Chapter Four.

Chapter Four.Con and the Little People.“They stole little BridgetFor seven years long;When she came home againHer friends were all gone.”There was once a boy who was a very good sort of a boy, except for two things; or perhaps I should say one thing. I am really not sure whether they were two things, or only two sides of the same thing; perhaps, children, you can decide. It was this. He could not bear his lessons, and his head wasalwaysrunning on fairies. You may say it is no harm to think about fairies, and I do not say that in moderation it is. But when it goes the length of thinking about them so much that you have no thought for anything else, then I think itisharm—don’t you? and I daresay that this had to do with Con’s hating his lessons so. Perhaps you will think it was an odd fancy for a boy: it is more often that girls think about fairies, but you must remember that there are a great many kinds of fairies. There are pixies and gnomes, and brownies and cobs, all manner of queer, clever, mischievous, and kindly creatures, besides the pretty, gentle, little people whom one always thinks of as haunting the woods in the summer time, and hiding among the flowers.Conknew all about them; where he got his knowledge from I can’t say, but I hardly think it was out of books. However that may have been, he did know all about the fairy world as accurately as some boys know all about birds’ nests, and squirrels, and field mice, and hedgehogs. And there was one good thing about this fancy of Con’s; it led him to know a great many queer things about out-of-door’s creatures that most boys would not have paid attention to. He did not care to know about birds’ nests for the sake of stealing them for instance, but he had fancies that some of the birds were special favourites of the fairies, and it led him to watch their little ways and habits with great attention. He knew always where the first primroses were to be found, because he thought the fairies dug up the earth about their roots, and watered them at night, when every one was asleep, with magic water out of the lady well, to make them come up quicker, and many a morning he would get up very very early, in hopes of surprising the tiny gardeners at their work before they had time to decamp. But he never succeeded in doing so; and, after all, when he did have an adventure, it came, as most things do, just exactly in a way he had never in the least expected it.Con’s home had something to do with his fancifulness perhaps. I won’t tell you where it was, for it doesn’t matter; and though some of the wiser ones among you may think you can guess what country he belonged to when I tell you that his real name was not Con, but Connemara, I must tell you you are mistaken. No, I won’t tell you where his home was, but I will tell youwhatit was. It was a sort of large cottage, and it was perched on the side of a mountain, not a hill, a real mountain, and a good big one too, and there were ever so many other mountains near by. There was a pretty garden round the cottage, and at the back a door opened in the garden wall right on to the mountain. Wasn’t that nice? And if you climbed up a little way you hadsucha view. You could see all the other mountains poking their heads up into the sky one above the other—some of them looked bare and cold, and some looked comfortable and warmly clad in cloaks of trees and shrubs and furze, but still they all looked beautiful. For the sunshine and the clouds used to chase each other over the heights and valleys so fast it was like giants playing bo-peep; that was on fine days of course. On foggy and rainy days there were grand sights to be seen too. First one mountain and then another would put on a nightcap of great heavy clouds, and sometimes the night-caps would grow down all over them till they were quite hidden; and then all of a sudden they would rise off again slowly, hit by bit, till Con could see first up to the mountain’s waist, then up, up, up to the very top again. That was another kind of bo-peep.Summer and winter, fine or wet, cold or hot, Con used to go to school every day. He was only seven years old, and there was a good way to walk, more than a mile; but it was very seldom, very,veryseldom, that he missed going. There were reasons why it was best for him to go; his father and mother knew them, and he was too good not to do what they told him, whether he liked it or not. But he was like the horse that one man led to the water, but twenty couldn’t make drink. There was no difficulty in making Con go to school; but as for getting him to learn once he was there—ah, no! that was a different matter. So I fear I cannot say that he was much of a favourite with his teachers. You see they didn’t know that his little head was so full of fairies that it really had no room for anything else, and it was only natural that they should think him inattentive and even stupid, and their thinking so did not make Con like his lessons any better. And with his playmates he was not a favourite either. He never quarrelled with them, but he did not seem to care about their games, and they laughed at him, and called him a muff. It was a pity, for I believe it was partly to make him play with other boys that his father and mother sent him to school; and for some things the boys couldn’t help liking him. He was so good-natured, and, for such a little fellow, so brave. He could climb trees like a squirrel, and he was never afraid of anything. Many and many a short winter’s afternoon it was dark before Con left school to come home, but he did not mind at all. He would sling his satchel of books across his shoulders, and trudge manfully home—thinking—thinking. By this time I daresay you can guess of what he was thinking.There were two ways by which he could come home from school—there was the road, really not better than a lane, and when he came that way you see he had to do all his climbing at the end, for the road was pretty level, winding along round the foot of the mountain, perched on the side of which was Con’s home; and there was what was called the hill road, which ran up the mountain behind the village, and then went bobbing up and down along the mountain side still gradually ascending, away, away, I don’t know where to—up to some lonely shepherds’ huts I daresay, where nobody but the shepherds and the sheep ever went. But on its way it passed not very far from Con’s home. I need hardly say that the hill road was the boy’s favourite way. He liked it because it was more “climby,” and for another reason too. By this way, he passed the cottage of an old woman named Nance, of whom he was extremely fond, and to whom he would always stop to speak if he possibly could.I don’t know that many boys and girls would have taken a fancy to Nance. She was certainly not pretty, and what is more she was decidedlyqueer. She was very very small, indeed the smallest person I ever heard of, I think. When Con stood beside her, though he was only seven, he really looked bigger than she did, and she was so funnily dressed too. She always wore green, quite a bright green, and her dresses never seemed to get dull or soiled though she had all her housework to do for herself, and she had over her green dress a long brown cloak with a hood, which she generally pulled over her face to shield her eyes from the sun, she said. Her face was very small and brown and puckered-up looking, but she had bright red cheeks, andverybright dark eyes. She was never seen either to laugh or cry; but she used to smile sometimes, and her smile was rather nice.The neighbours—they were hardly to be calledherneighbours, for her house was quite half-a-mile from any other—all called her “uncanny,” or whatever word they used to mean that, and they all said they did not know anything of her history, where she had come from, or anything about her. And once when Con repeated to her some remarks of this kind which he had heard at school, Nance only smiled and said, “no doubt the people of Creendale”—that was the name of the village—“were very wise.”“Buthaveyou always lived here, Nance?” asked Con.“No, Connemara,” she answered gravely, “not always.”But that was all she said, and somehow Con did not care to ask her more.It was not often he asked her questions; he was not that sort of boy for one thing, and besides, there was something about her that forbade it. He used to sit at one side of the cottage fire, or, in summer, on the turf seat just outside the door, watching Nance’s tiny figure as she flitted about, or sometimes just staring up at the sky, or into the fire without speaking. Nance never seemed to mind what he did, and he in no way doubted that she was glad to see him, though by words she had never said so. When he did speak it was always about one thing—what, you can guess, it was always about fairies. It was through this that he had first made friends with Nance. She had found him peering into the hollow trunk of an old solitary oak-tree that stood farther down the hill, not very far from her dwelling.“What are you doing there, Connemara?” she said.“I was thinking this might be one of the doors into fairyland,” he answered quietly, without seeming surprised at her knowing his name.“And what should you know about that place?” she said again.And Con turned towards her his earnest blue eyes, and told her all his thoughts and fancies. It seemed easier to him to tell Nance about them than it had ever seemed to tell any one else—his feelings seemed to put themselves into words, as if Nance drew them out.Nance said very little, but she smiled. And after that Con used to stop at her cottage nearly every day on his way home—he dared not on his waytoschool, for fear of being late, for almost the only thing he always did get was good marks for punctuality. His people at home did not know much about Nance. He told his mother about her once, and asked if he might stay to speak to her; and when his mother heard that Nance’s cottage was very clean, she said, “Yes, she didn’t mind,” and, after that, Con somehow never mentioned her again. He came to have gradually a sort of misty notion that Nance had had something to do with him ever since he was born. She seemed to know everything about him. From the very first she called him by his proper name—not Con or Master Con, but Connemara, and he liked to hear her say it.One winter afternoon, it was nearly dark though it was only half-past three, Con coming home from school (the master let them out earlier on the very short days), stopped as usual at Nance’s cottage. It was very,verycold, the fierce north wind came swirling down from the mountains, round and round, here, there, and everywhere, till, but for the unmistakable “freeze” in its breath, you would hardly have known whence it blew.“It is so cold, Nance,” said the boy, as he settled himself by the fire. Nance’s fires always burnt so bright and clear.“Yes,” said Nance, “the snow is coming, Connemara.”“I don’t care,” said Con, shaking his shaggy fair hair out of his eyes, for the heat was melting the icicles upon it. “I’m not going to hurry. Father and mother are away for two days, so there’s no one to miss me. Mayn’t I stay, Nance?”Nance did not answer. She went to the door and looked out, and Con thought he heard her whisper something to herself. Immediately a blast of wind came rushing down the hill, into the very room it seemed to Con. Nance closed the door. “Not long; the storm is coming,” she said again, in answer to his question.But in the meantime Con made himself very comfortable by the fire, amusing himself as usual by staring into its glowing depths.“Nance,” he said at last, “do you know what the boys at school say? They say they wonder I’m not afraid of you! They say you’re a witch, Nance!”He looked up in her face brightly with his fearless blue eyes, and laughed so merrily that all the corners of the queer little cottage seemed to echo it back. Nance, however, only smiled.“If youwerea witch, Nance, I’d make you grant me some wishes, three anyway,” he went on. “Of course you know what the first would be, and, indeed, if I had that, I don’t know that I would want any other. I mean, to go to fairyland, you know.”Nance nodded her head.“The other two would be for it to be always summer, and for me never, never,neverto have any lessons to learn,” he continued.“Never to grow a man?” said Nance.“I don’t know,” answered Con. “Lessonsdon’t make boys grow; but still I suppose theyhaveto have them sometime before they are men. But I shouldn’t care if I could go to fairyland, and if it would be always summer; I don’t think Iwouldcare about ever being a man.”As he said these words the fire suddenly sent out a sputtering blaze. It jumped up all at once with such a sort of crackle and fizz, Con could have fancied it was laughing at him. He looked up at Nance.Shewas not laughing; on the contrary, her face looked very grave, graver than ever he had seen it.“Connemara,” she said slowly, “take care. You don’t know what you are saying.”But Con stared into the fire again and did not answer. I hardly think he heard what she said; the warm fire made him drowsy, and the brightness dazzled his eyes. He was almost beginning to nod, when Nance spoke again to him, rather sharply this time.“My boy, the snow is beginning; you must go.” Con’s habit of obedience made him start up, sleepy though he was. Nance was already at the door looking out.“Do not linger on the way, Connemara,” she said, “and do not think of anything but home. It will be a wild night, but if you go straight and swift you will reach home soon.”“I’m not afraid,” said Con stoutly, as he set off.“I could wish he were,” murmured Nance to herself, as she watched the little figure showing dark against the already whitening hill side, till it was out of sight.Then she came back into the cottage, but she could not rest.Con strode on manfully; the snow fell thicker and thicker, the wind blew fiercer and fiercer, but he had no misgiving. He had never before been out in a snow-storm, and knew nothing of its special dangers. For some time he got on very well, keeping strictly to the path, but suddenly, some little way up the mountain to his right, there flashed out a bright light. It jumped and hopped about in the queerest way. Con stood still to watch.“Can it be a will-o’-the-wisp?” thought he, in his innocence forgetting that a bleak mountain side in a snow-storm is hardly the place for jack-o’-lanterns and such like.But while he watched the light it all at once settled steadily down, on a spot apparently but a few yards above him.“It may be some one that has lost their road,” thought Con; “I could easily show it them. I may as well climb up that little way to see;” for strangely enough the thought of thefairieshaving anything to do with what he saw never once occurred to him.He left the path and began to climb. There, just above him, was the light, such a pretty clear light, shining now so steadily. It did not seem to move, but still as fast as he thought he had all but reached it, it receded, till at last, tired, and baffled, he decided that itmustbe a will-o’-the-wisp, and turned to regain the road. But like so many wise resolutions, this one was more easily made than executed; Con could not find the road, hard though he tried. The snow came more and more thickly till it blinded and bewildered him hopelessly. Con did his utmost not to cry, but at last he could bear up no longer. He sank down on the snow and sobbed piteously; then a pleasant resting feeling came over him, gradually he left off crying and forgot all his troubles; he began to fancy he was in his little bed at home, and remembered nothing more about the snow or anything.Nance meanwhile had been watching anxiously at her door. She saw that the snow was coming faster, and that the wind was rising. Every now and then it seemed to rush down with a sort of howling scream, swept round the kitchen and out again, and whenever it did so, the fire would leap up the chimney, as if it were laughing at some one.“Frisken is at his tricks to-night,” said Nance to herself, and every moment she seemed to grow more and more anxious. At last she could bear it no longer. She reached a stout stick, which stood in a corner of the room, drew her brown cloak more closely round her, and set off down the path where she had lost sight of Con. The storm of wind and snow seemed to make a plaything of her; her slight little figure swayed and tottered as she hastened along, but still she persevered. An instinct seemed to tell her where she should find the boy; she aimed almost directly for the place, but still Connemara had lain some time in his death-like sleep before Nance came up to him. There was not light enough to have distinguished him; what with the quickly-approaching darkness and the snow, which had already almost covered his little figure, Nance could not possibly have discovered him had she not stumbled right upon him. But she seemed to know what she was about, and she did not appear the least surprised. She managed with great difficulty to lift him in her arms, and turned towards her home. Alas, she had only staggered on a few paces when she felt that her strength was going. Had she not sunk down on to the ground, still tightly clasping the unconscious child, she would have fallen.“It is no use,” she whispered at last; “they have been too much for me. The child will die if I don’t get help. The only creature that has loved me all these long, long years! Oh, Frisken, you might have played your tricks elsewhere, and left him to me. But now I must have your help.”She struggled again to her feet, and, with her stick, struck sharply three times on the mountain side. Immediately a door opened in the rock, revealing a long passage within, with a light, as of a glowing fire, at the end, and Nance, exerting all her strength, managed to drag herself and Con within this shelter. Instantly the door closed again.No sooner had it done so, no sooner was Nance quite shut out from the outside air, than a strange change passed over her. She grew erect and vigorous, and the weight of the boy in her arms seemed nothing to her. She looked many years younger in an instant, and with the greatest ease she carried Con along the passage, which ended in a small cave, where a bright fire was burning, in front of which lay some soft furry rugs, made of the skins of animals. With a sigh Nance laid Con gently down on the rugs. “He will do now,” she said to herself.The first thing Con was aware of when a sort of half-consciousness returned to him, was the sound of voices. He did not recognise either of them; he was too sleepy to think where he was, or to take in the sense of what he heard, but long afterwards the words returned to him.“Of course we shall do him no harm,” said the first voice. “That is not our way with those who come to us as he has done. All his life he has been wishing to come to us, and we might bear you a grudge for trying to stop him.”Here the speaker burst into a curious, ringing laugh, which seemed to be re-echoed by numberless other voices in the distance.“You made him wish it,” answered some one—it was Nance—sadly.“Wemade him wish it! Ha, ha! ha, ha! Did you ever hear anything like that, my dear friends? Why did his mother tie up his sleeves with green ribbon before he was christened? Answer that. Ha, ha! ha, ha!” And then there came another succession of rollicking laughter.“It was to be, I suppose,” said Nance. “But you won’tkeephim. I brought him here to save his life, not to lose his—”“Hush, hush; how can you be so ill-mannered?” interrupted the other. “Keephim? of course not,unless he wants to stay, the pretty dear.”“But will you make him want to stay?” pleaded Nance.