"If I could only begin to be a queen," she said to Jack, "I could go wherever I pleased. I am not a fairy, and yet I am not a proper queen. Oh, what shall I do? I cannot go any farther."
So Jack gave her some of the seeds of the melon, though it was so dark that he could scarcely find the way to her mouth, and then he took some himself, and they both felt that they were rested, and Jack comforted Mopsa.
"If you are not a queen yet," he said, "you will be by tomorrow morning; for when our shadows danced on before us yours was so very nearly the same height as mine that I could see hardly any difference."
When they reached the end of that great forest, and found themselves out in all sorts of moonlight, the first thing they did was to laugh the shadows looked so odd, sticking out in every direction; and the next thing they did was to stand back to back, and put their heels together, and touch their heads together, to see by the shadow which was the taller; and Jack was still the least bit in the world taller than Mopsa; so they knew she was not a queen yet, and they ate some more melon seeds, and began to climb up the mountain.
They climbed till the trees of the forest looked no bigger than gooseberry bushes, and then they climbed till the whole forest looked only like a patch of moss; and then, when they got a little higher, they saw the wonderful river, a long way off, and the snow glittering on the peaks overhead; and while they were looking and wondering how they should find a pass, the moons all went down, one after the other, and, if Mopsa had not found some glow-worms, they would have been quite in the dark again. However, she took a dozen of them, and put them round Jack's ankles, so that when he walked he could see where he was going; and he found a little sheep-path, and she followed him.
Now they had noticed during the night how many shooting stars kept darting about from time to time, and at last one shot close by them, and fell in the soft moss on before. There it lay shining; and Jack, though he began to feel tired again, made haste to it, for he wanted to see what it was like.
It was not what you would have supposed. It was soft and round, and about the color of a ripe apricot; it was covered with fur, and in fact it was evidently alive, and had curled itself up into a round ball.
"The dear little thing!" said Jack, as he held it in his hand, and showed it to Mopsa. "How its hearts beats! Is it frightened?"
"Who are you?" said Mopsa to the thing. "What is your name?"
The little creature made a sound that seemed like "Wisp."
"Uncurl yourself, Wisp," said Mopsa. "Jack and I want to look at you."
So Wisp unfolded himself, and showed two little black eyes, and spread out two long filmy wings. He was like a most beautiful bat, and the light he shed out illuminated their faces.
"It is only one of the air fairies," said Mopsa. "Pretty creature! It never did any harm, and would like to do us good if it knew how, for it knows that I shall be a queen very soon. Wisp, if you like, you may go and tell your friends and relations that we want to cross over the mountains, and if they can they may help us."
Upon this Wisp spread out his wings, and shot off again: and Jack's feet were so tired that he sat down and pulled off one of his shoes, for he thought there was a stone in it. So he set the little red jar beside him, and quite forgot what the stone woman had said, but went on shaking his shoe, and buckling it, and admiring the glow-worms round his ankle, till Mopsa said: "Darling Jack, I am so dreadfully tired! Give me some more melon seeds." Then he lifted up the jar, and thought it felt very heavy; and when he put in his hand, jar, and melon, and seeds were all turned to stone together.
They were both very sorry, and they sat still for a minute or two, for they were much too tired to stir; and then shooting stars began to appear in all directions. The fairy bat had told his friends and relations, and they were coming. One fell at Mopsa's feet, another in her lap; more, more, all about, behind, before and over them. And they spread out long filmy wings, some of them a yard long, till Jack and Mopsa seemed to be enclosed in a perfect network of the rays of shooting stars, and they were both a good deal frightened. Fifty or sixty shooting stars, with black eyes that could stare, were enough, they thought, to frighten anybody.
"If we had anything to sit upon," said Mopsa, "they could carry us over the pass." She had no sooner spoken than the largest of the bats bit off one of his own long wings, and laid it at Mopsa's feet. It did not seem to matter much to him that he had parted with it, for he shot out another wing directly, just as a comet shoots out a ray of light sometimes when it approaches the sun.
Mopsa thanked the shooting fairy and, taking the wing, began to stretch it, till it was large enough for her and Jack to sit upon. Then all the shooting fairies came round it, took its edges in their mouths and began to fly away with it over the mountains. They went slowly; for Jack and Mopsa were heavy, and they flew very low, resting now and then; but in the course of time they carried the wing over the pass, and half way down the other side. Then the sun came up; and the moment he appeared all their lovely apricot-colored light was gone, and they only looked like common bats, such as you can see every evening.
They set down Jack and Mopsa, folded up their long wings and hung down their heads.
Mopsa thanked them, and said they had been useful; but still they looked ashamed, and crept into little corners and crevices of the rock, to hide.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Reeds and Rushes
- Walter Scott
There were many fruit-trees on that slope of the mountain, and Jack and Mopsa, as they came down, gathered some fruit for breakfast, and did not feel very tired, for the long ride on the wing had rested them.
They could not see the plain, for a slight blue mist hung over it; but the sun was hot already, and as they came down they saw a beautiful bed of high reeds, and thought they would sit awhile and rest in it. A rill of clear water ran beside the bed, so when they had reached it they sat down, and began to consider what they should do next.
"Jack," said Mopsa, "did you see anything particular as you came down with the shooting stars?"
"No, I saw nothing so interesting as they were," answered Jack. "I was looking at them and watching how they squeaked to one another, and how they had little hooks in their wings, with which they held the large wing that we sat on."
"But I saw something," said Mopsa. "Just as the sun rose I looked down, and in the loveliest garden I ever saw, and all among trees and woods, I saw a most beautiful castle. Oh, Jack! I am sure that castle is the place I am to live in, and now we have nothing to do but to find it. I shall soon be a queen, and there I shall reign."
"Then I shall be king there," said Jack; "shall I?"
"Yes, if you can," answered Mopsa. "Of course, whatever you can do you may do. And, Jack, this is a much better fairy country than either the stony land or the other that we first came to, for this castle is a real place! It will not melt away. There the people can work, they know how to love each other: common fairies cannot do that, I know. They can laugh and cry, and I shall teach them several things that they do not know yet. Oh, do let us make haste and find the castle!"
So they arose; but they turned the wrong way, and by mistake walked farther and farther in among the reeds, whose feathery heads puffed into Mopsa's face, and Jack's coat was all covered with the fluffy seed.