While she spoke, she saw through the blank darkness a glimmer of light. It came through a little door. She remembered what Percinet had said – that she would never return to the fairy palace, until after she was buried. Perhaps this final cruelty of Grognon would be the end of her sorrows. So she took courage, crept through the little door. She came out into a beautiful garden, with long alleys, fruit trees, and flowerbeds. Well she knew it, and well she knew the glitter of the rock-crystal walls. And there, at the palace gate, stood Percinet, and the queen, his mother, and the princesses, his sisters. “Welcome, Graciosa!” cried they all, and Graciosa, after all her sufferings, wept for joy.
The marriage was celebrated with great splendour, and all the fairies, for a thousand leagues round, attended it. Some came in chariots drawn by dragons, or swans, or peacocks. Some were mounted upon floating clouds, or globes of fire. Among the rest, appeared the very fairy who had assisted Grognon to torment Graciosa. When she discovered that Grognon’s poor prisoner was now Prince Percinet’s bride, she was overwhelmed with remorse.
“But I will make amends for all the evil that I have done,” said the fairy, and, refusing to stay for the wedding dinner, she remounted her chariot, drawn by two terrible serpents, and flew to the palace of Graciosa’s father. There, before either king, or courtiers, or ladies-in-waiting could stop her – even had they wished to do it, which remains doubtful – she came behind the wicked Grognon, and twisted her neck, just as a cook does a fowl. So Grognon died and was buried, and nobody was particularly sorry for the same.
Whippety Stourie
Anon
READING TIME: 4 MINUTES
There was once a gentleman that lived in a very grand house, and he married a young lady that had been delicately brought up. In her husband’s house she found everything that was fine – fine tables and chairs, fine looking-glasses, and fine curtains, but then her husband expected her to be able to spin twelve skeins of thread every day, besides attending to her house, and, to tell the truth, the lady could not spin a bit. This made her husband cross with her, and, before a month had passed, she found herself very unhappy.
One day the husband went away upon a journey, after telling her that he expected her, before his return, to have not only learned to spin, but to have spun a hundred skeins of thread. Quite downcast, she took a walk along the hillside, till she came to a big flat stone, and there she sat down and cried. By and by she heard a strain of fine music, coming as it were from underneath the stone, and, on turning it up, she saw a cave below, where there were sitting six wee ladies in green gowns, each one of them spinning on a little wheel, and singing:
“Little knows my dame at hame
That Whippety Stourie is my name.”
The lady walked into the cave, and was kindly asked by the wee bodies to take a chair and sit down, while they still continued their spinning. She observed that each one’s mouth was twisted away to one side, but she did not venture to guess the reason. They asked why she looked so unhappy, and she told them that she was expected by her husband to be a good spinner, when the plain truth was that she could not spin at all, and found herself quite unable for it, having been so delicately brought up. Neither was there any need for it, as her husband was a rich man.
“Oh, is that all?” said the little wifies, speaking out of their cheeks alike.
“Yes, and is it not a very good all too?” said the lady, her heart like to burst with distress.
“We could easily quit ye of that trouble,” said the wee women. “Just ask us all to dinner for the day when your husband is to come back. We’ll then let you see how we’ll manage him.”
So the lady asked them all to dine with herself and her husband, on the day when he was to come back.
When the good man came home, he found the house so occupied with preparations for dinner, that he had no time to ask his wife about her thread, and, before ever he had once spoken to her on the subject, the company was announced at the hall door. The six fairy ladies all came in a coach-and-six, and were as fine as princesses, but still wore their gowns of green. The gentleman was very polite, and showed them up the stairs with a pair of wax candles in his hand. And so they all sat down to dinner, and conversation went on very pleasantly, till at length the husband, becoming familiar with them, said:
“Ladies, if it be not an uncivil question, I should like to know how it happens that all your mouths are turned away to one side?”
“Oh,” said each one at once, “it’s with our constant spin-spin-spinning.”
“Is that the case?” cried the gentleman. “Then, John, Tam, and Dick, fie, go haste and burn every rock, and reel, and spinning-wheel in the house, for I’ll not have my wife to spoil her bonnie face with spin-spin-spinning.”
And so the lady lived happily with her good man all the rest of her days.
The Phantom Vessel
By Norman Hinsdale Pitman
READING TIME: 12 MINUTES
Once a ship loaded with pleasure seekers was sailing from North China to Shanghai. High winds and stormy weather had delayed her, and she was still one week from port when a great plague broke out on board. This plague was of the worst kind. It attacked passengers and sailors alike until there were so few left to sail the vessel that it seemed as if she would soon be left to the mercy of winds and waves.
On all sides lay the dead, and the groans of the dying were most terrible to hear. Of that great company of travellers only one, a little boy named Ying-lo, had escaped. At last the few sailors, who had been trying hard to save their ship, were obliged to lie down upon the deck, a prey to the dreadful sickness, and soon they too were dead.
Ying-lo now found himself alone on the sea. For some reason – he did not know why – the gods or the sea fairies had spared him, but as he looked about in terror at the friends and loved ones who had died, he almost wished that he might join them.