“How could we?” said the other mockingly. “How couldweinfluence him? He is a pupil of yours. But if you like to change your mind, you may come back instead of him. Ha, ha! ha, ha! what a joke!” And the laughter sounded as if the creatures, whoever they were, were holding their sides, and rolling about in the extremity of their glee. It faded away, gradually however, growing more and more indistinct, as if receding into the distance. And Con turned round on his side, and fell asleep more soundly than ever.When at last he really awoke he found himself lying on a bed of soft moss, under the shade of some great trees, for it was summer time—summer evening time it seemed, for the light was subdued, like that of the sun from behind a cloud. Con started up in amazement, rubbing his eyes to make sure he was not dreaming. Where was he? How could it all be? The last thing he remembered was losing his way in the snow-storm on the mountain; what had become of the winter and the snow? He looked about him; the place he was in seemed to be a sort of forest glade; the foliage of the trees was so thickly interlaced overhead that only little patches of sky were here and there to be seen. There was no sunshine; just the same even, pale light over everything. It gave him again the feeling of being in a dream. Suddenly a sound caught his ears, it was that of running water; he turned in the direction whence it came.It was the loveliest little brook you ever saw—“with many a curve” it wound along through the forest, and on its banks grew the most exquisite and wonderful variety of flowers. Flowers of every colour, but of shapes and forms Con had never seen before. He stood looking at them in bewildered delight, and as he looked, suddenly the thought for the first time flashed into his mind—“This is fairyland! I have got my wish at last. I am in fairyland!”There was something, even to him, almost overwhelming in the idea. He could not move or speak, hardly even breathe. All at once there burst out in every direction, above his head, beneath his feet, behind him, in front of him,everywherein fact, peals and peals of laughter—the clearest, merriest, most irresistible laughter you ever heard.“It’s the fairies,” thought Con, “but where are they?”Where were they? Everywhere. There came another shrill peal of laughter and up they sprang, all together, from every imaginable corner. There was not a branch of a tree, hardly even a twig, it seemed to Con, on which one was not perched. They poked up their comical faces above the clear water of the brook where they must have been hiding, though how he had failed to see them there the boy could not imagine; they started up from the ground in such numbers, that Con lifted carefully first one foot and then the other to make sure he was not tramping upon some of them; they actually swarmed, and Con could not make it out at all. Could they have only just come, or had they been there all the time, and had something wrong with his eyes prevented his seeing them before? No, he couldn’t make it out.Were they like what he had expected to find them? Hardly, at least he was not sure. Yet they were very pretty; they were as light and bright and agile as—like nothing he could think of. Their faces seemed to be brimming over with glee; there was not a sad or anxious look among them. They were dressed in every colour of the rainbow, I was going to say, but that would not be true, for there were nobrilliantcolours among them. In every shade that you see in the woods in autumn would be more correct; the ladies in the soft greens and brown pinks and tender yellows of the fading leaves, the gentlemen in the olives and russet-browns and purples which give the deeper tints of autumn foliage—perhaps this was the reason that Con had not at first distinguished them from the leaves and the moss and the tree-roots where they had lain hidden?He stood gazing at them in silence, wondering when they were going to leave off laughing. At last the noise subsided, and one fairy, who had been swinging on a bough just above Con’s head, slid down and stood before him.“Welcome to fairyland, Connemara,” he said pompously. He was one of the tallest among them, reaching above Con’s waist. His face, like the rest, was full of fun, but it had a look of great determination too. “My name is Frisken,” he continued, “at least that’s one of my names, and it will do for you to use as well as any other, though up above there they have ever so many names for me. I am an old friend of yours, though you may not know it, and you will find it for your interest to please me. We’ve given up kings and queens lately, we find it’s better fun without; but, considering everything, I think I may say my opinion is considered of some importance. Elves, do you agree with me?”They all raised a shout of approval, and Frisken turned again to Con. “Our laws are easy to keep,” he said, “you will soon know them. Your duties are comprised in one word,Play, and if ever you attempt to do anything else it will be the worse for you. You interrupted us in the middle of a dance, by-the-by. Elves, strike up the music.”Then Frisken took Con’s right hand, and a lovely little maiden clad in the palest green, and with flowing yellow hair, took the other, and the fairies made themselves into dozens and dozens of rings, and twirled and whirled away to the sound of the gayest and most inspiriting music. Con had never enjoyed himself so much in his life, and the best of it was the more he danced the more he wanted to dance; he jumped and whirled and twirled as fast as any (though I have no doubt thefairiesthought him rather clumsy about it), and yet without the very least feeling of fatigue. He felt as if he could have gone on for ever. Suddenly the elves stopped.“Oh don’t stop!” said Con, who was beginning to feel quite at home, “do let’s go on. I am not a bit tired.”“Tired,” said Frisken, contemptuously, “whoever heard such a word? How can you be so ill-mannered? Besides, mortal though you are, you certainly shouldnotbe tired. Why, you’re only just awake, and you slept long enough to last you at any rate for—”“For how long?” said Con, timidly.But Frisken did not answer, and Con, who was rather in awe of him, thought it best not to press the enquiry. The fairies did not go on dancing, however. They were fond of variety, evidently, whether they ever got tired or not. They now all “adjourned” to another part of the forest, where a grand banquet was prepared. What the viands were, Con had no idea, but he little cared, for they were the most delicious he had ever tasted. He was not a greedy boy by any means, but he did enjoy this feast; everything was so charming; the fairies all reclined on couches made of the same soft green moss as that on which he had found himself lying when he first awoke, and all the time the invisible musicians played lovely, gentle music, which, had Con not winked violently, would have brought the tears to his eyes, for, somehow, it made him think of home, and wonder what his mother was doing, and whether she was in trouble about his absence. It did not seem to affect the fairies in the same way; they were chattering, and joking, and laughing, just as merrily as ever; once Con caught Frisken’s eye fixed upon him, and almost immediately after, the music stopped, and the games began. What wonderful games they were! I cannot tell you half of them; one favourite one you may have heard of before—they buried a seed a little way in the ground, and then danced round it in a circle, singing some queer wild words which Con could not understand. Then they all stood still and called to Con to look; he could hardly believe his eyes—there was the seed already a little plant, and even as he looked, it grew, and grew, and grew, up into a great strong tree; and as the branches rose higher and higher, the fairies caught hold of them and rose up with them into the sky, till the tree seemed to be covered with fruits of every shape and colour. Con had not recovered his amazement, when they were all down again, ready for something else. This time, perhaps, it would be the mouse game—a dozen or two of fairies would turn themselves into mice, and Frisken and one or two others into cats, and then what a chase they had! It puzzled Con quite as much as the seed game, for he wassurehe saw Frisken gobble up two or three mice, and yet—in a moment, there they all were again in their proper fairy forms, not one missing! He wished he could ask Frisken to explain it, but he had not time, for now an expedition to the treasure caves was proposed, and off they all set, some riding on fairy piebald ponies about the size of a rocking-horse, some driving in mother-of-pearl chariots drawn by large white cats, some running, some dancing along. And, oh, the treasure caves, when they got there! All the stories Con had ever heard of—Aladdin, and genii and pirates’ buried riches, none of them came up to these wonderful caves in the least. There were justheapsof precious stones, all cut and polished, and, according to fairy notions, quite ready for wear. For they all helped themselves to as many jewels as they wanted, strung them together on silk, with needles that pierced them as easily as if they had been berries, and flitted about as long as the fancy lasted, wreathed in diamonds and rubies, and emeralds, and every sort of brilliant stone. And then when they had had enough of them, threw them away as ruthlessly as children cast aside their withered daisy-chains.And so it went on without intermission; incessant jousts and revels, and banquets, constant laughter and joking, no pain, no fatigue, no anxiety. For the fairies live entirely and completely in the present, past and future have no meaning to their heedless ears, time passes as if it were not; they have no nights or days, no summer or winter. It is always the same in fairyland.But some things puzzled Con sorely. Strangely enough, in this realm of thoughtlessness, he was beginning tothinkas well as to fancy, to wish to know the whys and wherefores of things, as he had never done before. Now and then he tried to question Frisken, who, he felt certain, knew all he wished to learn, but it was difficult ever to get him to explain anything. Once, I was very nearly sayingone day, but there are no such things there—Con could keep no count of time, he could have told how many banquets he had been at, how many times they had been to the caves, how often they had bathed in the stream, but that was all—once, then, when Frisken seemed in a quieter mood than usual, Con tried what he could do.“Frisken,” he said, “why is it that all the oldest looking fairies among you are the smallest. Why, there’s the old fairy that drives the largest chariot, he’s not above half as big as you? It seems to me they keep getting smaller and smaller as they get older; why is it?”“Of course they do. What else would you have?” said Frisken. “What an owl the boy must be! How can you ask such ill-mannered questions?”“Do you mean they get smaller and smaller till they die?” said Con.Frisken sprang to his feet with a sort of yell. It was the first time Con had seen him put out, but even now he seemed more terrified than angry. He sat down again, shaking all over.“I don’t know what you mean,” he gasped; “we never mention such things.”“But what becomes of you all then—afterwards?” said Con, more discreetly.Frisken had recovered himself.“What do you mean by your afters and befores and thens?” he said; “Isn’tnowenough for you? What becomes of them? why, what becomes of things up there in that world of yours—where do the leaves and the flowers and the butterflies go to—eh?”“But they are onlythings,” persisted Con, “they have no—”“Hush!” screamed Frisken, “how can you be so ill-mannered? come along, the music is beginning; they are waiting for us to dance.”But it was with a heavy heart that Con joined the dance. He was beginning to be very tired of this beautiful fairyland, and to wish very much that he could go home to the cottage on the mountain, to his father and mother, even to his lessons! A shudder ran through him as old tales that he had heard or read, and scarcely understood, returned to his mind—of children stolen by the fairies whoneverwent home again till too late, and who then in despair returned to their beautiful prison to become all that was left to them to be, fairies themselves,things, like the flowers and the butterflies—supposing already it was too late for him? quickly as the time had passed, for all he knew, he had been a century in fairyland!But he had to dance and to sing and to play incessantly like the others. He must not let them suspect his discontent or he would lose all chance of escape. He watched his opportunity for getting more information out of Frisken.“Do you never go ‘up there?’” he asked him once, using the fairy word for the world he had left, “for a change you know, and to play tricks on people—that must be such fun.”Frisken nodded his head mysteriously. He was delighted to see what a regular elfin Con was growing.“Sometimes,” he said. “It’s all very well for a little while, but I couldn’t stay there long. The air is so thick—ugh—and the cold and the darkness! You wouldn’t believe, would you, now that you know what it’s like down here, that fairies have been known to go up there and tostayby their own choice—to become clumsy, miserable, short-lived mortals?”“What made them?” said Con.“Oh, a stupid idea that if they stayed up there they would have the chance of growing into— oh, nonsense, don’t let us talk of anything so disagreeable. Come and have some games.”But Con persisted. He had discovered that when he got Frisken all to himself he had a strange power offorcinghim to answer his questions.“Was old Nance once down here?” he asked suddenly. Frisken wriggled.“What if she was?” he said, “she’s not worth speaking about.”“Why did she go up there?” said Con.“She was bewitched,” answered Frisken. “I cannot think why you like to talk about such stupid things. You have forgotten about things up there; luckily for you you came down here before you had learnt much. Did you ever hear talk of a stupid thing they call ‘love’ up there? That took her up, and then she stayed because she got more nonsense in her head.”“Ilove my mother and my father,” said Con stoutly.“Nonsense,” said Frisken, “you make me feel sick. You must forget all that. Come along and make a tree.”But Con did not forget. He thought about it all constantly, and he understood much that he had never dreamt of before. He grew to detest his life among the fairies, and to long and plan for escape. But how to manage it he had no notion; which was the way “up” the fairies carefully concealed from him, and he had no clue to guide him.“Nance! Nance! are you there? O dear Nance! do let me out, and take me home to my mother again. O Nance! Nance!”It was Con. He had managed to escape from Frisken and the others, amusing themselves in the treasure caves, and had made his way along a narrow winding passage in the rock, with a vague idea that as it went “up” it would perhaps prove to be a way out of fairyland. He had passed the little cave where Nance had warmed him by the fire, and the sight of it had brought back a misty feeling that Nance had had something to do with that night’s adventures. Now he was standing at the end of the passage, the way was stopped by a great wall of rock, he could go no farther. In an agony of fear lest his fairy jailers should overtake him, he beat upon the rock and cried for his old friend’s help. For some time he got no answer, then suddenly, just as he fancied he heard the rush of the elves behind him in hot pursuit, he caught the sound of his own name whispered softly through the rocky door.“Connemara,” a voice said, “I will strike the door three times, but stand back or it may crush you.”He crept back into a corner and listened for the taps. One, two, three, and the tremendously heavy door of stone rolled back without a sound, and in a moment Con was back in the stupid old world again! There stood Nance; she put her arms round him and kissed him without speaking. Then “run home, Connemara,” she said, “run home fast, and do not linger. There is light enough to see the way, and there will soon be more.”“But come with me, dear Nance. I want to tell you all about it. Come home with me and I will tell mother you saved me.”But Nance shook her head. “I cannot,” she said, sorrowfully; “run home, I entreat you.”He obeyed her, but turned to look back when he had run a little way. Nance was no longer there.It was early morning, but it was winter time. The ground was covered with snow beginning to sparkle in the red light of the rising sun. The dear old sun! How glad Con was to see his round face again. The world looked just the same as when he had left it, but suddenly a dreadful fear seized Con. How would he find all at home? How long had he been away? Could it be a hundred years, or fifty, or even only seven, what a terrible change he would find. He thought of “little Bridget” in the ballad, and shivered. He was almost afraid to open the garden door and run in. But everything looked the same; and, yes—there to his delight was old Evan the gardener already at work, apparently no older than when last he had seen him—it must be all right, Evan wassoold, that to see him there at all told that no great time could have passed.“You’ve come home early this morning, Master Con,” he said. “Master and Missis came back last night in all that storm, but they weren’t frightened about you, as they had the message that you had stayed at school.”“What do you mean, Evan—what message? Who said I had stayed at school?” “Last night—could it have been onlylast night,” he whispered to himself.“A little boy brought the message, the queerest little chap you ever saw—not as big as you by half hardly, but speaking quite like a man. I met him myself on my way home, and turned back again to tell. What a rough night it was to be sure!”Feeling as if he were dreaming, Con turned to the house. There on the doorstep stood his mother, looking not a little astonished at seeing him.“Why, Con, dear,” she exclaimed, “youhavecome over early this morning. Did you get home-sick in one night?”But Con had flung his arms round her neck, and was kissing herdreadfully. “O mother, mother! Iamso glad to see you again,” he cried.“You queer boy. Why, I declare he has tears in his eyes!” his mother exclaimed. “Why, Con, dear, you seem as if you had been away a year instead of a night.”“I will tell you all about it, mother. But, oh! please, why did you tie up my sleeves with green ribbon before I was christened?”His mother stared. “Now who could have told you that, child?” she said. “It was silly of me, but I only did it to tease old nurse, who was full of fancies. Besides the days of fairy stealings are over, Con, though I have often thought nurse would have been alarmed if she had known how full of fairy fancies you were, my boy.”“Mother, mother! listen, it isquitetrue,” said Con, and he hastened to pour out the story of his wonderful adventure. His motherdidlook astonished, but naturally enough shecouldnot believe it. She would have it he had fallen asleep at old Nance’s cottage and dreamt it all.“But who was the boy that brought the message then?” said Con. “Iknowhe was a fairy.”And his mother could not tell what to say.“I know what to do,” he went on; “will you come with me to Nance’s cottage and askher?” and to this his mother agreed.And that very morning to the old woman’s cottage they went. It was in perfect order as usual, not a speck of dust to be seen; the little bed made, and not a stool out of its place. But there was no fire burning in the little hearth—and no Nance to be seen. Con ran all about, calling her, but she had utterly disappeared. He threw himself on the ground, sobbing bitterly.“She has gone back to them instead of me—to prevent them coming after me,” he cried, “and oh! she will be so unhappy.”And nothing that his mother could say would console him.But a night or two afterwards the boy had a dream, or a vision, which comforted him. He thought he saw Nance; Nance with her kind, strange smile, and she told him not to be troubled. “I have only gone back for a time,” she said, “and they cannot hold me, Connemara. I shall have conquered after all. You will never see me again here. I am soon going to a country very far away. I shall never come back to my little cottage, but still we may meet again and you must not grieve for me.”So Con’s mind was at peace about his old friend. Of course she never came back, and before long her cottage was pulled down. No one could say to whom it belonged, but no one objected to its destruction. She had been a witch they said, and it was best to do away with her dwelling.What Con’s mother really came in the end to think about his story, I cannot say; nor do I know if she ever told his father. I fancy Con seldom, if ever, spoke about it again. But as all who knew him when he grew up to be a man could testify, his taste of the land of “all play and no work,” never did him any harm.

