By Lilian Gask

The Illustrations are by
Willy PogÁny

T. Y. Crowell & Co
New York

The worst of being a Christmas Child is that you don’t get birthday presents, but only Christmas ones. Old Naylor, who was Father’s coachman, and had a great gruff voice that came from his boots and was rather frightening, used to ask how I expected to grow up without proper birthdays, and I thought I might have to stay little always. When I told Father this he laughed, but a moment later he grew quite grave.

“Listen, Chris,” he said. And then he took me on his knee—I was a small chap then—and told me things that made me forget old Naylor, and wish and wish that Mother could have stayed with us. The angels had wanted her, Father explained; well, we wanted her too, and there were plenty of angels in heaven, anyway. When I said this Father gave me a great squeeze and put me down, and I tried to be glad that I was a Christmas child. But I wasn’t really until a long time afterwards, when I had found the Fairy Ring, and met the Queen of the Fairies.

This was how it happened. Father and I lived at one end of a big town, in a funny old house with an orchard behind it, where the sparrows ate the cherries and the apple trees didn’t flower. Once upon a time, said Father, there had been country all round it, but the streets and the roads had grown and grown until they drove the country away, and now there were trams outside the door, and not a field to be seen. I often thought that our garden must be sorry to be so crowded up, and that this was why it wouldn’t grow anything but weedy nasturtiums and evening primroses.

Father is a doctor, and most awfully clever. If you cut off the top of your finger, he’d pop it on again in no time, and he used to cure all sorts of illnesses with different coloured medicines he made himself behind a screen.

But though he had lots and lots of patients—sometimes the surgery was full of them, ’specially on cold nights when there was a fire—they didn’t seem to have much money to give him, and sometimes they ran away with their furniture in the night so’s not to pay their bills. This worried Father dreadfully, and even Santa Claus was scared away by the things he said. On Christmas Eve the old fellow quite forgot to fill my stocking. It was all limp and empty when I woke in the morning, and if I hadn’t remembered that when I grew up I was going to be a Commander-in-Chief, I should never have swallowed that lump in my throat.

Father couldn’t even take me to hear “Hark The Herald Angels” at the big church down the road that day, for someone sent for him in a hurry, and when he didn’t come in for dinner, I wished it wasn’t Christmas at all. Nancy Blake, who kept house for us and was most stingy over raisins, banged the kitchen door when I said I would make her some toffee, and I couldn’t find anything else to do. I looked at all my books and pretended I was a soldier in a lonely fort; then I thought I would make up medicine myself, so’s to save Father trouble when he came home. But I burnt my fingers with some nasty stuff in a green bottle, and it hurt a good deal. So I determined to go to meet him, and tell him what I’d done.

The trams were running as usual, and as I had a penny left out of my pocket money—I hadn’t spent it before as it had got stuck in some bulls’ eyes—I took the car to the corner; then I jumped out and walked. There wasn’t a sign of Father all down the road, and I remembered at last that he had said he must look in at the Hospital, which was in quite a different direction. I should have gone home then, if it hadn’t been so dull with no one but Nancy Blake.

“He won’t be back until tea time anyhow,” I thought, and I made up my mind to be a boy scout, and go and explore.

It was a splendid day, and the roofs of the shops and houses glittered from millions of tiny points, just as you see on Christmas cards. I walked on and on, feeling gladder every moment, for my fingers had left off hurting me and I knew that I couldn’t be far from the woods, which were just outside the town. I had been there once with Father, and it was lovely; so I hurried on as quickly as I could.

When I got there they made me think of Fairyland. The trees were sparkling with the same frost-diamonds I had noticed on the roofs, and through the criss-cross branches above my head the sky was as blue as blue. A jolly little robin was twittering in a bush, enjoying himself no end; his bright red breast reminded me of the holly I had stuck over Father’s mantelpiece, and I began to feel sad again. For it did seem hard lines that though Christmas was my birthday, no one, not even Father, had thought of it.

“I wish that I hadn’t been born on Christmas Day!” I said aloud, when I had reached the very heart of the wood, and I sat down to rest on the stump of a tree close to a little circle of bright green. It was here I had come that day with Father, and he had told me that though it was called a “Fairy Ring,” it was really made by the spread of a very small fungus, or mushroom. I liked the idea of the fairy ring much better, and as I touched it with my foot I wished again that I wasn’t a Christmas child. And then I heard a sigh.

