES. “Do they never go to bed ?” asked Dick, very much awed. “Oh! yes, in the day-time, sometimes, they have to learn so much at nights, when you earth children are asleep.” TILL 4 11 and THE FAIRY OF THE STAR. Then she took them through the flowers and among the trees, where hundreds of tiny green fairies were at work. They were putting right 74 THE TWO PALACES. what the earth children had made wrong during the day. Here a little bird, all bare of feathers, and with wide open mouth, was being fed, and its tiny legs mended, which had been hurt by some cruel earth boy. “What will you do with it?” Dick asked. “Oh, put it back into its mother's nest again, and I shall have to watch it until it can fly, so that no harm comes to it.” “And look here, what is this tiny fellow doing?” “He's making sleep salve, to put on a lame boy's eyes, who has such pain he can't sleep, and who is so lonely all day, with no one to talk to him, or read him a story.” “Dick, do you think it's for that boy, “Limping Bobby,' down the lane at home, the boy you teased that day?" Dick’s cheeks turned scarlet, he glanced up at the Fairy of the Star, and found her laughing at him. “Yes,” she said “it is for the very boy, the boy that Algie slyly flung a stone at once when he was out by himself, and he thought no one saw him.” THE TWO PALACES. 75 Algie's head that had begun to have its usual conceited way with it, hung down suddenly, Scores of little green fairies were now running here and there, preparing for their nightly journey to the Earth. Shells were harnessed to great moths and beetles. Acorn husks and fox-glove flowers were loaded with medicines and bandages for the earth creatures so far away. There was stuff for smoothing wrinkles from mothers' fore- heads, brought on with worrying all day. There was medicine for crying babies, bandages for lame dogs, kittens, and rabbits, who had no friends to care for them, or even worse-belonged to unkind earth boys and girls, who kept them to starve and ill-use. When they were all ready the fairy children raised a shout, mounted their driving seats, and drove off like lightning through the air, right down to Earth. Suddenly there was a whirring sound, and the old Fairies Green-as-Grass and Yellow-as-Gold came up before the boys, and instantly the Fairy of the Star disappeared, then they waved their wands, and Algie and Dick found themselves on the garden seat at home. The rooks were still cawing round their nests in the high trees, it was almost dark, Dick's book THE TWO PALACES. was on the floor, Algie was holding his in his hand. A voice they knew to be nurse's was calling loudly, “ Supper is ready, make haste, where are you boys, always to seek, always to seek.” They slowly took hold of hands and went into the house together, and when nurse saw them, she lifted up her hands in astonishment, they looked so quiet. “ Are you ill,” she said, lifting Dick’s hair out of his eyes, but he did not speak, and she said :- “ Bless the boy, no, he's only tired.” And she kissed him. Flo. JACKSON. Qovo The Search for the fairy Queen. ITTLE Arthur lived in a quaint, sweet, old farmhouse. So lovely was it that people came from far and wide to see it as it stood covered with ivy and honeysuckle, and with twisted old apple trees surrounding it. Some- how everything and everybody always seemed so busy and yet so happy that it was quite a pleasure to sit and watch what was going on. So thought little Arthur any way, as perched on an apple bough he lazily noted the busy life around him. There was first of all old Sam, the shepherd, as with his crook in his hand and his dog at his heels he set off to count the sheep in the sunny meadows by the river. A busy bee flew past, and as it darted on the sweets lying in the heart of a lovely red rose, it seemed to say to Arthur, “Oh, you lazy boy, why are you not making the best of this beautiful weather. You people don't know how to enjoy 78 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. the pleasures of life.” A butterfly next swept past, its bright wings shining like coloured satin in the sunbeams. The very trees were bowing to each other merrily, and murmuring, "What a fine day!" As for the birds, their joy was so great that they sang and chirped quite deafeningly and circled in the air in the blithest manner. he A QUAINT, SWEET, OLD FARMHOUSE. Then Arthur lifted his eyes a little higher, and saw the tall, graceful spire of the church of Stratford-on-Avon as it gleamed through the trees, with hundreds of happy birds playing around it. He remembered what his mother had THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 79 told him about the great poet, Shakespeare, having passed his boyhood amongst the lovely scenery, and he wondered if he too had loved to lie and drink in all the surrounding beauties. Arthur felt quite sure that he had, for he remembered bits of lovely poetry which his father had read aloud to his mother in the evenings, and had said it was written by Shakespeare, about flowers and fairies and all the lovely things that one could not help thinking about when one lay in the sun on such a glorious day. At last a bright idea struck little Arthur. “I will go and wander about in the fields, and find out all the pretty spots that father read about the other night. I wonder if I could find that bank whereon the wild thyme blows, Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows,' where the fairy queen sleeps at night amongst all the sweet smelling flowers? I will try anyway.” So Arthur slipped from the bough of the apple- tree on to the soft grass below, and without telling anyone of his intentions set off to discover the abode of the fairy queen. Leaving the old orchard and the garden full of bright flowers, he climbed a stile in the hedge, almost hidden from view by creeping honeysuckle 80 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. and prickly sweet-briar, and dropped into the meadow below. How soft and velvety the grass was under his feet, how lovely the daisies and buttercups looked as they held up their fair heads, saying, “ Pick me, pick me!” The delicate cuckoo-flower bowed gracefully to him as he passed. The cowslips with their ruby spots welcomed him joyfully. On every blade of tender grass there still glistened the diamonds which the fairies had dropped in their midnight dance, but when he tried to pick them up, in order to give them back to the fairies when he found them, lo! they turned into dew- drops which the hot sun soon dry up. For a long, long time Arthur trotted through the fields, first picking up one lovely flower and then another till his hands were quite full, and the Aowers in his hot grasp began to droop and fade. The sun's rays fell with fierce power on Arthur's golden curls, and he began to feel very tired and hot and sleepy. Across the broad meadows, however, he saw a clump of trees, and under these he knew it would be cool. “I shall sit down and rest there,” he said consolingly to himself, and this restored his 82 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. ms SS drooping spirits as a cool draught of water would have refreshed the thirsty flowers in his hands. And when he reached the trees, what a lovely fairy spot lay before him! Through the waving trees, sunbeams strayed and danced on flower and fern, lighting up each bright petal or delicate frond. The ground rose and fell, forming here a little valley, there a baby hillock, and all was covered by grass of the daintiest green, amongst which nestled pale primroses and sweet violets. Arthur sank on the grass, which was soft as his own little bed, and closed his eyes with a satisfied sigh. “Who are you, bold stranger, who thus disturb our slumbers? Some great giant man, I see!” Arthur was much flattered by hearing himself described as a great giant man. It sounded so grown-up, and really it was time, for he was tired of being called a little boy. He opened his eyes and turned with a smile on his face in the direction from which the voice came. Compared with the little creature before him, he certainly was a great giant man. A dainty little figure was standing on a primrose, a crown on her head, and a sceptre in her hand; she had blue eyes, the OU 84 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. The fairy queen then gave command to the other fairies to cease tormenting him, and they all entered a dark cave, made by two large stones. “This is the judgment hall,” whispered a fairy to Arthur. "Here you are to be tried for your crime.” “What crime?" asked poor Arthur. “Prisoner at the bar,” said the fairy queen, “are you guilty or not guilty ?” “Guilty of what ?" asked Arthur. “The prisoner is impertinent,” said the queen angrily, while all the other fairies looked aghast at his boldness. “Pull his hair!” This the fairies did with so much energy that the prisoner begged for mercy. “I declare the prisoner guilty of invading our kingdom, and of impertinence towards ourself, the Queen of Fairyland,” said the Queen solemnly. "We therefore sentence him to " " Have his hair pulled ninety-nine million and seventy-five times,” screamed all the fairies with much excitement, pulling threatening faces at him. “Oh no, no, no !” screamed Arthur in such terror that he awoke, and, opening his eyes, saw bending over him a little girl far more beautiful than the fairy queen. THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 85 “Well,” she exclaimed, laughing merrily and showing two rows of pearly teeth, “you do sleep soundly; I thought I never was going to wake you. I tickled your nose and at last pulled your hair, but nothing would wake you." "Oh,” said Arthur with a sigh of relief, “I thought I was in fairyland, and all the fairies were tormenting me.” The little girl burst into a merry peal of laughter. “No, only one fairy was tormenting you all the time. My name is Fairy, at least father calls me so. But what are you doing here?”. Then Arthur told her that he had wanted to find the fairy queen his father had read about, who must live near, for Shakespeare had known her. “Well,” said Fairy “you have found her, or at least she has found you. I tell you I'm Fairy, though not Shakespeare's, for if I were I should be old, and yellow, and toothless like old Mother Scarecrow, as Shakespeare lived so very long ago. I don't live far from here, just on the banks of the Avon, but I thought I would have a picnic here to-day, and have brought my lunch." Then Fairy opened a big basket by her side. If Arthur had had some doubts about her being a 86 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. ra living person before, and thought that she must be a real fairy, he was quite sure about her now, for none but a healthy sturdy girl of five or six, unless it were a boy, would have thought of bringing such a quantity of provisions. She first pulled out some huge slices of bread and jam (“Straw- berry!” she explained triumphantly to her com- panion); then appeared three or four crisp curranty cakes ; apples and oranges and a bottle of milk completed the repast. After having spread them out on the green grass, Fairy regarded them thoughtfully, while Arthur's face put on a bright and jovial expres- sion. Fairy looked at the meal, then at Arthur, and sighed dolefully. “ You do look as though you could eat a lot.” she said mournfully. “Yes I can,” replied Arthur cheerfully. “ And so can I,” said Fairy. “ There's plenty there surely,” said Arthur. “Well, let's eat what there is, and then if we're hungry we must go home.” And the two set to work as fast as their little teeth would go, and soon made the provisions look decidedly small. Arthur did not mean to eat much, but Fairy, who was really a kind little girl, THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 87 though at first she had been rather unwilling to go shares, made him eat his fair half. “So you believe in fairies ?” asked Fairy scornfully. “You must be a milksop! Why I've known for years and years that there were no such things! Fancy going and looking for them too, and then dreaming of them. I expect you dreamt they made you fairy king, and all that rubbish, did you ?” Arthur flushed, for like all other boys he hated to be made fun of. He drew himself up and looked away. Then a pair of soft arms was thrown around him, and a merry voice said coaxingly :- “ Did it tease it, then ? Come, be friends, and then we'll go down to the river and gather rushes and make whistles.” Arthur was mollified and graciously allowed Fairy to kiss and make friends. Then they set off to the river, the beautiful Avon, which curves amongst the meadows, and by the banks of which stands the beautiful church of Stratford. They strolled along the banks, and were often in great danger of falling in, so eager were they to gather the finest and most feathery rushes. Fairy kept up a constant flow of chatter, 88 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. and proved herself a most delightful companion, though she rather frightened Arthur by her reck- lessness as she bent over the river to reach some coveted reed or flower. "Why, you are a coward,” she said once, as Arthur pulled her back when he thought she was in greater danger than usual. “ I'm not afraid for myself, but I am for you.” "Oh that's all very well! It's just like a boy to pretend it's for the girl's sake he is so careful, when he is so frightened himself that he trembles all over. Why, look,” she ended excitedly, “ here's some fun, here's a boat.”. And lightly as a fairy she jumped in. Arthur followed her quietly, afraid to remonstrate lest he should again be called a coward, and yet thinking how grieved his mother would be at his doing what he knew was wrong. “Now I'll be Columbus going to discover America, and you can be-oh! I don't know—well let's see! Oh, you can be the crew,” she cried in great glee. “You must do just as I tell you, or I shall clap you into irons." The poor crew sat in the stern feeling very frightened and uncomfortable. He began to think of his mother and what she would say. THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 89 “ Now,” said Columbus, “take an oar, and let's get to America as quickly as we can.” Arthur obediently took an oar, but splashed Fairy all over, and nearly fell into the water himself. “ You are clumsy,” remarked Fairy. “I shan't try any more,” retorted Arthur, crossly. “Now you are mutinying, and I shall clap you into irons,” and she jumped up in a threatening manner, glaring ferociously at the crew. From the bottom of the boat she picked up a piece of string and fastened his hands together, the crew offering no resistance. Indeed, the boat was going along so rapidly that he was afraid if he struggled it would capsize, and they would be drowned. “Oh, Fairy,” he began. “Call me Columbus, please," she interrupted sternly, drawing the string more tightly round his wrists. “Well then, Columbus, don't you think it would be nice to think we had got to America, and to land now and go and hunt lions or tigers ?” “Now you are showing what a lot you know 90 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. about geography. Why America is miles away. The truth is you're afraid of being upset.” “Well, so I am!” said the poor handcuffed crew, “and we shall be soon, if you jump about like that,” for mischievous Fairy was making the boat rock about in a most alarming manner. “ Fairy !” “ Columbus, please!” “ Columbus, have you a mother at home?” “No," answered Columbus, “she died years ago.” “Well, have you nobody who will be awfully sorry when you are carried home all dead and wet, drowned, you know?”. Columbus gazed at the crew with much contempt. “ Does it want to go home to its mammy, then ?” she said scornfully. “ Yes I do. Come, Fairy-.”. “Now,” said Columbus severely, “ you shall be clapped into more irons for speaking to me so disrespectfully. How dare you call me anything but Columbus or Captain!” and she stamped her foot impatiently. Then with another piece of string she securely fastened his feet together. The stream was flowing with such rapidity that THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 91 every moment the boat was near upsetting. Suddenly it was caught by the current and whirled against the opposite bank. The shock caused it to upset, and with a terrified shriek both children fell into the water. When next Fairy opened her eyes, she was lying in her own little bed at home. “ Have I been dreaming ?” she exclaimed. A figure advanced from the open window. It was Fairy's father's housekeeper. She came towards the bed with a glad kind smile on her face. "I am so glad you are better, dear. Now I will get you some broth to drink, and you will be ready to run about again,” and Mrs. Freshman hurried from the room. Then Mr. Thorne, Fairy's father, came in and kissed his little daughter lovingly. “My fairy is feeling better now,' he said. "Oh yes, I am quite better! What has been the matter ?” she answered. The father patted the golden head. “Here is Mrs. Freshman with your broth. Drink it, and then go to sleep. We will talk when you wake." Fairy drank the broth and then lay down again. 92 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. Mrs. Freshman drew down the blind, and she and Mr. Thorne quietly left the room. No sooner had they left than the church bells began to toll slowly and solemnly for some dead person. Fairy listened at first without paying particular attention, then all the circumstances of the day before flashed into her memory. The nice timid little boy, the picnic, the walk by the bank, and last of all the voyage in the boat, and the cold, cold water, as it closed over her. What had become of Arthur ? Boom! boom! slowly tolled the bell. Then the horrible thought came into her mind. Had he been carried home “all dead and wet, drowned, you know” as he had said ? Oh, no! it was too dreadful to think of, and Fairy began to count the flowers on the wall-paper, to think of something else. But it was no good! Boom boom! went the church-bell, and Fairy could think of nothing but Arthur's face as he begged her to land. So excited did poor Fairy become, that when Mrs. Freshman crept into the room to see if she slept, she was chattering deliriously, and tossing feverishly on her little bed. بیمه ها En لها ما * رب . میل ۔ ۔ م . - THEN ARTHUR TOLD HER THE WHOLE STORY. 96 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. W Jumping into the water, he swam to the spot, and was just in time to catch the golden hair as it rose again. As he did so, he noticed what seemed a bundle of clothes lying at the bottom of the clear water, so throwing the little girl quickly on to the bank, he dived to the bottom and drew to the surface the senseless and, as he thought at first, dead, form of little Arthur Gordon, with his hands and feet tightly bound together. He called to a labourer who was passing at a few yards’ distance, and they carried the children to their homes. For a long time it was thought that Arthur would die, but he gradually grew better, and was able to tell the whole story of their escapade. Fairy was ill longest, because she had brought on fever by worrying over the fate of Arthur. “But I thought you must be dead when I heard the bell tolling, and remembered that father would not talk to me about you just then. Then I remembered what you had said about being taken home to your mother, dead. Will she ever for- give me, do you think?”. "Oh, yes,” answered Arthur, quickly. “Why, she is awfully sorry about you, and has sent to inquire after you ever so many times a day. The bell was tolling for old Mrs. Scarecrow." r 1 THE SEARCH FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN. 97 “And will you forgive me, Arthur? You told me the fairies in your dream had tormented you, but the real Fairy, me, you know, has nearly killed you. If you will forgive me and be friends I will always be a good kind Fairy to you, all my life.” Arthur kissed the pale face lovingly, and declared that he had nothing to forgive. Fairy kept the promise which she then made, and was always Arthur's staunch friend and ally ; she learnt to look up to him in all things, and thought there never was any one so wise and brave as he was. For she now knew that those who think of the trouble they may cause their fathers and mothers are far braver and nobler than those who do things for fun which may bring sorrow and distress on those they love. Although she always loved to tease, yet she never wilfully hurt his feelings as she had done that day. As for Arthur, he thought there was in the whole world no one so charming, so sweet and merry, as his Fairy Queen, as he always called her, and always declared that his search that mid- summer day for the fairy queen was not in vain, for he had found a daintier lovelier fairy than even Shakespeare had ever dreamt of, great poet though he was. EVELYN INGLEBY. The poem of Life. Sia ) V N that golden and far away period of the world's history commonly known as "once upon a time,” there lived a young man, who was a poet. This poet had made a great number of DEC songs, and some of them were so sweet, that all who heard them were melted to tears. Yet he was not satisfied, but longed to produce some greater work than any- thing he had yet attempted. “I will write the poem of life,” he said, so he set out to journey all over the world, that he might write the poem of life. He went first to the land where the sun rises, and went into a garden where little children were at play. It was the most beautiful garden he had ever seen in his life. All the flowers were pure white, and white birds perched upon the branches of the trees, and sang sweeter songs than he had ever heard before. All about the garden, up and down its white walks, little THE POEM OF LIFE. 99 children came and went, and they all wore robes of spotless white, and carried tall stems of white lilies in their hands, and the poet said “This shall be the first canto of my poem.” So he put the children and the white garden into the poem of life, and then he went upon his way. He went on towards the land where it is noon. As he passed along the road, he saw many people, and he put them all into the poem. Boys and girls at study and at play, they made one canto. Another was made up of youths and maidens, who loved and were loved again ; and when this one was finished he came to the land where it is noon. Here everything was very different from the lands he had yet seen, there were no white flowers, and all the trees were a dark and sober green. The people in this land seemed to be very busy, many wore faces of anxious thought; many were hurrying to and fro about their work, and here and there he saw one who had fainted and fallen by the roadside through heat and weariness. After that he went through many lands, and added many cantos to his poem, and at last he drew near to the country where the sun sets ; he felt very tired, and some- IOO THE POEM OF LIFE. how he began to be dissatisfied with the work, which before had given him so much pleasure, and he turned over again the pages of his poem of life, and he found many parts which he wished he had never written, and he tried to blot them out, but could not, for verses written in the poem of life must