come true, never last. Still, you may have it," and she waved her magic
wand, and if the golden coach and four horses didn't appear right there
in the woods--honest! "Wish again, my dear," went on the fairy, and this
time Susie was more careful.
"I wish for ten boxes of chocolate-covered carrots," she said, and once
more the fairy said she was sorry, for that wish wouldn't last. Still,
it came true, and down from the tree where the blue fairy sat, came
tumbling the ten boxes of chocolate-covered carrots, each one wrapped up
in lace paper. Susie put them in the golden coach, and was ready for her
next wish. She thought a good long while over this one. Then she said:
"I wish I could find my ring with the blue stone!"
At that the fairy clapped her tiny hands. "That is a fine wish!" she
cried. "It will come true, and stay so. But the others----" and she
shook her head sorrowfully. Then she waved her magic wand three times in
the air, and suddenly, in less than two jumps, if the ring with the
blue stone, that Susie had lost, didn't appear right on the end of the
wand. And it flew off and landed right on Susie's paw. Oh, wasn't she
glad! And the fairy said: "The ring will last, because that is blue, and
I am blue, too. Now, good bye, Susie." And with that she disappeared,
changing into a butterfly with golden wings. Then Susie started to get
in the golden coach and ride home, but, would you believe me, if those
horses didn't run away, upsetting the coach and breaking it, and
scattering all the ten boxes of chocolate-covered carrots all over. Oh,
how badly Susie felt, but it was just what the fairy said would happen.
The first two wishes didn't last. Anyhow, Susie had the ring, and she
hurried home to tell her story. Now, if it doesn't rain to-morrow, the
story to-morrow night will be about Sammie and the green fairy.
XXVII
SAMMIE AND THE GREEN FAIRY
When Susie told her brother Sammie about what happened to her in the
woods, when she saw the blue fairy, the little rabbit boy remarked:
"Aw, I guess you fell asleep and dreamed that, Susie." for that's the
way with brothers sometimes. I once had a brother, and he--but there,
I'll tell you about him some other time.
"No," answered Susie, "I didn't dream it. Why, here's my ring to prove
it," and she held out the one with the blue stone in it.
"I guess you found that in the woods, where you lost it," went on
Sammie. "I don't believe in fairies at all."
"But didn't one cure Uncle Wiggily's rheumatism?"
"Aw, well, I guess that would have gotten better anyhow."
"It wouldn't, so there!" exclaimed Susie. "I just hope you see a fairy
some day, and I hope they don't treat you as kind as the one treated me,
even if the horses did run away and disappear." But of course Susie
didn't really want anything bad to happen to her brother. But you just
wait and see what did happen. Oh, it was something very, very strange,
yes, indeed, and I'm not fooling a bit; no, indeed. I wouldn't make it
out anything different than what it really was, not for a penny and a
half.
Well, it happened about a week later. Sammie was coming home from a ball
game, which he had played with Johnnie and Billie Bushytail (of whom I
will tell you later), and some others of his chums, and he was in a
deep, dark part of the wood, when suddenly he heard a crashing in the
bushes.
"Pooh!" exclaimed Sammie. "I s'pose that's one of them fairies. I'm not
going to notice her," and with that he tossed his baseball up in the
air, careless like, to show that he didn't mind. But he was a bit
nervous, all the same, and his hand slipped and his best ball went right
down in a deep, dark, muddy puddle of water. Then Sammie felt pretty
bad, I tell you, and he was going to get a stick to fish the ball out,
when he heard the crashing in the bushes again, and what should appear
but--no, not a fairy, but bad, ugly fox.
"Ah!" exclaimed the fox, looking at Sammie, and smacking his lips, "I've
been waiting for you for some time."
"Yes?" asked the little boy rabbit, and he tried to see a way to run
past that fox, only there wasn't any.
"Yes, really," went on the fox. "Have you had your supper?"
"No," replied Sammie, "I haven't."
"Neither have I," continued the fox, "but I'm going to have it pretty
soon, in fact, almost immediately," which you children know means right
away. "I'm going to eat directly," went on that bad fox, and he smacked
his lips again and looked at Sammie, as if he was going to eat him up,
for that's really what he meant when he said he was going to have
supper. Oh, how frightened Sammie was. He began to tremble, and he
wished he'd started for home earlier. Then the fox crouched down and was
just going to jump on that little boy rabbit, when something happened.
Right up from that puddle of water, where Sammie had lost his ball,
sprang a little man in green. He was green all over, like Bully, the
frog, but the funny part of it was that he wasn't wet a bit, even though
he came up out of the water.
"Ha! What have we here?" he cried out, just like that.
