Queen of the Fairies

“ I’ll give thee fairies to attend on thee, and they shall fetch thee jewels, and sing while thou liest sleeping on a bank of flowers. Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Moth! and Mustard-seed!”
Four little elves came flying at the summons, and the infatuated Queen of the Fairies gave this new object of her affections into their special charge. They led him away to the bower of the Queen, and there they decked him with flowers, while Titania lavished caresses on the clownish monster.
Bottom was not in the least impressed with the dainty loveliness of the Queen of the Fairies. ”

“ As soon as the ambassador arrived at the palace, the Queen started to fetch her daughter.
All the streets were spread with carpets, and the windows were full of ladies who were waiting to see the Princess, and carried baskets of flowers and sweetmeats to shower upon her as she passed.
They had hardly begun to get the Princess ready when a dwarf arrived, mounted upon an elephant. He came from the five fairies, and brought for the Princess a crown, a sceptre, and a robe of golden brocade, with a petticoat marvellously embroidered with butterflies' wings. ”

“ Her face is such a goodly one, her manners are so gentle, easy and winning, her every movement so graceful, delicate and yet so full of life, that we shall not be surprised to hear you say: "Surely, she must be the Fairy Queen herself!" ”

“ The cot was then shown, and the Queen went into raptures over it: it surely was the nicest ever made; it was of beautiful, rare wood, with a canopy of blue silk, inwrought with diamonds and rubies.
Then the fairies took the little Princess on their knees, and kissed her and hugged her because she was so good and beautiful. Each fairy wished her a good quality. One wished her to be wise; another wished that she might be good; another wished her to be virtuous; another to be beautiful; another to possess a good fortune; and the fifth asked for her a long life and good health. ”

“ At this the queen fell on her knees and begged Tormentilla to recall her cruel words. But the wicked fairy, without replying, turned and left the hall. Then the eighth fairy went to the queen and said: 46“Do not cry, my dear lady; for though I cannot relieve the princess of this enchantment I can make it less severe. She shall not die, but instead shall fall asleep for a hundred years. When those are past, a prince shall come and awaken her with a kiss.”
So the king and queen were somewhat comforted, and the fairies returned to their homes. ”

“ The four little fairies the queen called to must have been loitering. But now they came scampering up,—Ganderfeather behind the others, for he was a very fat and presumably a very lazy little fairy.
"The elves will be here presently," said the queen, "and then, little folk, you shall dance to your heart's content. Dance your prettiest to-night for the good old poet is watching you." ”

“ THE PRINCESS NOBODY. ONCE upon a time, when Fairies were much more common than they are now, there lived a King and a Queen. Their country was close to Fairy Land, and very often the little Elves would cross over the border, and come into the King’s fields and gardens. The girl-fairies would swing out of the bells of the fuschias, and loll on the leaves, and drink the little drops of dew that fell down the stems. ”

“ The Fairies danced away to the crying dandelions with the Queen's message.
"The Queen will give you a white top," they said.
"No, no!" they cried. "Yellow is the color we should wear with our green leaves. It is the color of the sun and we wish to be as near like him as we can," and they all began to cry:
"O bitter woe, we will not stop
Till the Fairies give us a yellow top."
They made such a noise that the Fairies put their fingers in their ears as they flew back to the Queen.
The grass-blades stood up higher and looked about. "Do quiet those noisy weeds," they said to the Queen ”

“ The Queen’s answer, as read in a great court of the fairies, after due counsel taken with the wisest counsellors, was this:
“That Flax-Flower be permitted to transform herself into the likeness and form of the coming Egyptian creature, but”—and here the Queen looked very stern, first at the Flax-Flower, and [135] then at all the company of fairies, who were to bear witness to her words—“if she should not like her new nature, she should not be allowed ever to become a fairy again. She must remain, for one year, a four-footed creature. ”