stand for ever. He entered the land where the sun sets, and went into a house to write the last canto. An old man lay upon a bed in the house, he was dying, and his friends stood weeping round the bed. The poet went on writing, and the old man drew his breath more and more feebly, and as the last line was written they carried him out to bury him. And the poem of life was ended. The poet went out and stood by the grave, and he felt very sad to think this must be the end. A bird flew over his head; and an acorn fell from its beak, and dropped upon the grave; and thinking little of what he did, he pressed it with his foot into the earth, and then he turned away and went back to his own home. But as he went he began to feel that somehow this might not be the end ; and when people asked him if his poem of life was finished, he would shake his head sadly and say, “Not yet, not yet.” And after a time laco THE POEM OF LIFE. IOI his answer grew to be, “No, it is only just begun,” and he wandered about the world trying to find more verses, but try as he would he could not finish the poem. And he grew old and white- headed, and it was unfinished still. At last one day he came again to the land where the sun sets, and he went and stood by the grave of that old man who had been buried years before, when the last verse of the poem of life had been written. When he looked at the place he was surprised to see a flourishing young tree growing over the grave, and he wondered by whose hands it had been planted, for he was sure it had not been there when he stood there before. He felt a light touch upon his arm, and turning he saw standing beside him a beautiful woman dressed in white. “Who are you?” he asked wonderingly. “My name is Faith,” she said. “Do you not remember pressing an acorn into the soil here, many years ago ?” “Yes,” he said, “I remember now, though I had forgotten it.” The woman touched his eyes and bade him look out across the world and tell her what he saw. “I see,” he said, “the country where it is ce me. · The Court of Queen Dab. o little May took up her basket, and with the last words of the fairy tale ringing in her ears, ran as fast as she could down the country lane towards her home. SW Little May was an orphan, and she o lived at the farm over the hill with her aunt, who kept house for her big brother until he would be old enough to marry and bring home a wife of his own to look after him. Generally May's afternoons were very dull and lonely, for her aunt was very busy, and she had no one to look after her. But this afternoon she had been up to the doctor's, and had played in the meadow with his children, little girl com- panions of her own age. And when the twilight began to creep up over the bright blue sky, she had gone home with them and had had tea in the nursery. And Mrs. Ridley, the doctor's wife, had told them a fairy tale. Such a beautiful tale it was; all about fairy queens and hobgoblins, and OOIIS V vere 104 THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. merry little fairy sprites who ran up and down all over the earth, and played such merry pranks, that one laughed at them until tears ran down one's cheeks. And then when Mrs. Ridley had finished, it was time for May to go home. So she ran off as quickly as she could, with the last words ringing in her ears, and her mind completely filled with visions and pictures of fairy life. Arriving home, she went straight up to bed. She did not wish to sit up and spoil her picture with everyday things, and the chatter of the servants in the kitchen, so off she went. “Oh! dear,” she whispered to herself as she quickly undressed, “if only I could see a fairy, like the little girl in the story, I should be so happy!” And after she had said her prayers, she walked to the window, and stood in her little white night- gown, peeping out into the darkness to see if she could catch a glance of any of them. But no! The moon shone faintly from the dark sky, and little stars peeped timidly out to watch the dark waving shadows that were creeping on to the lawn and over the fields. Timid grey rabbits scuttled hurriedly across the grass, and the little birds twittered softly as they THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. 105 prepared for bed—but no sign of the fairies. And with a sigh of disappointment, little May left the window, crept into her warm bed, and was soon asleep. She had not slept very long, however, before she woke to find the bright moonlight creeping softly through the blind into the room. Little May sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes. The clock on the landing struck twelve. “Oh!” said May, gladly, “This is the time the fairies dance. I won't go to sleep now, I will wait and see if they come.” So there she sat upon the bed. Her golden curls all in confusion, and her blue eyes winking and blinking at the moonlight as she strove to keep awake. Suddenly the sound of soft sweet music filled the room, and the light grew brighter and brighter. “ They are coming, they are coming,," whis- pered May to herself, gladly. “Oh! I do hope that they will not go.” But may need not have feared, for just then there was a knock at the window, and in flew a little fairy. Such a tiny little thing she was. May was 106 THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. almost afraid of moving for fear of frightening her away. But the fairy was quite bold, and she jumped lightly on to the bed and stood smiling at May. “Are you the little girl who wished to see the fairies ?" she asked. “If so, come with me.” May smiled to herself at being called little by so tiny a creature, and the fairy seemed to guess her thoughts. “Oh, you need not smile,” she said. “We do not care to be big. What is the use? One is only the more in the way, and besides I had to come in through the nick of the window, so I was obliged to be small. By-the-bye, you should always leave the window open if you wish to see the fairies, for some of us do not like squeezing through like that.” As she spoke she gently touched the glass with her tiny wand, and the window flew open immediately. “Come along,” she said to May, holding out her tiny hand. “We must be quick or it will be too late.” May took the hand in her own, and with a little flutter, off they flew together into the open air. : THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. 107 “Do not be afraid,” said the fairy, as May trembled to find herself flying swiftly over the fields. “You will be all right with me,—no one can harm the fairies, you know—and we shall soon be there." So May recovered her courage, and was soon able to see where they were going, and wondered a little, as she made out the familiar marks of the little town near where they lived. But they flew right over the town, and passed quickly on over miles and miles of country. And May's wonder grew into great astonishment as she saw the big towns and rivers rapidly fading behind them. Oh! it was splendid to be with the fairies. “Where are we going?” she asked, as they paused to rest a moment on a tall dome, which May recognised as belonging to St. Paul's Cathedral. She had seen the picture in her English history, and knew it in a moment. “We are going to the Court of Queen Mab,” said the fairy. “You know, what with the fogs and rains, the climate here is so bad that we cannot live in England. And I hope I shall be no worse for my journey to-night,--but I am half afraid I have caught cold already.” May thought that if the fairy who was used to 108 THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. а) such journeys had taken cold, what would she do? For she had nothing on but her thin nightdress, and they had already come miles and miles. But she said nothing, and they passed on. Over the sea, then on the land, away they went, and May could see and recognise the places she had read of in her geography. It was wonderful ! She had never dreamed that it would be like this. But the next time they paused, her heart misgave her. Although they had come very quickly, it must have taken days and days to reach where they were resting. “What would they think at home?” “Oh! it will be all right,” smiled the fairy reassuringly. “You know our days are quite different to the poor humans, and anyone can stay with us for years,—even for a life time, and go home to find he has never been missed, and all is going on as before." This restored little May's confidence, and shortly after they reached the fairy kingdom. Oh! what a beautiful land it was. Such a treat to May who had so longed to see it. Everything was of course very tiny, but of the most beautiful. All the trees were lit up with THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. 109 tiny coloured lamps of wonderful colours. May knew then why they called the little lamps in the drawing room fairy lamps. And besides these coloured lights, there were lanterns, that threw LX AUR THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. out a brilliant illumination, and made night into day. All round, seated in circles on the soft green turf, were groups of fairies. Some were dancing round in a circle, playing at THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. III "I thought everyone believed in fairies,” said May, but Queen Mab shook her head sadly. “No, dear, they do not. It is a sad reflection upon the age, of course, but none the less it is true. But they are glad to make use of us all the same, though, only they ascribe our power to other influences. Not that we mind,” added Queen Mab. “We fairies only exist to do good, and as long as our work is well done we care not for thanks.” May thought the sentiments were very credit- able to the fairies, and very discreditable to the human race, and the Queen, evidently pleased with her faith, went on to explain further. “You see,” she said, “if it were not for us the world would come to a standstill. It is we who look after the fields and the flowers; we who send them to sleep at night and wake them with the touch of our wands in the morning. We scatter our jewels and precious stones thickly upon the grass, but the poor blind people never heed them. And if they do see them they only say that they are dew drops. Poor things! they know no better, and really a diamond is very like a dew drop. Then again we look after the birds, the insects, and the butterflies. We . II2 THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. feed them, and we colour their wings with rich clothing that the earth cannot match. We store up the honey in the bee-hives, we ripen the berries on the fruit trees, but the people only talk about the weather, and never heed us. “Then, again, look what we do for the children. It is we who watch over the baby when he sleeps. We sing to him softly, and he smiles, and when we leave him he cries, but the poor silly mother only talks about his teeth, and never thinks that it is for us he is fretting. “And all over the world we fly about ; fitting hither and thither to look after the people who cannot do without us. We watch over the poor ragged orphans and make them dream of a mother's love and a father's care. We bring the kind clergyman round to the doorway where they are sleeping, and he looks after them because we tell him to do so. And it is we who tend to the old people when they are fading away. We sit close to them, and whisper in their ears little words about those far off days long since passed away. We comfort them with recollections of their young days and with pictures of scenes of long ago. Oh yes! we are very busy in the world. But'the people ascribe our work to other 114 THE COURT OF QUEEN MAB. May took the wand, and the fairies gathered round her and kissed her hands. “See!” said Queen Mab. “They greet you as one of themselves. Sleep now, little girl, and in the morning rise and do your duty.” She waved her wand thrice, and May sank on to the soft grass, and in a moment was fast asleep. When she awoke it was broad daylight, and she was once more safe in her own warm bed. By her side lay a branch of sweet smelling honey- suckle, which she knew was her wand. When May told her adventures to her aunt, she laughed and said that May had been dreaming. But the little girl shook her head. She knew the fairies had been with her, and she never forgets her promise to Queen Mab, but uses her wand most lovingly. HERBERT LLOYD. The Princess pulcherissima. TCVOJOUDVATE DOVODOO0ODOC - IE Princess pouted : she wrinkled up her chin and stuck out her pretty lips, and, now and then, patted the couch petulantly with her foot. Her white forehead was dinted by a deep frown, and there was at least a suspicion of tears about the long dark lashes and the big dark eyes. There could be no mistake about it: the Princess was terribly put out, inso- much that all the great lords and great ladies standing around the royal couch felt little like smiling, though, as in duty bound, they smiled their best. The fact was, the Princess had been greatly disappointed. For the first time in her life, she had been thwarted; for the very first time in all her life, things had not turned out exactly as she desired. It was no great matter that had gone wrong—no state affair, nothing affecting the welfare of her people. That indeed might have been borne with equanimity. It was 116 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. but a little thing—a trivial personal affair. But that, of course, made it so hard to bear. And that all her ministers had practically, as far as they dared, foretold exactly what had happened made it doubly aggravating. They had said (not of course, in so many words) that if she did so- and-so, such-and-such a thing would probably happen ; she had persisted in doing so-and-so, and such-and-such a consequence had followed. It was insupportable. So the poor Princess pouted and frowned, and tapped with petulant foot, and was very miserable indeed, honestly believing herself the most hardly-used person in the whole wide world. And all the courtiers stood around in ill-concealed trepidation (for the Princess was a very Absolute. Monarch)—daring to speak but in the softest of whispers, and to cast only the swiftest side glances at their Ruler. After a while-after the Princess had tossed for a time feverishly among the luxurious cushions of the great canopied couch, darting, now and then, angry flashes (from eyes that quivered with tears) at the Ministers and Courtiers—Her Royal Highness yawned. She yawned somewhat violently, twice. The consternation of the courtiers increased; they looked at each other reproachfully, THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 117 for there are many legends in Bolaria about the dreadful things that happen to unhappy attendants who permit a Monarch to yawn so many times in broad daylight. So the Mistress of the Blue Boudoir, the Lord High Crimson Cushion, the Keeper of the Couch, the Blue Sticks in Waiting, and all the Chamberlains, and Lords and Ladies, and Maids and Pages—they all, with one accord, turned dismayed and angry countenances towards each other. One person only did not share their distress, but even she gazed at the Princess with something like anxiety. She was the Dowager-Duchess of the Don, an old old lady, and as wise as she was aged. She was the Princess's most immediate attendant : the person who was most nearly intimate with her. She knew all those old legends, and knew how much of them to believe ; for she also knew the Truth. She had no fear, but still it was with the deepest interest that she watched the Princess. As she watched, the corners of the royal mouth were drawn down convulsively, the big eyes closed, and the Princess yawned again. The Dowager-Duchess knew that she had reached a crisis in her life. “Pulcherissima !” sounded a voice-a tiny 118 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. voice, yet clear and distinct-as though close to the Princess's ear, “Look, Pulcherissima!” The Princess was startled and indignant, and wondered who had dared to take so great a liberty. “Look, Pulcherissima! Look!” the voice commanded, and the Princess, fairly aroused, turned her eyes toward the right corner of the satin cushion, “Look, Pulcherissima!” said the audacious voice once more. And the Princess did look, and she saw, sitting comfortably upon the cushion, the tiniest, wee-est, weeniest little woman yoụ could imagine, dressed all in gauzy garments. It was, of course, a fairy : in a land like Bolaria, where fairies are so common (many having fled thither from more matter-of-fact countries) it did not take the Princess long to discover that. Nor did it take her long either to be sure—though she had never previously seen her—that this little person was her fairy God- mother, from whom she had received her seventeenth name, Carita. The Fairy Carita had a tiny wand that glinted and irradiated like a pure diamond, and with this she touched the Princess lightly upon the forehead. Instantly, all the curly-wigged courtiers faded away, and all the paintings and tapestries, the THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 119 heavy hangings and delicate decorations, of the great Blue Boudoir vanished; the Princess felt the cool breath of the evening air upon her cheek, and in place of rich odours and subdued chatter came the scent of pine-trees and the evensong of birds and insects. Instead of the rustling of silk and satin she only heard the occasional crack of a branch or the soft thump of a fir-cone as it tumbled to the ground. The Princess found her- self sitting in a little clearing in a forest, and she could see the redness of the sunset between the straight and slender stems. She was just a little frightened at first, so that, when she heard the voice at her ear once more, it seemed very friendly and reassuring. “Look again, Pulcherissima- look through the trees," it said. She obeyed, but could see nothing, though a strange sound fell upon her ears. It was like the note of a bird, but it was not a bird ; a sound shrill, but sweet, and sustained it was, and it rose and sank, and formed a tune that the Princess knew and liked. It was the first time the Princess had ever heard anyone whistling. She stretched her head forward eagerly to discover whence the sound came, and she saw someone advancing along the narrow forest-path. It was a man, whose 120 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. oarse form was outlined against the ruddy sky. He carried a cross-bow over his shoulder, and a little dog ran hither and thither around his feet, snuffing about amongst the fallen needles. The man's head was bent and she could not see his face; but, as he emerged into her little patch of daylight, she noticed that he was bravely dressed. Some impulse made her glance at her own dress as she noticed this, and lo, in place of the splendid silks she had worn but a moment before in the Palace, she was clothed in a gown of homely coarse material. In the midst of her surprise, and a sudden terror that seized her at finding herself alone for the very first time in all her life, the little dog ran sniffing towards her, whilst the man—the young man, as she knew, somehow, that he was—strode, still whistling, across the clearing. Looking down at the dog, she found that she had neither shoes nor stockings, and so she hung her head still lower, and her cheeks burnt terribly. The little dog did not bark, but looked at her, with one ear and one foot raised in- quiringly. She dared not lift her eyes even so high as the little beast, which, however, came up to her and licked one of her hands. When she drew it away he jumped upon her lap. She saw I 22 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. sticks, whose smoke sometimes escaped through a hole in the roof, and sometimes curled in thick rolls around the wall, and filed swiftly through the doorway. The Princess would gladly have followed it, but something seemed to prevent her. She tried to summon to her aid her customary commanding tones and looks. But they wouldn't come. All she could do was to stand and stare in astonishment at the woman, who simply scolded her again. Then there came a gruff voice from the table. “Sulky?" it said, en- quiringly. Turning her eyes in that direction, the Princess saw a man, who, roughly dressed as he was, and with thick and matted hair and beard, bore the same fleeting resemblance to her lords as the woman did to her ladies. “Sulky, eh?” he growled. “Give her her supper, mother, the supper for the sulky ones, and let her be.” And the woman fetched a crust, so hard that, when she tossed it at the Princess, it hurt her where it hit, and cried, “She may fetch water for herself.” The Princess, having struggled in vain to express her horror and indignation, had sunk upon the filthy floor, and she sat there in the darkest corner, with the crust upon her lap, and all that she could do was to sob softly. THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 123 The man and the woman talked to each other for a while, and sometimes glanced at her and called her “Sulky," and when it was quite dark the man took up an axe and set out. The woman, soon after, without another word to the Princess, lay down and went to sleep, and snored. All the time, the poor Princess crouched and quivered in the corner. She was so bewildered and so terrified. How had all this come about? Who was she? With whom had she changed places ? and why? She must be dreaming. But the smoke and the smell and the snores seemed too terribly real. She crouched there and cried quietly, and asked herself these questions over and over again. But she could get no satisfactory reply. That it was some of the Fairy Carita's doing she felt sure. But why had she-her Godmother-treated her thus ? She called to her, and kept on asking "why?” and crying, until at last she fell asleep. She had a most beautiful dream. She was a Princess again, and sitting upon her Throne. Before her was a vast throng of her people, who cheered her joyously, and cried “ Long Live our Beautiful Princess !” The sun shone gloriously, and her heart danced within her, vas a 124 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. and swelled with pleasure and exultation. She turned her eyes with a smile towards her left- hand side, where another Throne stood, upon which a man was sitting—a young man, lithe and strong. She was raising her eyes to his face, when she woke up with a convulsive sob. The woman was stirring, and a grey cold light peered dimly in at the doorway. Without, the birds were shaking themselves and uttering a sleepy chirp or two, and strange sounds came at moments as from a distance. The woman cried “Now, my girl! out and about !” and the Princess rose with a kind of stupefied submission, and did what the woman told her. So the morning passed, the Princess obeying the woman, and doing this, that, and the other. At noon-day they had a coarse and frugal meal, and in the afternoon—whilst the woman lay down- the tired Princess was sent into the forest to gather sticks. She was so very tired and so very frightened that she did not wander far from the clearing. Her back ached with the stooping, and her bare feet hurt so. It was dreadfully hot, and at every sound she