It wasn’t the robin, for he was still twittering on his bush, and it wasn’t the wind, for the air was quite sheltered behind the bank, which was sweet with wild thyme in summer. The next moment I heard another sigh, and this seemed to come from a frond of bracken just outside the fairy ring. It was brown and withered, but the frost had silvered it all over, and as I looked at it I saw the loveliest little creature you can imagine clinging to the stem. She was only about three inches high, but her tiny form was full of grace, and her eyes so bright and beautiful that they shone like stars. Her hair was the palest silver-gold, and she had a crown of diamonds and an amethyst wand that sparkled when she moved it. The scarf wreathed round her shoulders flashed all the colours of mother-of-pearl, and throwing it from her she hummed to herself a little song about violets and eglantine, and sweet musk roses. Her notes were as clear as the lark’s, and as if she had called them, more Fairies showed amidst the bracken.

They were lovely too, though not so lovely as she. One was dressed in pink, like a pink pea; another had a long grey coat, spangled with drops of dew, while the third had wings like a big grey moth, and the smallest Elf was all in brown.

“It is Titania who sings,” chirped the robin in my left ear; “Titania, the Queen of the Fairies, though some call her the fair Queen Mab!” And he hopped to the foot of the frond of bracken and made a funny little duck with his head.

“Good bird!” cried Titania, breaking off her song. “You, too, sing through the winter gloom, and are here to welcome the sweet o’ the year.” Then she pointed her gleaming wand at me, and shook her head.

“O Christmas child,” she said reproachfully, “it is well that it was I who heard you, and not my brave lord Oberon, who has less patience with mortal folly. So you wish you had not been born on Christmas Day? Why, ’tis the day most blessed in all the year—the day when the King of Kings sent peace and goodwill to Man in the form of the Christ Child. It is His birthday as well as yours, and in memory of Him the Fairies show themselves to Christmas children, if they are pure in heart and word and deed. Your Mother knew this, and she was glad. She called you ‘Chris’ to remind you always which day you came.”

And then I was sure that I hadn’t been dreaming after all, though Nancy said, “Stuff and Nonsense,” when I fancied that I had seen those wee brown men busy about the house on winter mornings, or flitting in shadowy corners at night, before she lit the gas. I had never spoken to them, for I thought if I did they might run away; but I was pleased to know they had been real.

“You would have seen us before,” said Titania, “but you live in a big town, and your eyes were dimmed with smoke and fog. My dainty Elves love dales and streams, and the depths of forests; in spring they throng the meadows, decking the cowslips’ coats of gold at early dawn with splotches of ruby, my choicest favours, and hanging pearls in their dainty ears. In summer they sleep in the roseleaves, and ride behind the wings of butterflies, while in winter they hush the babble of the brooks, and powder the branches of the trees with frost to hide their nakedness. Away with you, Peas-blossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustard-seed! Go, freeze the fingers of Father Time into glassy icicles, and forget not to seek for crimson berries on which our friends the birds may feed at morn!”

She clapped her hands, and the Fairies fled. I wondered why she did not fall, since she no longer clung to the frond of bracken; but her tiny feet were firmly planted in the fork of a leaf, and behind her glinted a pair of wings which had been invisible before. As I watched her I thought of a question I had often wanted to ask.

“Where do Fairies come from?” I said, hoping she would not be offended.

“Ah,” she replied, “that is more than I may tell you. But we were here, in these very islands, long before the people of the woods, and the white-haired Druids who worshipped the God of the Oak. There were spirits then, as now, in streams and rivers, and sweet-voiced Sirens in the deep blue sea. Some Fairies rode on magic horses, and some were even smaller than I, and lived in the ears of the yellow corn. Dagda then was the King of the Fairies, a mighty spirit whose cauldron was supposed to be the vast grey dome of the sky. Those were the days of Witches, Dwarfs, and Giants, and little people who lived in the hills, and many other Fairies known by different names.

We are found in various guises all over the world, but our home is said first to have been in Persia. There dwelt the ancient Jinn who haunted the mountain recesses and the forest wilds ages before the first man trod the earth. Here, too, were Deevs, malicious creatures of terrible strength who warred with our sisters, the Peries. These exquisite creatures abode at KÂf, in the deep green mountains of Chrysolite, the realm of Pleasure and Delight, wherein was the beauteous Amber City. Some day you may go to Persia, and then, if you meet a Peri, she will tell you how a mortal man once came to her sisters’ rescue, and conquered the wicked Deevs.”

The thought of meeting a Peri took my breath away, for I had read about them on winter evenings.

“Do you mean that wherever I go I shall see the Fairies, just as I see you now?” I cried.

“Wherever you go!” she said, nodding her head, “and soon I believe you will cross the sea and travel through other lands. But you must not think,” she went on earnestly, “that the Fairies in your own country are less worth knowing, for you might spend your life in making friends with them, and yet have much to learn.”

