"Now, just hold your tongue, Mr. Charles," answered nurse, angrily. "Your brother would scorn to talk such talk; but you're no better than Master Gerald, trying to come over an old body with your fairy stories."
"It is quite true, Mrs. Wilson," said Emma Deverell, "and I wish you were all going with us into this land of enchantments. Then, Margaret, dear Margaret, how happy we should be. You should be queen, and we all your attendant sylphs, and
'Merry it would be in fairy-land,
Where the fairy birds were singing.'"
"Merry for you, little wild goose," said her brother Edward; "but Charles has told you the fairy birds do not sing; and our sylph-life will be one of hard labor for many months before we make our fairy-land and court lit to receive our queen. Then we must try and lure her to us. How shall we contrive it, Emma?"
Margaret smiled and shook her head. "Too bright a dream," said she, "to be safely indulged in. But you must tell us all you propose to do, and we will watch your progress in fancy."
"Oh, do tell us all about it, Edward," said Hugh. "But, first of all, make a dot upon my map, that we may know where you are when we come to seek you."
"Very prudent, Hugh," answered Edward, "though I doubt the accuracy of my dot on this small map; but I suppose I shall not be more than a hundred miles wrong, and that is nothing in the wilds of Australia."
"But I see you will be close on this great river that falls into the Darling," said Hugh; "so if we only follow up the rivers, we must find you."
"You would not find that so easy a task as it seems, my boy," replied Edward. "Neither are we, as you suppose, close on that river, but fifty miles from it; but we have a charming little river laid down on our plan, which we must coax and pet in the rainy season, that it may provide us with water in the drought."
"You have a most extensive tract," said Arthur, looking on the plan.