started and her heart stopped still. Greatly as she loathed the hut and its occupants, she felt less lonely—and it was vas THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 125 SI- so very, very lonely out there in the forest—when she knew that she was near to it. She went along, from spot to spot, gathering THE PRINCE OF PARAJANA. the dried twigs and little sticks, until at last she felt that she could do so no longer, she must rest awhile. So she sank down, and began again to wonder wearily at this terrible change in her lot, 126 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. and to ask why it should be so. But only for a little while, for she was soon in a sound and dreamless sleep. She felt something cold upon her hand, and, as she started up in terror, she heard a sound that she recognised. Her heart beat furiously, but the cool and gentle evening breeze, once more fanning her cheeks, seemed to soothe her. The little black dog once again leapt into her lap, and she sat up and listened to the whistling ; the tune was the same, and floated towards her in vibratory cadences. The little dog licked her hand again and looked up into her face before he scampered off. When he had gone, she crept towards the clearing, and from there could catch glimpses of the lithe, strong figure, as glints from the setting sun fell upon his back. When he was out of sight and the sound of the whistling had died away, she sat down again and sighed. By and bye, the woman came out from the hut, and rated her more fiercely than before for her idleness. She pushed her, still scolding, into the cottage. “Idle, eh?” said the man, who again sat at the rude table, “then let her eat the bread of idleness,” and, as he threw her another hard crust, they both laughed uproariously. The as roman THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 127 evening passed much as did the previous one. The Princess cried quietly, and wondered why this cruel change had come upon her, until once more she fell asleep. This time, when she dreamed, she was sitting at her Council ; her Ministers were seated below her, and each wore his most congratulatory smile. As one began to read an address, her pleased eyes again turned towards her left, and there was the strong lithe figure. She raised them slowly, and, as she did so, the scene vanished, and she again awoke in the dismal hut. The morning of this third day passed like its predecessor, and in the afternoon she was again sent out to search for sticks. This time she kept awake and hovered about the clearing, listening all the while for the whistling. She wondered why she did so, and it struck her that never, when she was a princess, had she cared about anything so much. But then everything was so different now. So she strained her ears to catch the sound. So eager was she to catch that particular sound that she didn't hear the woman when she came upon her. Something had put her into a better humour, and the Princess, as she saw, had a fairly big bundle of sticks. THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 129 across the beautiful expanse of country towards the distant hills behind which he was slowly dropping. Just then she was conscious that she was leaning upon an arm, and as she moved her head a little it rested upon a shoulder. She looked down, and as she saw the figure beside her she said to herself merrily, “I will see your face this time!" Immediately a voice said, “ Don't be too sure !” and a merry laugh followed, and just as she swiftly lifted her eyes the whole scene vanished. For the next. nine afternoons the Princess strove to catch a glimpse of the whistler's face ; she was always almost successful, but never quite so. Something always occurred to frustrate her desire. Sometimes she saw him pass with bent head, and she was too far away to observe his face, and at others when she was nearer she did not see him at all until his back was turned. She found herself trying various little tricks in order to see his face—stationing herself at this or that point in the forest that she expected him to pass, but she never got to quite the right spot, for when she heard him he had always gone beyond her. But the little dog always came to her, and looked at her intelligently, and licked 130 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. her hand when she stroked his head. In her dreams-she was a Princess again every night- she found an equal difficulty in seeing the face of the man who was always beside her. So she had ceased attempting to do so. She liked the dreams so much that, in order not to end them so soon, she no longer looked higher than the lace ruffles that hung before the man's throat. If it had not been for the dreams she would almost have ceased to wonder at her greatly altered con- dition. She had ceased bitterly bemoaning it. She had practically accepted it. There was so much to do—especially in the afternoons. When she did stop to ask herself about anything it was about this new feeling of curiosity to discover the whistling man's appearance that seemed to be filling her mind all day long. She had never before been so curious about anything, but then, of course, she had always had everything she wanted, just when she wanted it. And this other feeling of expectancy, too: kings and queens had visited her in the old days, and she had never been so thrilled beforehand as she was by the mere hope of seeing a strong and lithe man's face. Why, she actually trembled with expectancy! On the tenth morning, she was busily engaged THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 131 before the hut with a pail of water when she became conscious of a step. Looking up hastily, she saw immediately that it was the whistler himself. She noticed that he was carrying the little dog in his arms. She had looked no further when he spoke. “Maiden,” he said, "where is the good woman of this cottage ?” The Princess could not answer; she had half-risen, and then had sunk down again upon her knees, her cheeks burned and her ears tingled. As for her eyes, she—who, young as she was, had met the greatest and wisest in the world face to face- dared not, could not raise them from her own red reflection in the pail. “Will you not tell me? ” the man asked again. But she could neither speak nor look. “My little dog, whom I love, is hurt,” he said. She managed to utter a little sympathetic “Oh!” “I want some fresh clean water for its wound,” he continued, “is there any near ?” “1–1," was all that she could say, and she seized a little vessel lying near, and ran off to the stream to fill it. So many thoughts and sensations rushed across her that she hardly knew whether she thought or felt at all. This inexplicable sense of shame, her inability to gratify her longing and look at the ense 132 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. man, disappointment and anger with herself, her bad behaviour and uncouth appearance, pity for her little friend the dog, and a hundred other feelings, came across her. As she was stooping to dip up the water she became conscious that the man had followed her. She determined that she would look boldly at him, but his head was bent over the wounded animal, and she could only see the top of his cap, and when he raised his head her eyes went swiftly down. “Thank you,” he said, as she passed the basin towards him, and he knelt down and began to bathe the little injured foot. “Will you hold the basin for me?” he asked, and she took it, she could not move away somehow. After he had carefully tended the poor foot, he said, “ Can you take him for a minute ?” She put him on her lap, and gave another little sympathetic cry as the poor thing began, friendly, to lick her hand. The man had pulled off a piece of linen, and when she spoke, looked up. He looked at her keenly, and she raised her eyes to his for a second, and then they went on doctoring the dog. They walked back afterwards to the clearing, and when they reached it he thanked the maiden and went away slowly without whistling. THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 133 From that night she ceased to dream of herself as a Princess, but sometimes she dreamt of the face she had now seen, and that it looked at a poor peasant girl. She had indeed ceased altogether thinking of herself as a Princess at all, short as the time was since she had pouted in the Blue Boudoir. She did her hard work cheerfully, and often sang over it-a certain tune; and she was always sure to see the young man (quite young he was, and very handsome) in the afternoons, and he often whistled—a certain tune. He used to nod at first and tell her how the dog was, and he used to look at her big, dark eyes. Then, later, when they encountered each other some way from the clearing (and she had, you know, to go further and further afield-in one direction though-to find the firewood), they would walk back together, and, by-and-bye, they would rest by the way, and sit beside each other, and then he would help her with her load. She certainly was the most curious peasant girl he had seen : with that face and manner of speech, and he was the first young man she had ever known. One day the peasant saw them side by side in the wood—they didn't see him—and he chuckled. “Ho, Ho!” 134 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. he laughed. “ Prince and peasant lass !” and he grinned again ; and when she came home he took her by the ears, not roughly, and stared laughing at her, but she couldn't look at him and had to run away. Why, she didn't know ; just as she didn't know why she was so bright and happy, nor why she met the young man every day, and would be very sorry-dreadfully sorry—if they didn't meet. The next time she did meet him (which was the following afternoon), he was, clearly, very much agitated. He walked beside her without uttering a word; his brow was knit, and a thoughtful, not to say angry, expression was on his face. “Let's sit down," he said at last, and then, for a while, he only picked up the fir-cones, and threw them moodily before him. “I've got to go away, I can't come here any more,” he said at last, abruptly. She gave a quick gasp, but nothing more. "What a beast I am!” he exclaimed, “to treat you so!” and he got up and walked up and down, whilst she sat there colourless and power- less. At last he stopped and looked at her earnestly, then he ran towards her, and cried vehemently. “No! I won't! I will not!” THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 137 “Pulcherissima!” said the voice, and turning her eyes aside idly, they were met by other eyes, just discernible in the darkness. They were not the dog's eyes, though exactly like them, and wearing the same intelligent expression. No, these belonged to tiny Carita, who was standing once more by her ear, in her gauzy garments. “Pulcherissima,” she said, “awake and look,” and she touched her again between the eyes with the irradiescent wand. The Princess opened her eyes, and lo, she was lying in her bed—the great golden bed, with its crown-surmounted canopy and heavy looped-up curtains. There were strange scents in the darkened chamber, and there were whispering voices and tip-toe foot-falls, and softly rustling dresses. The Princess lay still and tried to collect her thoughts. Why was she here? How long was it since she had left the forest ? And how had she been brought back to the Palace? Then she recollected the day—so long, long ago it seemed —when she had been so much put out, and had sulked in the Blue Boudoir. She remembered how she had then declared “I am the most miserable person in the world; the poorest 138 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. peasant girl is happier than 1,” and had wished that she were a peasant girl. At this remembrance she stirred a little, and “Oh, Princess! Sweet Princess !” came the voice of the Dowager Duchess, as she seized her hand. “At last you are yourself again! How we have waited for this sign! How we have watched whilst you have lain there!” The Princess could not speak, but lay there quietly—thinking, thinking, thinking. She had not been really ill, though she had been seized with a sudden and complete faint that had lasted for an hour. The next day she did the duties that fell to her, and passed through the pleasures devised for her in a quiet, listless way. The duties she attended to with almost painful care, and for the pleasures she expressed a chilly thankfulness. But she was pre-occupied, and (some said) sad. Still she would smile, sometimes, as she lay among the cushions on the couch, and the Dowager Duchess -wise old woman—noted the smile and the sadness, and shook her head and wondered. “We shall have,” she said to the Prime Minister, “to find a husband for our Princess.” “Ah, but where?” exclaimed the Minister. “True,” said THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 139 the Duchess, “Where, indeed?” So the days passed on Now, when the Princess dreamed, she was a peasant girl again, and heard the whistler's notes come welling through the wood; and they sat together once more at the foot of a fir-pillar, and the air was aromatic with the forest smells. She could feel his gaze bent upon her, and though her own eyes were downcast, she knew each flash of expression that flew to his handsome face. She was very content. But there were always darker circles now around her big dark eyes, and her cheeks had no colour. “She has been weeping ” her ladies said. She was taken to her Garden Palace that stood on the very confines of her country, and she liked there to sit where the breeze bore the pine-trees' scent down from the mountains. She would stay there as much alone as possible, and gaze across the valley towards the dark green hills. “ He is found,” said the Prime Minister, one day, to the Dowager-Duchess. She turned towards him, and raised her eyebrows inquiringl;. “He is found,” the statesman repeated significantly. “And he is?” the Duchess asked. “The Prince of Parajana," said the Premier, with quiet triumph. 140 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. “ You have seen him?" she demanded. “It is all arranged,” the Prime Minister replied. “It must not be done suddenly,” said the Duchess thoughtfully, “it must be quietly and gently done.” And the old diplomatist smiled and nodded. This was an alliance much desired in Bolaria. A few days later, the Dowager-Duchess again encountered the Minister, and could see that he was perturbed. “Well,” she said. He was striding in his purple velvet robe, up and down the long Council chamber; he stopped beside her, and with a frown said, “ Not well!” “Ah,” she said, “the Prince ?”, “Precisely. The Prince. His Royal Highness absolutely declines to enter the Palace. He has, throughout, been adverse, but then he is young and we thought to conquer that. He had not seen our Princess. By various cunning means he has been led as far as the Border. But there he stays. For three days he and his followers have stuck there.” And the old man frowned again. “Ah, well,” said the lady quietly, touching his arm with her fingers. “A drive of a few miles would do our Princess good.” And they smiled rather slyly. They strolled out of the Palace too, and by seen as THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. 141 degrees arrived at the Princess's favourite place. But the Princess wasn't there. The place was deserted and silent, except for the incessant barking of a dog, a short way off. They stood and looked across the smiling valley, to the blue hills of Paragana. “ There," said the Premier, “is where he is,” and he pointed to the centre of the valley. “But what is happening there? Who is that ?” asked the Duchess anxiously, pointing in the direction from which the sound of the dog was coming. “That !” exclaimed the Minister, “ That's the Princess !” She was kneeling upon the ground, close to a little copse, not far below them. A small black dog was dancing around her and barking joyfully. They could see that her eyes were bright, and her breast heaved ; and she caught up the little animal and kissed it, and pressed it to her. The astonished Premier, when he was able, made a movement forward, remarkably rapid for so old a man. But then he stopped again, and the old lady stepped up to him. They were now quite near, but hidden from the Princess by the copse, and they looked at each other, as they saw her strange, extravagant behaviour. Some one, they could hear, was trampling and 142 THE PRINCESS PULCHERISSIMA. crushing through the copse. Someone who, now and then, called and whistled. When this sound reached her, the Princess dropped the little dog, and her eyes grew brighter than before. She held her hand to her left side, as she in her eager- ness rose, and half-crawled and stumbled towards the copse. The Minister was about to make a movement towards her, when a man parted the branches immediately before her, and scrambled out. He evidently didn't see her, and she fell backwards, supporting herself by her right arm. He seized the little dog, and called it by its name, but it struggled and slipped from him, and ran barking back to the Princess, whom now he saw. He staggered and uttered a cry, and she, laughing and crying both, waved her left hand in an aimless way towards him. Then he looked at her again eagerly, and just as she extended both her arms, he dashed forward, and caught her up in his, as though she were a feather. The bewildered Minister led the still more bewildered Duchess away. “The Prince!” he cried, “ the Prince himself!" Not such a very long time afterwards, there were two thrones set up in a magnificent VOUDOLJUBE OOOOO00000 02 (COC WEEG Lord tharry's Ghost. HE "Elizabeth” was a barge that glided lazily along a pretty winding river, carrying coal from the busy seaport at the mouth of this same river to a sleepy town several miles inland. Had the bargeman and his wife been of a poetical or artistic turn of mind, many were the joys they might have experienced as they passed through the lovely English country from one town to the other. The bargeman, however, preferred to lounge in the cabin smoking and drinking, while the wife devoted her time and attention to guiding the barge or scolding the small boy, whose duties on board that barge were of every kind and variety. Jack was not a lazy boy, and did not mind having plenty of work to do, but still he often wished for a scramble through the meadows which skirted the silver river. He had heard of wondrous birds' eggs of every imaginable size and hue, of glorious flowers, and graceful ferns and grasses, of rabbits and hares, of ere LORD HARRY'S GHOST. 145 sweet berries and nuts from the woods, and his whole soul yearned to see and taste for himself the pleasures of a country ramble. Several times had he made this same journey on the “Elizabeth,” but never yet had he been spared for even a short hour to stretch his legs on the green sward on the banks of the river. “What should we do,” the bargeman had said when Jack once timidly suggested that he should love to go a - birdnesting, “while you went a-gallivanting? I expect you would like to see me a-swabbing of this 'ere deck, and the missis a-stoking the fire. Not for Joe, young man, so there.” The bargeman, having delivered himself of this decisive speech, returned to his pipe and beer, and Jack was obliged for the present to forego his little jaunt. One day, however, the bargeman was sleeping the sleep of those who have drunk a little too freely, and “his missis ” was in a more agreeable mood than the lady usually indulged in. Little Jack, thinking that now was his chance, asked her permission to jump on the bank and have a little walk. The lady assented, and Jack made his escape before she had a chance to change her mind. The amiable moods of the bargeman's 146 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. missis, it may be mentioned, were few and far between, and of very short duration. When Jack felt the soft grass beneath his feet as he leaped from the barge to the bank, they were just passing a fine old hall which stood on a slight hill, with meadows sloping to the water's edge. Parts had fallen down, parts were built of roughest stone, but some of the building looked well preserved, though broken windows and smokeless chimneys proved that even the best parts were uninhabited. So grand in its age and desolation looked the mansion that Jack gazed at it in awe, only half understanding his feelings of admiration for its beauty, and pity for its neglect. Jack's home in the seaport they had just left consisted of a bare garret in a tumble-down old house, where his old grandmother sat all day, being too rheumatic and infirm for any work, but living on a small sum weekly paid her by the parish and on the wages of her little grandson. Jack had forgotten the cottage where he was born, and where his father and mother had both died of the same fever, and so he never wished for a better home. It certainly never entered his touzled golden head that such a noble building as the one before him might be someone's home. LORD HARRY'S GHOST. 147 “It must be an old workhouse or an asylum, perhaps," he thought to himself. He ran towards it, and began eagerly peering about. The gardens were wild and neglected, weeds abounding on all sides, even sprouting from the grey old walls. He made a circuit of the whole building, and, peeping into the windows where blinds were not pulled down, noticed great lofty rooms with old oaken furniture, floors, and walls, relieved with tarnished gilt. Everything was old, old, old. The dreariness and desolation of the place so worked on the boy's spirits that he trembled with fright and excitement, and turned to run away. A shrill, cracked voice, calling “ Boy, boy,” stopped him, however. He turned, and saw at the great, clumsy-looking door of the back premises, an old woman standing. Such an old woman, with bent back and a wizened, wrinkled old face! She waved Jack towards her with a stout, formidable-looking stick. Jack had a wholesome awe of such a weapon, and, though he slowly advanced towards the dame, he still held himself ready to duck his head and dodge the stick, should the old lady show any desire to bring it down on him. The old woman, guessing his fear, said in her 148 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. high, old voice, at the same time looking in a kindly way at the small boy with the golden head :-“ You need not be afraid of my stick, little boy, for did I wish to hurt you, which I do not, I think I should be no match for those sturdy legs.” Jack cautiously approached nearer. “Come in, come in, little man, and I will see if I have any cake and milk.” This suggestion quite won over small Jack, and he entered the large old-fashioned kitchen without more ado. As the old woman trotted about finding the promised cake and milk, to which she added several rosy-cheeked apples, Jack sat uncomfort- ably on the extreme corner of a slippery, highly- polished, wooden chair. However, under the influence of the food and the kindly glance of the old woman, he began to feel more at his ease, and was soon giving her a full account of his young life. The boy shewed his contented mind and happy disposition by dwelling much more on the kindness of his old grandmother, the sweetness of his Sunday School teacher, the rough good- humour of his “guvnor and missis” of the barge when not excited by drink, than on the hardness W Piala 141.. ICMENET. I TE TEILE 2 ' . ASSINE TON W JOLIN WIRST BCEWORTHY EZTEBETES TE JA Sailor '875 THE OLD HALL. LORD HARRY'S GHOST. 