I can’t remember half of all that Titania told me after this, but she spoke of fair White Elves who live among the trees, and are ruled by a King who rides abroad in a beautiful little coach with trappings of gold and silver; of mischievous Black Elves who live underground, and haunt people with nasty tempers; of Nymphs and Gnomes and sad-faced Trolls, and of Brownies and Portunes and Pixies. I should have liked to hear more about the Brownies and Portunes, but it was fun to learn how the Brownies play tricks on lazy people who lie in bed and won’t get up, pulling the clothes right off them, and throwing these on the floor, and of how they help the farmers’ wives to bake and brew if they are clean and neat. Titania said that Fairies dislike people who are untidy, and I hoped that she hadn’t seen my playbox or my chest of drawers. I made up my mind that directly I got home I would put them straight, and so that she might not notice how red I had grown, I asked her to tell me what Portunes were.

“Queer little wrinkled creatures with faces like old men,” she said. “They wear long green coats covered with darns and patches, and are only found now in the depths of the country. They like to live on prosperous farms, and though some of them are barely an inch high, they can lift heavier weights than the strongest labourer. Like the Brownies, they can be mischievous as well as helpful. A farmer once offended a Portune by speaking disrespectfully of his kindred, and the next time that the good man rode home from market in the dusk, the little fellow sprang on to the horse’s reins, and guided him into the bog. Both horse and man had to flounder out as best they could, and the farmer was careful henceforth to mind his tongue.”

“And what are Pixies like?” I asked. She had said that I reminded her of one of these, so of course I was curious about them.

“They are much taller than we are, and very fair,” answered Titania, “with blue-grey eyes like yours. If you want to meet them, you must go to Devonshire, for it is there that they make their home. They love the ferns and the heather, and the rich red earth, and live in a Pixy-house in a rock. They, also, are ruled by a King, who commands them as I do my Elves and Fays, despatching them hither and thither to do his will. Sometimes he sends them down to the mines, to show the men who work there where the richest lode is to be found; and if the miners grumble, or are discontented, the Pixies lead them astray by lighting false fires. On other occasions they are told off to help the villagers with their housework, and their attentions are warmly welcomed by the Devon folk. One good dame was so pleased with the help a ragged little Pixie who had torn her frock on a sweet-briar bush gave her with her spinning, that she made her a new set of clothes of bright green cloth, and laid these by the spinning wheel. The Pixy put them on at once, and singing

sped out of the house in broad daylight, and, alas! she never came back again.”

“Ho! ho! ho!” laughed a merry voice, and a shock-headed little fellow swung himself down from a bough just behind me, and turned a somersault on the ground.

“Welcome, gay Puck!” Titania cried. “Whence do you come, and what do you do this night?”

“I come from the court of King Oberon, sweet Titania,” answered the Elf, “and to-night I plait the manes and tails of Farmer Best’s grey horses. At early dawn I shall skim the cream off the milk in his good wife’s dairy, since yester-e’en she grudged a drink of it to an orphan child. ‘Robin Goodfellow has been here!’ she will cry when she sees what I have been after, and her greedy old eyes will fill with tears. That is one of my pet names, Wide-eyes,” he added, hopping on to my shoulder and pinching my ear. “I am also Pouke, Hobgoblin, and Robin Hood. But where are the Urchins, my merry play-fellows? It is high time that they were here, for the lady moon has hung her lamp i’ the sky.”

The clouds were all tinted a deep rose pink, and behind the trees, just where the moon had risen, was a haze of purple. I knew by this that it must be nearly tea-time, and I was just going to say that I must go, when Titania left the frond of bracken, and alighted in the centre of the Fairy Ring. Waving her wand, she summoned her “gladsome sprites,” and next moment the Fairy Ring was thronged with dancing Elves who wore red caps and silver shoes, with bright green mantles buttoned with bobs of silk. Puck flew to join them, but Peas-blossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustard-seed, who sprang from nowhere, danced in an inner circle round the Fairy Queen. They sang as they danced, and this is their song. I found it afterwards in a book of Father’s, which he said had in it more wonderful things than all books in the world but one:

“And about goe wee, goe wee!” echoed down the glade, and then the Elves suddenly disappeared, with Puck and Titania and her attendants.

The wood was growing darker every minute, but the sparkles of frost were glittering still, and lit my way. At the end of the scrub I saw Father coming to meet me, swinging down the road with such long steps that he looked like a kindly big giant. He had guessed where I had gone, and he was so pleased to find me that he forgot to say I mustn’t explore any more without him, as I was afraid he would. He took my hand, and we both ran; it was lovely at home by the fire.