“They stole little BridgetFor seven years long;When she came home againHer friends were all gone.”

“They stole little BridgetFor seven years long;When she came home againHer friends were all gone.”

There was once a boy who was a very good sort of a boy, except for two things; or perhaps I should say one thing. I am really not sure whether they were two things, or only two sides of the same thing; perhaps, children, you can decide. It was this. He could not bear his lessons, and his head wasalwaysrunning on fairies. You may say it is no harm to think about fairies, and I do not say that in moderation it is. But when it goes the length of thinking about them so much that you have no thought for anything else, then I think itisharm—don’t you? and I daresay that this had to do with Con’s hating his lessons so. Perhaps you will think it was an odd fancy for a boy: it is more often that girls think about fairies, but you must remember that there are a great many kinds of fairies. There are pixies and gnomes, and brownies and cobs, all manner of queer, clever, mischievous, and kindly creatures, besides the pretty, gentle, little people whom one always thinks of as haunting the woods in the summer time, and hiding among the flowers.

Conknew all about them; where he got his knowledge from I can’t say, but I hardly think it was out of books. However that may have been, he did know all about the fairy world as accurately as some boys know all about birds’ nests, and squirrels, and field mice, and hedgehogs. And there was one good thing about this fancy of Con’s; it led him to know a great many queer things about out-of-door’s creatures that most boys would not have paid attention to. He did not care to know about birds’ nests for the sake of stealing them for instance, but he had fancies that some of the birds were special favourites of the fairies, and it led him to watch their little ways and habits with great attention. He knew always where the first primroses were to be found, because he thought the fairies dug up the earth about their roots, and watered them at night, when every one was asleep, with magic water out of the lady well, to make them come up quicker, and many a morning he would get up very very early, in hopes of surprising the tiny gardeners at their work before they had time to decamp. But he never succeeded in doing so; and, after all, when he did have an adventure, it came, as most things do, just exactly in a way he had never in the least expected it.

Con’s home had something to do with his fancifulness perhaps. I won’t tell you where it was, for it doesn’t matter; and though some of the wiser ones among you may think you can guess what country he belonged to when I tell you that his real name was not Con, but Connemara, I must tell you you are mistaken. No, I won’t tell you where his home was, but I will tell youwhatit was. It was a sort of large cottage, and it was perched on the side of a mountain, not a hill, a real mountain, and a good big one too, and there were ever so many other mountains near by. There was a pretty garden round the cottage, and at the back a door opened in the garden wall right on to the mountain. Wasn’t that nice? And if you climbed up a little way you hadsucha view. You could see all the other mountains poking their heads up into the sky one above the other—some of them looked bare and cold, and some looked comfortable and warmly clad in cloaks of trees and shrubs and furze, but still they all looked beautiful. For the sunshine and the clouds used to chase each other over the heights and valleys so fast it was like giants playing bo-peep; that was on fine days of course. On foggy and rainy days there were grand sights to be seen too. First one mountain and then another would put on a nightcap of great heavy clouds, and sometimes the night-caps would grow down all over them till they were quite hidden; and then all of a sudden they would rise off again slowly, hit by bit, till Con could see first up to the mountain’s waist, then up, up, up to the very top again. That was another kind of bo-peep.

Summer and winter, fine or wet, cold or hot, Con used to go to school every day. He was only seven years old, and there was a good way to walk, more than a mile; but it was very seldom, very,veryseldom, that he missed going. There were reasons why it was best for him to go; his father and mother knew them, and he was too good not to do what they told him, whether he liked it or not. But he was like the horse that one man led to the water, but twenty couldn’t make drink. There was no difficulty in making Con go to school; but as for getting him to learn once he was there—ah, no! that was a different matter. So I fear I cannot say that he was much of a favourite with his teachers. You see they didn’t know that his little head was so full of fairies that it really had no room for anything else, and it was only natural that they should think him inattentive and even stupid, and their thinking so did not make Con like his lessons any better. And with his playmates he was not a favourite either. He never quarrelled with them, but he did not seem to care about their games, and they laughed at him, and called him a muff. It was a pity, for I believe it was partly to make him play with other boys that his father and mother sent him to school; and for some things the boys couldn’t help liking him. He was so good-natured, and, for such a little fellow, so brave. He could climb trees like a squirrel, and he was never afraid of anything. Many and many a short winter’s afternoon it was dark before Con left school to come home, but he did not mind at all. He would sling his satchel of books across his shoulders, and trudge manfully home—thinking—thinking. By this time I daresay you can guess of what he was thinking.

There were two ways by which he could come home from school—there was the road, really not better than a lane, and when he came that way you see he had to do all his climbing at the end, for the road was pretty level, winding along round the foot of the mountain, perched on the side of which was Con’s home; and there was what was called the hill road, which ran up the mountain behind the village, and then went bobbing up and down along the mountain side still gradually ascending, away, away, I don’t know where to—up to some lonely shepherds’ huts I daresay, where nobody but the shepherds and the sheep ever went. But on its way it passed not very far from Con’s home. I need hardly say that the hill road was the boy’s favourite way. He liked it because it was more “climby,” and for another reason too. By this way, he passed the cottage of an old woman named Nance, of whom he was extremely fond, and to whom he would always stop to speak if he possibly could.

I don’t know that many boys and girls would have taken a fancy to Nance. She was certainly not pretty, and what is more she was decidedlyqueer. She was very very small, indeed the smallest person I ever heard of, I think. When Con stood beside her, though he was only seven, he really looked bigger than she did, and she was so funnily dressed too. She always wore green, quite a bright green, and her dresses never seemed to get dull or soiled though she had all her housework to do for herself, and she had over her green dress a long brown cloak with a hood, which she generally pulled over her face to shield her eyes from the sun, she said. Her face was very small and brown and puckered-up looking, but she had bright red cheeks, andverybright dark eyes. She was never seen either to laugh or cry; but she used to smile sometimes, and her smile was rather nice.

The neighbours—they were hardly to be calledherneighbours, for her house was quite half-a-mile from any other—all called her “uncanny,” or whatever word they used to mean that, and they all said they did not know anything of her history, where she had come from, or anything about her. And once when Con repeated to her some remarks of this kind which he had heard at school, Nance only smiled and said, “no doubt the people of Creendale”—that was the name of the village—“were very wise.”

“Buthaveyou always lived here, Nance?” asked Con.

“No, Connemara,” she answered gravely, “not always.”

But that was all she said, and somehow Con did not care to ask her more.

It was not often he asked her questions; he was not that sort of boy for one thing, and besides, there was something about her that forbade it. He used to sit at one side of the cottage fire, or, in summer, on the turf seat just outside the door, watching Nance’s tiny figure as she flitted about, or sometimes just staring up at the sky, or into the fire without speaking. Nance never seemed to mind what he did, and he in no way doubted that she was glad to see him, though by words she had never said so. When he did speak it was always about one thing—what, you can guess, it was always about fairies. It was through this that he had first made friends with Nance. She had found him peering into the hollow trunk of an old solitary oak-tree that stood farther down the hill, not very far from her dwelling.

“What are you doing there, Connemara?” she said.

“I was thinking this might be one of the doors into fairyland,” he answered quietly, without seeming surprised at her knowing his name.

“And what should you know about that place?” she said again.

And Con turned towards her his earnest blue eyes, and told her all his thoughts and fancies. It seemed easier to him to tell Nance about them than it had ever seemed to tell any one else—his feelings seemed to put themselves into words, as if Nance drew them out.

Nance said very little, but she smiled. And after that Con used to stop at her cottage nearly every day on his way home—he dared not on his waytoschool, for fear of being late, for almost the only thing he always did get was good marks for punctuality. His people at home did not know much about Nance. He told his mother about her once, and asked if he might stay to speak to her; and when his mother heard that Nance’s cottage was very clean, she said, “Yes, she didn’t mind,” and, after that, Con somehow never mentioned her again. He came to have gradually a sort of misty notion that Nance had had something to do with him ever since he was born. She seemed to know everything about him. From the very first she called him by his proper name—not Con or Master Con, but Connemara, and he liked to hear her say it.

One winter afternoon, it was nearly dark though it was only half-past three, Con coming home from school (the master let them out earlier on the very short days), stopped as usual at Nance’s cottage. It was very,verycold, the fierce north wind came swirling down from the mountains, round and round, here, there, and everywhere, till, but for the unmistakable “freeze” in its breath, you would hardly have known whence it blew.

“It is so cold, Nance,” said the boy, as he settled himself by the fire. Nance’s fires always burnt so bright and clear.

“Yes,” said Nance, “the snow is coming, Connemara.”

“I don’t care,” said Con, shaking his shaggy fair hair out of his eyes, for the heat was melting the icicles upon it. “I’m not going to hurry. Father and mother are away for two days, so there’s no one to miss me. Mayn’t I stay, Nance?”