"If--if you please, sir," began Sammie.
"It's my supper time!" cried the fox, interrupting, which was not very
polite on his part. "It's my supper time, and I'm hungry."
"I don't see anything to eat," spoke the little green man. "Nothing at
all," and he looked all around.
"If--if you please, kind sir," went on Sammie, "I think he intends to
eat me."
"What! What!" cried the little green man. "The very idea! The very
idonical idea! We'll see about that! Oh, my, yes, and a bushel of apple
turnovers besides! Aha! Ahem!"
Then he looked most severely at that fox, most severely, I do assure
you, and he asked: "Were you going to eat up my friend Sammie
Littletail?"
"I was, but I didn't know he was a friend of yours," replied the fox,
beginning to tremble. Oh, you could see right away that he was afraid of
that little green man.
"Oh, you bad fox, you!" cried the little green man. "Oh, you bad fox!
Just for that I'm going to turn you into a little country village!
Presto, chango! Smacko, Mackeo! Bur-r-r-r!" and he waved his hands at
the fox, who immediately disappeared. And he was changed into a little
country village, with a church, a school and thirty-one houses, and it's
called Foxtown to this very day. I ought to know, for I used to live
there.
"Well, Sammie?" asked the little green man, when the fox had vanished,
"How do you feel now?"
"Much better, kind sir. Thank you. But who are you?"
"Me? Who am I? Why, don't you know?"
"No, indeed, unless you're some relation to Bully, the frog."
"Well, I am a sort of distant thirty-second cousin to him. I am the
green fairy. And to prove it, look here, I will get your ball back for
you."
Then while Sammie looked on, his eyes getting bigger and bigger and his
breath coming faster and faster, until it was like a locomotive or a
choo-choo, whatever you call them, going up hill, if that little green
man didn't wave his hands over that puddle of water, where Sammie's ball
had fallen. And he spoke the magic word, which must never be spoken
except on Friday nights, so if you read this on any night but Friday you
must skip it, and wait. The word is (Tirratarratorratarratirratarratum),
and I put it in brackets, so there would be no mistake. Well, all of a
sudden, after the magic word was spoken, if Sammie's ball didn't come
bounding up out of that water, and it was as dry as a bone, and it had a
nice, new, clean, white cover on.
"There," said the little green man proudly, "I guess that's doing some
tricks in the fairy line, isn't it?"
"It certainly is," agreed Sammie, "I can't thank you enough."
"Just believe in fairies after this," said the little green man, as he
changed into a bumble bee and flew off. Now, how would you like to hear
about Susie and the fairy godmother to-morrow night, eh?
XXVIII
SUSIE AND THE FAIRY GODMOTHER
You can just imagine how excited Susie and her mamma and papa and Nurse
Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy, the muskrat, were when Sammie got home and told about
the bad fox who had been changed into a country village. Uncle Wiggily
Longears was surprised, too. He said:
"My, it does seem to me that there are strange goings on in these woods.
There never used to be any fairies here. I wonder where they come from?"
"Well, it's a good thing that fox has been changed into a town," spoke
Papa Littletail. "If he hadn't been, I would have had him arrested for
frightening you, Sammie. I know the policeman down at our corner, and
I'm sure he would have arrested him for me. But it's all right now," and
Sammie's papa sat back in his chair and read the paper, for he was tired
that night from working in the turnip factory. You see, he changed from
the carrot factory, and got a place sorting turnips. And sometimes he
would bring little sweet ones home to the children.
One day Susie was hurrying back from the store with a loaf of bread, a
yeast cake and three-and-a-half of granulated sugar, and she was sort of
wondering if she would meet the blue fairy again when, just as she got
opposite a place where some goldenrod grew, she heard a voice saying:
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear me! I shall never be able to reach it! Never, never,
never!" Susie looked around, and what should she see but a nice, little
old lady, trying to break off a stem of goldenrod.
"Oh, dear me suz-dud!" cried the old lady again, and then Susie saw that
she was very little indeed, hardly larger than a ten-cent plate of ice
cream after it's all melted. So she couldn't reach the goldenrod, she
was so little.
"What is the matter?" asked Susie very politely. "Can I help you?"
"Thank you, my dear child," went on the little old lady. "If you would
be so kind as to reach me down a stem of goldenrod, I would be very much
obliged to you."
"What do you want with it?" asked Susie, wondering who the little old
lady could possibly be.
"Why, I want it for a fairy wand," she answered. "I have lost mine."
"Are you a fairy, too?" asked the little rabbit girl, and she began to
wonder what would happen next as she broke off a stem for the old lady.