I meant to have told him about Queen Titania while we were having tea, but Nancy had made such scrumptious cakes that there wasn’t time at first, and before I had finished he began to open the letters that had come just after he left that morning. They seemed to be all bills, and Father sighed as he looked them over, his forehead puckered into rucks and lines. Presently he came to a big blue envelope, and he turned this round and round as if he thought there might be something horrid inside. The paper crackled like anything as he drew it out, and when it was unfolded he sat looking at it for a long time, though there didn’t seem to be much writing. At last he gave an odd kind of gasp, and took my face between his hands. He pressed it so hard that he made me say “O!” though I didn’t want to do this, and I wondered what had happened.

“Your great-aunt Helen is dead, Chris,” he said at last, as he let me go. “I haven’t seen her for years and years.… She was not over kind to me when I was a lad, though I believe she meant well.… And now she’s left us all her money. We shan’t be poor any more.”

This was the beginning of ever so many surprises. First, Father and I had warm new overcoats, with woolly stuff inside them that felt like blankets, only much more soft and fluffy, and Nancy had the blue silk dress she always vowed that she should buy when her ship came home. There was a fire every night in Father’s study, and I had one in my bedroom. More patients came up for soup than they did for medicine, and they said “God bless you, Sir!” to Father so often that he wanted to run away. The children in the hospital had the biggest tree that the ward would hold, and all the old men and women in the workhouse had a big tea, and shawls and mufflers.

A few weeks later a strange young man with a very shiny collar and a new brown bag came to stay with us. Father said he was a “locum,” but Nancy said it ought to be “locust,” for his appetite was enormous, and she couldn’t make enough buttered toast to please him. He had come to take care of Father’s patients until someone bought all the medicines and things in the surgery, and I was awfully glad to hear we were going away.

“We’ll go straight to the sunshine, Chris,” said Father, “where there are trees and flowers instead of long rows of houses, and the air isn’t full of smoke.”

And that night I dreamt all about fairies, and of what I was going to see and hear in foreign lands.

The cliffs were hidden in the mist when we left Dover, and the sky was dull and grey. But very soon it began to clear; a silvery light shone behind the clouds, and then the sun came out, and the rolling waves turned emerald green. They tossed our steamer up and down as if it were a cork, and Father soon went below, but I begged so hard to be allowed to stay on deck that he said I might if I would promise, “honour bright,” not to get into mischief.

When he had gone I put my cap into my pocket, so that it might not blow off, and leaned over the rails to watch the swell of the sea. I wasn’t thinking of Fairies then, nor of being a Christmas child, but of how it must feel to be shipwrecked. So when the spray blew in my face and made me blink, I was surprised to see a merry red face grinning up at me from the foam. It had curls of seaweed upon its forehead, and a mouth like a big round “O”.

“I’m Father Neptune,” it roared, so loudly that I could hear it quite distinctly above the noise of the wind. “Why not take a header, and come and ride one of my fine sea horses? ‘Father wouldn’t like it?’ Ho! ho! ho! What a molly-coddle of a boy!”

A big wave tossed him on one side, and on its crest was a beautiful girl with a shining tail, and hair like a stream of gold. Of course I knew she was a mermaid, and would want me to go to her coral caves.

“Won’t you come with me and play with my sheeny pearls?” she cried. “They gleam like the dawn on a summer morning, and you shall choose the loveliest for your very own.”

She held out her arms and I nearly sprang into them, for I thought that a pearl would be splendid for Father’s pin. But just behind her I saw two ugly mermen, with horrid green teeth and bright red eyes, and ropes of seaweed in their long thin hands. Then I remembered that mermaids were dangerous, and I ran straight over to the other side of the steamer and put my fingers into my ears, so that I might not hear her call. She spoke so sweetly that it was difficult to resist, but I did not trust her.

The water was calmer on this side, and I wondered why until I saw some funny brown men, rather like Brownies, but ever so much bigger and stronger, stretched out at full length on the tops of the waves. They were blowing on conchs as hard as they could, and wherever they blew, the waves grew quieter. I guessed at once that they were Tritons—seafolk who live with Neptune in his crystal palace under the sea. I was still watching them when Father came up behind me, and told me that we were really in.

We stayed the night at a big hotel where almost everyone spoke in a language which I did not understand, and I had a grown-up dinner with Father, with heaps of different dishes, most of them tasting much alike. Next day we went on for hours in the train, and the air grew warmer and warmer, and the grass more green, until at last we were in the south of France. There were palms and orange groves and heaps of flowers, and it would have been just splendid if Father had been all right. He hadn’t had time to be ill at home you see, and now there were no sick people to worry him, he was so tired that he couldn’t do anything. But he told me not to worry, for once he was really rested, he would soon get well.