Nance did not answer. She went to the door and looked out, and Con thought he heard her whisper something to herself. Immediately a blast of wind came rushing down the hill, into the very room it seemed to Con. Nance closed the door. “Not long; the storm is coming,” she said again, in answer to his question.

But in the meantime Con made himself very comfortable by the fire, amusing himself as usual by staring into its glowing depths.

“Nance,” he said at last, “do you know what the boys at school say? They say they wonder I’m not afraid of you! They say you’re a witch, Nance!”

He looked up in her face brightly with his fearless blue eyes, and laughed so merrily that all the corners of the queer little cottage seemed to echo it back. Nance, however, only smiled.

“If youwerea witch, Nance, I’d make you grant me some wishes, three anyway,” he went on. “Of course you know what the first would be, and, indeed, if I had that, I don’t know that I would want any other. I mean, to go to fairyland, you know.”

Nance nodded her head.

“The other two would be for it to be always summer, and for me never, never,neverto have any lessons to learn,” he continued.

“Never to grow a man?” said Nance.

“I don’t know,” answered Con. “Lessonsdon’t make boys grow; but still I suppose theyhaveto have them sometime before they are men. But I shouldn’t care if I could go to fairyland, and if it would be always summer; I don’t think Iwouldcare about ever being a man.”

As he said these words the fire suddenly sent out a sputtering blaze. It jumped up all at once with such a sort of crackle and fizz, Con could have fancied it was laughing at him. He looked up at Nance.Shewas not laughing; on the contrary, her face looked very grave, graver than ever he had seen it.

“Connemara,” she said slowly, “take care. You don’t know what you are saying.”

But Con stared into the fire again and did not answer. I hardly think he heard what she said; the warm fire made him drowsy, and the brightness dazzled his eyes. He was almost beginning to nod, when Nance spoke again to him, rather sharply this time.

“My boy, the snow is beginning; you must go.” Con’s habit of obedience made him start up, sleepy though he was. Nance was already at the door looking out.

“Do not linger on the way, Connemara,” she said, “and do not think of anything but home. It will be a wild night, but if you go straight and swift you will reach home soon.”

“I’m not afraid,” said Con stoutly, as he set off.

“I could wish he were,” murmured Nance to herself, as she watched the little figure showing dark against the already whitening hill side, till it was out of sight.

Then she came back into the cottage, but she could not rest.

Con strode on manfully; the snow fell thicker and thicker, the wind blew fiercer and fiercer, but he had no misgiving. He had never before been out in a snow-storm, and knew nothing of its special dangers. For some time he got on very well, keeping strictly to the path, but suddenly, some little way up the mountain to his right, there flashed out a bright light. It jumped and hopped about in the queerest way. Con stood still to watch.

“Can it be a will-o’-the-wisp?” thought he, in his innocence forgetting that a bleak mountain side in a snow-storm is hardly the place for jack-o’-lanterns and such like.

But while he watched the light it all at once settled steadily down, on a spot apparently but a few yards above him.

“It may be some one that has lost their road,” thought Con; “I could easily show it them. I may as well climb up that little way to see;” for strangely enough the thought of thefairieshaving anything to do with what he saw never once occurred to him.

He left the path and began to climb. There, just above him, was the light, such a pretty clear light, shining now so steadily. It did not seem to move, but still as fast as he thought he had all but reached it, it receded, till at last, tired, and baffled, he decided that itmustbe a will-o’-the-wisp, and turned to regain the road. But like so many wise resolutions, this one was more easily made than executed; Con could not find the road, hard though he tried. The snow came more and more thickly till it blinded and bewildered him hopelessly. Con did his utmost not to cry, but at last he could bear up no longer. He sank down on the snow and sobbed piteously; then a pleasant resting feeling came over him, gradually he left off crying and forgot all his troubles; he began to fancy he was in his little bed at home, and remembered nothing more about the snow or anything.

Nance meanwhile had been watching anxiously at her door. She saw that the snow was coming faster, and that the wind was rising. Every now and then it seemed to rush down with a sort of howling scream, swept round the kitchen and out again, and whenever it did so, the fire would leap up the chimney, as if it were laughing at some one.

“Frisken is at his tricks to-night,” said Nance to herself, and every moment she seemed to grow more and more anxious. At last she could bear it no longer. She reached a stout stick, which stood in a corner of the room, drew her brown cloak more closely round her, and set off down the path where she had lost sight of Con. The storm of wind and snow seemed to make a plaything of her; her slight little figure swayed and tottered as she hastened along, but still she persevered. An instinct seemed to tell her where she should find the boy; she aimed almost directly for the place, but still Connemara had lain some time in his death-like sleep before Nance came up to him. There was not light enough to have distinguished him; what with the quickly-approaching darkness and the snow, which had already almost covered his little figure, Nance could not possibly have discovered him had she not stumbled right upon him. But she seemed to know what she was about, and she did not appear the least surprised. She managed with great difficulty to lift him in her arms, and turned towards her home. Alas, she had only staggered on a few paces when she felt that her strength was going. Had she not sunk down on to the ground, still tightly clasping the unconscious child, she would have fallen.

“It is no use,” she whispered at last; “they have been too much for me. The child will die if I don’t get help. The only creature that has loved me all these long, long years! Oh, Frisken, you might have played your tricks elsewhere, and left him to me. But now I must have your help.”

She struggled again to her feet, and, with her stick, struck sharply three times on the mountain side. Immediately a door opened in the rock, revealing a long passage within, with a light, as of a glowing fire, at the end, and Nance, exerting all her strength, managed to drag herself and Con within this shelter. Instantly the door closed again.

No sooner had it done so, no sooner was Nance quite shut out from the outside air, than a strange change passed over her. She grew erect and vigorous, and the weight of the boy in her arms seemed nothing to her. She looked many years younger in an instant, and with the greatest ease she carried Con along the passage, which ended in a small cave, where a bright fire was burning, in front of which lay some soft furry rugs, made of the skins of animals. With a sigh Nance laid Con gently down on the rugs. “He will do now,” she said to herself.

The first thing Con was aware of when a sort of half-consciousness returned to him, was the sound of voices. He did not recognise either of them; he was too sleepy to think where he was, or to take in the sense of what he heard, but long afterwards the words returned to him.

“Of course we shall do him no harm,” said the first voice. “That is not our way with those who come to us as he has done. All his life he has been wishing to come to us, and we might bear you a grudge for trying to stop him.”

Here the speaker burst into a curious, ringing laugh, which seemed to be re-echoed by numberless other voices in the distance.

“You made him wish it,” answered some one—it was Nance—sadly.

“Wemade him wish it! Ha, ha! ha, ha! Did you ever hear anything like that, my dear friends? Why did his mother tie up his sleeves with green ribbon before he was christened? Answer that. Ha, ha! ha, ha!” And then there came another succession of rollicking laughter.

“It was to be, I suppose,” said Nance. “But you won’tkeephim. I brought him here to save his life, not to lose his—”

“Hush, hush; how can you be so ill-mannered?” interrupted the other. “Keephim? of course not,unless he wants to stay, the pretty dear.”

“But will you make him want to stay?” pleaded Nance.

“How could we?” said the other mockingly. “How couldweinfluence him? He is a pupil of yours. But if you like to change your mind, you may come back instead of him. Ha, ha! ha, ha! what a joke!” And the laughter sounded as if the creatures, whoever they were, were holding their sides, and rolling about in the extremity of their glee. It faded away, gradually however, growing more and more indistinct, as if receding into the distance. And Con turned round on his side, and fell asleep more soundly than ever.

When at last he really awoke he found himself lying on a bed of soft moss, under the shade of some great trees, for it was summer time—summer evening time it seemed, for the light was subdued, like that of the sun from behind a cloud. Con started up in amazement, rubbing his eyes to make sure he was not dreaming. Where was he? How could it all be? The last thing he remembered was losing his way in the snow-storm on the mountain; what had become of the winter and the snow? He looked about him; the place he was in seemed to be a sort of forest glade; the foliage of the trees was so thickly interlaced overhead that only little patches of sky were here and there to be seen. There was no sunshine; just the same even, pale light over everything. It gave him again the feeling of being in a dream. Suddenly a sound caught his ears, it was that of running water; he turned in the direction whence it came.

It was the loveliest little brook you ever saw—“with many a curve” it wound along through the forest, and on its banks grew the most exquisite and wonderful variety of flowers. Flowers of every colour, but of shapes and forms Con had never seen before. He stood looking at them in bewildered delight, and as he looked, suddenly the thought for the first time flashed into his mind—“This is fairyland! I have got my wish at last. I am in fairyland!”

There was something, even to him, almost overwhelming in the idea. He could not move or speak, hardly even breathe. All at once there burst out in every direction, above his head, beneath his feet, behind him, in front of him,everywherein fact, peals and peals of laughter—the clearest, merriest, most irresistible laughter you ever heard.

“It’s the fairies,” thought Con, “but where are they?”

Where were they? Everywhere. There came another shrill peal of laughter and up they sprang, all together, from every imaginable corner. There was not a branch of a tree, hardly even a twig, it seemed to Con, on which one was not perched. They poked up their comical faces above the clear water of the brook where they must have been hiding, though how he had failed to see them there the boy could not imagine; they started up from the ground in such numbers, that Con lifted carefully first one foot and then the other to make sure he was not tramping upon some of them; they actually swarmed, and Con could not make it out at all. Could they have only just come, or had they been there all the time, and had something wrong with his eyes prevented his seeing them before? No, he couldn’t make it out.

Were they like what he had expected to find them? Hardly, at least he was not sure. Yet they were very pretty; they were as light and bright and agile as—like nothing he could think of. Their faces seemed to be brimming over with glee; there was not a sad or anxious look among them. They were dressed in every colour of the rainbow, I was going to say, but that would not be true, for there were nobrilliantcolours among them. In every shade that you see in the woods in autumn would be more correct; the ladies in the soft greens and brown pinks and tender yellows of the fading leaves, the gentlemen in the olives and russet-browns and purples which give the deeper tints of autumn foliage—perhaps this was the reason that Con had not at first distinguished them from the leaves and the moss and the tree-roots where they had lain hidden?

He stood gazing at them in silence, wondering when they were going to leave off laughing. At last the noise subsided, and one fairy, who had been swinging on a bough just above Con’s head, slid down and stood before him.

“Welcome to fairyland, Connemara,” he said pompously. He was one of the tallest among them, reaching above Con’s waist. His face, like the rest, was full of fun, but it had a look of great determination too. “My name is Frisken,” he continued, “at least that’s one of my names, and it will do for you to use as well as any other, though up above there they have ever so many names for me. I am an old friend of yours, though you may not know it, and you will find it for your interest to please me. We’ve given up kings and queens lately, we find it’s better fun without; but, considering everything, I think I may say my opinion is considered of some importance. Elves, do you agree with me?”

They all raised a shout of approval, and Frisken turned again to Con. “Our laws are easy to keep,” he said, “you will soon know them. Your duties are comprised in one word,Play, and if ever you attempt to do anything else it will be the worse for you. You interrupted us in the middle of a dance, by-the-by. Elves, strike up the music.”

Then Frisken took Con’s right hand, and a lovely little maiden clad in the palest green, and with flowing yellow hair, took the other, and the fairies made themselves into dozens and dozens of rings, and twirled and whirled away to the sound of the gayest and most inspiriting music. Con had never enjoyed himself so much in his life, and the best of it was the more he danced the more he wanted to dance; he jumped and whirled and twirled as fast as any (though I have no doubt thefairiesthought him rather clumsy about it), and yet without the very least feeling of fatigue. He felt as if he could have gone on for ever. Suddenly the elves stopped.

“Oh don’t stop!” said Con, who was beginning to feel quite at home, “do let’s go on. I am not a bit tired.”

“Tired,” said Frisken, contemptuously, “whoever heard such a word? How can you be so ill-mannered? Besides, mortal though you are, you certainly shouldnotbe tired. Why, you’re only just awake, and you slept long enough to last you at any rate for—”

“For how long?” said Con, timidly.

But Frisken did not answer, and Con, who was rather in awe of him, thought it best not to press the enquiry. The fairies did not go on dancing, however. They were fond of variety, evidently, whether they ever got tired or not. They now all “adjourned” to another part of the forest, where a grand banquet was prepared. What the viands were, Con had no idea, but he little cared, for they were the most delicious he had ever tasted. He was not a greedy boy by any means, but he did enjoy this feast; everything was so charming; the fairies all reclined on couches made of the same soft green moss as that on which he had found himself lying when he first awoke, and all the time the invisible musicians played lovely, gentle music, which, had Con not winked violently, would have brought the tears to his eyes, for, somehow, it made him think of home, and wonder what his mother was doing, and whether she was in trouble about his absence. It did not seem to affect the fairies in the same way; they were chattering, and joking, and laughing, just as merrily as ever; once Con caught Frisken’s eye fixed upon him, and almost immediately after, the music stopped, and the games began. What wonderful games they were! I cannot tell you half of them; one favourite one you may have heard of before—they buried a seed a little way in the ground, and then danced round it in a circle, singing some queer wild words which Con could not understand. Then they all stood still and called to Con to look; he could hardly believe his eyes—there was the seed already a little plant, and even as he looked, it grew, and grew, and grew, up into a great strong tree; and as the branches rose higher and higher, the fairies caught hold of them and rose up with them into the sky, till the tree seemed to be covered with fruits of every shape and colour. Con had not recovered his amazement, when they were all down again, ready for something else. This time, perhaps, it would be the mouse game—a dozen or two of fairies would turn themselves into mice, and Frisken and one or two others into cats, and then what a chase they had! It puzzled Con quite as much as the seed game, for he wassurehe saw Frisken gobble up two or three mice, and yet—in a moment, there they all were again in their proper fairy forms, not one missing! He wished he could ask Frisken to explain it, but he had not time, for now an expedition to the treasure caves was proposed, and off they all set, some riding on fairy piebald ponies about the size of a rocking-horse, some driving in mother-of-pearl chariots drawn by large white cats, some running, some dancing along. And, oh, the treasure caves, when they got there! All the stories Con had ever heard of—Aladdin, and genii and pirates’ buried riches, none of them came up to these wonderful caves in the least. There were justheapsof precious stones, all cut and polished, and, according to fairy notions, quite ready for wear. For they all helped themselves to as many jewels as they wanted, strung them together on silk, with needles that pierced them as easily as if they had been berries, and flitted about as long as the fancy lasted, wreathed in diamonds and rubies, and emeralds, and every sort of brilliant stone. And then when they had had enough of them, threw them away as ruthlessly as children cast aside their withered daisy-chains.