"Indeed I am," replied the little old lady. "I am a fairy godmother. I
have charge of all the other fairies, the blue fairy and the red fairy
and the green fairy, and all the other colors, including the fairy
prince, who used to be a mud turtle."
"But, if you are a fairy," asked Susie, "why couldn't you make that
goldenrod come down to you, when you weren't tall enough to reach up to
it?"
"Hush!" exclaimed the fairy godmother, for she really was one, as you
shall see. "Hush, my dear child! It's a great secret. Don't tell any
one," and she put her right hand over her mouth and her left hand over
her ear, and held the goldenrod under her arm. "You see, I lost my magic
wand," she went on, "and I couldn't do any more magic until I got a new
one. Now I am all right, and to reward you you may come with me."
"But I have to get home with the bread and sugar and yeast cake," said
Susie.
"No," spoke the fairy godmother, "you will not need to be in a hurry.
Besides, what I will show you will happen in an instant, and you will
get home in time after all."
So she waved the goldenrod in the air, and once more the silver trumpet
sounded: "Ta-ra-ta-ra-ta-ra!" and, all of a sudden, Susie found herself
lifted up, and there she and the fairy godmother were sailing right
through the air on a big burdock leaf. At first Susie was afraid, but
she soon got over her fright and enjoyed the ride.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"We are going to where the fairies live," answered the little old woman,
but she seemed larger now, and the old dress she had worn had changed
into a cloak of gold and silver with diamonds and rubies on it all over,
like frost on a cold morning.
So pretty soon--oh, I guess in about as long as it would take to eat a
peanut, or, maybe, two, if they didn't come to fairyland. At least
that's what Susie thought it was, for there were fairies all about. The
red fairy was there, and the green, and the blue one. And the blue fairy
asked: "Have you your ring yet, Susie?" Then Susie said she had, but she
didn't want to talk any more, for so many wonderful things were going
on.
The fairies were skipping about, leaping here and there, some riding on
the backs of birds and butterflies and bumblebees, and some running in
and out of holes in the ground.
"What are they doing?" asked Susie, moving her long ears back and forth.
"They are doing kind things to the people of the earth," replied the
fairy godmother, "and it keeps them busy, let me tell you." Then Susie
saw fairies doing all sorts of magical tricks, such as making lemonade
out of lemons, and things like that.
Then, all at once, just when one little fairy was making a hat out of
some straw, the godmother said: "It is time for us to go now," so the
burdock leaf came sailing through the air, and Susie got on. As they
came near the woods where the goldenrod grew they saw a boy throwing a
stone at a robin.
"Ah, I must stop that!" cried the fairy godmother, so she waved her new
magic wand that Susie had helped her get, and, honestly, if that stone
didn't turn right around in the air, and instead of hitting the bird, it
flew back and hit that boy right on the end of his nose! Oh, how he
cried, and, what is better, he never threw stones at birds again. I call
that a pretty good trick, don't you? Well, the burdock leaf came to the
ground, and Susie ran home, and she was just in time to help her mother
set bread. To-morrow night's story is going to be about Uncle Wiggily
and the fairy spectacles. That is, I think it is, but, if you like, you
may turn over the page to make sure. But you are only allowed just one
peep, only one, mind you.
XXIX
UNCLE WIGGILY AND THE FAIRY SPECTACLES
Sammie and Susie Littletail were playing out in front of their burrow.
Their mamma had a headache, and had gone to lie down in a dark room, and
Nurse Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy had put a mustard leaf on the back of Mamma
Littletail's neck, for that is sometimes good for a headache.
"What shall we do?" asked Susie.
"Oh, I don't know," replied her brother. "S'pose we play stump tag?"
"All right; you're 'it,' Sammie," called Susie.
So Sammie began to hop after Susie. You see, when you play stump tag
you have to keep on a stump if you don't want to be tagged. It's lots of
fun. Try it some day, if you can find a place where there are plenty of
stumps. Well, after playing this for some time, the rabbit children got
tired. Then they played other games, and they were making quite a noise,
when Uncle Wiggily Longears came out.
"You children will have to make less racket," he said, real cross like.
"Your mamma has a headache."
Then Sammie and Susie were quieter for a time, but soon they were almost
as noisy as ever.
"Now you must run right away from here!" cried Uncle Wiggily, coming to
the door of the underground house again, and he spoke still more
crossly.
"What do you s'pose ails Uncle Wiggily?" asked Susie, as she and Sammie
hopped away.
"I don't know," replied Sammie, "unless it's his rheumatism again."
"No, it can't be that. Don't you remember, the red fairy cured him?"
"Maybe it came back."