And so he did, though it took a long time to rest him, and we couldn’t explore a bit. In the mornings we strolled through the gardens, or down to the sea, and most afternoons we did nothing at all. Very often, as I sat beside him on the verandah, with the sun shining full on the green awning, and the roses nodding to us over the balcony, he would fall asleep; and then a Flower-Fairy would peep through the ferns, and tell me the loveliest stories. The Rose-Fairy came, and the Queen of the Lilies, with a lovely gold crown upon her head; but my favourite Fairy lived in a bed of violets. Her frock was purple, and I knew when she was coming because the air all round grew sweet. Her stories were the best of all. She had heard them from the wind, she said, as he played with her leaves at dawn. My favourite was one that she said he had brought from Provence.

“A worthy couple at Marseilles,” she began, “had longed for a child for years in vain, and great was their joy when they knew at last that their wish was about to be granted. The boy was born during a fearful storm, and the first sound he heard was the crash of the sea as it broke on the shore. He was christened Paul, and grew up into a handsome lad with a quantity of thick fair hair which curled like the tips of the waves, and piercing blue eyes which were always twinkling with fun and mischief.

There was not any question as to what calling he should follow, for the sea claimed him as a son of her own, and he was never content on dry land. When his ship came home and the crew was dismissed, he could not rest, and every evening at sunset he would row himself out in a little boat as far as he could go. One summer night, when a thousand ripples danced on the waves, he leaned over the side of his boat, gazing down—down—down. He did not know why, but he felt quite sure that someone was calling him, and with all his heart he longed to obey the summons. Presently he felt himself lifted gently, and drawn through the gleaming water by hands which he could not see. It was black as night before they released him, for neither sun nor moon pierce the depths of the ocean. He would have been in total darkness but for the strange-shaped fish who carried lanterns on their heads, and guided him to the gates of a palace, formed of millions of barnacles. These were piled one on the top of the other until they reached an enormous height, and were decorated with what looked like a row of human eyes.

The gates flew open as Paul approached them, and through a passage of mother-of-pearl he reached a chamber that flashed with opal lights. Here a Fairy Princess awaited him—a Princess so exquisitely beautiful in spite of her sea-green hair, that though his heart did not go out to her, he was not repelled by the love she showed him.

She kept him with her for many hours, and at dawn of day she bade him return to his home, giving him two golden fish which he was to show to all who asked him where he had spent the night, telling them he had been a’fishing. The invisible hands which had brought him thither bore him back to his boat, and he landed just at sunrise. His golden fish were a source of awe and wonder to his neighbours, who had never seen their like before; but the priest shook his head, and warned him to have no dealings with the powers of darkness.

But Paul could not resist rowing out to the edge of the sunset. Evening after evening he plied his oars, and always at twilight he was drawn down—down, to the palace of the strange Princess with the sea-green hair. When he went on a voyage all was well with him, for his vessel bore him to other seas, where no one called him when the sky grew red; but he was no sooner at home with his parents than something within him made him row out to the west.

At last it seemed as if he had forgotten the Princess, for he fell in love with sweet Lucile, who was as good and gentle as she was fair, and willingly gave him her troth. Their wedding was fixed for Easter Day, and the night before, Paul wandered down to the sea-shore, thinking of the bliss in store for him on the morrow. His love-lit eyes fell dreamily on his boat, which had lain for months in the shallow cove where he had moored her, and without thinking what he was doing, he stepped inside and took the oars in his hands. Alas! No sooner did he feel the boat moving under him, than he was seized by the old wild longing to sail towards the west.

All happened as before, until he reached the Princess’s palace; but now, instead of smiling sweetly, she received him with threatening looks which showed an array of cruel teeth behind her rose-red lips.

‘So! you have been unfaithful to me!’ she cried. ‘I will not slay you, since I have greater punishments in store than death.… You shall stay in the depths of the sea until your yellow hair is bleached and white, and your face a mask of hideous wrinkles. Then, and then only, shall you return to land, and those who have loved you best shall spurn you from them as something loathsome. Scorn for scorn, and pain for pain. Thus will I take my revenge.’

