But with the rising wind beginning to moan drearily round our house, and the icicle-laden rose-twigs rattling every now and again against the glass, I could see nothing amusing in Maggie May’s little picture.
The Fairy Forest.
“Had you been walking across that wild wintry waste, Maggie May,” I began, “you would have seen at some distance before you a great pine-wood, half buried in drifting snow, the tall trees bending before the icy blast and tossing their branches weirdly in the wind.”
“Don’t you want slow music to that?” said Frank, pretending to reach for his fiddle.
“Hush, Frank! When you looked again, Maggie May, lo! what a change! The fairy forest has been transformed into a city. There is a blue uncertain mist all over it, but you can plainly distinguish streets and terraces, steeples, towers, ramparts, and ruins; and instead of the mournful sighing of the wind that previously fell on your ear, you can now listen to the music of bells and the pleasant murmur of the every-day life of a great town. Towards this town then, one day, a big wolf was journeying. It was summer then, the sun shone bright, clouds were fleecy, and the sky was blue, and the plain all round him was bright with the greenery of grass and dotted with wild flowers. But neither the beauty of the day, nor the loveliness of the scenery, had any effect on the gaunt and ugly wolf. Not being good himself, he could see no goodness in Nature.
“‘I’m far too soon,’ he grumbled to himself, ‘I must curl up till nightfall; I wish the sun wasn’t shining, and I wish the birds wouldn’t sing so. Moonlight and the owls would suit me far better. I wonder what makes that skylark so happy? Well, I was happy once,’ he continued as he lay down behind a bush, ‘yes I was, but, dear me, it is long ago. When I was young and innocent, ha! ha! I wouldn’t have stolen a tame rabbit or a chicken for all the world; I was content with the food I found in the wild woods, and now I’m lying here waiting for night, that I may fall upon and slay a dozen at least of those pretty lambkins I see gambolling down on yonder lea. I wouldn’t mind being young again though, I think I might lead a better life, I think—’
“He did not think any more just then, for he had fallen sound asleep.
“The hours flew by. The sun went round and down, and a big moon rose slowly up in the east and smiled upon the landscape.