“ We are obliged to confer a certain number of favours on the world generally, and to return an account of them. When my sister gave in hers, it appeared that she had limited her excursions and her benefits to the confines of the Fortunate Island.
"Several of our ill-natured fairies blamed this conduct, and our Queen, in consequence, demanded of her why she had restricted her benevolence to this small corner of the earth, when she could not be ignorant that a young fairy was bound to travel far and wide, and manifest to the universe at large our pleasure and our power. ”

“ Then the Fairy answered that the Princess would be as pretty, and clever, and well brought up as it was possible to be, and the old King growled to the Queen that it was lucky for her that it was so, as they would certainly have been hanged if it were otherwise. Then he stamped off, taking the Fairy with him, and leaving the poor Queen in tears.
‘How can I wish my little daughter to grow up pretty if she is to be married to that horrid little dwarf, the King’s son,’ she said to herself, ‘and yet, if she is ugly we shall both be killed. ”

“ Her tears fell like dew drops on the spider web, and the sun shone on them, and made them as bright as the fairy queen's diamonds.
The fairy began to think of the queen and the court, and the bundle of dreams; and she wondered who would do the work if she never got free. The fairy queen had always trusted her, and had sent her on many errands. ”

“ The fairy returned immediately to her palace, where she had left the queen. "I bring you, madam," cried she, "the happiest tidings." "Alas!" answered the queen, "what tidings of joy can come to me, who have lost both my husband and my child?" "It is always right to hope," replied the little white mouse, for the fairy had again taken that figure; "I have seen the princess your daughter, and she is more beautiful than the blushes of the dawning day." She then related the whole of her discovery, at which the queen wept with joy. ”

“ People came in from every quarter in great numbers; they threw water upon the Princess’s face, unlaced her, struck her on the palms of her hands, and rubbed her temples with Hungary-water; but nothing would bring her to herself.
And now the King, who came up at the noise, bethought himself of the prediction of the fairies, and, judging very well that this must necessarily come to pass, since the fairies had said it, caused the Princess to be carried into the finest apartment in his palace, and to be laid upon a bed all embroidered with gold and silver. ”

“ So she hurried back to her castle, where the Queen sat busy with her embroidery, and cried:
"Well, madam, will you wager your thimble and your golden needle that I am bringing you the best news you could possibly hear?"
"Alas!" sighed the Queen, "since the death of the jolly King and the loss of my Delicia, all the news in the world is not worth a pin to me."
"There, there, don't be melancholy," said the fairy. "I assure you the Princess is quite well, and I have never seen her equal for beauty. She might be a queen to-morrow if she chose" ”

“ How shall I know now whether my Delicia is being taken care of or not? Anyone else would have let the greedy old woman have you and eat you up, but I could not bear to do it." Whereupon the mouse answered:
"Believe me, madam, you will never repent of your kindness."
The Queen was immensely astonished when the mouse began to speak, and still more so when she saw its little sharp nose turn to a beautiful face, and its paws to hands and feet; then it suddenly grew tall, and the Queen recognized the fairy who had come with the wicked King to visit her. ”

“ After spending the greater part of his early youth in pleasure, he met a Princess of such remarkable beauty that he at once asked her hand in marriage, and, having obtained it, considered himself the happiest of men.
After a year’s time a son was born, worthy in every way of such distinguished parents, and much admired by the whole Court. As soon as the Queen thought him strong enough for a journey she set out with him secretly to visit her Fairy godmother. I said secretly, because the Fairy had warned the Queen that the King was a magician ”

“ The other fairies came, and they said that Heartsease should be the kindest and the cleverest princess ever seen: her eyes should [100] be as blue as forget-me-nots, her smile as bright as the morning, her hands as delicate as snowdrops, and her heart of pure gold. Moreover, she should sing like a lark, and ride wild horses, and do needlework better than all other princesses. Towards the end of the feast, the Fairy of the Yellow Mines arrived in a chariot drawn by two snorting dragons. ”