So for seven long years Paul was a prisoner in the darkness of the deep, his bed the black and slimy ooze, and his companions fearsome monsters who would fain have devoured him. At last, when his hair was white as snow, and his face so wrinkled and ugly that the children of the mer-folk shuddered as they passed, he was seized by a sprawling octopus, and dragged up through the water. The loathsome creature held him fast until they reached a spot not far from the little brown cottage where Lucile had lived with her old father, and here it loosened its coils; and a great wave cast Paul on shore. The cottage was empty and deserted, and the winding path he had trodden so often was covered with moss. Close by, however, was another cottage, far more spacious, and through the open door of this Paul saw his old sweetheart sitting beside a cradle. She sang as she rocked it gently with her foot, and her shining needles flew in and out of a fisherman’s coarse blue sock.

As the shadow fell across the threshold she looked up brightly, expecting to see her husband. Meeting Paul’s gaze instead, her own grew strained with horror, and snatching her baby from the cradle she fled to the inner room. Without a word Paul hastened away. He knew his doom, and hastened to throw himself back to the sea.

In his headlong flight he stumbled against an old, old woman, gathering drift-wood on the wreck-strewn coast. She would have fallen if he had not caught her in his arms, and as he held her she saw his eyes. They alone were unchanged, and his mother knew them.

‘My boy—my dear boy!’ she cried with a sob of joy. And she drew his seared face down to her bosom, murmuring over it the same fond words she had used when he was a child. She kissed him, and the spell was broken; once more he was good to look upon.… The Princess had not known, you see, that a mother’s love is immortal.”

Father was still asleep when the story came to an end, so I implored the Fairy to tell me another.

“This comes from Provence, too,” she said in answer to my pleading, “and will show you that sea-folk can sometimes be merciful.”

“Among the crew of the good ship And behold! a great storm shook the sea, as if the gods themselves were angry. Thunder and lightning rolled and flashed, and raindrops heavy as leaden balls fell in swift torrents. So fearful was the tempest that it threatened to overwhelm the ship, and the Captain was in despair.

In this dire extremity a knight on a magnificent black charger came riding over the waves.

‘Surrender him who threw the spear!’ he cried, and the sea stayed its turmoil to listen. ‘Do this, and I will save the ship. Else shall it perish, with all on board, and sea creatures shall gnaw your bones.’

The sailors were exceedingly afraid, but they would not betray their comrade. Seeing this, Antoine stepped forth of his own accord, for he would not let his shipmates suffer for his fault. Leaping from the deck, he landed upon the haunches of the charger, behind the knight, and that moment the sea became smooth as glass, and the strange steed disappeared with his two riders.

The ship made good way, and his shipmates never expected to see poor Antoine again, but to the amazement and joy of all, he rejoined the vessel a few days later as though it had stood by for him. The excitement of the men was great as they gathered round him to hear of his adventures.

And truly he had a marvellous story to relate. He had ridden, he told them, to a distant island, where in a castle of shimmering gold, on a bed of the softest eiderdown, he found a knight stretched in agony. It was he whom he had wounded, while in the form of a porpoise, and the spear he had thrown so thoughtlessly was still sticking in his side. He drew this out, with tears of shame, and then, with his guilty right hand, he cleansed and bathed the wound. When this was done, the knight fell into a deep sleep, and woke at dawn well as ever. Taking Antoine’s hand, he led him through many corridors lit with gems to a resplendent banquet hall, where the walls were encrusted with star-shaped sapphires, and the floor was of beaten gold. Many other knights were assembled here, and maidens so fair that Antoine sighed to think of them. When he had feasted on curious dishes of rich fruits, the same knight who had brought him thither took him back to the sea-shore, where the same black horse awaited their coming. Mounting as before, the charger sped like the wind over the sea until the ship hove in sight. When they came to within one hundred yards of the vessel, the black steed and his rider disappeared as mysteriously as they had come, and Antoine was left struggling in the water. However, he was an excellent swimmer, and soon reached the ship’s side, up which he easily clambered by the aid of a rope which fortunately happened to be trailing in the water.

This was the tale that Antoine told his shipmates, and in memory of the clemency of the porpoise-knight, the sailors vowed that never again would they injure a porpoise. Not only were they as good as their word, but the vow is kept to this day by their children’s children.”

It was spring time when we left for Brittany. Father had been there once with Mother, and thought he would like to go again. So I said goodbye to my Flower-Fairy, and promised that if I could I would come back one day to see her.

The sunny air of the south had done Father good, and now he was almost well. While we were in the train he read from the guide book, and told me about curious “dolmens,” or mounds of stone, which are supposed to have been built to mark the ancients’ burying places. There were hundreds of these in Brittany, he said, and I was glad, for I knew they were haunted by “Gorics” and “Courils”—strange Fairies of olden times.

