Frances Hodgson Burnett

“ But the minute he gets away and you lose him, he turns into a tiny black Imp Fairy and pinches and kicks you and tells lies to you and whispers ugly things to you until you are perfectly mizz'able and make everybody else mizz'able too. I had a lovely little Temper. There never was a cleverer one or a prettier one. He was tiny and rosy and his face was pink and full of dimples, and I perfectly loved him. I always kept him in a tiny silver cage, or fastened to my waist by a diamond chain. ”

“ Fairies are real—Fairies are true.
But you cannot make people believe it. Even children don't. That is what is the matter with everything. People will believe in nasty things and they won't believe in nice things, and that has been going on so long that my great fear is that the Fairies themselves will forget their accomplishments, and then what will become of Fairyland? ”

“ You see, just now I thought in the front of my head and I thought in the back of my head and when I was thinking in the back of my head I suddenly remembered that when people who are not Fairies want to persuade any one to believe in anything they always write books about it. ”

“ The Dormouse knows more than the King. Every year, when the weather grows cold, the Dormouse rolls himself into a ball and he takes his hind legs and he tucks them round his ears and he doesn't move until the Spring comes. So the people think he is asleep. But he is not asleep. He is thinking all the time. He can think better and faster when he is rolled up and his hind legs are tucked over his ears. ”

“ Rumors have come to my palace of Fairies who were not even able to change themselves into rabbits when it was very important indeed, and I heard of one Fairy who was trying to turn a naughty little boy into a pussy cat because he was pulling a kitten's tail, and she only got as far as the miaw and the claws and she forgot how to do the rest, and he ran away mi-a-owing and scratching his face with his sharp claws when he tried to rub his eyes because he was crying. ”

“ Besides, if I have not written books myself, I have taught other people to write them. I know a Respectable Person—quite a Respectable Person. She sits in a garden full of roses and any number of birds call on her and she writes books for a living, and she learned it all from me. ”

“ They write books about Lions, and books about Tigers, they write books about Africa and books about America; and why should you not write books about Fairies and Fairyland and the things the Fairies do? I once lined my nest with a leaf out of a book about Dormice—though I couldn't say I slept well that winter." He put out his paw and tapped me on the shoulder several times. ”

“ She lives in a house with a park round it and when she goes and stands on the big stone steps and calls out, 'Thistle, Thistle,' her pet donkey lifts up his head and walks slowly across the grass to her and even walks up a stone step or two just to engage in confidential conversation. No donkey would be as intimate as that with a Disrespectable person. Animals are very aristocratic. ”