151 over again sad and sorrowful scenes ; she shook her head from side to side as though at the memory of wicked deeds, whilst her stick softly tapped the flagged floor. Jack s eyes shone, for he now expected a story, and he leant forward eagerly, placing his hands on the old woman's knees to recall her from her reverie. “A story,” he exclaimed eagerly, “tell me a story of this old hall. I am sure you can. My grannie sometimes tells me stories of what happened when she was a girl, and you must have better stories than her's.” The old woman smiled gently. “Just a short one, then, or else you will be getting into trouble with your 'guvnor' of the · Elizabeth.' The river, however, takes a great bend just below here, and while they are going round, you can cut across the meadows, and overtake them in a few minutes, while they have been winding round an hour or more. Well, now for the story :- “Nearly ninety years ago I was born, and what I am going to tell you happened ten years or more before that. As far back as I can remember my father and mother were the only 152 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. inhabitants of this great old house. The family to whom it belongs left them here as caretakers to see that no robbers came near it, and that the windows were occasionally opened to let in the air and sun. I have often thought that the family would be glad if some day they heard that the old place had been burnt down to the ground. Every six months through the post my father and mother received their wages, and when they died, the same sum was sent to me, and that is all I know of the great family. Often I have thought it would be best if I gave up my post, for I am too old now for the work, but certain it is that no one else would live here for fear of poor little Lord Harry's ghost. Yes, it is a ghost story I am going to tell you, Jack, the sad story of a boy no older than yourself. "Over one hundred years ago, Lord Philip Marston came of age, and there were great rejoicings here. Oxen and sheep were roasted whole before this very fire, and distributed amongst the poor of the village. The Marstons were a bad race from father to son, but never were the poor forgotten. Many a bad deed was forgotten and forgiven because of the bounty and benefits they distributed so generously. Lord 154 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. to the little son and heir, and so was much in their company. This state of happiness did not last long, however. When little Lord Harry was six years old, Lord Philip was brought home dead from the hunting field. Lord Hubert, it appeared, had jumped his horse at a fence, just as poor Lord Philip was riding full speed at it. The horse being thus stopped suddenly in its headlong course, had fallen, and rolled over with Lord Philip underneath. Lord Hubert was blamed very much for his mistake. Many said it was no mistake at all, but of course nothing was proved against him. “He had been left in Lord Philip's will, sole guardian of his little nephew. He then took up his abode at the hall, though everyone could see that Lady Marston hated the very sight of him. Poor thing! the death of her husband would have been more than she could have borne, had it not been for her son. Many thought she would die too, but my mother always said she lived to guard her son against his uncle. “Before company, or in the presence of Lady Marston, Lord Hubert made much of his little nephew, though my mother often caught him looking at the poor child in a way that made her LORD HARRY'S GHOST. 155 blood run cold, so full of hate and malice was the glance. She therefore resolved to be always on her guard, and, without alarming her dear lady, never to leave the boy alone with his guardian. However, one day Lord Hubert was too cunning for her. “Lady Marston loved to wander along the river bank with her little son running beside her, gathering the wild flowers, and prattling in his pretty childish way. One beautiful day in June she started off as usual, holding her child by his hand, and my mother following behind. It was a very hot, sultry day, and Lady Marston had forgotten her sunshade. After they had wandered a little way, my mother was sent back for the sunshade, Lady Marston sitting on the bank waiting her return. “Whilst my mother was away Lord Hubert oined them. Lady Marston, who thought he was several miles away, was angry at being disturbed in her simple pleasures, and, when Lord Hubert, roused by her displeasure, threatened to take her son away from her altogether if she did not hide her disdain, the poor lady, terrified and unhappy, and remembering that now there was no beloved husband to protect her and her child, 156 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. n burst into tears. Little Lord Harry was playing near, and gazed in astonishment at his mother in tears. Then guessing in his childish way that it was uncle who had made mother cry, he threw himself upon Lord Hubert, and struck him in his boyish wrath. His uncle, enraged now with both mother and child, and wishing to punish the mother through her child, struck him so fiercely that Lord Harry lost his balance and fell to the ground. Before the mother could spring forward to save him, little Lord Harry had rolled into the river. “With a shriek Lady Marston would have thrown herself in after him, but Lord Hubert held her tight. “« Save him! save him!”” she shrieked in such terror that my mother heard her and ran as fast as she could. It was too late, however, when she reached them. The child had been borne away by the current, and in answer to the mother's shrieks and prayers, Lord Hubert only laughed savagely. “My mother seized her lady from his grasp and drew her away. To her death, several months after, the ill-fated Lady Marston was quite mad, raving night and day for her child. Lord LORD HARRY'S GHOST. 157 ever ad Hubert fled from those cries, but as long as he lived he always heard the mother calling on him to save her child, and ever before his eyes rose the vision of his nephew as he last saw his pale face and golden curls rise above the water before it engulfed him for the last time. “None of his race have ever since dared to visit this place, for they say the ghosts of the lady and child will haunt it for ever, the lady wringing her hands and mourning for her child, the boy with pale face and stern eye ever accusing his wicked uncle for the murder on his body. My mother, because her conscience was free, and because of her great love for her mistress, never was troubled by these sad ghosts, nor am I, her child, but no one who has committed any sin whatsoever is safe from such visions here. For that reason it is so shunned.” Jack had listened to the old woman's story in fear and trembling, but as she finished, he jumped up and thanked her warmly, saying he must now be off. “I shall always be glad to see you, lad,”: the old woman said, “and next time I will tell you a more cheerful story.” Jack ran off across the fields, and was soon roma 158 LORD HARRY'S GHOST. again on the barge. He related all he had heard to the bargeman's wife. "Good lawks !” exclaimed that lady, " You do make me feel creepy. I love a good story, too. I'll remember to let you off another time hereabouts, and you can go and hear another.” EVELYN INGLEBY. What the fce-king Saw and Did. WAY in the frozen North stands the palace of the Ice-King. For miles around stretches a vast white plain of snow that no foot has ever trod and no smoke has ever darkened. Far, far away from the bustle of the world, amid the stillness of unap- proachable solitude, that mighty dwelling rears its massive front. It is built of solid iceberg, and, as the rays of the red Arctic sun fall upon its translucent sides, it glows and flashes from its basement to the highest spire like a palace of flame. Right in the centre of the building, under a wide glittering dome of crystal, stands the chamber of the Ice-King; and all around are smaller ante-chambers in which abide his daughters, the snow-maidens. Beneath the centre of the dome the Ice-King sleeps upon a couch of frozen snow, and above him hangs a canopy fringed with icicles. His breath comes from him in a stream of cloud that rises slowly through the clear air 160 THE ICE-KING. upwards to the ceiling, lights there, and congeals, and hangs in frozen stalactites for ever. It is Christmas morning. Without, the stars are twinkling in the dark sky; and, as we see them throb and beat there in bright clusters in the palpitating firmament, we might be pardoned for the fancy that we beheld drawing near us the first faint glitter of an angelic host coming to gladden once more with their majestic anthem, a strife-worn earth through all its borders, — “Glory to God in the highest ; On earth peace and goodwill towards men.” Within the palace all is dark, save where one cressett of white marble, hung on silver chains, depends from the roof above the sleeping monarch, and casts its soft light around upon a thousand icy mirrors. It was yet early in the morning when the Ice-King woke. He sprang to his feet and stood upright; for the Ice-King is no decrepit, toothless dotard as some would have him ; but a young man, and an agile, whose youth is perpetual and unchanging. He pressed the golden curls from his brow, and as he did so he revealed the sparkle of the diamond coronet that was the symbol of his kingship. Then he clapped his hands for his 162 THE ICE-KING barren, and bare, and there they stayed. Then the Ice-King gave a task to each of the snow- maidens, and each set off upon her errand. One hovered over the fields for a while. Clouds were sailing all around her; she gathered them all together, and breathed upon them, and they became snow, which she scattered to the winds. It fell on the brown fields, and made them white. It filled up the rough places and the hollows, and made them smooth and level. Some fell on the cattle on the pasture-land, and it made them shiver and huddle closer together. Some whirled round the labourer going to his work. It popped into his eyes, and settled on his cap, and ran down his beard ; and the man chuckled good- naturedly, for he had a kindly soul, and this was Christmas morning. Some whisked in the face of the farmer as he opened his door to look out at the weather, and some frolicked past him into the house, and, as he shut the door again, he laughed a great laugh, for with him, too, it was Christmas morning. Another of the snow-maidens lighted upon the top of a hill. She breathed upon the mists that Aoated round its crest, and they, too, turned into snow. At the will of the maiden, the snow fell THE ICE-KING. 163 VO softly down, and covered with its white mantle all the hill and the forests standing beneath it. And the birds twittered on the branches, and looked sad ; but the plants rejoiced, for the snow had come to be a warm covering for them from the frost and cold. A third snow-maiden rested over a great city, and she, too, caused the snow to fall. Beneath, she heard the deadened hum of early morning, for the life of the city was but drowsy yet, and was only wakening into the full stir of day. The snow fell silently down upon the streets and houses, amongst all the filth, and the squalor, and the wretchedness, and the sin. It lay without distinction upon all things, upon clean and foul, and covered them over with its robe of spotless purity. Is it not thus that God blots out our sins? He hides our soul's festering corruption from His sight by clothing it in a garment that is “whiter than snow.” And at Christmastide have the downy flakes no other lesson for us? Methinks it seems as if, in the snow's gentle fall, God were saying “Hush” to the strife of men. Meanwhile the Ice-King, having sent his daughters on their several missions, pursued his journey alone. In the grey of early morning he 164 THE ICE-KING. stopped at the door of a large mansion that stood all by itself in the midst of parks and trees. The Ice-King neither knocked nor rang the bell : he just went in. He passed the servants bustling in the hall, but they saw him not. Upstairs, in a large airy bedroom, two little boys lay sleeping. Thither the Ice-King made his way. Invisible the while, he stood at the foot of the bed and watched the children. As he looked they rubbed their eyes and awoke. Neither of them wished his brother a merry Christmas, but the elder of the two said to his brother, “I say, Phil, come and let's see what Santa Claus has brought.” “All right, Alfie,” said Phil, “Hooray! this is Christmas morning.” At this the two little fellows scuttled out of bed, and made their way to the fire-place, in which a few embers still smouldered. On the hearthrug stood two little pairs of slippers that had been duly placed there the night before, in the firm belief that the good genius of Christmastide would visit them before morning. Nor was the belief ill-founded, for it rested upon a sure basis, that of experience. As far back as their memory served—though that was not very far at the best—the boys had laid their slippers down before the fender on THE ICE-KING. 165 Christmas Eve, and there they had found them filled with good things on Christmas morning. At first the receptacles had contained only such trifles as cake, and fruit, and hideous sweetmeats in the shape of dogs and pigs and hens. But as the children grew older the gifts became more valuable, and on this particular Christmas they were all eagerness to see what had fallen to their lot. Nor were their hopes disappointed. Gift after gift such as boys love was dragged forth from the recesses of those slippers. “And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew.” It seemed, in fact, to be a thing altogether beyond comprehension how articles so small could hold so much. As the Ice-King saw their eyes open wider and wider with amazement, he shook with noiseless laughter. But as he laughed his breath made the room so cold that the boys shivered, and scampered with their treasures back to bed again. Silently, as he had come, the Ice-King left the house. His next visit was to a villa in a well-to-do suburb of a large town. He passed into a room where in a little cot lay a little girl. There he stood, and, as he looked and saw the rich dark 166 THE ICE-KING. hair lying on the white pillow, the red cheeks, the deep dreamy eyes, and the merry smile that dimpled her chin, the heart of even the Ice-King warmed towards the lovely child. Suddenly the door opened, and the dark eyes ceased to dream, for their owner was intently watching her nurse, who had entered the room and was coming softly towards her, bearing in her arms a bundle wrapped in a blanket. “See, Lizzie,” said the nurse, as she stepped up to the little girl, “see, Lizzie, here's a Christmas present come for you.” “For me?” said the child, “What is it ? ” “You won't guess,” replied the nurse. “It's a little brother,” and as she spoke she turned back a fold of the blanket, and showed her little charge the baby's face. The child clapped her hands at the sight; but noiselessly, for intense joy is always silent, and the awe of a great gladness had fallen upon the child's spirit. Then, looking up suddenly, she asked in a hushed whisper, “Who sent him to me? Was it God?” “Yes," answered the nurse reverently. And after a moment’s pause the child continued, “ May I tiss him?” This, too, was answered in the affirmative, but as the little girl bent eagerly THE ICE-KING. 167 down towards her treasure-trove, the infant awoke, and vaguely stretching out a tiny, dimpled hand, poked it into one of its admirer's eyes. The baby smiled; a merry peal of laughter rang from the little girl's throat ; and the Ice-King laughed too, after his own fashion, as he glided from the room. His next visit was to a far different scene. Away down amid narrow streets, in the heart of a mighty city, where the crowds are thickest, and the mud is deepest; where human beings huddle together like cattle, and naked sin stalks in the sunlight openly, and is not ashamed, the Ice-King sought out a mean garret at the head of a long stair, and entered. The room, if room it might be called, was bare of everything, save a low wooden bedstead, beside which a woman knelt dressed in a worn black gown. On the bed before her lay her only child, a boy of three summers. Fever had laid its hand upon them both, and was burning, burning-eating away their lives with its slow consuming flame. "The mother knelt there with her child before her, and, as she looked upon the wasted face, she pressed her hand over her hot, tearless eyes, and prayed. She scarce knew why, or for what. It was only ave THE ICE-KING. 169 She turned towards him, and “Oh! sir,” she cried, “ bring back my boy.” “Nay,” answered the Ice-King, “that may not be, but my Master hath sent me to take thee to him.”. With that he took her by the hands and led her upwards, and when he had brought her to her babe, the Master gave it into her arms, saying, “Take thou this child of Mine, and tend it well for Me.” The Ice-King did no more that Christmas-tide. But, as he journeyed homewards to his palace, his heart was glad. And, as he pondered upon all he had seen that morning, and especially upon the latest scene of all, his thoughts were like that of the poet when he sang :- “Thou, then, the longing heart that breakest, Stealing the treasures one by one, I'll call Thee blessed when Thou makest The parted—one." SYDNEY WYATT. Uw Juan hayalam * Es min Am 34"árii que THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 172 THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. clear for a grand dwarf dance ; how there were bands of fairy musicians stood with their trumpets, fairy tumblers who could walk about on their hands and peel oranges with their feet at the same time, fairy clowns who could make such funny grimaces that three were quite as many as any one could bear for laughing ; all waiting, as they had done for thousands of years, for any good child who could get into the Castle, so that they might amuse him very much. It was said that when the wind was high the giant's groans could be heard, and his shouts for some one to take his gold away; that, on moonlight nights, the merry little faces of the dwarfs could be seen at the windows looking out for someone to clear the floor of the jewels and nuts ; that in the middle of the night a beautiful sound came down from the castle as the musicians played their scales on the trumpets. There were other tales told by the grandmammas, but they all meant the same thing, and that was, that whatever it was that any little boy or little girl wanted was inside the great and mighty castle, if he or she could only get inside. So they all wished to enter. But it was very difficult to go in. There THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 175 was sure how some day he would have to learn to do other things. In those days everyone was kind to little children : but the hardest thing of all for Hubie was to say “Thank you,” and “ If you please,” and he longed to go to the Castle Desirouselle, where he was sure he would find everything boys had to do become very easy, and that he would never have to say “ Thank you” at all. So Hubie climbed the tiring steps, and only rested once in a resting-house. Then he jumped and hopped across the stones till he reached the other side of the lake, and marched boldly through the gateway of the castle, when, all at once, he was not tired any longer. The castle seemed empty, but he did not take much notice at first of what he saw. There was no giant that he could discover, and no dwarfs that he could find out. He looked for tumblers and acrobats, but did not see any. At length he thought he would go into the court-yard, in the centre of the castle, and make sand-pies. But as he walked down a corridor, feeling very fresh and lively, he was surprised to meet a chair, which ran quickly into one of the rooms near. Hubie followed it, when he found it stood near saw. as *THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 177 being laid in such a wonderful way, advanced to pick up the broken plate, but before he could get near it the window of the room flew open and all the fragments of the plate fung themselves out. As soon as the little boy had risen from his chair, it ran round to the head of the table and he went and sat on it again, while a serviette slipped out of a ring and tucked itself smartly round his neck. At the same time a prodigious bumping sound came from the vestibule, and presently a huge dish came in carrying a smoking joint of beef, while several tureens and sauce-boats danced round it as it came. The large dish put itself on the table in the front of Hubie, who, though not used to carving for himself, was just about to seize the carving knife, when it slipped sharply from his hand. Instantly the steel rose up, too, and they began to fight in the front of Hubie's nose, which made the little boy sit much more still than he had ever done before. But the steel got tired of fighting, and lay down, upon which the fork darted into the beef, and the knife cut several splendid juicy slices off the joint, and the knife and fork together carefully put them upon one of the plates, which in a very proud 178 THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. way slid off the pile of plates, and put itself in front of Hubie. Tureen-lids whisked off, spoons officiously helped the plate to potatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, artichokes, and gravy; the castors strutted about, and the mustard-spoon jumped out laden with mustard, and tapped on the plate edge. Hubie put out his hands for his own little knife and fork, but they slipped away, and do what he could, he could not touch them, till at last, I am sorry to say, he put his hands in his pockets, and felt rather sulky ; but the little fork leaped on to his plate, the knife skipped on too, and, before the little boy could think what they were doing, the fork was putting a piece of beef between his teeth. Vegetables followed in the same way, and for about a quarter of an hour the knife and fork kept the little boy very busy indeed. Then the beef, and all the soiled dinner- ware jumped upon the sideboard to make way for a large apple-tart, that came waltzing in with a magnificent custard for a partner, while a fresh lot of plates chased the castors and sauce-boats off the table. A knife and fork sprang upon the tart, a spoon and fork upon a little plate, and Hubie was once more fed while his hands lay idly upon his lap. A gasogene just now remembered San ne THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 179 itself, and sailed in hurriedly pursued by two or three glasses. It turned round upon the quickest and filled it with ginger-ale. The glass steadily lifted itself to Hubie's mouth, and he drank off the contents. All