The little men and the little ladies said: “Your Highness’s commands shall be obeyed.”
When they had gone out through the window the ugly dog stretched himself out on the straw, Childe Charity turned in her sleep, and the moon shone in on the back garret.
The master could not close his eyes any more than the maid or the mistress, for thinking of this strange sight. He remembered to have heard his grandfather say, that somewhere near his meadows there lay a path leading to the Fairies’ country, and the haymakers used to see it shining through the grey Summer morning as the Fairy bands went home. Nobody had heard or seen the like for many years; but the master concluded that the doings in his back garret must be a Fairy business, and the ugly dog a person of great account. His chief wonder was, however, what visitor the Fairies intended to take from his house; and after thinking the matter over he was sure it must be one of his daughters—they were so handsome, and had such fine clothes.
Accordingly, Childe Charity’s rich uncle made it his first business that morning to get ready a breakfast of roast mutton for the ugly dog, and carry it to him in the old cow-house. But not a morsel would the dog taste. On the contrary, he snarled at the master, and would have bitten him if he had not run away with his mutton.
“The Fairies have strange ways,” said the master to himself. But he called his daughters privately, bidding them dress themselves in their best, for he could not say which of them might be called into great company before nightfall.
Childe Charity’s proud cousins, hearing this, put on the richest of their silks and laces, and strutted like peacocks from kitchen to parlour all day, waiting for the call their father spoke of, while the little girl scoured and scrubbed in the dairy.
They were in very bad humour when night fell, and nobody had come. But just as the family were sitting down to supper the ugly dog began to bark, and the old woman’s knock was heard at the back door. Childe Charity opened it, and was going to offer her bed and supper as usual, when the old woman said:—
“This is the shortest day in all the year, and I am going home to hold a feast after my travels. I see you have taken good care of my dog, and now if you will come with me to my house, he and I will do our best to entertain you. Here is our company.”
As the old woman spoke there was a sound of far-off flutes and bugles, then a glare of lights; and a great company, clad so grandly that they shone with gold and jewels, came in open chariots, covered with gilding, and drawn by snow-white horses.
The first and finest of the chariots was empty. The old woman led Childe Charity to it by the hand, and the ugly dog jumped in before her. The proud cousins, in all their finery, had by this time come to the door, but nobody wanted them. And no sooner was the old woman and her dog within the chariot than a marvellous change passed over them, for the ugly old woman turned at once to a beautiful young Princess, with long yellow curls and a robe of green and gold, while the ugly dog at her side started up a fair young Prince, with nut-brown hair, and a robe of purple and silver.