And so it went on without intermission; incessant jousts and revels, and banquets, constant laughter and joking, no pain, no fatigue, no anxiety. For the fairies live entirely and completely in the present, past and future have no meaning to their heedless ears, time passes as if it were not; they have no nights or days, no summer or winter. It is always the same in fairyland.

But some things puzzled Con sorely. Strangely enough, in this realm of thoughtlessness, he was beginning tothinkas well as to fancy, to wish to know the whys and wherefores of things, as he had never done before. Now and then he tried to question Frisken, who, he felt certain, knew all he wished to learn, but it was difficult ever to get him to explain anything. Once, I was very nearly sayingone day, but there are no such things there—Con could keep no count of time, he could have told how many banquets he had been at, how many times they had been to the caves, how often they had bathed in the stream, but that was all—once, then, when Frisken seemed in a quieter mood than usual, Con tried what he could do.

“Frisken,” he said, “why is it that all the oldest looking fairies among you are the smallest. Why, there’s the old fairy that drives the largest chariot, he’s not above half as big as you? It seems to me they keep getting smaller and smaller as they get older; why is it?”

“Of course they do. What else would you have?” said Frisken. “What an owl the boy must be! How can you ask such ill-mannered questions?”

“Do you mean they get smaller and smaller till they die?” said Con.

Frisken sprang to his feet with a sort of yell. It was the first time Con had seen him put out, but even now he seemed more terrified than angry. He sat down again, shaking all over.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he gasped; “we never mention such things.”

“But what becomes of you all then—afterwards?” said Con, more discreetly.

Frisken had recovered himself.

“What do you mean by your afters and befores and thens?” he said; “Isn’tnowenough for you? What becomes of them? why, what becomes of things up there in that world of yours—where do the leaves and the flowers and the butterflies go to—eh?”

“But they are onlythings,” persisted Con, “they have no—”

“Hush!” screamed Frisken, “how can you be so ill-mannered? come along, the music is beginning; they are waiting for us to dance.”

But it was with a heavy heart that Con joined the dance. He was beginning to be very tired of this beautiful fairyland, and to wish very much that he could go home to the cottage on the mountain, to his father and mother, even to his lessons! A shudder ran through him as old tales that he had heard or read, and scarcely understood, returned to his mind—of children stolen by the fairies whoneverwent home again till too late, and who then in despair returned to their beautiful prison to become all that was left to them to be, fairies themselves,things, like the flowers and the butterflies—supposing already it was too late for him? quickly as the time had passed, for all he knew, he had been a century in fairyland!

But he had to dance and to sing and to play incessantly like the others. He must not let them suspect his discontent or he would lose all chance of escape. He watched his opportunity for getting more information out of Frisken.

“Do you never go ‘up there?’” he asked him once, using the fairy word for the world he had left, “for a change you know, and to play tricks on people—that must be such fun.”

Frisken nodded his head mysteriously. He was delighted to see what a regular elfin Con was growing.

“Sometimes,” he said. “It’s all very well for a little while, but I couldn’t stay there long. The air is so thick—ugh—and the cold and the darkness! You wouldn’t believe, would you, now that you know what it’s like down here, that fairies have been known to go up there and tostayby their own choice—to become clumsy, miserable, short-lived mortals?”

“What made them?” said Con.

“Oh, a stupid idea that if they stayed up there they would have the chance of growing into— oh, nonsense, don’t let us talk of anything so disagreeable. Come and have some games.”

But Con persisted. He had discovered that when he got Frisken all to himself he had a strange power offorcinghim to answer his questions.

“Was old Nance once down here?” he asked suddenly. Frisken wriggled.

“What if she was?” he said, “she’s not worth speaking about.”

“Why did she go up there?” said Con.

“She was bewitched,” answered Frisken. “I cannot think why you like to talk about such stupid things. You have forgotten about things up there; luckily for you you came down here before you had learnt much. Did you ever hear talk of a stupid thing they call ‘love’ up there? That took her up, and then she stayed because she got more nonsense in her head.”

“Ilove my mother and my father,” said Con stoutly.

“Nonsense,” said Frisken, “you make me feel sick. You must forget all that. Come along and make a tree.”

But Con did not forget. He thought about it all constantly, and he understood much that he had never dreamt of before. He grew to detest his life among the fairies, and to long and plan for escape. But how to manage it he had no notion; which was the way “up” the fairies carefully concealed from him, and he had no clue to guide him.

“Nance! Nance! are you there? O dear Nance! do let me out, and take me home to my mother again. O Nance! Nance!”

It was Con. He had managed to escape from Frisken and the others, amusing themselves in the treasure caves, and had made his way along a narrow winding passage in the rock, with a vague idea that as it went “up” it would perhaps prove to be a way out of fairyland. He had passed the little cave where Nance had warmed him by the fire, and the sight of it had brought back a misty feeling that Nance had had something to do with that night’s adventures. Now he was standing at the end of the passage, the way was stopped by a great wall of rock, he could go no farther. In an agony of fear lest his fairy jailers should overtake him, he beat upon the rock and cried for his old friend’s help. For some time he got no answer, then suddenly, just as he fancied he heard the rush of the elves behind him in hot pursuit, he caught the sound of his own name whispered softly through the rocky door.

“Connemara,” a voice said, “I will strike the door three times, but stand back or it may crush you.”

He crept back into a corner and listened for the taps. One, two, three, and the tremendously heavy door of stone rolled back without a sound, and in a moment Con was back in the stupid old world again! There stood Nance; she put her arms round him and kissed him without speaking. Then “run home, Connemara,” she said, “run home fast, and do not linger. There is light enough to see the way, and there will soon be more.”

“But come with me, dear Nance. I want to tell you all about it. Come home with me and I will tell mother you saved me.”

But Nance shook her head. “I cannot,” she said, sorrowfully; “run home, I entreat you.”

He obeyed her, but turned to look back when he had run a little way. Nance was no longer there.

It was early morning, but it was winter time. The ground was covered with snow beginning to sparkle in the red light of the rising sun. The dear old sun! How glad Con was to see his round face again. The world looked just the same as when he had left it, but suddenly a dreadful fear seized Con. How would he find all at home? How long had he been away? Could it be a hundred years, or fifty, or even only seven, what a terrible change he would find. He thought of “little Bridget” in the ballad, and shivered. He was almost afraid to open the garden door and run in. But everything looked the same; and, yes—there to his delight was old Evan the gardener already at work, apparently no older than when last he had seen him—it must be all right, Evan wassoold, that to see him there at all told that no great time could have passed.

“You’ve come home early this morning, Master Con,” he said. “Master and Missis came back last night in all that storm, but they weren’t frightened about you, as they had the message that you had stayed at school.”

“What do you mean, Evan—what message? Who said I had stayed at school?” “Last night—could it have been onlylast night,” he whispered to himself.

“A little boy brought the message, the queerest little chap you ever saw—not as big as you by half hardly, but speaking quite like a man. I met him myself on my way home, and turned back again to tell. What a rough night it was to be sure!”

Feeling as if he were dreaming, Con turned to the house. There on the doorstep stood his mother, looking not a little astonished at seeing him.

“Why, Con, dear,” she exclaimed, “youhavecome over early this morning. Did you get home-sick in one night?”

But Con had flung his arms round her neck, and was kissing herdreadfully. “O mother, mother! Iamso glad to see you again,” he cried.

“You queer boy. Why, I declare he has tears in his eyes!” his mother exclaimed. “Why, Con, dear, you seem as if you had been away a year instead of a night.”

“I will tell you all about it, mother. But, oh! please, why did you tie up my sleeves with green ribbon before I was christened?”

His mother stared. “Now who could have told you that, child?” she said. “It was silly of me, but I only did it to tease old nurse, who was full of fancies. Besides the days of fairy stealings are over, Con, though I have often thought nurse would have been alarmed if she had known how full of fairy fancies you were, my boy.”

“Mother, mother! listen, it isquitetrue,” said Con, and he hastened to pour out the story of his wonderful adventure. His motherdidlook astonished, but naturally enough shecouldnot believe it. She would have it he had fallen asleep at old Nance’s cottage and dreamt it all.

“But who was the boy that brought the message then?” said Con. “Iknowhe was a fairy.”

And his mother could not tell what to say.

“I know what to do,” he went on; “will you come with me to Nance’s cottage and askher?” and to this his mother agreed.

And that very morning to the old woman’s cottage they went. It was in perfect order as usual, not a speck of dust to be seen; the little bed made, and not a stool out of its place. But there was no fire burning in the little hearth—and no Nance to be seen. Con ran all about, calling her, but she had utterly disappeared. He threw himself on the ground, sobbing bitterly.

“She has gone back to them instead of me—to prevent them coming after me,” he cried, “and oh! she will be so unhappy.”

And nothing that his mother could say would console him.

But a night or two afterwards the boy had a dream, or a vision, which comforted him. He thought he saw Nance; Nance with her kind, strange smile, and she told him not to be troubled. “I have only gone back for a time,” she said, “and they cannot hold me, Connemara. I shall have conquered after all. You will never see me again here. I am soon going to a country very far away. I shall never come back to my little cottage, but still we may meet again and you must not grieve for me.”

So Con’s mind was at peace about his old friend. Of course she never came back, and before long her cottage was pulled down. No one could say to whom it belonged, but no one objected to its destruction. She had been a witch they said, and it was best to do away with her dwelling.

What Con’s mother really came in the end to think about his story, I cannot say; nor do I know if she ever told his father. I fancy Con seldom, if ever, spoke about it again. But as all who knew him when he grew up to be a man could testify, his taste of the land of “all play and no work,” never did him any harm.