the things then trooped away again, clattering and banging, and bumping and rolling down the lobby till the sounds were lost in the distance. Next a procession came in. It was a dessert- service, but there was nothing on any of the plates, dishes, stands, or epergnes. But with a kind of crinkling laugh, a number of paper bags hurried in, and all at once, like so many balloons, raised themselves in the air till every bag was over an epergne, stand, dish, or plate. All at once the bags opened and down fell apples, oranges, hazel-nuts, filberts, brazil-nuts, straw- berries, rasps, peaches, apricots, plums, pears, tangarines, cherries, and nectarines. One or two cabbage leaves fell out also, but the paper bags popped over them quickly, up went the window, and out they flew ! A pair of nut-crackers now came striding in, and Hubie reached out his hand to seize them by the leg ; but, I grieve to say, the crackers kicked his knuckles, and then striding to the 180 THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. nuts, picked out the finest and cracked them upon which they sped to Hubie's mouth. Silver knifes meanwhile were flying about paring apples, peeling oranges, and dividing peaches, while strawberries—after rolling about in castor-sugar- stood waiting till the nut-crackers should be tired of cracking nuts. Hubie, at length feeling that he could eat no more dessert, got off his chair, which at once slid back to the wall ; all the dessert-service formed a line and went off in procession as it came in, while a crumb-brush and tray hastened off all the silver knives and forks, and briskly swept up the crumbs, etcetera. Hubie walked into the corridor again, thinking that life in the castle was really very easy indeed. The thought of the fairy band occurred to him, and just as he was passing by a door it flew open and he went in. A chair ran towards him and he sat down, a cushion adjusting itself behind his head, and a footstool beneath his feet. Two fiddles, a violoncello, a basso, a cornet, a trumpet, a flute, and a triangle, lay on a table, with a number of music-books. "Ha,” he said aloud, “I will play something." After thinking it over a minute, he decided that - - -- THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 181 the triangle would be the easiest, so he put out his hand for it, when the triangle evaded his hand, and a little hammer and the triangle jumped naco HUBIE IN THE CHAIR. up, and the hammer beat upon the triangle ; but it was all one note, and Hubie began to laugh, for the triangle played its one note in a most THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 183 “I should like a scrap-book," Hubie now observed aloud; when immediately a large book pushed open the door of a book-case, and lay down on the hearthrug. A cup of paste and a brush then led in a flock of loose pictures, while a pair of scissors ran round and round them, snipping and snapping at them like a shepherd dog at a flock of sheep. Hubie took hold of the scissors, but they closed tightly, and he could not open them. But as soon as he laid them down, they sprang at the pictures, and cut them neatly round the edges. The brush jumped out of the paste and pasted the backs of the pictures, and the pictures put themselves into the scrap-book with great taste. Hubie, however, after watching them do this through about a dozen pages, became tired of the inaction, and left them to themselves, when they at once put themselves tidily away. If only he had a little dog to play with, he thought, when instantly a little white dog came barking out of the courtyard, and jumped up to be caressed and petted. But the curious thing about this dog was that it came whatever name it was called by, and whenever Hubie was about to whistle for it, it whistled for itself, and came 184 THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. running up full pelt. Outside he found marbles, but as soon as he began to play, the marbles insisted upon shooting about by themselves, rolling into holes by themselves, and, as Hubie won, they jumped without any assistance into his pockets. Then he stood umpire while a bat and ball played a most exciting game of cricket, in which the ball finally stumped the bat out, and threw itself in the air to a tremendous height, while a piece of chalk wrote upon a board, “Hubie : 17 not out.” Next Hubie walked round a field at the side of the castle, while a golf-stick sedately marched round and round and round, poking, and smacking, and striking at the golf-ball which was never lost, for it always found itself. Now this game was too much for Hubie, and as the golf-stick was stalking off round the links, Hubie took advan- tage of a bush, and fled away from the castle as fast as he was able. Over the stepping-stones he leaped ; down the hill he ran, and at length he arrived at his home again. His father looked at him and smiled. His mother looked at him and smiled. “Wherever have you been to?" they asked. THE CASTLE OF DESIROUSELLE. 185 “To the castle,” he said; “and I wish never to go again.” When he grew older he said: “I did not use to like any trouble or exertion, but now I have found that there is a great pleasure in them; and that there is a sweet pleasure in using arms and legs and feet and fingers, even though it be in tiring work. Let those, who can, get their wish in getting inside the Castle of Desirouselle. I would rather stop outside, and do for myself what I have to do, and as for me, what I have to do I will try to do it well.” In the end the rock on which the castle was built became higher and higher, and for every year a step was added. Sometimes its inviting outline can be still seen in the sky, but as time goes on, the Castle of Desirouselle gets more and more in the clouds. T. TINDALL WILDRIDGE. The Girl, the fairy, and the Toad. SOVO H, you nasty, ugly thing !” The exclamation was not a nice one, and yet it came from the lips of a very nice-looking little girl. She was standing in the garden, at the close of a bright day in summer, and there was not a flower there that was prettier than herself. The object that had called forth the exclamation, and which she was regarding with a look of the strongest aversion, was a large toad, which, now that the heat of the day had passed, had, like herself, come out for a walk, and just hopped in front of her as she slowly threaded the flower- bordered path. She stepped back hurriedly, regarded the creature for a moment with mingled fear and dislike, and then, kicking it from her path, ran towards a little gate that opened into the grounds of an old abbey, of which only the grey and moss- THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 187 grown ruins remained to bear witness to its former grandeur. Entering the interior of the venerable pile by an arched doorway in the ivy-mantled wall, the girl was about to sit down upon a stone, that marked the grave of one of the old abbots of former times, when she started as she had done in the garden, and again it was a toad crawling at her feet that prompted the movement and the expression of repulsion that accompanied it. “Horrid thing !” she exclaimed, retreating towards the door by which she had entered ; but, before she could reach it, a bat flew against her face, and an owl hooted from the ivy that clung around the great window that had once been filled with stained glass, but was now open to the wind and the weather, as indeed it had been for centuries. “Nasty, tiresome thing !” exclaimed the girl, as the bat, recovering itself, Auttered away. “I do so dislike those flitter-mice.” "They are not mice,” said a small voice near her. “ Eh? Who spoke ?” questioned the girl, looking around her, her voice trembling with mingled fear and wonder, as she saw no one near her from whom the voice could have proceeded. re CA 188 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. The moon had just risen, and the silvery light of the planet shone on the clustered columns and lofty arches, but no living thing could the girl see, save the toad that was still crawling among the tufts of grass that grew between the worn slabs with which the place was paved. The girl was about to run towards the door by which she had entered, when her trembling feet were arrested by the appearance of a pair of shining, gauzy wings, which had suddenly been brought into sight by being just touched by the moonbeams. They looked like the wings of a dragon-fly, the girl thought ; but, if they were such, the insect to which they belonged must have been much larger than the largest dragon- fly that ever winged its circling flight over pool or stream. “Why do you dislike bats and toads ? ” asked the owner of the small voice, which the wondering girl had heard before. “Who are you? And where are you?" she asked, her voice trembling as she again looked around her, and saw no human being, though that human-like voice sounded so near to her. “I am here, close to you, and I am the fairy THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 189 Mab,” replied the voice. “You have heard of me, I dare say.” “I don't know,” said the girl, more puzzled than before. “I think I have read about you, or, if I haven't, I have heard someone else read it. But I don't see you, though your voice sounds as if you were very near to me.” She did not feel so much frightened as before, now that the unseen visitant had announced herself, for she had read a good deal about fairies and elves and pixies, and the presence of one of that family was not so alarming as that of a being altogether unknown would have been. So she strained her eyes in the direction from which the voice proceeded, and saw between the shining, gauzy wings a figure smaller than her own, wearing a glistening robe of pale green, and upon the wavy golden hair, that fell upon the white shoulders, a wreath of red and white roses. “I see you now,” she said. “And you see this,” returned the fairy, coming nearer, and pointing with a slender reed to the toad, which was now resting at the base of a broken column. “Oh, the nasty, ugly thing !” exclaimed the 190 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. girl, shrinking away from the reptile, and holding back her skirts with both hands. “What is ugliness ? ” queried the fairy. “The mate of this creature, as much as yourself a child of Him at whose behest all living things came into being, thinks him beautiful.” “But toads spit poison,” said the girl, wondering at the fairy's words, and still shrinking from the object of her dislike. “What a silly little thing you are,” returned the fairy, with a rippling laugh. “The poor toad is as harmless as yourself, and I am not sure that he is not a more useful member of the animal more world.” “I am not an animal,” said the girl, in a tone that expressed her displeasure at being included in the same category as the toad. “ You live, and you move,” returned the fairy. “You are not fixed to one place, like the moss on that stone, or those blades of grass. Therefore you are an animal. And as for beauty,—”. “ The beauty of a toad!” exclaimed the girl, with a scornful shrug of her plump, white shoulders. “ Don't interrupt me,” said the fairy. “It is very rude. Look at the eyes of this creature,” THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 191 she continued, completing the sentence which the girl's interruption had made a gap in. She took up the toad as she spoke, and held it so near the girl that she involuntarily shrunk away from it. The girl felt herself constrained to look into the creature's eyes. They were certainly large and bright, and shone with a soft light which she had not expected to see. “What bright eyes it has,” she observed, and, feeling that some apology to the creature was due, she added, “I have never before looked at the eyes of a toad.” “That confession excuses you,” said the fairy, carefully replacing the toad among the grass. The girl contrasted in her mind this action of the fairy with her own treatment of the poor toad who had the misfortune to cross her path in the garden, and acknowledged to herself her moral inferiority to Mab of the gauzy wings. But she had not time to dwell upon this humiliating reflection, for almost in the moment that it crossed her mind her thoughts were diverted by the most charming music that had ever delighted her ears. Whence the sweet sounds came, and how they were produced, she had not the slightest idea. 192 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. US as They were not vocal, and yet were unlike those of any instruments of music she had ever heard. “What sweet music !” she said, in a hushed tone, when she had listened for a few moments to the strange melody as one spell-bound. It was soft and low, and yet every note was borne to her ears distinctly in the stillness of the night, and there mingled with it no sound of earth, for of earth this music could scarcely be, the girl thought as she listened, entranced, to the sweet strains. “Where is it ? ” she asked, when she had listened a few minutes longer ; for the music was all around her, and though seeming to be subdued by distance, the pianissimo notes were as distinctly heard as the fortissimo. “Shall we seek it ? ” asked Mab, answering the girl's question with another. “ But where?” said she, remaining by the abbot's moss-encrusted tomb, unwilling to move lest the charm should be dispelled, and the sweet music cease. “It seems all around us ; I have never heard music like it before.” “It is not to everyone that it is given to hear the music of the fairy world,” rejoined Mab. 194 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. that flooded the valley, the streamlet that meandered through it shone like a silver thread. “How beautiful!" said the gazing girl, lower- ing her voice in harmony with the quietude and restfulness that reigned around. The fairy stood by her in silence for a few minutes while she gazed upon the moonlit scene before them, and then she dropped lightly to the ground. “Come,” said she, and the girl in the next moment was by her side. The fairy music continued, and was still all around them, floating up from the valley, from the sleeping woods, and from the grey old abbey they had just quitted. All at once it ceased, and the silence that succeeded it seemed all the more profound for the strangely sweet harmony before. “I think I must go in now," said the girl. “ Nay, you will not be missed,” returned the fairy. “Our people have placed in your bed a little girl so much like yourself that your mother will not perceive any difference, and you shall take her place in time to prevent its discovery. Come with me into the woods.” The girl felt herself drawn towards the woods by some power stronger than her own will, and in 196 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. them from their home in the thickest recesses of the wood to play in the moonlight,” explained the fairy. “The baby badgers like play as much as little girls and boys. Can you climb a tree?" “I don't know," returned the girl, who was doubtful of her ability in that respect. “Not if it is a high one, I think.” The fairy sprang from the ground, caught one of the lower branches of a tree, and drew herself up to it. “Now give me your hand,” said she, when she was comfortably perched ; and leaning downward, she grasped the hand of her companion, and drew her up to a place beside her. Then, standing up, she assisted the girl to assume a similar position. “Look in that cleft of the old tree, and tell me what you see,” said Mab. “What pretty little things !” exclaimed her companion, clapping her little hands with delight ; for what she saw in the shimmering moonlight was four tiny bundles of reddish-brown fur, baby squirrels, who were playing with their mother, whose large dark eyes beamed with pleasure as she joined in their gambols. “ You like them,” said the fairy. “I don't THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 199 W nearer. ir Own she had read sliminess was a characteristic of all the reptiles which the writers had evolved from their fertile imaginations, “Observe its bright eyes,” said the fairy, holding it up for her young companion's observa- tion, as she drew nearer. “Take it in your own hand.” The girl timidly extended her hand, but at that moment a rustling in the moss at her feet diverted her attention from the lizard, and looking down she saw a snake wriggling among it, and again retreated. “Another of my friends,” said Mab, stooping again and taking up the snake with her disengaged hand. The girl looked on in wonder while the reptile twined about the fairy's arm, which it seemed to caress with its forked tongue, as a petted cat will do. “This is wonderful to me,” said she, when she had gazed for some minutes upon what was indeed to her a strange spectacle. “ I had no idea that snakes and such like creatures were so interesting, or could be made so tame. I think,” she said, approaching the fairy, “I will let you put the lizard into iny hand.” cares 200 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. She extended her hand, and the fairy placed in it the lizard, who found its warmth very agreeable in the absence of the warm sunshine. “See, Mab!” she exclaimed, her eyes and voice expressing her pleasure at the result of the experiment, a pleasure, as the reader may suppose, that was as new to her as was the experiment. “ It likes to lie in my hand; what a pretty little thing !”. The fairy's eyes reflected the pleasurable feeling which she read in those of her companion, and she placed the snake upon the ground, and clapped her hands. The action seemed a signal for a new surprise for the girl, for at that moment sounds reached her ears like the chiming of church bells when heard at a distance in the silence of a summer evening in the country, when the music is borne as on the soft west wind over intervening woods and fields. Gradually the sweet sounds came nearer, as if one set of bells after another took up the melody, until the wood seemed to be filled with fairy bell-ringers. “They must surely be the bells of Fairyland that I hear,” she observed, as she listened to the strange music, almost unconscious of the ner eyeІ a THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 201 lizard that nestled in her hand, and of the neighbourhood of the snake, which, on being placed on the ground by Mab, had returned to its retreat among the roots of the old tree. “ Have we not bells all around us ? ” said the fairy. “See how the bells of the foxglove are moving, and how the smaller bells of the hyacinth take up the melody in turn." “ But you know it is not from them the music proceeds,” rejoined the girl, still wondering. “Who knows?” said the fairy, and then she raised the reed she carried, and waved it slowly above her head three times. As the girl looked all round the sides of the hollow, that was lighted by the moonbeams, she became conscious of other sounds mingling with the music. There was a rustling of leaves and twigs, a pattering of small feet upon the earth, a sound as of wings above and among the trees. Presently there came out of the darkness into the hollow all the furred and feathered creatures that had their abode in the woods—foxes and badgers, martens and hedge-hogs, squirrels and rabbits ; and the feathered tribes that had their habitations in the trees, jays and doves, finches and tits, all twittering and warbling, as if excited 202 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. by the strange influence that had brought them from their roosts and their nests at that unwonted hour. “What does it mean?” the girl asked, with surprise and wonder in her wide-open eyes. “ It is like the animals going into the ark, in the picture on the lid of my box of toys.” “ Listen,” said the fairy, and then there came a full-throated volume of song from the feathered choristers of the woodlands, which somehow translated itself, to the ears of the listening girl, into the following words : “We come from wood and field, From meadow and from grove, Our homage due to yield To all-persuading Love ; From dingle and from dell The praise of Love we sing, Obeying the magic spell That makes us gaily sing.” The foxes gave a short, sharp bark of approval, on behalf of the quadrupeds, as the song of the birds ceased, and then a hum of voices rose from the strangely assorted animals gathered in the hollow,—“Quite a happy family, on rather a large scale,” the girl said to herself—as a crowd of fairies came out of the surrounding THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 203 woodland, and formed in a semi-circle between the animals and the nearest trees; and these tiny creatures also broke into song, accompanying their voices with elfin castanets, the words being something like the following: “ Hail to the fairies' queen! The queen we love, all hail ! Trees, bow your heads of green ; Birds, beasties, none must fail To welcome Mab.” Whether the trees did actually bow their heads in homage to her companion, the girl could not positively affirm, when she afterwards told the story of that night's strange experiences and adventures; but she was certain that all the members of the brute creation present raised their heads and lifted up their voices, which did not seem to alarm the birds in the smallest degree. On the contrary, they broke into melody again, and warbled once more the first verse of their song, as if they had taken the barking and squeaking of their four-footed fellow creatures for an encore. “What does it all mean?” said the girl, turning to the fairy queen, “my head begins to reel with the strangeness of it all.” 204 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. е And well it might. “ It is something more than a welcome to me,” replied Mab. “ It is a festival in celebration of the reconciliation of a young heart and mind with all the creatures to which the supreme Wisdom and Love have given life. Before this night, the scene which you now behold would have been impossible, for had you and anyone of the creatures before you met in field or wood, they would have ran or flown from you. Some of them would have come from their homes only during the hours of darkness, lest they should encounter some member of your race, which their experience has taught them to fear, or some of those other animals, between which and themselves your race have fostered antagonism for your own selfish purposes, or the gratification of evil promptings. The fox and the badger would have fled to earth, the squirrel have taken refuge up a tree, the rabbit have retreated to its burrow, the hedge-hog have presented to you a ball of sharp spines, the birds have flown to the shelter of bushes or the branches of trees beyond your reach, the snake and the lizard have concealed themselves in the crevices of the earth. Yet you read in the Book from which THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 205 you draw rules for your life, that the Being whom you worship saw all the creatures He had made, ‘and, behold, it was very good ;' and one of your poets has taught you that- 'He prayeth best who loveth most All things, both great and small, For the good Lord who loveth us, He made and loves them all.”” “I