The sails flapped about like great broken wings, while the giant waves dashed higher above the deck, washing many of the bodies overboard and wetting the little boy to the skin. Shivering with cold, he gave himself up for lost and prayed to the gods, whom his mother had often told him about, to take him from this dreadful ship and let him escape the fatal illness.
As he lay there praying, he heard a slight noise in the rigging just above his head. Looking up, he saw a ball of fire running along a yardarm near the top of the mast. The sight was so strange that he forgot his prayer and stared with open-mouthed wonder. To his astonishment, the ball grew brighter and brighter, and then suddenly began slipping down the mast, all the time increasing in size. Nearer and nearer came the fireball. At last, when it reached the deck, to Ying-lo’s surprise, something very, very strange happened. Before he had time to feel alarmed, the light vanished, and a funny little man stood in front of him peering anxiously into the child’s frightened face.
Yes, you are the lad I'm looking for,” he said at last, speaking in a piping voice that almost made Ying-lo smile. “You are Ying-lo, and you are the only one left of this wretched company.”
Although he saw that the old man meant him no harm, the child could say nothing, but waited in silence, wondering what would happen next.
By this time the vessel was tossing and pitching so violently that it seemed every minute as if it would upset and go down beneath the foaming waves, never to rise again. Not many miles distant on the right, some jagged rocks stuck out of the water, lifting their cruel heads as if waiting for the helpless ship.
The newcomer walked slowly towards the mast and tapped on it three times with an iron staff he had been using as a cane. Immediately the sails spread, the vessel righted itself and began to glide over the sea so fast that the gulls were soon left far behind, while the threatening rocks upon which the ship had been so nearly dashed seemed like specks in the distance.
“Do you remember me?” said the stranger, suddenly turning and coming up to Ying-lo, but his voice was lost in the whistling of the wind, and the boy knew on
ly by the moving of his lips that the old man was talking. The greybeard bent over until his mouth was at Ying-lo’s ear: “Did you ever see me before?”
With a puzzled look, at first the child shook his head. Then as he gazed more closely there seemed to be something that he recognized about the wrinkled face. “Yes, I think so, but I don’t know when.”
With a tap of his staff the fairy stopped the blowing of the wind, and then spoke once more to his small companion:
“One year ago I passed through your village. I was dressed in rags, and was begging my way along the street, trying to find someone who would feel sorry for me. Alas! No one answered my cry for mercy. Not a crust was thrown into my bowl. All the people were deaf, and fierce dogs drove me from door to door. Finally when I was almost dying of hunger, I began to feel that here was a village without one good person in it. Just then you saw my suffering, ran into the house, and brought me out food. Your heartless mother saw you doing this and beat you cruelly. Do you remember now, my child?”
“Yes, I remember,” he answered sadly, “and that mother is now lying dead. Alas! All, all are dead, my father and my brothers also. Not one is left of my family.”
“Little did you know, my boy, to whom you were giving food that day. You took me for a lowly beggar, but, behold, it was not a poor man that you fed, for I am Iron Staff. You must have heard of me when they were telling of the fairies in the Western Heaven, and of their adventures here on earth.”
“Yes, yes,” answered Ying-lo, trembling half with fear and half with joy, “indeed I have heard of you many, many times, and all the people love you for your kind deeds of mercy.”
“Alas! They did not show their love, my little one. Surely you know that if any one wishes to reward the fairies for their mercies, he must begin to do deeds of the same kind himself. No one but you in all your village had pity on me in my rags.”
Ying-lo listened in wonder to Iron Staff, and when he had finished, the boy’s face was glowing with the love of which the fairy had spoken. “My poor, poor father and mother!” he cried, “they knew nothing of these beautiful things you are telling me. They were brought up in poverty. As they were knocked about in childhood by those around them, so they learned to beat others who begged them for help. Is it strange that they did not have hearts full of pity for you when you looked like a beggar?”
“But what about you, my boy? You were not deaf when I asked you. Have you not been whipped and punished all your life? How then did you learn to look with love at those in tears?”
The child could not answer these questions, but only looked sorrowfully at Iron Staff. “Oh, can you not, good fairy, restore my parents and brothers, and give them another chance to be good and useful people?”
“Listen, Ying-lo, it is impossible unless you do two things first,” he answered, stroking his beard gravely and leaning heavily upon his staff.
“What are they? What must I do to save my family? Anything you ask of me will not be too much to pay for your kindness.”
“First you must tell me of some good deed done by these people for whose lives you are asking. Name only one, for that will be enough, but it is against our rules to help those who have done nothing.”
Ying-lo was silent, and for a moment his face was clouded. “Yes, I know,” he said, brightening. “Last year when the foreigner rode through our village and fell sick in front of our house, they cared for him.”
“How long?” asked the other sharply.
“Until he died the next week.”
“And what did they do with the mule he was riding, his bed, and the money in his bag? Did they try to restore them to his people?”
“No, they said they’d keep them to pay for the trouble.” Ying-lo’s face turned scarlet.
“But try again, dear boy! Is there not one little deed of goodness that was not selfish? Think once more.”