"Oh, no, fairies don't do things that way. I guess he must have
indigestion. But I wish he wouldn't be so cross, especially when mamma
has a headache and Jane Fuzzy-Wuzzy can't come out to play with us. Oh,
dear! Isn't it too bad?"
"What's too bad?" asked a little voice, under a big clump of grass, and
at that moment what should come walking out but a little pink fairy. Oh,
she was the dearest little thing you ever saw! I just wish I could take
you to see her, but it's not allowed. Some day, perhaps--but there, I
must get on with the story. Well, the little pink fairy stood out in
the sunlight, and she asked again: "What is the matter?"
"Oh," explained Susie, who, by this time, had gotten used to fairies of
all kinds, "Mamma has a headache, and Uncle Wiggily is cross."
"Headache, eh? Uncle Wiggily cross. Perhaps his glasses do not fit him,"
suggested the fairy.
"Oh, I guess there's nothing the matter with his spectacles," answered
Sammie. "I saw him reading a book with them."
"You never can tell," declared the pink fairy. "Suppose you call him out
here, and we'll take a look at his glasses. Maybe he has the wrong
kind."
"What about mamma's headache?" asked Susie.
"Oh! I'll stop that in a minute," replied the fairy kindly, so she
waved her magic wand in the air three times. "Now your mamma's head is
all better," she added.
And, sure enough, when Susie ran in the burrow to ask Uncle Wiggily to
come out, if Mamma Littletail's head wasn't all well. Wasn't that just
fine? Well, at first Uncle Wiggily didn't want to come out. He was still
cross, but finally Susie begged him so hard that he did. He saw the
little pink fairy, and he asked, real cross like: "Well, what do you
want of me?"
"Aha!" exclaimed the pink fairy. "I see what the trouble is. It's your
spectacles."
"They're all right," growled Uncle Wiggily.
"They are not," declared the fairy very decidedly. "Let me look at
them," and before you could say "Pussy-cat Mole jumped over a coal," she
frisked those glasses off. "Oh!" she cried, "look here, Sammie and
Susie! What terribly gloomy spectacles!" Then she held them up, first in
front of Sammie, and then in front of Susie. And when they looked
through them the little rabbit children saw that everything was dark,
and gloomy, and dreary, and even the sun seemed to be behind a cloud.
Oh, it was as cold and unpleasant as it is just before a snowstorm. "No
wonder you were cross!" cried the fairy. "But I will soon fix matters!
Presto-chango! Ring around the rosey, sweet tobacco posey!" she cried,
and then she rubbed first one pink finger on one glass, and then another
pink finger on the other glass of the spectacles.
And a most wonderful thing happened, she smiled as she held the glasses
up in front of Sammie and Susie, and as true as I'm telling you, if
everything wasn't as bright and shining as a new tin dishpan. Oh,
everything looked lovely! The flowers were gay, and the sun shone, and
even the green grass was sort of pink, while the sky was rose-colored.
"There," said the fairy to Uncle Wiggily. "Try those."
So Uncle Wiggily Longears put on his glasses again, and he cried out:
"Why, goodness me! Oh, my suz-dud! Oh, turnips and carrots and a
chocolate cake! Oh, my goodness me!"
"What's the matter?" asked Susie.
"Why, everything looks different," answered her uncle. "Oh, how much
better I feel! Whoop-de-doodle-do!" and he began to dance a jiggity-jig.
"Who would have thought my glasses were so dark and gloomy?" he went on.
"I feel ever so much better, now. Come on, Sammie and Susie, and I'll
buy you some cabbage ice cream. And you too, little pink fairy." You
see, he had been looking through gloomy glasses all that while, and that
was what made him cross.
"Oh, thank you, I only eat rose-leaf ice cream," the fairy said. "But
I'm not hungry now. Good-luck to all of you, and may you be always
happy!" Then she turned into a little bird and flew away singing, while
Uncle Wiggily and the rabbit children went to the ice cream store. Now,
unless I'm much mistaken, to-morrow night's story will be about Sammie
and how he saved Billie Bushytail. But of course you never can tell what
will happen.
XXX
SAMMIE SAVES BILLIE BUSHYTAIL
Sammie Littletail was out in a green field digging a burrow, or
underground house. He didn't really need another house, for the one he,
and his papa, and mamma, and sister, lived in was very nice, but, as he
had nothing else to do, he thought he would dig a big hole, and, maybe,
go all the way through to China. Sammie thought he would like to see how
China looked, and he thought he might make the acquaintance of some
Chinese rabbits.
Well, he hadn't gotten down very far, and he was still a good many miles
from China, when he heard some one singing a song in a very loud voice.