will never be cruel to any living thing again, not even to a toad,” said the girl, as Mab paused. “ There are many girls and boys,” resumed the fairy, “ who do not sin in that way from the promptings of a cruel heart urging them to inflict pain upon the weak and helpless, but because their minds have been dulled, and their feelings blunted, by false teachings concerning the creatures who, in consequence, become their victims. You believed that the toad would spit venom at you, that the lizard was poisonous to the touch, that the snake would sting you. Therefore, you feared them, and fear always makes those under its influence cruel. Know- ledge casts out fear, and love takes its place in the heart.” “And the greatest of these is Love,'” the girl 206 THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. repeated softly, remembering at that moment the text from which she had heard a sermon on the preceding Sunday morning. There was a murmur of assent from the assembled representatives of the animal world, and then they began to separate and return to their haunts in the surrounding woodlands, and the fields beyond. The fairies remained, and as the hollow became clear of the beasts and birds, they came forward and crowded round their queen. " Thanks for your welcome,” said she, and then she turned to the mortal who stood by her side. “It is time, my dear little friend,” she said, “that you were tucked up in your little bed. Do not forget what you have learned to-night, and you will be a better child, and a happier one, for the lesson." “ Leave me, my subjects,” she continued, turning to the elfin host, “and your nightly revel ended, seek repose beneath such canopies as mushrooms yield, or in the swinging hammocks of the convolvulus.” The fairies danced away, some of the more volatile spirits among them performing somer- THE GIRL, THE FAIRY, AND THE TOAD. 207 saults over such small obstructions as they encountered, and the girl was guided by Mab through the wood to the vicinity of the abbey ruins. “Good night,” said Mab, and the next moment she was gone, and the girl stood alone in the moonlight. Bewildered by the strange events of the night, she never remembered how she reached her chamber, where she, however, found herself when she awoke the next morning. GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 209 ferocious and cunning, and blood-thirsty mon- sters ; they don't all go about “Fee-fo-fi-fum-ing,” and smelling the blood of Englishmen, and grinding their bones to make them bread. Far from it. I have known several giants; and though they had their faults (as who, even amongst the smallest of us, has not ?) they were not bad creatures. They were real giants, too, mind you—not one of them an inch under forty- seven feet high. Now, a giant once served me a very good turn, and that was Gerald, who lived on a strip of land lying to the west of our country. He was not to be compared to some of the giants I have seen for size, but he stood fully sixty-three feet high in his stockings. He was quite young when I first met him—he had seen some eighty or ninety summers only. I• am going to tell you how I came to meet him, and what was the good turn he did me. I don't know whether you are at all acquainted with the laws of the Kingdom of Androgovia, but, if you are, you will of course remember that Princes of the Royal House are sternly forbidden to marry any but Princesses of rank equal to their own, that they are not allowed to go to 210 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. court when they have passed the age of one-and- twenty years until they have married, and that no Prince may engage in any trade, profession, or occupation until he is entitled to go to court ; indeed, he may not adopt any calling unconnected with the court. You may say that it is not necessary for a Prince to follow any trade, profession, occupation, or calling ; it is sufficient for him, you will say, to be Royal and to be good. But there you show your ignorance of the laws of Androgovia, because, in that country at any rate, the Prince has to earn his living like any other man ; he has no other allowances, and no other means of making any pocket money. It is true that Princes have certain advantages as tradesmen or professional men, for the loyal Androgovians are very ready to purchase the handiwork of their Princes, or to take advantage of their professional skill. They enjoy saying to one another (for example) “ You see that chair- or that pipe-or that antimacassar? I bought that at Pygmalian's.” Or, “I shall engage Pro- metheus to defend me in my coming law-suit.” Or, “I shall give Bernardus an order for a new suit of clothes.” Or, “ I think I shall go and see Constantine at the Theatre Royal this evening.” IS eveni 2 1 2 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. It was in his reign that the new Summer Palace, on the banks of the Androgoon, was finished. This beautiful building was entirely the work of successive generations of Princes. Its history was rather interesting. The work of constructing and furnishing it would every now and then reach a certain point, when it would come to a standstill, because something had to be done which none of the Royal workmen could do, on account of that limitation in the range of their trades. And so the building would have to remain in that state until some Prince should have discovered a means of entering and learning the required profession and attaining skill in it. Thus it was some time before the water-pipes were laid in, for there could not be any plumber amongst the Princes ; however, one of my great- uncles solved the difficulty by becoming an Artificer of Apparatus Appertaining to Aqueductal Arrangements. But all such difficulties had been surmounted before my time, and, when I was born, the Palace stood amongst the orange-trees and palms (planted by an Arboriculturist, whilst the grounds were of course laid out by a Cultivator) by the blue waters of the Androgoon, a thing of beauty and a joy for ever. GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 213. However, as I have said, the possible pro- fessions were very largely filled up when the time came for me to think about earning my living, but I finally made up my mind to apprentice myself to a carpet maker. Before, though, I could become a journeyman and make money, it was necessary that I should take a wife. And here the disadvantage of belonging to so large a family again became manifest, for the supply of available princesses had by that time pretty nearly run out -if I may put it in such a vulgar way. It was true that the neighbouring Kings of Paflagonia and Bistrancia each had unmarried daughters- the latter three of them. But—well, I should be rude, I'm afraid, if I were to say more than that I didn't consider that any of those four ladies would make me a good and suitable wife. So I resolved to seek a private audience of my father, and to ask his permission to go further afield in search of a spouse. It was two days before my twenty-first birthday when, having asked for a half-holiday, I was ushered into the presence of the king. I explained my position to His Majesty, pointing out the exceptional disadvantages in which I had been placed by coming at the end of so long a 216 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. his watch-chain, and pointing to a certain mark in the panelling of the wall, he said, “ Press your finger six inches above that mark.” I did so, and a tiny door at once opened, disclosing a key-hole. “Now, turn this key in that lock.” I did that also, and a larger door flew open, revealing a cupboard containing a mass of papers, a number of pipes, and a very varied collection of other curious articles. “Do you see a cash-box ?" asked my father, adding, “Don't stir the things up too much.” But I was forced to confess that I could see no such a thing as a cash-box. “Well,” said the King, who now stood behind me—“Well, you may be a jolly good carpet- maker, but I'll be dethroned if you're anything of a cash-box seeker! I should make carpet-ter one myself! What do you call this now?” and as he spoke he took up and handed me a thickish volume, shaking it as he did so, when, sure enough, I could hear the rattle of coins within. This curious cash-box he got me to set down upon the table, whilst he proceeded to deliver me a lecture upon thrift and economy, and the like subjects (he enjoyed an income of £6,000,000 a-day himself), finishing up thus :- “Now, my dear Jonathan, you may be GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 217 Р er surprised to hear that every single one of your brothers before you, except Hector, has come to me exactly with the same story as yourself, at the age of twenty years, eleven months, and twenty- nine days; each has in turn begged me to advance him a certain sum of money—to be returned out of his first earnings. Therefore, although there is no provision for this in our constitution, and for all I know, it may not be quite in accordance with the law-I have never consulted the Chancellor on the subject-I have made each of your brothers a present of a certain sum of money out of my Privy Purse, to help him in the business of obtaining a wife. I gave your eldest brother, Henderson, the sum of one pound, ten shillings, and fivepence; that is to say, a penny for every day in the year, which is, with the practice of decent economy, sufficient, I should think, to enable a man to exist—I don't say in luxury, but at anyrate in moderate comfort- for a twelve month. But I have recognised the possibility of each of my sons having a little greater difficulty than his next elder brother in finding a suitable mate, and have proportionately increased the amount of my gift to each successive Prince. To Jimmy I gave three pounds and tenpence, Inai 220 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. had seen me safely return the box to its secret resting-place-—“ And now, my dear fellow, off you go! Don't waste time! What do you say to Bango? You recollect old Pax, the King of Bango, being here some years ago; well, I'm told his girls are — but you go and see them ! You couldn't please me better. Don't delay ; its a long and difficult journey! Oh, never mind that !” (I was attempting to thank him.) “ Off you go! By-bye! My best love and best wishes!” And, with that, His Majesty nodded smilingly, plainly intimating that I was to withdraw, and refusing to hear a word of the thanks I endeavoured to utter. He nodded again and waved his hand, and so I withdrew; and that was the last I saw of the genial old gentleman for many a long day. I walked out of the chamber and down all the long corridors and out of the Palace without speaking to anyone, and in a very mixed frame of mind. I was very much touched by my father's friendliness and kindness, and yet I could not but recognize that he had given me what, under the circumstances, virtually amounted to a command—a command to take one of the daughters of the King of Bango to be my wife. GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 221 Now, the Princesses of Bango might be very nice girls—as a matter of fact they are, very nice girls indeed—but a young fellow doesn't like anyone to say to him, “ You must go and marry so-and-so.” He likes to exercise a certain amount of discrimination and selection in these matters- at least, I think so ; and, moreover, in my case, things were complicated by my having decided in my own mind upon the Princess whom I would marry—having, indeed, met and talked to her, and found out that I liked her and she liked me. And this Princess was a Princess of Tertia —of Tertia, between which country and Andro- govia there was an hereditary enmity—a feud of seventeen hundred years' standing, that was constantly breaking out into open war! Oh, that fatal second condition ! You may ask : why did I accept it by taking the money ? Well, I must admit that it seems foolish, but I must explain. When I went to see my father, it had been with a hope—a not very sanguine one, certainly—that I should be able, by pleading the very limited number of available Princesses (I had forgotten all about King Pax's daughters, his country was so many thousand miles away) to insinuate that there was nothing left for me to do but to seek a Princess eІ was 1 Cm *incess 222 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. in one of the hostile countries, and, by such a union, to bring about the blessings of peace, and so on. But, I had forgotten also, for the moment, the character of my father ; I might have known that he would have his own ideas con- cerning me, and would, by keeping the conver- sation to himself, prevent the utterance of any ideas of my own. And, of course, I hadn't considered the inability I should be sure to experience of coping with such a plan of action. But, you will say, why did I take the money ? Why did I sign the receipt ? Well, it was weak, perhaps ; but I was afraid of displeasing my father by refusing to do so, and I wanted the money very much. I wanted it to help me to visit Tertia. I suspect my father was very much the stronger-willed man of the two, but he had such a jolly way of forcing you to do things that you didn't recognize this. Even now, as I strode about moodily, and conscious as I was that (as I put it to myself) he had got me in a trap, I couldn't help laughing at the recollection of the funny things he had said in his funny way, and I could not think but with pleasure of his hearty manner and the demonstrations of affection he had made towards me. My heart was very 226 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. . most presentable of them, and the place he was to visit being but just beyond the frontier—at last he consented. He gave out that I was to be sent to a certain place in our country, and that he would take another of the apprentices with him into Tertia. But we had not gone far out of the town, before I assumed the clothes and name of my fellow-apprentice (who had been sworn to secrecy) and he mine, and we changed places with one another. I enjoyed the experience immensely-none the less because it was a forbidden pleasure. I also liked very much assisting my master to design the new carpets for the rooms of this castle, which was extremely picturesque itself, and was most picturesquely situated. There were three daughters of this family, who had been left at home by their parents with but few of the servants, and these girls had a friend, a schoolmate—staying with them, whom they in- variably spoke of and addressed as “Addie.” I had not been long there before this girl attracted me : she often came, with her friends, to watch us at our work, and I used to take the opportunity to watch her—so frank and careless and joyous in all her acts and words, she was a great delight to 228 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. Conve differences from those that grew in hers. And so we fell to seeking other flowers, and into quite a conversation over them. Her companions mean- while could be heard chattering in the neighbour- hood. But after a little while it seemed as though they missed her, for I had caught the sound of her name mentioned, and they ceased to talk as though they were listening for her step or her movement among the bushes. They must have discovered immediately that she was speaking with some person, for one called out, “Addie, who is that with you?" Before she had time to reply they suddenly appeared, and burst into a merry laugh when they detected us. (No doubt they saw something exquisitely amusing in her associating with a carpet-maker's boy). “Why!” cried another of the sisters, "we thought you had found a Fairy Prince !” I might have answered, “Not a Fairy one!” But again I was capable of restraint; and, in order to cover her confusion —for their sudden appearance and laughter had made her for the moment dumb, and had sent the colour flying across her sweet face,-I again doffed my cap, and explained most deferentially how · I had had the good fortune (they little knew how great good fortune I esteemed it!) to be of service SO am GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 229 to Mademoiselle. And so I left them. She rejoined them, and I could hear them laughing again, and she was laughing with them. That was the last time I spoke to her alone, although my stay in the Castle lasted for nearly a fortnight longer, and she was there all the time. I constantly saw her, however, and sometimes (a little while after that encounter) she would come to where I was working, and would ask me a question or two, but more shyly than before. And when our work was quite done—I am afraid I had purposely been slow over the latter part of mine—and it was the day before we were to leave, she approached me, and, again blushing, she said, in her pretty, imperfect Androgovian, “I have never properly thanked you, Monsieur, for assisting me to obtain the flower that day in the plantation, but I do so now. And I must thank you, too, for what you have told me about your people and the beautiful flowers of your country. Will you, Monsieur, accept this little token of my thankfulness?" and she passed to me a trinket from her watch-chain. All I could do was to say that I would indeed accept it gratefully, and that she did me too much honour. Whereupon she began again to ask me about our country and 230 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. how long it would take me to reach my home, and so on. And, all the while, the young ladies of the house, her friends, regarded her with an amuse- ment easy to be discerned. Finally, she held out her little hand and bade me “good-bye ” and "bon voyage.” As I bent over it I read in her face plainly the assurance of what I had hoped and imagined before--that the attraction I had felt for her was, to some extent at all events, felt by her towards me. And my heart leapt, as I said to myself, “ This woman and no other!" As we were travelling home, side by side, my master and 1-jogging along on our steady white mules through the sunny country—he broke the silence that had hitherto reigned by a long sharp whistle. I asked him what was the matter ; but he would say nothing, though I could see that he was simply bursting so to do. I was not very curious to know what it might be, and I had much to think of, so I said no more, and we jogged along silently for another quarter of an hour or so. Then, all at once, he said, “ Here, I ought not to tell you, perhaps; but I can't help it! It would be wiser to hold my tongue, and yet I don't know that it matters much! Anyway, I must tell you! I've just GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 233 vas ing one in such evident pain. I had never seen the giant before; but from what I had heard, I recognised him immediately as Gerald, and I ran up to him and asked him what was the matter. He thought, he told me, that his ancle must be injured. He had caught it in a ravine as he was descending a mountain in his own country, and had hurt it badly ; and he was now on his way to our city to consult a doctor. (Have you ever spoken to a giant ? It is curious until you are accustomed to it; their voices seem so far away, and take such a time coming to you.) I mentioned the name of a skilful surgeon, and was just about to leave the giant when I saw a man running towards us. In my surprise I gave vent to an exclamation, for the man was my brother Hector, whom I had not seen for a good many years; and the giant also cried out, calling my brother (rather to my astonishment) by his name. “Gerald !” shouted my brother, “What's the matter, old man ?” And when Hector had reached us, and had discovered me, the giant told him what he had told to me. “Oh, if that's all,” exclaimed my brother, “I can attend to you as well as any other." 234 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT, "You can do everything, and you know everything, I think," said the giant, with an attempt to smile. “Well, I think I can manage this for you, at any rate,” my brother answered. And then, turn- ing to the people who had still followed us, but more respectfully, and who were now whispering my brother's name to each other, he cried, “Here, you! make yourselves useful, and do as I tell you.” They all joined us with the greatest alacrity, and appeared only too pleased to do anything that Hector ordered them to do. Presently we reached a large meadow that sloped pleasantly down towards the little river named the Beenara, and here Hector made the giant sit. This he did in a very careful manner, kneeling at first, and then reclining, and giving utterance to stifled cries of pain during the per- formance. Well, with the assistance of the people, we got the poor fellow's boot off, my brother examined the swollen ancle (it was a size !) bathed it in the river, and bandaged it with some bed-sheets that the peasants had been glad to sell to us. When it was all done, we left Gerald, who said that he was much more com- fortable, and announced that he should stay there na GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 235 during the night, which was now fast drawing in. But he besought us to see him again early in the morning. So I walked off with Hector, well pleased to have met him, for—as I have said—I had not seen him for a long time. I had always liked Hector; he was so different from all the rest of my brothers, and there was something mysterious about him that charmed me. Although he was the eldest son but one, coming next to Hender- son, the Crown Prince, he had no position at court, because he was neither married, nor did he follow any trade or profession. He had travelled much in foreign countries in his youth (he must have been nearly forty, I should think, at the time about which I am writing), and had amassed some money so that he could get along without troubling to earn any more. But I am not quite sure that that was the only reason why he did not do as the rest of us did. I don't think he liked court life and the Palace ways; he preferred to be free, and to be able to roam about, and to do as he pleased. I had heard (though I didn't know whether to believe it) that he was a member, if not a leader, of what was called the New Party, who wanted to make great changes in our laws 236 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. and constitution. However, he was a very nice fellow, whom everybody liked—our father, the King, not the least of all. When he heard that Hector was anywhere in the neighbourhood of the Palace, he would be sure to command a shooting or hunting expedition for the following day, and would meet him and enjoy a long talk with him. | As Hector and I trudged along together, we saw a man advancing towards us, a man in the Royal livery. He soon came up to us, and making a salute to me (he took no notice of Hector, not being permitted to do so by court etiquette), he delivered into my hands a sealed parchment, addressed to me as I saw-in the King's own hand. When he had given it to me, he again saluted, and Hector spoke to him and they had a few moments' conversation, as one friend and equal with another. I did not open the letter until the messenger had left us, and then, breaking the seals, I read as follows: VERB. SAP. SAT.. Old King Pax in Bango reigns, And has charming daughters three; He who one of them obtains Very greatly pleases me. 238 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. no so highly as that; but it isn't difficult to guess the cause of any trouble that may occur to one of us at your time of life. It doesn't require a Sherlock Holmes to guess that. At the same time, believe me, I am very much on your side, and if you care for my help, why you can have it. There's nothing that I like better than making a young couple happy, especially if at the same time I can work against that idiotic law. However, all I want to do now is to make you happy. I know you would be miserable without her; and as for her-well, I know what she thinks, aye, and how often she thinks, of the fascinating apprentice who told her all about carpets and wild flowers." “But however did you find out — ?”