For a long time Ying-lo did not reply. At length he spoke in a low voice, “I think of one, but I fear it amounts to nothing.”
“No good, my child, is too small to be counted when the gods are weighing a man’s heart.”
“Last spring the birds were eating in my father’s garden. My mother wanted to buy poison from the shop to destroy them, but my father said no, that the little things must live, and he for one was not in favour of killing them.”
“At last, Ying-lo, you have named a real deed of mercy, and as he spared the tiny birds from poison, so shall his life and the lives of your mother and brothers be restored from the deadly plague.
“But remember there is one other thing that depends on you.”
Ying-lo’s eyes glistened gratefully. “Then if it rests with me, and I can do it, you have my promise.”
“Very well, Ying-lo. What I require is that you carry out to the letter my instructions. Now it is time for me to keep my promise to you.”
So saying, Iron Staff called on Ying-lo to point out the members of his family, and, approaching them one by one, with the end of his iron stick he touched their foreheads. In an instant each, without a word, arose. Looking round and recognizing Ying-lo, they stood back, frightened at seeing him with the fairy. When the last had risen to his feet, Iron Staff beckoned all of them to listen. This they did willingly, too much terrified to speak, for they saw on all sides signs of the plague that had swept over the vessel, and they remembered the frightful agony they had suffered in dying. Each knew that he had been lifted by some magic power from darkness into light.
“My friends,” began the fairy, “little did you think when less than a year ago you drove me from your door that soon you yourselves would be in need of mercy. As you look back through your wicked lives can you think of any reason why you deserved this rescue? No, there is no memory of goodness in your black hearts. Well, I shall tell you – it is this little boy, this Ying-lo, who many times has felt the weight of your wicked hands and has hidden in terror at your coming. To him alone you owe my help.”
“If at any time you treat him badly and do not heed his wishes – mark you well my words – by the power of this magic staff which I shall place in his hands, he may enter at once into the land of the fairies, leaving you to die in your wickedness. This I command him to do, and he has promised to obey my slightest wish.
“This plague took you off suddenly and ended your wicked lives. Ying-lo has raised you from its grasp and his power can lift you from the bed of sin. No other hand than his can bear the rod which I am leaving. If one of you but touch it, instantly he will fall dead upon the ground.
“And now, my child, the time has come for me to leave you. First, however, I must show you what you are now able to do. Around you lie the corpses of sailors and passengers. Tap three times upon the mast and wish that they shall come to life,” So saying he handed Ying-lo the iron staff.
Although the magic rod was heavy, the child lifted it as if it were a fairy’s wand. Then, stepping forward to the mast, he rapped three times as he had been commanded.
Immediately on all sides arose the bodies, once more full of life and strength.
“Now command the ship to take you back to your home port, for such sinful creatures as these are in no way fit to make a journey among strangers. They must first return and free their homes of sin.”
Again rapping on the mast, the child willed the great vessel to take its homeward course. No sooner had he moved the staff than the boat swung round and started on the return journey. Swifter than a flash of lightning it flew, for it had become a fairy vessel. Before the sailors and the travellers could recover from their surprise, land was sighted and they saw that they were entering the harbour.
Just as the ship was darting toward the shore the fairy suddenly changed into a ball of fire which rolled along the deck and ascended the spars. As it reached the top of the rigging it floated off into the sky, and all on board watched it until it vanished.
With a cry of thanksgiving, Ying-lo flung his arms about his parents and descended with them to the shore.
The Story of Wali Dad, the Simple-Hearted
By Andrew Lang
READING TIME: 20 MINUTES
In India, a fairy is called a Peri or Pari, and often appears to give help to the virtuous.
Once upon a time there lived a poor old man whose name was Wali Dad Gunjay, or Wali Dad the Bald. He had no relations, but lived all by himself in a little mud hut some distance from any town, and made his living by cutting grass in the jungle, and selling it as fodder for horses. He only earned by this five halfpence a day, but he was a simple old man, and needed so little out of it, that he saved up one halfpenny daily, and spent the rest upon such food and clothing as he required.
In this way he lived for many years until, one night, he thought that he would count the money he had hidden away in the great earthen pot under the floor of his hut. So he set to work, and with much trouble he pulled the bag out on to the floor, and sat gazing in astonishment at the heap of coins which tumbled out of it. What should he do with them all? But he never thought of spending the money on himself, because he was content to pass the rest of his days as he had been doing for ever so long, and he really had no desire for any greater comfort or luxury.
At last he threw all the money into an old sack, which he pushed under his bed, and then, rolled in his ragged old blanket, he went off to sleep.
Early next morning he staggered off with his sack of money to the shop of a jeweller whom he knew in the town, and bargained with him for a beautiful gold bracelet. With this carefully wrapped up in his cotton waistband he went to the house of a rich friend, who was a travelling merchant, and used to wander about with his camels and merchandise through many countries. Wali Dad was lucky enough to find him at home, so he sat down, and after a little talk he asked the merchant who was the most virtuous and beautiful lady he had ever met with. The merchant replied that the princess of Khaistan was renowned everywhere as well for the beauty of her person as for the kindness and generosity of her disposition.
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