That very first evening, while Father was writing letters, I slipped away by myself instead of going to bed, for I wanted to see a Poupican. A Poupican, you must know, is the dwarf-child of a Korrigan—a Fairy who looks lovely by night and horrible by day, and cares for nothing so that she gets what she wants. Korrigans are said to have been princesses in days gone by, but they were so cruel and selfish that someone laid them under a spell, which lasts for thousands of years unless a mortal breaks it. On account of the wicked things they said their mouths are always dry, and they are consumed by thirst; so they chose their homes by streams and fountains, of which there are many in Brittany.

Father had been telling me that there was a famous fountain in a wood not far from our hotel, and I thought I might find them here. The fountain was hidden behind a grove of fir-trees, but the moon shone down on its rough grey stones, and turned the square pond of water in front of it into a silver mirror.

At first there seemed to be no one there, but when my eyes had grown used to the gloom I saw a number of Elves about two feet in height, with misty white veils wound round their bodies. A cloth was spread beside the fountain. It was covered with the loveliest things to eat—honey and fruit, and queer-shaped cakes sprinkled with sugar comfits—while in the centre stood a crystal goblet, from which the moon drew flashes of soft fairy light. As I crouched in the ferns, a wee green Wood-Elf stole up behind me; her tiny face was good and kind, and although she was so small that I could almost have held her in my hand, I felt she was there to protect me.

Then I turned my eyes to the crystal goblet and I grew thirsty all at once; and I wondered what the Korrigans would do if I took a sip of the amber wine which filled it to the brim.

“One drop would make you wise for ever,” whispered the Wood-Elf, just as if I had spoken, “but you would be silent for ever, also. No mortal can drink that wine and live. The Korrigans pass it round to each other in a golden cup at the end of their feast, which takes place but once in the year. It gives them power to work many charms, and to take the form of animals at will.”

“Once, in these very woods, a hunter shot a fair white doe, when to his amazement, she spoke to him in a human voice. He was so touched by her reproaches that he tore his fine linen shirt into strips to bind up her wound, and then hurried off to the spring for water to quench her thirst. It was dusk by the time he could get back to her, for the first spring he reached was dry, and instead of the milk-white doe, he found a beauteous maiden, who threw herself on his bosom and entreated him not to leave her. For a year and a day he was under her spells, but he escaped in the end by making the sign of the cross with his two forefingers. This sign puts a Korrigan to instant flight, for things which are holy fill them with terror.… Ah! they have been at their mischief again. Poor Annette will weep for this.”

The Wood-Elf stopped speaking, for running lightly over the grass, holding each other’s long white veils so as to form a swinging cradle, came a group of nine smooth-limbed Korrigans, their red-gold hair tossing on the wind behind them. In the midst of the hanging cradle lay a tiny baby, with widely opened eyes and a solemn pink face, sucking a fat round thumb.

“They have stolen him from his mother, while she dreamt of fairy gold,” the Wood-Elf sighed. “She should not have left her door on the latch; it was a sad mistake. In her little one’s place there is now a Poupican. At first she will not know, but will fondle and kiss the changeling as if he were her own. After a while she will grieve to find that he gives her no love in return for hers, and plays as readily with strangers as with his mother. But her husband, who is a hard man, will rejoice at the wee child’s cleverness. For he will have an old head on young shoulders, and be wise beyond his years.”

While the Wood-Elf was speaking, poor Annette’s baby lay contentedly beside the crystal goblet, sucking his thumb and looking up at the stars. The Korrigans had left off singing now, and they were passing round the golden cup when there came on the wind the sound of a church bell. Flinging the cup and the goblet into the pond, and staying only to wind the baby in their clinging veils, the Korrigans fled into the darkness with cries of anguish. Some spell seemed to hold me, or I should have tried to rescue the little thing; for it was dreadful to think what might happen to him with the Korrigans.

But the Wood-Elf was quite comforting. “He will be well taken care of,” she said, “and someday Annette may break the spell, with the help of the CurÉ. Rose-Marie got back her child by her own wit, but then she has the name of the blessed Mother. ‘You would like to know how?’ Then I must speak softly, lest a Korrigan should hear.”

“Rose-Marie was very young when she married Pierre,” began the Elf, “and nothing his mother or hers could say would induce her to beware of Korrigans when her baby came.

‘They would not hurt him even if they could,’ she cried. ‘Who could harm anything so small and sweet?’ And she actually set his cradle under the cherry trees, so that his round pink face was covered with fallen petals. Then she went to fetch Pierre from his sowing that he might see how his little son was hidden under the spring snow, and lingered on her way to gather a cluster of purple violets.