. “My dear boy, let me remind you once more of the giant's words.” And he laughed again. I need hardly say that I was greatly amazed by this knowledge of my secret on the part of my brother, and as I thanked him for his offer of assistance—the value of which these revelations had helped me to estimate-I could not forbear entertaining an uneasy feeling that it might be known to others also. Well, we arranged to meet again three days 242 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. an aro wa might make mistakes." I didn't like this very much, but I noticed that Hector only laughed, so that I guessed there was not much to be feared. In a time that seemed incredibly short, the giant had a great fire of logs burning upon the floor. Then I began to realise the proportions and magnificence of this cave. The logs threw off an aromatic fragrance that was delightful, and a thin column of bluish smoke rose from them straight up towards the roof. But I could not yet see the roof. As the fire grew higher, how- ever—which it did very rapidly-I gazed up and around. The top of the cave seemed miles above us, and it was one mass of glittering stalactites, that sparkled with every conceivable colour as the firelight struck them. They were so far beyond us, though, that the effect was by no means too brilliant or dazzling, it was simply like the twinkling of innumerable constellations. The walls were of the same formation, but were not so sparkling. There was nothing that might be called furniture in this great apartment, but there were a number of boulders and rocks, some of them curious and grotesque in shape, strewn about the floor, and here and there was a litter of dried leaves, and twigs, and straw. GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 243 vn we ve. ummon The giant had withdrawn whilst we were gazing at this strange hall (Hector, I found, had seen it before several times); he had gone within another curtain that veiled presumably the entrance to another cave. Thither he summoned us presently. This cave was by no means equal to the other in size, but it was still more beautiful by reason of the marvellous delicacy of the tints that radiated from roof and walls. Here there was a kind of fireplace, wherein a new-made fire was crackling, and by the hearth was an enormous, but well-made, chair. A table, also gigantic (as was, of course, to be expected), stood in the middle of the apartment, and along the wall, upon the floor, was evidently the giant's bed. But what astonished me most was the quantity of books that lay everywhere. They were piled up in the corners, they were strewn about the floor, there were many on the table- in fact, they were everywhere. And these books were ordinary volumes, such as we use, not giant books in any sense. The giant had put a great pan or kettle upon the fire, when he asked us to go with him back into the larger hall. He walked to the entrance, and lifting the curtain, admitted a waft of cold era 244 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. night air, smelling of forest and mountain. Then he quietly called out something, and in stalked a most magnificent leopard, which went up to him and rubbed against his leg. “It's rather chilly,” he muttered, and he blew a peculiar whistle. At once a pack of these beautiful beasts dashed into the room, scrambling and jumping over each other in their eagerness and delight. They leapt and danced around the giant for a few moments, and he fondled them lovingly; but then he exclaimed, “Dear, dear! Where are your manners? Down, boys!" and they were quiet in an instant. Each was then called forward by name, thirty-two of them, in turn, and was intro- duced to me: that is to say, they came up to me and smelt my hand, and allowed me to scratch their heads. As to Hector, he hailed them all as old friends, and they showed pleasure at seeing him again. Their supper was next given to them. The giant held up one finger, and they all ranged themselves in a semi-circle, and sat so, patiently, whilst their master went to a corner, and returned with a huge wooden dish in his arm. Each beast was fed from this dish, and retired with his piece of meat to his own particular bed. We had our suppers after that in the inner III e - GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT 246 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. chamber-Hector and I, that is, for the giant would not eat with us, but waited until we had done ; he did not like, I imagine, to contrast the extent of his appetite with ours. He would, indeed, have retired altogether to the outer hall, but this we would not permit. I had noticed that, whilst he was attending to us, he cast many furtive but longing glances towards a big box that stood upon the floor, a box that he had brought with him at the same time as he brought us; and when we had finished and he had arranged our beds for us upon his table, he said, “Will you excuse me if I open that box? I am very curious to examine its contents.” Of course we told him to do so, and, with one wrench, he tore off the cover. The box was full of new books, and his eyes glowed as he gazed at them. “You read a good deal, I suppose,” I said. “Yes,” he replied, “ I read almost everything -every story-book, that is ;: I don't care for anything else. I think I must have read all the stories with happy endings that have been written. I only read those that end happily, I never touch any others. If, by accident, I were to read one that didn't end so, I should be very 248 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. wa other. He might, of course, in many cases, simply have put out his hand and caught the bird or beast—whatever it was that he chased ; but he said that that would not be giving it a fair chance, and he never did so, he told us, unless he was pinched for food. The creatures knew this, and the consequence was that whilst they flew or fled from the leopards and from us, they exhibited no fear whatsoever of the giant, indeed, they frequently took refuge upon or near him. One day we had chanced, in pursuing some creature, to go near to the mountains that, as I have told you, divided this place from our country. There we saw a man. He had brought a fresh box of books for Gerald. But he also took opportunity to say a few words, privately, to my brother, that caused him to look very grave, though he said nothing then to me or to the man. * That night, however, he asked me if I had made up my mind yet as to what I intended to do. I told him that the only thing I could think of was to get into Tertia, in some disguise, to see Addie, to reveal my real rank to her, and to formally ask her to be my wife. Of course, ' I saw very well what difficulties there were in the 250 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. where I might be able to ply my trade as carpet- maker. And could I ask that of Adalia ? If I did, I felt sure she would consent; but — I ask you : Did you ever hear of a Prince in so deplorable a plight? It was not the trouble—the danger even—that I minded. I didn't care twopence for that, and was ready to go through any amount of it to win her. But this irritating necessity of earning money, after I had won her -What Prince of all the story-book heroes ever had to face a thing like that? You see the position : If I succeeded in winning her, I should be deprived of the means of obtaining the necessaries of life. If I didn't succeed in winning her—if I were caught, I mean, endeavouring to win her—I might be handed over to the Tertian police, who might do I knew not what to me- at the very least, hand me back to my angry father. However, be the penalties what they might, I intended to make the attempt. That was what I told Hector; and he was kind enough to say that I was a good fellow who deserved to succeed, . and who would succeed in the end if I faced all difficulties boldly and didn't allow anything to daunt me. He had, however, bad news to tell me, for he said he could GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 251 assist me no further—for two reasons, it would be fatal to my “incognito” if I were found travelling in Tertia with him, where he was well-known, and, moreover, the messenger we had met had brought him tidings that demanded his immediate presence elsewhere. What these tidings were he did not tell me, but, as a matter of fact, I believe it was the news that our father, the king, was contemplating abdication, at an early date, in favour of our eldest brother, Henderson. Of course it was with the very greatest regret that I realised that I was to have no more of Hector's pleasant company and prudent advice; but he told me that I should find a loyal friend in Gerald. At the same time he warned me not to tell him too much. “He is a good-hearted fellow,” he said, “but rather a blunderhead.” So, one day, a little while after Hector had left us (his going was as much a disappointment to Gerald as to myself), I asked the giant how he was getting along with his books, and whether he would not soon want some new ones. He seemed a little astonished by these questions, but answered the latter in the affirmative. Then I began to talk about a story that had been published in 254 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. that I was, that day, to find myself once more in the presence of my beloved. I had had no means of communicating with her beforehand, although I had intended to have feigned illness and to have devised some present for the Princess, as from the giant, and to have placed therein a letter from myself ; but I imagined, on second thoughts, that this would be too risky a proceeding, and, moreover, I could think of no way in which to word the letter so that it might convey to Adalia a knowledge of the writer's identity. Therefore, I resolved to go boldly to court with my presumed uncle, and to trust to some means arising whereby I might make myself known to the Princess. But, alas, a great disappointment awaited me. When we arrived at the Palace, we found everything in a state of great commotion. The Queen had been seized with a fainting-fit, whilst engaged upon the business of the state, and had had to be supported from her council chamber by the Prime Minister and the Chamberlain, and was now being assiduously waited upon by the Princess Adalia in her private apartments. So we were received by the Chamberlains, who explained this to us very briefly, took our 256 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT sam t fish, the national emblem), and that they came out again at the same hour every evening. I next discovered that one of these very men, a fellow of about the same age as myself, was lodging in the same house with me. I speedily made his acquaintance, and found, as I had anticipated, that work was going on in the Palace. A certain suite of rooms, long disused, were being prepared for some eminent foreign visitor. Who this visitor was, he did not know, but he had heard that it was the new King of Borgo, who was to be married to the Princess Adalia. I need not say that at this intelligence I pricked up my ears. I could get no more in- formation, however ; but I found out that the young man, who was a carpenter, was very tired of his work. He did not belong to the city, moreover, and wanted to return, as soon as he could, to his own town. Here, I thought, was the chance for which I had longed. With the help of a little present, I managed to induce my fellow-lodger to throw up his work, and to take me to his overseer, who did not make much trouble about engaging me in his stead. The next morning I went, with the other men, into the Palace. That day I was kept very GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 257 Dr n nor CSS closely at work, and saw no one but my fellow- workers, nor could I learn anything more about the person for whom the rooms, which were very beautiful, were being prepared. I did hear, how- ever, that the Queen had not yet recovered. A few days later, when the rooms seemed nearly ready, and I had neither seen the Princess nor heard of her, and was beginning to despair of getting any good out of my scheme, two ladies of the court inspected the apartments. One of them spoke to our overseer, and said, “The Princess will come and see them to-morrow.” How my heart beat when I heard this ! All that night I never slept a wink for thinking of the morrow, and what it was to bring me. The morrow duly came (as it so often does), and with it the Princess. I was afraid at first that, after all, I should not see her, for the orders were, of course, to have the workmen out of the way when her Highness arrived. However, there was so much more to be done than had seemed necessary, that we were working almost up to the very minute of her appearance, and then had time only to scramble into an ante-room, whence it was quite possible to see all the roya party. I could scarcely breathe for the excite- GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. 259 It was plain that there was a mistake some- where. This woman was certainly not my Addie —was not an atom like her. And yet I found that she was looked upon by all as the Princess Adalia. I could see it in the demeanour of the court ladies towards her, as well as receiving assurances to the same effect from those around me. But she was not the Princess Adalia I had seen, the Princess Adalia of the old castle, the Princess Adalia whom I loved. I was at first stupefied, and inclined to believe that I had had a dream, or that I was still in one. I tried to persuade myself that all these people were labouring under a delusion, and that this haughty person was an imposter and a sham. But, by-and-by, a new light dawned upon me: the only person who had actually told me that my Addie was the Princess Adalia was my old master, the carpet-maker. What if the “mistake some- where ” were a mistake there? I forgot whether or no Hector had ever mentioned the name of the Princess Adalia to me or I to him ; and, if he had, what if he had got his information from the carpet-maker also ? But then came the question : If Addie were not the Princess Adalia, who was she ? That 264 GERALD, THE GENTLE GIANT. re- character and behaviour of everyone connected with the court, but for all of that I had no ears. Presently, the crowd began to thin and break, and I scrambled forward ; and, somehow, I know not how, I found myself beyond the halberdiers, and at the foot of the platform. Again, I know not huw, but before anyone could stay me, I had climbed up and was amongst the lords and ladies who had turned to re-enter the hall in procession. I heard indistinctly the cries of the pike-men and the other people behind me, but I heeded them not a jot, but pressed forward, diving and dodging in and out, until I had come before the head of the procession in the great hall. Here, I threw myself on one knee before my brother and his startled Princess, and the other equally startled personages of court. But my brother raised me laughingly, and I was, as in a dream, presented to them all, even to the Princess Addie, who was full of wonder, but in whose eyes I also read, I thought, hope and confidence, and encouragement. I was handed over to the chamberlains, and, having been dressed in a princelier fashion, took my place at the banquet that followed, as the Brother Benedict's Buns. OUR or five centuries ago, the sun and the sky were very much the same as they are now, but the land and the people of Europe were very different. The land in England was different, because it had not so much care as at present, being widely covered with forests, or with swamps. The people were different in a thousand ways. They had no parliamentary trains, or agents, no circular tours, compulsory education, trade councils, accidental insurance, or Australian mutton. They had at least two Thursday afternoon holidays every week; and dressed according to the climate, with whatever colours they pleased. They had strong ideas of right and wrong, with vague ways of acting upon those ideas. Many people thought that it was impossible to be good without entering a monastery, there to live part of the time, saying latin prayers at regular hours, and the other part minding other people's business. However, as that 268 BROTHER BENEDICT'S BUNS. included feeding other people who were hungry, and curing other people who were sick, we will consider we have not time to talk of that. Those are some of the differences. Another great difference, and the one which concerns us here, between the people of old England and ourselves, is this : they nearly all believed in fairies. I always did suspect my Uncle Hal of not believing in the charming little beings as much as I did, but if you, I, and Uncle Hal had lived four or five centuries ago, we should all have believed in them as much as one another, or even more. Brother Benedict did. He was a young friar, who lived with other friars in a building in Monk- gate, Hull. It was called the Augustine Friary. The friars in all the Augustine monasteries were called Black Friars, because the Father-Christmas- shaped gowns they wore were black. Brother Robert, on the other hand, was doubt- ful of fairies, whether elves, fays, pixies, gnomes, or brownies. He never, however, said that he was doubtful. He thought that, perhaps, some- day he might have reason to believe in them. So he had waited for fifty-seven years, not trying to make up his mind on this point, as well as on caus BROTHER BENEDICT’S BUNS. 269 many others; but keeping an observant eye on the world, or what he could see of it. “How cometh it, Brother Robert, that we make and give away these crossed buns on Good Friday?” asked the young Brother Benedict, early one Good Friday morning, as he carried off, on a board, one batch after another of the loaflets of white “lord's bread." Brother Robert cast his observant eye upon Benedict. “It is said,” he observed, “that the custom first began on account of some absent-minded brother, who, being deputed to make the sacramental wafers, made up a quantity larger than required, and, as the dough had been blessed, it was thought it could not be rightly made into ordinary bread. So it was made into these “bons” (as being good), and sent round, with crossed marks, to all the gentry, and other monasteries near. Then it became a custom used by all these religious houses.” “I see,” said Brother Benedict. “It reminds the folks of the day.” “Yes,” replied Robert, as he rolled out another slab of paste, bringing his eye approvingly to bear on Benedict. “It does." WHIT: Mlllllii hay Viralli 1/M19 IN MIT SEMITI MIUI Will Alles W KUMAHA linnas MuU 24 OD 155TH Hitta யாரமா duto NDALL WILDE I. BROTHER BENEDICT AND BROTHER ROBERT. 272 BROTHER BENEDICT'S BUNS. himself into the wallet with the letter. Then he said, “ Thanks to you, Brother Anselm,” just as though Anselm had done it, which was also a custom Brother' Robert had ; and Anselm was well satisfied. The young Brother set out. “Give this letter to the Provost, and when he has returned it to you, take it to the Prior.” This was all that was said to him. The young Brother arrived at Beverley. He delivered the missive to the Provost, who put his seal to it. “Cans’t thou read ?” he asked. “Not yet,” he replied, remembering how diffi- cult all learning was to him, for he was simple. “ Brother Robert is teaching me, but I am slow.” “God bless Brother Robert,” said the Provost “Amen,” said Benedict, and went out. After eating and drinking, he took the road again. All the face of the land, with its oak forest and its beech forest, its swampy hollows and its thorny wras, had been covered, as he came, with the green haze which the bud beginnings give the land in early spring. But now a sudden fall of snow was covering everything over. He trudged on. The snow fell faster. He lost his way, and found himself in a straggling wood, which he had 274. BROTHER BENEDICT'S BUNS. fairy,” said Brother Benedict, in a bolder tone than he would previously have given himself credit for. “Do not harm me. I am on an important mission --though I know not one jot of what it concerns —and I bear my rosary, and in my wallet are three hot crossed buns, least hot they were five or six hours ago, when I left Monkgate.” “Harm thee! good young father,” said the tiny voice. “I would not an' I could.” “ Many thanks,” said Brother Benedict, getting upon his feet, and looking down on the little figure. “But, methinks, you are taller than the fairies Gammar Catchwynd has told me of; and if I may be so bold—there are tears on your fairyship’s cheeks!” “Yes, I have been crying,” said the little one in green. “Won't you come back with me; my little sister is there, and we are lost, and we are very tired." “Gramercy !” said the young friar in surprise. People often said Gramercy, or “Grant mercy,” in those days. “Grammercy! Then you are not a fairy.” “Not I,” said the boy in the velvet clothes. “ I am Jack, and my sister is Avice, and John of Auburn is our father!” BROTHER BENEDICT’S BUNS. 275 Then Brother Benedict took up Jack, the son of John de Auburn, in his strong arms, and strode hastily in the way he had returned. “There she is,” the boy shouted merrily, pointing to where a little girl, of exactly his own age, was seated under a blackberry bush, which was thick with last year's leaves. “There she is. I sang to her and cried to myself, first one and then the other, over and over again, until I heard you come. But you ran away. Still, say nothing as to the crying, for she knew it not.” Then Brother Benedict sat down under the blackberry bush with the two children, and brought out his three crossed buns, cold now, but very good. So they had one each, and a drink also from a flask, which it happened Brother Benedict had with him, containing a pint of good Malmsey wine. There Benedict asked what wood it was, and the children told him, and after they had all rested they walked shrewdly to the edge of the wood; and Jack pointed out first one thing and then another, till at length the Brother recognised one of the names, and knew where he was. He said, “ First, good little master, I will take you to your father's house, for master John 278 BROTHER BENEDICT'S BUNS. and asked, “Are there any fairies, Brother Robert ?” “I never saw any,” responded Brother Robert, casting his observant eye on Brother Benedict, and speaking very slowly, “ but I do not know that there are none. “Valuable and interesting.”