THERE were two robins in the orchard hedge last Spring. They had a dear little nest, and two bluey eggs, and they were as happy as anyone need wish to be.

But one day a Boy came by, and he went off with the two eggs in a pill-box. Then the little robins sat and cried all night.

But when they looked into the nest in the morning they saw where the two bluey eggs had been a small pink egg—the colour of apple-blossoms.

“I shall hatch this egg,” said Mrs. Robin firmly. “Poor little deserted thing!”

“Take care it doesn’t turn out a cuckoo,” said her husband.

But when the orchard was all pink and white with blossom, the egg was hatched, and out of it came no cuckoo but a real live Fairy in a pink gown.

She kissed the Robins again and again. “You dears!” she said. “A wicked enchanter shut me up in that pink egg—and you know the only way to get anything alive out of an egg is to hatch it! So you’ve saved me. And—well, you’ll see.” And she shook out her gauzy wings and fluttered off.

Suddenly the Robins heard a faint “Tweet, tweet.” Mrs. Robin flew to the nest, and there were two baby robins, and the Pink Fairy was sitting on the edge of the nest. And hundreds of pink apple-blossom fairies were crowding round.

“They are your very own babies,” said the Pink Fairy. “While you were hatching me, my brothers and sisters stole your eggs from the Boy, and they’ve been hatched in Fairyland.”

And that’s why two of the robins in our orchard sing more sweetly than any other robins in the world.

They were hatched in Fairyland, you know, and of course that makes all the difference.

E. Nesbit.