When she had disappeared, the Korrigans stole her baby, leaving a Poupican in the fragrant nest. The sun had gone in when she came back, and the little creature was wailing fretfully, Rose-Marie snatched him to her bosom and tried to soothe him, but from that day forward she had no rest. Her milk was sweet and plentiful, and the cradle was soft and warm, but he gave neither her nor her good man Pierre a moment’s peace. All through the hours of the night he wailed, and tore at her hair when she held him close to her, scratching her face like an angry kitten.

When he grew older, he was just as bad, for there was no end to his mischief. He shut the cat in a bin of flour, and opened the oven door when Rose-Marie was baking, so that the bread was spoilt. He drove the hens into the brook, and cut the cord which tethered Pierre’s white cow, so that she roamed for miles. And with all he did, he never uttered a word. It was this which first roused Rose-Marie’s suspicions, and after that she watched him carefully.

One morning she made up her mind to surprise him into speaking, and as he sat beside the hearth, peering at her through his half-closed eyes, she set an egg shell on the fire, and placing in this a spoonful of broth, stirred it carefully with a silver pin. The Poupican was amazed, for it was nearing the dinner hour, and there would be ten to feed. At last he could contain himself no longer.

‘What are you doing, Mother?’ he asked in a strange cracked voice.

‘I am preparing a meal for ten,’ returned Rose-Marie, without looking round.

‘For ten—in an eggshell?’ he cried. ‘I have seen an egg before a hen; I have seen the acorn before the oak; but never yet saw I folly such as this!’ And he fell to cackling like a full farmyard, rocking himself from side to side, and repeating, ‘Such folly I never saw!’ until even gentle Rose-Marie was moved to anger.

‘You have seen too much, my son,’ she said, and lifting him up by the scruff of his neck in spite of his struggles, she carried him out of the house. Then, sitting down on a heap of stones beside the brook, she proceeded to whip him soundly. At his first cry of pain a Korrigan appeared, in the shape of an ugly old woman with bleared red eyes and straggling tresses. She was leading a curly-haired boy by the hand, the living image of Pierre. As she released him he flew across the grass to Rose-Marie and hid his face in her skirts.

‘Here is thy son!’ croaked the Korrigan. ‘I have fed him on meal and honey, and he has learnt no evil. Give me my Poupican, and I will go.’

So Rose-Marie gave up the Poupican, and with a thankful heart took her own son home.”

“Do you know any more stories?” I asked when the Elf stopped for breath. I didn’t want to go back just yet, for it was jolly in the wood, and I could smell violets close by.

“More than I can tell,” replied the Elf, “but you shall hear what happened to Peric and Jean.”

“In a beautiful valley not far from here a number of Korrigans were accustomed to gather on summer nights, for the grass was soft as velvet, and the mountains sheltered it from the breeze. None of the peasants dare cross the valley after dark, lest they might be forced to join their revels; for it was known by all that the Korrigans must dance whether they would or not, until some mortal should break the charm that had been laid upon them.

One evening, when the west was aglow with fire, a farmer was sent for to attend the sick bed of his mother, who lived on the other side of the valley. His wife and he had been at work all day in the fields, since labour was scarce and they were poor, and as both loved the old woman dearly, they hurried off without stopping to lay aside their Then the dancers made way for the farmer and his wife, who reached the old mother safely, and comforted her last hours.

When they returned to their own homes they told what they had seen and heard. Some of the villagers were still too much afraid of the Korrigans to venture, but others armed themselves with In a neighbouring village two tailors dwelt, and they were as anxious as the rest to see the Korrigans. The elder was a tall and handsome fellow named Jean, but in spite of his inches he had no pluck, and was idle as well as vain. The other was Peric, a red-haired hunchback, so kind and lovable in spite of his looks that if ever a neighbour were in trouble, it was to Peric he went first. Though the hunchback and Jean shared the same business, the latter was always gibing at Peric, and left him to do most of the work.

‘Since you’re so courageous,’ he sneered, one fine warm night when he and Peric had stayed behind in the valley to watch the Korrigans, ‘suppose you ask them to let you join their dance. Your hump should make you safe with them, for they are not likely to fall in love with you.’

‘All right,’ said Peric cheerfully, though at this unkind reference to his deformity his face had flushed. And taking off his cap he approached the whirling Elves.

‘May I dance with you?’ he asked politely, dropping his ‘You’re more brave than good looking,’ they replied, their feet still moving to the same quick measure. ‘Are you not afraid that we shall work you ill?’

‘Not a bit!’ answered Peric, joining hands with them; and he started to sing as lustily as they:—