—The Times. “A remarkably handsome volume, typographically equal to the best production of any European capital.” – North British Daily Mail. . The Bygone Series. The following works are included in this series, and issued at 7s. 6d. per volume. Demy Svo., cloth gilt. Informing, interesting, illustrated Volumes on Local History, Biography, Folk Lore, etc., etc. Bygone Derbyshire. EDITED BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. CONTENTS :-Historic Derbyshire, by Thomas Frost-On an Early Christian Tomb at Wirksworth, by the Rev. J. Charles Cox, LL.D., F.S.A. -Curious Lead-Mining Customs, by William Andrews, F.R.H.S. -The Place-Name Derby, by Frederick Davis, F.S.A.-Duffield Castle, by Jno. Ward, F.S.A.-Haddon Hall—The Romance of Haddon Hall—The Ordeal of Touch-The Monumental Brasses at Tideswell, by James L. Thornely- Bolsover Castle, by Enid A. M. Cox— The Lamp of St. Helens, by T. Tindall Wildridge-Peverel Castle, by James L. Thornely-Samuel Slater, the Father of the American Cotton Manufacture, by William E. A. Axon-The Bakewell Witches, by T. Tindall Wildridge-Mary Queen of Scots in Derbyshire—The Babington Conspiracy—Ēyam and its Sad Memories, by W. G. Fretton, F.S.A.- Well-Dressing, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A. -Old-Time Football, by Theo Arthur-After Thirty Years : An Incident of the Civil War, by Edward Lamplough—Derbyshire and the '45, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.- Bess of Hardwick, by Frederick Ross, F.R.H.S.--Shadows of Romance-Index. “A valuable addition to any library.”-Derbyshire Times. “The volume is pleasant reading of a most attractive county.”—Daily Telegraph. Bygone Essex. EDITED BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. CONTENTS :-/ listoric Essex, by Thomas Frost-Epping Forest: Its History, Customs, and Laws, by Jesse Quail-Greenstead Church, by Edward Lamplough—The Burial of Harold at Waltham, by William Winters, f.R.H.S.St. Osyth’s Priory, by John T. Page--Colchester in Olden Times, by Joseph W. Spurgeon—The Siege of Colchester, by Joseph W. Spurgeon-Colchester : Its Historic Buildings and Famous Men, by Joseph W. Spurgeon-Essex Tokens, by Thomas Forster- Queen Elizabeth at Tilbury: A glance at Armada Days, by Edward Lamplough-The Lawless Court, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.-The Dunmow Flitch-A Deserted Primitive Village, by G. Fredk. Beaumont- William Hunter: The Young Martyr of Brentwood, by Sohn W, Odling -Fairlop Fair, by John W. Odling—Thomas Tusser, and his “ Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry," by W. H. Thompson--John Ray, Naturalist, by W. H. Thompson -- Wanstead House, by John T. Page - Hopkins, the Witchfinder, by Frederick Ross, F.R.H.S. - An Essex Poet, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B. A.—Historic Harwich-Old Bow Bridge, by John T. Page-Index. “ Readable as well as instructive, and it has an interest for many more than Essex people.”— The Globe. “The work will be welcomed by all intelligent explorers of their own county, who cannot fail 10 regard its ancient monuments and historic localities with renewed interest after perusing it.”—The Gentlewoman. Bygone England. Social Studies in its Historic Byways and Highways. BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. CONTENTS :-Under Watch and Ward-Under Lock and Key—The Practice of Pledging—The Minstrel in the Olden Time-Curious Land. holding Customs—Curiosities of Slavery in England-Buying and Selling in the Olden Time-Curious Fair Customs—Old Prejudices against Coal- The Sedan-Chair-Running Footmen—The Early Days of the Umbrella -A Talk about Tea-Concerning Coffee—The Horn-Book-Fighting Cocks in Schools—Bull-Baiting - The Badge of Poverty-Patents to wear Nightcaps-A Foolish Fashion –Wedding Notices in the Last Century- Selling Wives—The Story of the Tinder Box-The Invention of Friction Matches-Body Snatching–Christmas Under the Commonwealth-Under the Misletoe Bough-A carefully prepared Index. "We welcome ‘Bygone England.' It is another of Mr. Andrews' meri. torious achievements in the path of popularising archæological and old-time information without in any way writing down to an ignoble level.”—The Antiquary. "A delightful volume for all who love to dive into the origin of social habits and customs, and to penetrate into the byways of history.”- Liverpool Daily Post. “There is a large mass of information in this capital volume, and it is so pleasantly put that many will be tempted to study it. Mr. Andrews has done his work with great skill.”—London Quarterly Review. Bygone Kent. EDITED BY RICHARD STEAD, B.A., F.R.H.S. CONTENTS :-Historic Kent, by Thomas Frost-Kentish Place-Names, by R. Stead, B.A., F.R.H.S.–St. Augustine and his Mission, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.—The Ruined Chapels and Chantries of Kent, by Geo. M. Arnold, J.P., D.L., F.S.A. - A Sketch of the History of the Church or Basilica of Lyminge, by the Rev. Canon R. C. Jenkins, M.A.-Canterbury Pilgrims and their Sojourn in the City, by the Rev. W. F. Foxell, B.A. - William Lambarde, the Kentish Antiquary, by Frederick Ross, F.R.H.S.- The Revolt of the Villeins in the Days of King Richard the Second, by Edward Lamplough—Royal Eltham, by Joseph W. Spurgeon-Greenwich Fair, by Thomas Frost—The Martyred Cardinal, by Frederick Ross, F.R.H.S.—The Kentish Dialects, and Pegge and Lewis, the Old County Dickinson, B.A. -Belvoir Castle-Robert, Earl of Leicester : A Chapter of Mediæval History-Local Proverbs and Folk Phrases, by T. Broadbent Trowsdale-Festival Customs in Leicestershire, by Henrietta Ellis- Witchcraft in Leicestershire, by J. Potter Briscoe, F.R.H.S. --William Lilly, The Astrologer, by W. H. Thompson-Gleanings from Early Leicestershire Wills, by the Rev. W. G. D. Fletcher, M.A., F.S. A. — Punishments of the Past-Laurence Ferrers, the Murderer-Earl, by T. Broadbent Trowsdale--The Last Gibbet, by Thomas Frost—The Ancient Water-Mills at Loughborough, by the Rev. W. G. D. Fletcher, M.A., F.S.A.--Ashby-de-la-Zouch Castle and its Associations; Ashby-de-la-Zouch and the French Prisoners, by Canon Denton, M.A.-Miss Mary Linwood : An Artist with the Needle, by William Andrews, F.R.H.S. -Street Cries, by F. T. Mott, F.R.G.S.- Minstrelsy in Leicester, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A. -Index. “The subjects are dealt with in a popular manner, and the utmost accuracy has been observed in setting forth the more interesting phases of local history, biography, and folk-lore of Leicestershire. The book is interspersed with some capital illustrations; the whole is nicely printed, and forms an acceptable gift to any one who takes an interest in the doings of bygone days, or in the history of this especial county.”—Hull News. Bygone Lincolnshire. Edited by WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R. H.S. CONTENTS OF VOLUME I. :-Historic Lincolnshire, by John Nicholson -The Ancient Boat at Brigg, by T. Tindall Wildridge - Havelok, the Dane, by Mabel Peacock- The Crowle Stone, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.-A Roman Arch-A Curious Legend, by the Rev. W. Henry Jones -Quaint Land Tenures and Customs of the Manor, by T. Broadbent Trowsdale, F.R.H.S.-Swineshead: The Story of King John's Death, by Edward Lamplough—Barton-on-Humber in the Olden Time, by C. H. Crowder-Pirates in the Humber, by Edward Peacock, F.S.A. - The Pilgrimage of Grace, by Frederick Ross, F.R. H.S.-Horncastle or Winsby Fight, by Edward Lamplough-Somersby Manor and Cross, by J. G. Hall -Some Old Lincolnshire Guilds, by the Rev. J. Malet Lambert, M.A., LL.D.-Somerton Castle and its Royal Captive, by Theo. Arthur. - The Champion, by William Andrews, F.R.H.S.-Haxey Hood-Bull-Running, by John H. Leggott, F.R. H.S.—Henry Welby, the Grub Street Hermit, by Theo. Arthur-The Plague in Alford, 1630, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.—Kirke White in Lincolnshire, by Alfred Lishman-Index. CONTENTS OF VOLUME II. — Lincoln Cathedral, by T. Tindall Wildridge -Lincoln Castle, by E. Mansell Sympson, M.D.-Tattershall, its Lords, its Castle, and its Church, by E. Mansell Sympson, M.D.-Bolingbroke Castle, by Tom Robinson, M.D. —Ancient Stained Glass at Barton-on- Humber, and the great Earl Beaumont, by T. Tindall Wildridge-On the Population of Lincolnshire, by Tom Robinson, M.D. —Superstitious Beliefs and Customs of Lincolnshire, by the Rev. Wm. Proctor Swaby, D.D.- The Legend of Byard's Leap, by the Rev. J. Conway Walter — Thornton Abbey, by Frederick Ross, F. R. H.S.—The Witches of Belvoir, by T. Broadbent Trowsdale—The Battle of Lincoln, by Edward Lanplough- Lincoln Fair, by Edward Lamplough-Alford Fight, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.- Robert de Brunne, by Frederick Ross, F. R.H.S.-Dr. Dodd, the Forger, by John T. Page--Sir Isaac Newton-- Barton-on-Humber Ferry, by C. H. Crowder-An Eighteenth Century Poet, by the Rev. Alan Cheales, MA.-Lincolnshire a Century Ago-Spalding Gentlemen's Society, by Dr. Perry-The Great Brass Welkyn of Boston, by William Stevenson—The Great Hawthorn Tree of Fishtoft-Index. “Mr. William Andrews collects together a series of papers, by various competent hands, on the history, antiquities, and folk-lore of the great eastern county which has borne so conspicuous a part in the past history of England, and produced so many men who have illustrated it. ... A valuable contribution to local history.”—The Times. Bygone London. By FREDERICK ROSS, F.R. H.S. CONTENTS :--The Walls and Gates-Episodes in the Annals of Cheapside-Bishopsgate Street Within and 'Without-Aldersgate Street and St. Martin's-le-Grand-Old Broad Street-Chaucer and the Tabard- The Priory of the Holy Trinity, Aldgate-Convent of the Sisters Minoresses of the Order of St. Clare, Aldgate--The Abbey of St. Mary of Graces, or East Minster - The Barons Fitzwalter, of Baynard's Castle—Sir Nicholas Brember, Knight, Lord Mayor of London—An Olden Time Bishop of London : Robert de Braybrooke- A brave Old London Bishop --Fulco Basset-An Old London Diarist-Index. “Mr. Ross deals with the chief episodes in the history of London architecture, and with existing London antiquities, in a garrulous, genial spirit, which renders his book generally attractive.”—The Times. “Beyond all doubt a more interesting and withal informing volume than • Bygone London' it has not been our good fortune to come across for many a long day.”—The City Press. Bygone Northamptonshire. Edited by WILLIAM ANDREWS, F. R. H.S. CONTENTS :- Historic Northamptonshire, by Thomas Frost-—The Eleanor Crosses, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.-Fotheringhay: Past and Present, by Mrs. Dempsey-The Battle of Naseby, by Edward Lamplough - The Cottage Countess—The Charnel House at Rothwell, by Edward Chamberlain-The Gunpowder Plot, by John T. Page—Earls Barton Church, by T. Tindall Wildridge-Old Fairs, by William Sharman- Witches and Witchcraft, by Eugene Teesdale- The City of Peterborough, by Frederick Ross, F.R.H.S.—The English Founders of the Washington Family of America, by Thomas Frost--Ann Bradstreet, The Earliest American Poetess—Liber Custumarum, Villa Northamptoniæ, by Christo- pher A. Markham, F.S.A.— Thomas Britton, the Musical Small Coal Man, by E. E. Cohen-Old Scarlett, The Peterborough Sexton-Accounts of Towcester Constables, by John Nicholson-Miserere Shoemaker of Wellingborough, by T. Tindall Wildridge—Sir Thomas Tresham and his Buildings, by John T. Page—Northampton Folk-Lore, by John Nicholson -Northamptonshire Proverbs- An Ancient Hospital, by the Rev. I. Wodhams, M.A.--A carefully prepared Index. —Numerous Illustrations. "The volume is very interesting, and for those who dwell in the county, or whose tastes lead them to explore its history, it will have especial attraction.”—Publishers' Circular. “A welcome contribution to the literature of the county.”- Northampton Herald. “A welcome addition to the shelves of anyone interested in the antiquities of Northamptonshire, while even those who are not, will be able to pleasantly while away many odd half-hours by perusing its pages.”— Kettering Leader. Bygone Nottinghamshire. By WILLIAM STEVENSON. CONTENTS :-The Wapentakes—The Origin of the County-The Origin of the Town-The Earliest Recorded Visitors to the County-The Suppression of the Knights Templars-Old Sanctuary Days-Notable Instances of Sanctuary-A Note on the Beverley Sanctuary—The King's Gallows of the County--The Reign of Terror in Notts- Public Executions -Old Family feuds- Visitations of the Plague-Visitations in the Town, Visitations in the County-Nottingham Goose Fair—The Great Priory Fair at Lenton—The Pilgrimage of Grace—The Pilgrim Fathers; or, The Founders of New England–The Descendents of the Pilgrim Fathers- Archiepiscopal Palaces—The Ancient Inns and Taverns of Nottingham- Index. “Mr. Wm. Stevenson, of several of whose previous works Nottingham and the shire have formed the basis, adds to the list an exceedingly interesting and useful book on the county, under the title of ‘Bygone Nottinghamshire,' illustrated by a large number of engravings from photographs, old prints, and other sources. The writer's aim has been to incorporate much information beyond the reach of ordinary students on the past history of the county, and thereby to prove the shire is, as he believes, rich beyond comparison in ancient lore. ... A most pleasant addition to local history." —Nottingham Daily Guardian. “We welcome Mr. Stevenson's book as a useful addition to the literature of the county." —Newark Advertiser. Bygone Scotland. By DAVID MAXWELL, C.E. CONTENTS :-The Roman Conquest of Britain-Britain as a Roman Province--The Anglo-Saxons in Britain-The Rise of the Scottish Nation -The Danish Invasions of Britain-The last Two Saxon Kings of England -How Scotland became a Free Nation Scotland in the Two Hundred Years after Bannockburn-The Older Scottish Literature—The Reforma- tion in England and Scotland–The Rival Queens, Mary and Elizabeth, Old Edinburgh-Offences and their Punishment in the Sixteenth Century -Old Aberdeen-Witchcraft in Scotland-Holy-Wells in Scotland Scottish Marriage Customs-Scotland under Charles the First-Scotland under Cromwell-Scotland under Charles the Second-Scotland under James the Second—The Revolution of 1688—The Massacre of Glencoe- The Union of Scotland and England—The Jacobite Risings of 1715—The Rebellion of 1745—Index. " The book forms a splendid addition to the works of the same series all printed at the ‘Hull Press,' and, like all its predecessors, is printed in the exceptionally beautiful style which marks the productions of Mr. Andrews' establishment. The volume is handsomely bound, and well illustrated. Mr. Andrews is a bookmaker par excellence." - Printing World. Bygone Yorkshire. Edited by WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R. H.S. CONTENTS :-Lake-Dwellings of Yorkshire, by T. Tindall Wildridge- An Ancient Monolith, by W. H. Thompson-Relics and Remnants, by John Nicholson-Yorkshire Castles : Some of their Historic Associations, by Edward Lamplough-York Castle, by Sidney W. Clarke-Castles and Castle Builders : Bolton Castle and the Scropes-Ramparts, Walls, and Bars of York, by W. Camidge—The Ivanhoe Country, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A.- Knights Templars, by J. J. Sheahan-St. Mary's Abbey, York, by George Benson-Byland Abbey : Its Historical Associations, by Edward Lamplough-Robin Hood in Yorkshire, by Charles A. Federer, L.C.P. -The Pilgrimage of Grice, by W. H. Thompson- The Ilistory, Traditions, and Curious Customs of York Minster, by George Benson-A Story of the Gunpowder Plot, by the Rev. Geo. S. Tyack, B.A. -The Spinning-Wheel, by I. W. Dickinson, B.A. --Ripon and its Minster, by George Parker-Ripon Spurs, by T. C. Heslington -Captain Cook, the Circumnavigator, by W. H. Burnett-Farnley Hall, by J. A. Clapham- Index. “An important addition to the literary history of the county."'-- Yorkshire Herald. “ Matters of fact, romance, and legend are interwoven in the most charming manner. The work will, no doubt, command the warm admiration it richly deserves.”—Halifax Guardian. “It is replete from cover to cover with readable and informing articles.” - Wakefield Free Press. Elegantly bound in cloth gilt, demy 8vo., price 6s. Old Church Lore. By WILLIAM ANDREWS, F. R. H.S. CONTENTS :-The Right of Sanctuary- The Romance of Trial-A Fight between the Mayor of Hull and the Archbishop of York-Chapels on Bridges-Charter Horns-The Old English Sunday-The Easter Sepulchre -St. Paul's Cross-Cheapside Cross—The Biddenden Maids Charity-- Plagues and Pestilences-A King Curing an Abbot of Indigestion. The Services and Customs of Royal Oak Day-Marrying in a White Sheet- Marrying under the Gallows-Kissing the Bride - Flot Ale at Weddings - Marrying Children—The Passing Bell–Concerning Coffins—The Curfew Bell— Curious Symbols of the Saints-Acrobats on Steeples—A carefully. prepared Index. -Illustrated. “ It is chatty and instructive from cover to cover.”—The Antiquary. “ It will afford considerable enjoyment to those readers who are interested in tracing the influence of the Church on the habits and social life of the people in past times.” – Morning Post. " Most pleasantly readable." --- Yorkshire Herald. “Mr. Andrews sustains the uwabated interest of his readers.” — Literary World. “It is full of information, which will make it a very attractive book for all who have any leaning towards antiquarianism.”—London Quarterly Review. “The book is eminently readable, and may be taken up at any moment with the certainty that something suggestive or entertaining will present itself.”—Glasgow Citizen. “Mr. Andrews' book does not contain a dull page. ..Deserves to meet with a very warm welcome.”'— Yorkshire Post. Second Edition. Bound in cloth gilt, demy 8vo., 6s. Curiosities of the Church. Studies of Curious Customs, Services, and Records, By WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R. H.S. CONTENTS :-Early Religious Plays : being the Story of the English Stage in its Church Cradle Days—The Caistor Gad-Whip Manorial Service -Strange Serpent Siories—Church Ales-Rush-Bearing-.Fish in Lent- Concerning Doles--Church Scrambling Charities—Briefs— Bells and Beacons for Travellers by Night-Hour Glasses in Churches-Chained Books in Churches-Funeral Effigies-Torchlight Burials—Simple Memorials of the Early Dead— The Romance of Parish Registers-Dog Whippers and Sluggard Wakers-Odd Items from Old Accounts-A carefully compiled Index. -- Illustrated. “An extremely interesting volume.”—North British Daily Mail. “Full of interest.”—The Globe. “We feel sure that many will feel grateful to Mr. Andrews for having produced such an interesting book.”—The Antiquary. “A volume of great research and striking interest.”—The Bookbuyer (New York). "A valuable book.”—Literary World (Boston, U.S.A.) “ Contains, in a popular and readable form, much that is curious and instructive.”—Manchester Guardian. “An admirable book.”—Sheffielil Independent. “An interesting, handsomely got up volume. . . . Mr. Andrews is always chatty, and expert in making a paper on a dry subject exceedingly readable." —Newcastle Courant. “Mr. William Andrews' new book, ‘Curiosities of the Church,' adds another to the series by which he has done so much to popularise antiquarian studies. . . The book, it should be added, has some quaint illustrations, and its rich matter is made available for reference by a full and carefully compiled index.”-Scotsman. Fcap. 410. Bevelled boards, gilt tops. Price 4s. Famous Frosts and Frost Fairs in Great Britain. Chronicled from the Earliest to the Present Time. By WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. This work furnishes a carefully prepared account of all the great Frosts occurring in this country from A.D. 134 to 1887. The numerous Frost Fairs on the Thames are fully described, and illustrated with quaint woodcuts, and several old ballads relating to the subject are reproduced. It is tastefully printed and elegantly bound. “The history and the literature of our county are now receiving marked attention, and Mr. Andrews merits the support of the public for the production of this and other interesting volumes he has issued. We cannot speak too highly of this volume, the printing, the paper, and the binding being faultless.”—Driffield Observer. Elegantly bound in cloth gilt, demy 8vo., 6s. Yorkshire Family Romance. By FREDERICK ROSS, F. R. H,S. CONTENTS :--The Synod of Streoneshalh-The Doomed Heir of Osmotherley--St. Eadwine, the Royal Martyr—The Viceroy Siward- Phases in the Life of a Political Martyr—The Murderer's Bride—The Earldom of Wiltes—Black-faced Clifford–The Shepherd Lord-The Felons of Ilkley—The Ingilby Boar's Head—The Eland Tragedy-The Plumpton Marriage—The Topcliffe Insurrection-Burning of Cottingham Castle—The Alum Workers—The Maiden of Marblehead-Rise of the House of Phipps - The Traitor Governor of Hull. “The grasp and thoroughness of the writer is evident in every page, and the book forms a valuable addition to the literature of the North Country.” -Gentlewoman. “ Many will welcome this work.”— Yorkshire Post. Crown 8vo. Bound in cloth extra. Price 3/6. Biblical and Shakespearian Characters Compared Studies of Life and Literature. By the Rev. JAMES BELL. BETWEEN the Hebrew Bible and Shakespeare there exist some interesting and instructive points of resemblance, especially in respect of their ways of life and character. No doubt certain inevitable differences also exist between them, but these do not hide the resemblance; rather they serve to set it, so to speak, in bolder relief. The author in this volume treats of this striking resemblance, under certain phases, between Hebrew Prophecy and Shakespearian Drama. The following are the chief “ Studies” which find a place in the work :—Hebrew Prophecy and Shakespeare : a Comparison-Eli and Hamlet-Saul and Macbeth-Jonathan and Horatio-David and Henry V. -Epilogue. The foregoing list of subjects will give some notion of the drift and style of the book, which, it is hoped, is a contribution towards a better study of the Bible in connection with our literature and moral experience. The following short extracts are selected from a large number of reviews of Mr. Bell's book :- “One of the most suggestive volumes we have met with for a long time." -Birmingham Daily Gazette. "An interesting book.”-North British Daily Mail. book. ... The reader's interest is aroused from the first and is sustained to the end. There is pathos in the story and there is humour, and Mr. Lloyd writes very gracefully and tenderly where grace and tenderness are needed.”—Birmingham Daily Gazette. “The story ... is full of action and movement, and is never dull.”—The Scotsman. Fancy Cover, is. Wanted-An Heiress : A Novel. By EVAN MAY. .“ It is an entrancing story, and perfectly wholesome reading. In this work, the author of 'The Greatest of These' is at her best; and ' Wanted an Heiress' may be pronounced a leading tale of the season.”--South Yorkshire Free Press. “ The story is well told.”—Northern Echo. “ It is a bright book for holiday reading.–Carlisle Express. HDI HW 273H 7 S1 2008