“ The same fairy who had been present at the birth of little Riquet with the Tuft was here too; and to moderate the Queen’s joy she told her that this little Princess should have no sense at all, but should be as stupid as she was pretty. This mortified the Queen very much, but soon she had a still greater sorrow, for the second daughter was extremely ugly.
“Do not afflict yourself so much, madam,” said the fairy. “Your daughter shall have it made up to her in other ways; she shall have so much intelligence and wit that her want of beauty will hardly be noticed.” ”

“ This young Princess knew that one fairy could not positively prevent anything predicted by another of her own class, but that she might mitigate the punishment which that other had inflicted.
"I shall go," said the Queen, "in search of Lumineuse, Sovereign of the Happy Empire; she is a celebrated fairy who delights in protecting the unfortunate. ”

“ Upon this the people cried with one accord: "We will, we will! We have been gloomy and miserable too long already." And they all took hands and danced round the Queen and Delicia and the good fairy, singing: "Yes, yes; we will, we will!"
Then there were feasts and fireworks in every street in the town, and early the next morning the fairy, who had been all over the world in the night, brought back with her in her flying chariot the most handsome and good-tempered Prince she could find anywhere. ”

“ One of the young fairies who sat by her overheard how she grumbled; and, judging that she might give the little Princess some unlucky gift, went, as soon as they rose from table, and hid herself behind the hangings, that she might speak last, and repair, as much as she could, the evil which the old Fairy might intend.
In the meanwhile all the fairies began to give their gifts to the Princess. The youngest gave her for gift that she should be the most beautiful person in the world; the next, that she should have the wit of an angel ”

“ At these words the Princess embraced the two Fairies, who invited her, with the King and Grimaçon, to go with them to the palace of the King. The released youths and maidens then dispersed to their several homes, and, mounting the chariot of the Fairy of the Green Woods, Moonflower soon reached the palace, followed by the King and the dwarf, who accompanied the other Fairy. ”

“ Because they loved her they called her the Dear Princess, and the country in which she lived was known as the Crystal Mountain. It was the delight of the fairies to do her bidding, to fly and fly over hill and dale to fetch her anything she wished to have. Sometimes she wished to have very curious things, because all the ordinary things that Princesses like to have had been brought to her long ago by the fairies. If she wanted things that no one had ever heard of before, the fairies would set to work to make them for her. ”

“ You must know that she is a cruel fairy who hates me, and as she is older than I am and has more power, I can do nothing against her. I know no way of rescuing Delicia from her clutches.’
When the Queen heard this terrible news she was heart-broken, and begged the Fairy to do all she could to get the poor little Princess back again. At this moment in came the gaoler, and when he missed the little Princess he at once told the King, who came in a great fury asking what the Queen had done with her. She answered that a fairy, whose name she did not know, had come and carried her off by force. ”

“ They all enjoyed excellent health, and in the evening, when the period of working had passed, they diverted themselves with all sorts of pastimes. "Alas!" cried the Queen, "the fairy made me a very evil present when she gave me a crown. Contentment is not to be found in magnificent palaces, but only in the innocent employments of a country life." These words had hardly passed her lips when the fairy appeared. "It was not my intention, when I made you Queen, to reward, but to punish you," said the fairy to her, "for giving me your plums with so much ill will. ”

“ Next day the fairy gave the queen three boiled peas, and a small bit of black bread, and the next, and the next, until the poor queen wasted to skin and bone, and the baby looked like a wax doll that had been left out in the rain all night.
"In a few days it will be over," thought the poor queen. "We shall be starved to death."
She fell to spinning with what strength remained to her (for the fairy made her work, to pay her board, she said) , and just then she saw, entering at a small hole, a pretty little mouse as white as snow. ”

“ I am pursued by rats.’
The Prince when he heard this got up also, and ran after the King, and they had not gone far when they both fell into the river and were never heard of again.
Then the good Fairy ran to tell the Queen, and they went together to the black dungeon where Delicia was imprisoned. The Fairy touched each door with her wand, and it sprang open instantly, but they had to go through forty before they came to the Princess, who was sitting on the floor looking very dejected. ”