Chapter Five.Mary Ann Jolly.“But I lost my poor little doll, dears,As I played in the heath one day;And I cried for her more than a week, dears—”They say that the world—and of course that means the people in it—has changed very much in the last half century or so. I daresay in some ways this is true, but it is not in all. There are some ways in which I hope and think people will never change much. Hearts will never change, I hope—good, kind hearts who love and trust each other I mean; and little children, they surely will always be found the same,—simple and faithful, happy and honest; why, the very wordchildlikewould cease to have any meaning were the natures it describes to alter.Looking back over more than fifty years to a child life then, far away from here, flowing peacefully on, I recognise the same nature, the same innocent, unsuspicious enjoyment, the same quaint, so-called “old-fashioned” ways that now-a-days I find in the children growing up about me. The little ones of to-day enjoy ashorterchildhood, there is more haste to hurry them forward in the race—we would almost seem to begrudge them their playtime—but that I think is the only real difference. My darlings are children after all; they love the sunshine and the flowers, mud-pies and mischief, dolls and story-books, as fervently as ever. And long may they do so!My child of fifty years ago was in all essentials a real child. Yet again, in some particulars, she was exceptional, and exceptionally placed. She had never travelled fifty miles from her home, and that home was far away in the country, in Scotland. And a Scottish country home in those days was far removed from the bustle and turmoil and excitement of the great haunts of men. Am I getting beyond you, children, dear? Am I using words and thinking thoughts you can scarcely follow? Well, I won’t forget again. I will tell you my simple story in simple words.This long-ago little girl was named Janet. She was the youngest of several brothers and sisters, some of whom, when she was born even, were already out in the world. They were, on the whole, a happy, united family; they had their troubles, and disagreements perhaps too, sometimes, but in one thing they all joined, and that was in loving and petting little Janet. How well she remembers even now, all across the long half century, how the big brothers would dispute as to which of them should carry her in her flowered chintz dressing-gown, perched like a tiny queen on their shoulders, to father’s and mother’s room to say good-morning; how on Hallowe’en the rosiest apples and finest nuts were for “wee Janet;” how the big sisters would work for hours at her dolls’ clothes; how, dearest memory of all, the kind, often careworn, studious father would read aloud to her, hour after hour, as she lay on the hearth-rug, coiled up at his feet.For little Janet could not read much to herself. She was not blind, but her sight was imperfect, and unless the greatest care had been taken she might, by the time she grew up, have lost it altogether. To look at her you would not have known there was anything wrong with her blue eyes; the injury was the result of an accident in her infancy, by which one of the delicate sight nerves had been hurt, though not so as to prevent the hope of cure. But for several years she was hardly allowed to use her eyes at all. She used to wear a shade whenever she was in a bright light, and she was forbidden to read, or to sew, or to do anything which called for much seeing. How she learnt to read I do not know—I do not think she could have told you herself—but still it is certain that she did learn; perhaps her kind father taught her this, and many more things than either he or she suspected in the long hours she used to lie by his study fire, sometimes talking to him in the intervals of his writing, sometimes listening with intense eagerness to the legends and ballads his heart delighted in, sometimes only making stories to herself as she sat on the hearth-rug playing with her dolls.There are many quaint little stories of this long-ago maiden that you would like to hear, I think. One comes back to my mind as I write. It is about a mysterious holly bush in the garden of Janet’s home, which one year took it into its head to grow all on one side, in the queerest way you ever saw. This holly bush stood in a rather conspicuous position, just outside the breakfast-room window, and Janet’s father was struck by the peculiar crookedness which afflicted it, and one morning he went out to examine it more closely. He soon found the reason—the main branch had been stunted by half an orange skin, which had been fitted upon it most neatly and closely, like a cap, just where it was sprouting most vigorously. Janet’s father was greatly surprised. “Dear me, dear me,” he exclaimed as he came in; “what a curious thing. How could this ever have got on to the holly bush? An old orange skin, you see,” he went on, holding it up to the assembled family party. Little Janet was there, in her usual place by her father’s chair.“Was it on the robin’s bush, father?” she asked.“The robin’s bush, Janet? What do you mean?”“The bush the wee robin perches on when he comes to sing in the morning,” she answered readily. “A long, long time ago, I tied an orange skin on, to make a soft place for the dear robin’s feet. The bush wassoprickly, I could not bear to see him stand upon it.”And to this day the crooked holly bush tells of the little child’s tenderness.Then there is another old story of Janet, how, once being sorely troubled with toothache, and anxious to bear it uncomplainingly “like a woman,” she was found, after being searched for everywhere fast asleep in the “byre,” her little cheek pillowed on the soft skin of a few days’ old calf. “Its breath was so sweet, and it felt so soft and warm, it seemed to take the ache away,” she said.And another old memory of little Janet on a visit at an uncle’s, put to sleep in a room alone, and feeling frightened by a sudden gale of wind that rose in the night, howling among the trees and sweeping down the hills. Poor little Janet! It seemed to her she was far, far away from everybody, and the wind, as it were, took mortal form and voice, and threatened her, till she could bear it no longer. Up she got, all in the dark, and wandered away down the stairs and passages of the rambling old house, till at last a faint glimmer of light led her to a modest little room in the neighbourhood of the kitchen, where old Jamie, the faithful serving-man, who had seen pass away more than one generation of the family he was devoted to, was sitting up reading his Bible before going to bed. How well Janet remembers it even now! The old man’s start of surprise at the unexpected apparition of wee missy, how he took her on his knee and turned over the pages of “the Book,” to read to her words of gentle comfort, even for a little child’s alarm; how Jesus hushed the winds and waves, and bade them be still; how not a hair of the head of even tiny Janet could be injured without the Father’s knowledge; how she had indeed no reason to fear; till, soothed and reassured, the child let the good old man lead her back to bed again, where she slept soundly till morning.But all this time I am very long of introducing to you, children, the real heroine of this story—not Janet, but who then? Janet’s dearest and most tenderly prized doll—“Mary Ann Jolly.”She was one of several, but the best beloved of all, though why it would have been difficult to say. She was certainly not pretty; indeed, to tell the truth, I fear I must own that she was decidedly ugly And an ugly doll in those dayswasan ugly doll, my dears. For whether little girls have altered much or not since the days of Janet’s childhood, there can be no two opinions about dolls;theyhave altered tremendously, and undoubtedly for the better. There were what peoplethoughtvery pretty dolls then, and Janet possessed two or three of these. There was “Lady Lucy Manners,” an elegant blonde, with flaxen ringlets and pink kid hands and arms; there was “Master Ronald,” a gallant sailor laddie, with crisp black curls and goggle bead eyes; there were two or three others—Arabellas or Clarissas, I cannot tell you their exact names; on the whole, for that time, Janet had a goodly array of dolls. But still, dearest of all was Mary Ann Jolly. I think her faithfulness, her thorough reliableness, must have been her charm; she never melted, wept tears of wax—that is to say, to the detriment of her complexion, when placed too near the nursery fire. She never broke an artery and collapsed through loss of sawdust. These weaknesses were not at all in her way, for she was of wood, wooden. Her features were oil-painted on her face, like the figure-head of a ship, and would stand washing. Her hair was a good honest black-silk wig, with sewn-on curls, and the whole affair could be removed at pleasure; but oh, my dear children, shewasugly. Where she had come from originally I cannot say. I feel almost sure it was from no authorised doll manufactory. I rather think she was home-made to some extent, and I consider it highly probable that her beautiful features were the production of the village painter. But none of these trifling details are of consequence; wherever she had come from, whatever her origin, she was herself—good, faithful Mary Ann Jolly.One summer time there came trouble to the neighbourhood where little Janet’s home was. A fever of some kind broke out in several villages, and its victims were principally children. For the elder ones of the family—such of them, that is to say, as were at home—but little fear was felt by their parents; but for Janet and the brother next to her, Hughie, only three years older than she, they were anxious and uneasy. Hughie was taken from the school, a few miles distant, to which every day he used to ride on his little rough pony, and for the time Janet and he were allowed to run wild. They spent the long sunny days, for it was the height of summer, in the woods or on the hills, as happy as two young fawns, thinking, in their innocence, “the fever,” to them but the name of an unknown and unrealisable possibility, rather a lucky thing than otherwise.And Hughie was a trusty guardian for his delicate little sister. He was a brave and manly little fellow; awkward and shy to strangers, but honest as the day, and with plenty of mother-wit about him. Janet looked up to him with affection and admiration not altogether unmixed with awe. Hughie was great at “knowing best,” in their childish perplexities, and, for all his tenderness, somewhat impatient of “want of sense,” or thoughtlessness.One day the two children, accompanied as usual by Hughie’s dog “Caesar,” and the no less faithful Mary Ann Jolly, had wandered farther than their wont from home. Janet had set her heart on some beautiful water forget-me-nots, which, in a rash moment, Hughie had told her that he had seen growing on the banks of a little stream that flowed through a sort of gorge between the hills. It was quite three miles from home—a long walk for Janet, but Hughie knew his way perfectly—he was not the kind of boy ever to lose it; the day was lovely, and the burn ran nowhere near the direction they had been forbidden to take—that of the infected village. But Hughie, wise though he was, did not know or remember that close to the spot for which he was aiming ran a road leading directly from this village to the ten miles distant little town of Linnside, and even had he thought of it, the possibility of any danger to themselves attending the fact would probably never have struck him. There was another way to Linnside from their home, so Hughie’s ignorance or forgetfulness was natural.The way down to the edge of the burn was steep and difficult, for the shrubs and bushes grew thickly together, and there was no proper path.“Stay you here, Janet,” he said, finding for the child a seat on a nice flat stone at the entrance to the gorge; “I’ll be back before you know I am gone, and I’ll get the flowers much better without you, little woman; and Mary Ann will be company like.”Janet obeyed without any reluctance. She had implicit faith in Hughie. But after a while Mary Ann confided to her that she was “wearying” of sitting still, and Janet thought it could do no harm to take a turn up and down the sloping field where Hughie had left her. She wandered to a gate a few yards off, and, finding it open, wandered a little farther, till, without knowing it, she was within a stone’s throw of the road I mentioned. And here an unexpected sight met Janet’s eyes, and made her lose all thought of Hughie and the forget-me-nots, and how frightened he would be at missing her. Drawn up in a corner by some trees stood one of those travelling houses on wheels, in which I suppose every child that ever was born has at one time or other thought that it would be delightful to live. Janet had never seen one before, and she gazed at it in astonishment, till another still more interesting object caught her attention.It was a child—a little girl just about her own age, a dark-eyed, dark-haired, brown-skinned, but very, very thin little girl, lying on a heap of old shawls and blankets on the grass by the side of the movable house. She seemed to be quite alone—there was no one in the waggon apparently, no sound to be heard; she lay quite still, one thin little hand under her head, the other clasping tightly some two or three poor flowers—a daisy or two, a dandelion, and some buttercups—which she had managed to reach without moving from her couch. Janet, from under her little green shade, stared at her, and she returned the stare with interest, for all around was so still that the slight rustle made by the little intruder caught her sharp ear at once. But after a moment her eyes wandered down from Janet’s fair childish face, on which she seemed to think she had bestowed enough attention, and settled themselves on the lovely object nestling in the little girl’s maternal embrace. A smile of pleasure broke over her face.“What’s yon?” she said, suddenly.“What’swhat?” said Janet.“Yon,” repeated the child, pointing with her disengaged hand to the faithful Mary Ann.“That,” exclaimed Janet. “That’s my doll. That’s Mary Ann Jolly. Did you never see a doll?”“No,” replied the brown-skinned waif, “never. She’s awfu’ bonny.”Janet’s maternal vanity was gratified.“She’s guid and she’s bonny,” she said, unconsciously imitating, with ludicrous exactness, her own old nurse’s pet expression when she was pleased with her. She hugged Mary Ann closer to her as she spoke. “You’d like to have a dolly too, wouldn’t you, little girl?”The child smiled.“I couldnagieher tae ye,” said Janet, relapsing into Scotch, with a feeling that “high English” would probably be lost upon her new friend. “But ye micht tak’ her for a minute in yer ain airms, if ye like?”“Ay wad I,” said the child, and Janet stepped closer to her and deposited Mary Ann in her arms.“Canna ye stan’ or walk aboot? Hae ye nae legs?” she inquired.“Legs,” repeated the child, “what for shud’ I no hae legs? I canna rin aboot i’ the noo; I’ve nae been weel, but I’ll sune be better. Eh my! but she’s awfu’ fine,” she went on, caressing Mary Ann as she spoke.But at this moment the bark of a dog interrupted the friendly conversation. Caesar appeared, and Janet started forward to reclaim her property, her heart for the first time misgiving her as to “what Hughie would say.” Just as she was taking Mary Ann out of the little vagrant’s arms, Hughie came up. He was hot, breathless, anxious, and, as a natural consequence of the last especially, angry.“Naughty Janet, bad girl,” he exclaimed, in his excitement growing more “Scotch” than usual. “What for didna ye bide whaur I left ye? I couldna think what had become o’ ye; bad girl. And wha’s that ye’re clavering wi’? Shame on ye, Janet.”He darted forward, snatched his little sister roughly by the arm, dropping the precious forget-me-nots in his flurry, and dragged Janet away, making her run so fast that she burst out sobbing with fear and consternation. She could not understand it; it was not like Hughie to be so fierce and rough.“You are very, very unkind,” she began, as soon as her brother allowed her to stop to take breath. “Why should I nae speak to the puir wee girl? She looked sae ill lying there her lane, and she was sae extraordinar’ pleased wi’ Mary Ann.”“You let her touch Mary Ann, did ye?” said Hughie, stopping short. “I couldna have believed, Janet, you’d be such a fule. A big girl, ten years old, to ken nae better! It’s ‘fare-ye-weel’ to Mary Ann any way, and you have yourself to thank for it.” They were standing near the spot where Hughie had left his sister while he clambered down to the burn, and before Janet had the least idea of his intention, Hughie seized the unfortunate doll, and pitched her, with all his strength, far, far away down among the brushwood of the glen.For an instant Janet stood in perfect silence. She was too thunderstruck, too utterly appalled and stunned, to take in the reality of what had happened. She had never seen Hughie in a passion in her life; never in all their childish quarrels had he been harsh or “bullying,” as I fear too many boys of his age are to their little sisters. She gazed at him in terrified consternation, slowly, very slowly taking in the fact—to her almost as dreadful as if he had committed a murder—that Hughie had thrown away Mary Ann—her own dear, dear Mary Ann; and Hughie, her own brother had done it! Had he lost his senses?“Hughie,” she gasped out at last; that was all.Hughie looked uneasy, but tried to hide it.“Come on, Janet,” he said, “it’s getting late. We must put our best foot foremost, or nurse will be angry.”But Janet took no notice of what he said.“Hughie,” she repeated, “are ye no gaun to get me Mary Ann back again?”Hughie laughed, half contemptuously. “Get her back again,” he said. “She’s ower weel hidden for me or anybody to get her back again. And why should I want her back when I’ve just the noo thrown her awa’? Na, na, Janet, you’ll have to put up wi’ the loss of Mary Ann; and I only hope you won’t have to put up wi’ waur. It’s your own fault; though maybe I shouldna’ have left her,” he added to himself.“Hughie, you’ve broke my heart,” said Janet. “Whatdidyou do it for?”“If you’d an ounce of sense you’d know,” said Hughie; “and if you don’t,I’mno gaun to tell.” And in dreary silence the two children made their way home—Hughie, provoked, angry, and uneasy, yet self-reproachful and sore-hearted; Janet in an anguish of bereavement and indignation, yet through it all not without little gleams of faith in Hughie still, that mysteriously cruel though his conduct appeared, there must yet somehow have been a good reason for it.It was not for long, however, that she understood it. She did not know that immediately they got home honest Hughie went to his father and told him all that had happened, taking blame to himself manfully for having for an instant left Janet alone.“And you say she does not understand at all why you threw the doll away,” said Janet’s father. “Did she not notice that the little girl had been ill?”“O yes, but she took no heed of it,” Hughie replied. “She thinks it was just awfu’ unkind of me to get in such a temper. I would like her to know why it was, but I thought maybe I had better not explain till I had told you.”“You were quite right, Hughie,” said his father; “and I think it is better to leave it. Wee Janet is so impressionable and fanciful, it would not do for her to begin thinking she had caught the fever from the child. We must leave it in God’s hands, and trust no ill will come of it. And the first day I can go to Linnside you shall come with me, and we’ll buy her a new doll.”“Thank you, father,” said Hughie gratefully. But he stopped as he was leaving the room, with his hand on the door handle, to say, half-laughing, half-pathetically, “I’m hardly thinking, father, that any new doll will make up to wee Janet for Mary Ann.”Janet heard nothing of this conversation, however, and the silence which was, perhaps mistakenly, preserved about the loss of her favourite added to the mysterious sadness of her fate. The poor little girl moped and pined, but said nothing. To Hughie her manner was gently reproachful, but nothing more. But all her brightness and playfulness had deserted her; she hung about listless and uninterested, and for some days there was not an hour during which one or other of her doting relations—father, mother, sisters, and brothers—did not make up his or her mind that their darling was smitten by the terrible blast of the fever.A week, ten days, nearly a fortnight passed, and they began to breathe more freely. Then one day the father, remembering his promise, took Hughie with him to the town to buy a new doll for Janet, instead of her old favourite. I cannot describe to you the one they bought, but I know it was the prettiest that money could get at Linnside, and Hughie came home in great spirits with the treasure in his arms.“Janet, Janet,” he shouted, as soon as he had jumped off his pony, “where are you, Janet? Come and see what I’ve got for you!”Janet came slowly out of the study, where she had been lying coiled up on the floor, near the low window, watching for her father’s return.“I’m here, Hughie,” she said, trying to look interested and bright, though the effort was not very successful.But Hughie was too excited and eager to notice her manner.“Look here, Janet,” he exclaimed, unwrapping the paper which covered Miss Dolly. “Now, isn’tshea beauty? Far before that daft-like old Mary Ann; eh, Janet?”Janet took the new doll in her hands. “She’s bonny,” she said, hesitatingly. “It’s very kind of you, Hughie; but I wish, I wish you hadn’t. I don’t care for her. I dinna mean to vex ye, Hughie,” she continued, sadly, “but I canna help it. I want, oh I do want my ain Mary Ann!”She put the new doll down on the hall table, burst into tears, and ran away to the nursery.“She’s just demented about that Mary Ann,” said Hughie to his father, who had followed him into the hall.“I’m sorry for your disappointment, my boy,” said his father, “but you must not take it to heart. I don’t think wee Janet can be well.”He was right. What they had so dreaded came at last, just as they had begun to hope that the danger was over. The next morning saw little Janet down with the fever. Ah, then, what sad days of anxiety and watching followed! How softly everybody crept about—a vain precaution, for poor Janet was unconscious of everything about her. How careworn and tear-stained were all the faces of the household—parents, brothers and sisters, and servants! What sad little bulletins, costing sixpence if not a shilling each in those days, children, were sent off by post every day to the absent ones, with the tidings still of “No better,” gradually growing into the still worse, “Very little hope.” It must have been a touching sight to see a whole household so cast down about the fate of one tiny, delicate child.And poor Hughie was the worst of all. They had tried to keep him separate from his sister, but it was no use. He had managed to creep into the room and kiss her unobserved, and then he had it all his own way—all the harm was done. But he could hardly hear to hear her innocent ravings, they were so often about the lost Mary Ann, and Hughie’s strange cruelty in throwing her away. “I canna think what came over Hughie to do it,” she would say, over and over again. “I want no new dollies I only want Mary Ann.”Then there came a day on which the doctor said the disease was at its height—a few hours would show on which side the victory was to be; and the anxious faces grew more anxious still, and the silent prayers more frequent. But for many hours of this day Hughie was absent, and the others, in their intense thought about Janet, scarcely missed him. He came home late in the summer evening, with something in his arms, hidden under his jacket. And somehow his face looked more hopeful and happy than for days past.“How is she?” he asked breathlessly of the first person he met. It was one of the elder sisters.“Better,” she replied, with the tears in her eyes. “O Hughie, how can we thank God enough? She has wakened quite herself, and the doctor says now there is only weakness to fight against. She has been asking for you, Hughie. You may go up and say good-night. Where have you been all the afternoon?”But Hughie was already half way up the stairs. He crept into Janet’s room, where the mother was on guard. She made a sign to him to come to the bed where little Janet lay, pale, and thin and fragile, but peaceful and conscious.“Good-night, wee Janet,” Hughie whispered; “I’m sae glad wee Janet’s better.”“Good-night, Hughie,” she answered softly.“Kiss me, Hughie.”“I’ve some one else here to kiss you, wee Janet,” he said.Janet looked up inquiringly.“You must not excite her, Hughie,” the mother whispered. But Hughie knew what he was about. He drew from under his jacket a queer, familiar figure. It was Mary Ann Jolly! There had been no rain, fortunately for her, during her exposure to the weather, and she was sturdy enough to have stood a few showers, even had there been any. She really looked in no way the worse for her adventure, as Hughie laid her gently down on the pillow beside Janet.“It’s no one to excite her, mother,” he said. “It’s no stranger; only Mary Ann. She’s been away paying a visit to the fairies in the glen, and I think she must have enjoyed it. She’s looking as bonny as ever, and she was in no hurry to come home. I had to shout for her all over the glen before I could make her hear. Are you glad she’s come, Janet?”Janet’s eyes were glistening. “O Hughie,” she whispered, “kiss me again. I can sleepsowell now.”The crisis no doubt had been passed before this, but still it is certain that Janet’s recovery was faster far than had been expected. And for this she and Hughie, and some of the elder ones, too, I fancy, gave the credit to the return of her favourite. Hughie was well rewarded for his several hours of patient searching in the glen; and I am happy to tell you that he did not catch the fever.He would have been an elderly, almost an old man by now had he lived—good, kind Hughie. But that was not God’s will for him. He died long ago, in the prime of his youthful manhood; and it is to his little grand-nephews and nieces that wee Janet’s daughter has been telling this simple story of a long-ago little girl, and a long-ago doll, poor old Mary Ann Jolly!

