"But when are you going to tell me how you came to turn into mist?" asked the night-violet impatiently. "I know all about the underground spring. When the air is quite still, I can hear it murmur from where I stand."
The mist lifted herself a little and took a turn round the meadow. Then she came back, and went on with her story:—
"It is the worst of this world that one is never contented with what one has. So it was with us. We kept running on and on, till at last we ran into a great lake, where water-lilies rocked on the water and dragon-flies hummed on their great stiff wings. Up on the surface the lake was clear as a mirror. But whether we wished it or not, we had to run right down by the bottom, where it was dark and gruesome. And this I could not endure. I longed for the sunbeams. I knew them so well from the time I used to run in the brook. There they used to peep down through the leaves and pass over me in fleeting gleams. I longed so much to see them again that I stole up to the surface, and lay down in the sunshine all amongst the white water-lilies and their great green leaves. But, ugh! how the sun burnt me there on the lake! It was scarcely bearable. Bitterly did I regret that I had not stopped down below."
THE EVENING HOUR