Her dress was a brownish robe, reaching to the floor. It was covered with ink-spots. Her hair was tumbled, and stuck full of pens. Her hands were filled with big charts and rolls of manuscripts.
“Potobi, ritu fo bam. Shik, sho, tabi,” said she, approaching her beautiful sister so awkwardly that she almost trod upon one of the pretty miniatures in her dress. The beauty sprang angrily up, and there would have been a great quarrel, had not the Green Fairy, with a motion of her wand, ordered them from the apartment.
Meanwhile, the pale Lily Queen, paler now than ever, sat sighing and weeping.
“Arouse yourself, dear lady,” said the fairy, “and choose quickly, for others may summon me, and I must soon be gone.”
“Good fairy,” said the lady, “bestow upon her, not happiness for herself, but the blessing of bringing happiness to others. I ask for her the gift of exceeding love. Kindle a love-flame in her heart which shall never grow dim.”
“Alas!” said the fairy, “what you ask is not mine to give. Far, far away, in a land which no mortal and no fairy ever saw, is an altar upon which the holy fire is constantly burning. Now, although no mortal and no fairy may enter there, yet there may, and there do, come messengers from thence, bearing sparks of this holy fire. Happy the heart which receives such messengers, for the love-flame, once kindled from the sacred fire, is never quenched. And all who have love in their hearts possess the blessing you have chosen,—the power and the will to create happiness. Be silent, now, and let only beautiful and holy thoughts enter your mind.”
The fairy then described with her wand a circle upon the floor, in the centre of which she stood for some time, motionless. At last, in a low voice, she began chanting,—
“Beautiful Spirit! Spirit of Love,
Why dost thou tarry? O, where dost thou rove?
Linger not by the altar, sweet Spirit, for see!