Now I don't advise you to sing it quite so loudly, for you might awaken
the baby, if you have one in your house. Anyway, it does just as well to
sing it softly. This is the song Sammie heard:
"I want to be a sailor
And sail the ocean blue.
I'd journey to a distant land
And then come back to you.
I'd bring you lots of happiness,
A big trunk filled with joy;
A barrel full of hickory nuts
For every girl or boy."
Well, when Sammie heard that he cried out:
"Is that a fairy?"
"No, it's me," was the answer.
"Oh, then you must be Billie or Johnnie Bushytail," went on Sammie, for
he remembered that once the little boy squirrels went sailing and were
shipwrecked.
"Yes, I'm Billie," said the voice, and then up popped the little
squirrel. "But what did you say about a fairy?" he asked.
"I thought at first you were a fairy," continued Sammie, and then he
stopped digging the hole in the ground. "There have been such a lot of
fairies around here lately," Sammie added. "Red ones, and green ones,
and blue ones, and--"
"Are you talking about Easter eggs or something else?" inquired Billie
Bushytail.
"Fairies, of course."
"Oh, get out! Oh, ho! Don't tell me that! Why, how superfluous!" cried
Billie, for that last was a new word he had just learned. "Don't mention
fairies to me!" he continued.
"Why not?" Sammie wanted to know.
"Because I don't believe there are such things!" cried Billie, frisking
his big tail until it looked like a dusting brush that they use after
sweeping to knock the dust from the furniture onto the floor again.
"Don't talk to me like that, Sammie."
"Well," remarked the little boy rabbit, "all I've got to say is that
there _are_ fairies! But where's Johnnie? Maybe he believes in 'em."
"No, he doesn't. Besides he's gone out walking with Sister Sallie. Come
on, let's have a catch. Where's your ball?"
"I didn't bring it," replied Sammie. "But we can have some fun playing
in this hole I've dug." So they played for some time, and pretty soon,
oh, in about two and a half frisks of Billie's tail, what should happen,
but that, all of a sudden, a great big hawk swooped down from the sky
and grabbed that little boy squirrel up in its claws, and flew off with
him. Well, you can just imagine how scared Sammie was. His nose wiggled
so he sneezed three times. Then he looked up, and there was the hawk,
flying away, and away, and away with poor Billie. Oh, wasn't it
dreadful!
"Save me! Save me!" Billie cried from up there among the clouds.
"I will! I will!" shouted Sammie, and then he got so excited that he ran
around in a circle, and tried to catch his tail, but it was so short
that he couldn't even see it, no matter how fast he went around. Then he
grabbed up a stone, and he threw it at that hawk, but of course he
couldn't hit him, for the big, bad bird was too far away. "Oh, whatever
shall I do?" exclaimed Sammie. "If I could only fly now, I'd go up after
that hawk. Oh, why didn't Susie wish for wings for me and her instead of
for a golden chariot and ten boxes of chocolate-covered carrots the time
she saw the blue fairy? Oh, why didn't she? Wings would have been of
some use!"
Then he ran around after his tail some more, but he couldn't catch it,
and the hawk kept taking Billie farther and farther away, and then
Sammie cried out: "Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Oh, dear!" three times, just like
that. Then, all at once, if the little green man didn't suddenly appear.
He always appears when any one says "Oh, dear!" three times in exactly
the right way, but it's hard to know just what is the right way.
"Well," said the little green man, "you seem to be in trouble."
"I am," cried Sammie. "A hawk has Billie Bushytail, and I want to save
him."
"Very well," said the little green man, "since you are so kind, you
shall save him. Shut your eyes, cross your front paws, and wrinkle your
nose three times and a half." So Sammie did this, and, would you
believe me? if, in another instant, the little green man hadn't changed
into a big, kind, good-natured eagle. "Get up on my back," the eagle
said to Sammie, "and we will save Billie."
So Sammie got on the eagle's back, and the big bird flew after that
hawk, and, pretty soon, it caught up to him.
"Here, you let Billie Bushytail go!" cried Sammie, and then he took a
long stick he had grabbed up, and he hit that hawk. At first the hawk
wasn't going to let go of the little squirrel, but when the eagle bit
him three times on each leg, then that bad bird was glad enough to drop
Billie and fly off. Oh, my, no, he didn't drop Billie to the ground;
that would have been too bad. He only dropped him on the eagle's back,
where Sammie was, and pretty soon the two boys were safe on the ground
once more, and the eagle had turned into a little green man again.
"I'm ever so much obliged to you for saving me, Sammie," spoke Billie.