“But I lost my poor little doll, dears,As I played in the heath one day;And I cried for her more than a week, dears—”

“But I lost my poor little doll, dears,As I played in the heath one day;And I cried for her more than a week, dears—”

They say that the world—and of course that means the people in it—has changed very much in the last half century or so. I daresay in some ways this is true, but it is not in all. There are some ways in which I hope and think people will never change much. Hearts will never change, I hope—good, kind hearts who love and trust each other I mean; and little children, they surely will always be found the same,—simple and faithful, happy and honest; why, the very wordchildlikewould cease to have any meaning were the natures it describes to alter.

Looking back over more than fifty years to a child life then, far away from here, flowing peacefully on, I recognise the same nature, the same innocent, unsuspicious enjoyment, the same quaint, so-called “old-fashioned” ways that now-a-days I find in the children growing up about me. The little ones of to-day enjoy ashorterchildhood, there is more haste to hurry them forward in the race—we would almost seem to begrudge them their playtime—but that I think is the only real difference. My darlings are children after all; they love the sunshine and the flowers, mud-pies and mischief, dolls and story-books, as fervently as ever. And long may they do so!

My child of fifty years ago was in all essentials a real child. Yet again, in some particulars, she was exceptional, and exceptionally placed. She had never travelled fifty miles from her home, and that home was far away in the country, in Scotland. And a Scottish country home in those days was far removed from the bustle and turmoil and excitement of the great haunts of men. Am I getting beyond you, children, dear? Am I using words and thinking thoughts you can scarcely follow? Well, I won’t forget again. I will tell you my simple story in simple words.

This long-ago little girl was named Janet. She was the youngest of several brothers and sisters, some of whom, when she was born even, were already out in the world. They were, on the whole, a happy, united family; they had their troubles, and disagreements perhaps too, sometimes, but in one thing they all joined, and that was in loving and petting little Janet. How well she remembers even now, all across the long half century, how the big brothers would dispute as to which of them should carry her in her flowered chintz dressing-gown, perched like a tiny queen on their shoulders, to father’s and mother’s room to say good-morning; how on Hallowe’en the rosiest apples and finest nuts were for “wee Janet;” how the big sisters would work for hours at her dolls’ clothes; how, dearest memory of all, the kind, often careworn, studious father would read aloud to her, hour after hour, as she lay on the hearth-rug, coiled up at his feet.

For little Janet could not read much to herself. She was not blind, but her sight was imperfect, and unless the greatest care had been taken she might, by the time she grew up, have lost it altogether. To look at her you would not have known there was anything wrong with her blue eyes; the injury was the result of an accident in her infancy, by which one of the delicate sight nerves had been hurt, though not so as to prevent the hope of cure. But for several years she was hardly allowed to use her eyes at all. She used to wear a shade whenever she was in a bright light, and she was forbidden to read, or to sew, or to do anything which called for much seeing. How she learnt to read I do not know—I do not think she could have told you herself—but still it is certain that she did learn; perhaps her kind father taught her this, and many more things than either he or she suspected in the long hours she used to lie by his study fire, sometimes talking to him in the intervals of his writing, sometimes listening with intense eagerness to the legends and ballads his heart delighted in, sometimes only making stories to herself as she sat on the hearth-rug playing with her dolls.

There are many quaint little stories of this long-ago maiden that you would like to hear, I think. One comes back to my mind as I write. It is about a mysterious holly bush in the garden of Janet’s home, which one year took it into its head to grow all on one side, in the queerest way you ever saw. This holly bush stood in a rather conspicuous position, just outside the breakfast-room window, and Janet’s father was struck by the peculiar crookedness which afflicted it, and one morning he went out to examine it more closely. He soon found the reason—the main branch had been stunted by half an orange skin, which had been fitted upon it most neatly and closely, like a cap, just where it was sprouting most vigorously. Janet’s father was greatly surprised. “Dear me, dear me,” he exclaimed as he came in; “what a curious thing. How could this ever have got on to the holly bush? An old orange skin, you see,” he went on, holding it up to the assembled family party. Little Janet was there, in her usual place by her father’s chair.

“Was it on the robin’s bush, father?” she asked.

“The robin’s bush, Janet? What do you mean?”

“The bush the wee robin perches on when he comes to sing in the morning,” she answered readily. “A long, long time ago, I tied an orange skin on, to make a soft place for the dear robin’s feet. The bush wassoprickly, I could not bear to see him stand upon it.”

And to this day the crooked holly bush tells of the little child’s tenderness.

Then there is another old story of Janet, how, once being sorely troubled with toothache, and anxious to bear it uncomplainingly “like a woman,” she was found, after being searched for everywhere fast asleep in the “byre,” her little cheek pillowed on the soft skin of a few days’ old calf. “Its breath was so sweet, and it felt so soft and warm, it seemed to take the ache away,” she said.

And another old memory of little Janet on a visit at an uncle’s, put to sleep in a room alone, and feeling frightened by a sudden gale of wind that rose in the night, howling among the trees and sweeping down the hills. Poor little Janet! It seemed to her she was far, far away from everybody, and the wind, as it were, took mortal form and voice, and threatened her, till she could bear it no longer. Up she got, all in the dark, and wandered away down the stairs and passages of the rambling old house, till at last a faint glimmer of light led her to a modest little room in the neighbourhood of the kitchen, where old Jamie, the faithful serving-man, who had seen pass away more than one generation of the family he was devoted to, was sitting up reading his Bible before going to bed. How well Janet remembers it even now! The old man’s start of surprise at the unexpected apparition of wee missy, how he took her on his knee and turned over the pages of “the Book,” to read to her words of gentle comfort, even for a little child’s alarm; how Jesus hushed the winds and waves, and bade them be still; how not a hair of the head of even tiny Janet could be injured without the Father’s knowledge; how she had indeed no reason to fear; till, soothed and reassured, the child let the good old man lead her back to bed again, where she slept soundly till morning.

But all this time I am very long of introducing to you, children, the real heroine of this story—not Janet, but who then? Janet’s dearest and most tenderly prized doll—“Mary Ann Jolly.”

She was one of several, but the best beloved of all, though why it would have been difficult to say. She was certainly not pretty; indeed, to tell the truth, I fear I must own that she was decidedly ugly And an ugly doll in those dayswasan ugly doll, my dears. For whether little girls have altered much or not since the days of Janet’s childhood, there can be no two opinions about dolls;theyhave altered tremendously, and undoubtedly for the better. There were what peoplethoughtvery pretty dolls then, and Janet possessed two or three of these. There was “Lady Lucy Manners,” an elegant blonde, with flaxen ringlets and pink kid hands and arms; there was “Master Ronald,” a gallant sailor laddie, with crisp black curls and goggle bead eyes; there were two or three others—Arabellas or Clarissas, I cannot tell you their exact names; on the whole, for that time, Janet had a goodly array of dolls. But still, dearest of all was Mary Ann Jolly. I think her faithfulness, her thorough reliableness, must have been her charm; she never melted, wept tears of wax—that is to say, to the detriment of her complexion, when placed too near the nursery fire. She never broke an artery and collapsed through loss of sawdust. These weaknesses were not at all in her way, for she was of wood, wooden. Her features were oil-painted on her face, like the figure-head of a ship, and would stand washing. Her hair was a good honest black-silk wig, with sewn-on curls, and the whole affair could be removed at pleasure; but oh, my dear children, shewasugly. Where she had come from originally I cannot say. I feel almost sure it was from no authorised doll manufactory. I rather think she was home-made to some extent, and I consider it highly probable that her beautiful features were the production of the village painter. But none of these trifling details are of consequence; wherever she had come from, whatever her origin, she was herself—good, faithful Mary Ann Jolly.

One summer time there came trouble to the neighbourhood where little Janet’s home was. A fever of some kind broke out in several villages, and its victims were principally children. For the elder ones of the family—such of them, that is to say, as were at home—but little fear was felt by their parents; but for Janet and the brother next to her, Hughie, only three years older than she, they were anxious and uneasy. Hughie was taken from the school, a few miles distant, to which every day he used to ride on his little rough pony, and for the time Janet and he were allowed to run wild. They spent the long sunny days, for it was the height of summer, in the woods or on the hills, as happy as two young fawns, thinking, in their innocence, “the fever,” to them but the name of an unknown and unrealisable possibility, rather a lucky thing than otherwise.

And Hughie was a trusty guardian for his delicate little sister. He was a brave and manly little fellow; awkward and shy to strangers, but honest as the day, and with plenty of mother-wit about him. Janet looked up to him with affection and admiration not altogether unmixed with awe. Hughie was great at “knowing best,” in their childish perplexities, and, for all his tenderness, somewhat impatient of “want of sense,” or thoughtlessness.

One day the two children, accompanied as usual by Hughie’s dog “Caesar,” and the no less faithful Mary Ann Jolly, had wandered farther than their wont from home. Janet had set her heart on some beautiful water forget-me-nots, which, in a rash moment, Hughie had told her that he had seen growing on the banks of a little stream that flowed through a sort of gorge between the hills. It was quite three miles from home—a long walk for Janet, but Hughie knew his way perfectly—he was not the kind of boy ever to lose it; the day was lovely, and the burn ran nowhere near the direction they had been forbidden to take—that of the infected village. But Hughie, wise though he was, did not know or remember that close to the spot for which he was aiming ran a road leading directly from this village to the ten miles distant little town of Linnside, and even had he thought of it, the possibility of any danger to themselves attending the fact would probably never have struck him. There was another way to Linnside from their home, so Hughie’s ignorance or forgetfulness was natural.

The way down to the edge of the burn was steep and difficult, for the shrubs and bushes grew thickly together, and there was no proper path.

“Stay you here, Janet,” he said, finding for the child a seat on a nice flat stone at the entrance to the gorge; “I’ll be back before you know I am gone, and I’ll get the flowers much better without you, little woman; and Mary Ann will be company like.”

Janet obeyed without any reluctance. She had implicit faith in Hughie. But after a while Mary Ann confided to her that she was “wearying” of sitting still, and Janet thought it could do no harm to take a turn up and down the sloping field where Hughie had left her. She wandered to a gate a few yards off, and, finding it open, wandered a little farther, till, without knowing it, she was within a stone’s throw of the road I mentioned. And here an unexpected sight met Janet’s eyes, and made her lose all thought of Hughie and the forget-me-nots, and how frightened he would be at missing her. Drawn up in a corner by some trees stood one of those travelling houses on wheels, in which I suppose every child that ever was born has at one time or other thought that it would be delightful to live. Janet had never seen one before, and she gazed at it in astonishment, till another still more interesting object caught her attention.

It was a child—a little girl just about her own age, a dark-eyed, dark-haired, brown-skinned, but very, very thin little girl, lying on a heap of old shawls and blankets on the grass by the side of the movable house. She seemed to be quite alone—there was no one in the waggon apparently, no sound to be heard; she lay quite still, one thin little hand under her head, the other clasping tightly some two or three poor flowers—a daisy or two, a dandelion, and some buttercups—which she had managed to reach without moving from her couch. Janet, from under her little green shade, stared at her, and she returned the stare with interest, for all around was so still that the slight rustle made by the little intruder caught her sharp ear at once. But after a moment her eyes wandered down from Janet’s fair childish face, on which she seemed to think she had bestowed enough attention, and settled themselves on the lovely object nestling in the little girl’s maternal embrace. A smile of pleasure broke over her face.

“What’s yon?” she said, suddenly.

“What’swhat?” said Janet.

“Yon,” repeated the child, pointing with her disengaged hand to the faithful Mary Ann.

“That,” exclaimed Janet. “That’s my doll. That’s Mary Ann Jolly. Did you never see a doll?”

“No,” replied the brown-skinned waif, “never. She’s awfu’ bonny.”

Janet’s maternal vanity was gratified.

“She’s guid and she’s bonny,” she said, unconsciously imitating, with ludicrous exactness, her own old nurse’s pet expression when she was pleased with her. She hugged Mary Ann closer to her as she spoke. “You’d like to have a dolly too, wouldn’t you, little girl?”

The child smiled.

“I couldnagieher tae ye,” said Janet, relapsing into Scotch, with a feeling that “high English” would probably be lost upon her new friend. “But ye micht tak’ her for a minute in yer ain airms, if ye like?”

“Ay wad I,” said the child, and Janet stepped closer to her and deposited Mary Ann in her arms.

“Canna ye stan’ or walk aboot? Hae ye nae legs?” she inquired.

“Legs,” repeated the child, “what for shud’ I no hae legs? I canna rin aboot i’ the noo; I’ve nae been weel, but I’ll sune be better. Eh my! but she’s awfu’ fine,” she went on, caressing Mary Ann as she spoke.

But at this moment the bark of a dog interrupted the friendly conversation. Caesar appeared, and Janet started forward to reclaim her property, her heart for the first time misgiving her as to “what Hughie would say.” Just as she was taking Mary Ann out of the little vagrant’s arms, Hughie came up. He was hot, breathless, anxious, and, as a natural consequence of the last especially, angry.

“Naughty Janet, bad girl,” he exclaimed, in his excitement growing more “Scotch” than usual. “What for didna ye bide whaur I left ye? I couldna think what had become o’ ye; bad girl. And wha’s that ye’re clavering wi’? Shame on ye, Janet.”

He darted forward, snatched his little sister roughly by the arm, dropping the precious forget-me-nots in his flurry, and dragged Janet away, making her run so fast that she burst out sobbing with fear and consternation. She could not understand it; it was not like Hughie to be so fierce and rough.

“You are very, very unkind,” she began, as soon as her brother allowed her to stop to take breath. “Why should I nae speak to the puir wee girl? She looked sae ill lying there her lane, and she was sae extraordinar’ pleased wi’ Mary Ann.”

“You let her touch Mary Ann, did ye?” said Hughie, stopping short. “I couldna have believed, Janet, you’d be such a fule. A big girl, ten years old, to ken nae better! It’s ‘fare-ye-weel’ to Mary Ann any way, and you have yourself to thank for it.” They were standing near the spot where Hughie had left his sister while he clambered down to the burn, and before Janet had the least idea of his intention, Hughie seized the unfortunate doll, and pitched her, with all his strength, far, far away down among the brushwood of the glen.

For an instant Janet stood in perfect silence. She was too thunderstruck, too utterly appalled and stunned, to take in the reality of what had happened. She had never seen Hughie in a passion in her life; never in all their childish quarrels had he been harsh or “bullying,” as I fear too many boys of his age are to their little sisters. She gazed at him in terrified consternation, slowly, very slowly taking in the fact—to her almost as dreadful as if he had committed a murder—that Hughie had thrown away Mary Ann—her own dear, dear Mary Ann; and Hughie, her own brother had done it! Had he lost his senses?

“Hughie,” she gasped out at last; that was all.

Hughie looked uneasy, but tried to hide it.

“Come on, Janet,” he said, “it’s getting late. We must put our best foot foremost, or nurse will be angry.”

But Janet took no notice of what he said.

“Hughie,” she repeated, “are ye no gaun to get me Mary Ann back again?”

Hughie laughed, half contemptuously. “Get her back again,” he said. “She’s ower weel hidden for me or anybody to get her back again. And why should I want her back when I’ve just the noo thrown her awa’? Na, na, Janet, you’ll have to put up wi’ the loss of Mary Ann; and I only hope you won’t have to put up wi’ waur. It’s your own fault; though maybe I shouldna’ have left her,” he added to himself.

“Hughie, you’ve broke my heart,” said Janet. “Whatdidyou do it for?”

“If you’d an ounce of sense you’d know,” said Hughie; “and if you don’t,I’mno gaun to tell.” And in dreary silence the two children made their way home—Hughie, provoked, angry, and uneasy, yet self-reproachful and sore-hearted; Janet in an anguish of bereavement and indignation, yet through it all not without little gleams of faith in Hughie still, that mysteriously cruel though his conduct appeared, there must yet somehow have been a good reason for it.

It was not for long, however, that she understood it. She did not know that immediately they got home honest Hughie went to his father and told him all that had happened, taking blame to himself manfully for having for an instant left Janet alone.

“And you say she does not understand at all why you threw the doll away,” said Janet’s father. “Did she not notice that the little girl had been ill?”

“O yes, but she took no heed of it,” Hughie replied. “She thinks it was just awfu’ unkind of me to get in such a temper. I would like her to know why it was, but I thought maybe I had better not explain till I had told you.”

“You were quite right, Hughie,” said his father; “and I think it is better to leave it. Wee Janet is so impressionable and fanciful, it would not do for her to begin thinking she had caught the fever from the child. We must leave it in God’s hands, and trust no ill will come of it. And the first day I can go to Linnside you shall come with me, and we’ll buy her a new doll.”

“Thank you, father,” said Hughie gratefully. But he stopped as he was leaving the room, with his hand on the door handle, to say, half-laughing, half-pathetically, “I’m hardly thinking, father, that any new doll will make up to wee Janet for Mary Ann.”

Janet heard nothing of this conversation, however, and the silence which was, perhaps mistakenly, preserved about the loss of her favourite added to the mysterious sadness of her fate. The poor little girl moped and pined, but said nothing. To Hughie her manner was gently reproachful, but nothing more. But all her brightness and playfulness had deserted her; she hung about listless and uninterested, and for some days there was not an hour during which one or other of her doting relations—father, mother, sisters, and brothers—did not make up his or her mind that their darling was smitten by the terrible blast of the fever.

A week, ten days, nearly a fortnight passed, and they began to breathe more freely. Then one day the father, remembering his promise, took Hughie with him to the town to buy a new doll for Janet, instead of her old favourite. I cannot describe to you the one they bought, but I know it was the prettiest that money could get at Linnside, and Hughie came home in great spirits with the treasure in his arms.

“Janet, Janet,” he shouted, as soon as he had jumped off his pony, “where are you, Janet? Come and see what I’ve got for you!”

Janet came slowly out of the study, where she had been lying coiled up on the floor, near the low window, watching for her father’s return.

“I’m here, Hughie,” she said, trying to look interested and bright, though the effort was not very successful.

But Hughie was too excited and eager to notice her manner.

“Look here, Janet,” he exclaimed, unwrapping the paper which covered Miss Dolly. “Now, isn’tshea beauty? Far before that daft-like old Mary Ann; eh, Janet?”

Janet took the new doll in her hands. “She’s bonny,” she said, hesitatingly. “It’s very kind of you, Hughie; but I wish, I wish you hadn’t. I don’t care for her. I dinna mean to vex ye, Hughie,” she continued, sadly, “but I canna help it. I want, oh I do want my ain Mary Ann!”

She put the new doll down on the hall table, burst into tears, and ran away to the nursery.

“She’s just demented about that Mary Ann,” said Hughie to his father, who had followed him into the hall.

“I’m sorry for your disappointment, my boy,” said his father, “but you must not take it to heart. I don’t think wee Janet can be well.”

He was right. What they had so dreaded came at last, just as they had begun to hope that the danger was over. The next morning saw little Janet down with the fever. Ah, then, what sad days of anxiety and watching followed! How softly everybody crept about—a vain precaution, for poor Janet was unconscious of everything about her. How careworn and tear-stained were all the faces of the household—parents, brothers and sisters, and servants! What sad little bulletins, costing sixpence if not a shilling each in those days, children, were sent off by post every day to the absent ones, with the tidings still of “No better,” gradually growing into the still worse, “Very little hope.” It must have been a touching sight to see a whole household so cast down about the fate of one tiny, delicate child.

And poor Hughie was the worst of all. They had tried to keep him separate from his sister, but it was no use. He had managed to creep into the room and kiss her unobserved, and then he had it all his own way—all the harm was done. But he could hardly hear to hear her innocent ravings, they were so often about the lost Mary Ann, and Hughie’s strange cruelty in throwing her away. “I canna think what came over Hughie to do it,” she would say, over and over again. “I want no new dollies I only want Mary Ann.”

Then there came a day on which the doctor said the disease was at its height—a few hours would show on which side the victory was to be; and the anxious faces grew more anxious still, and the silent prayers more frequent. But for many hours of this day Hughie was absent, and the others, in their intense thought about Janet, scarcely missed him. He came home late in the summer evening, with something in his arms, hidden under his jacket. And somehow his face looked more hopeful and happy than for days past.

“How is she?” he asked breathlessly of the first person he met. It was one of the elder sisters.

“Better,” she replied, with the tears in her eyes. “O Hughie, how can we thank God enough? She has wakened quite herself, and the doctor says now there is only weakness to fight against. She has been asking for you, Hughie. You may go up and say good-night. Where have you been all the afternoon?”

But Hughie was already half way up the stairs. He crept into Janet’s room, where the mother was on guard. She made a sign to him to come to the bed where little Janet lay, pale, and thin and fragile, but peaceful and conscious.

“Good-night, wee Janet,” Hughie whispered; “I’m sae glad wee Janet’s better.”

“Good-night, Hughie,” she answered softly.

“Kiss me, Hughie.”

“I’ve some one else here to kiss you, wee Janet,” he said.

Janet looked up inquiringly.

“You must not excite her, Hughie,” the mother whispered. But Hughie knew what he was about. He drew from under his jacket a queer, familiar figure. It was Mary Ann Jolly! There had been no rain, fortunately for her, during her exposure to the weather, and she was sturdy enough to have stood a few showers, even had there been any. She really looked in no way the worse for her adventure, as Hughie laid her gently down on the pillow beside Janet.

“It’s no one to excite her, mother,” he said. “It’s no stranger; only Mary Ann. She’s been away paying a visit to the fairies in the glen, and I think she must have enjoyed it. She’s looking as bonny as ever, and she was in no hurry to come home. I had to shout for her all over the glen before I could make her hear. Are you glad she’s come, Janet?”

Janet’s eyes were glistening. “O Hughie,” she whispered, “kiss me again. I can sleepsowell now.”

The crisis no doubt had been passed before this, but still it is certain that Janet’s recovery was faster far than had been expected. And for this she and Hughie, and some of the elder ones, too, I fancy, gave the credit to the return of her favourite. Hughie was well rewarded for his several hours of patient searching in the glen; and I am happy to tell you that he did not catch the fever.

He would have been an elderly, almost an old man by now had he lived—good, kind Hughie. But that was not God’s will for him. He died long ago, in the prime of his youthful manhood; and it is to his little grand-nephews and nieces that wee Janet’s daughter has been telling this simple story of a long-ago little girl, and a long-ago doll, poor old Mary Ann Jolly!

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