They were treated with great respect by the people in the tents; and when Jack asked his friend to whom he had given the whistle what they were, and where they got so much money as they had, she replied that they lived over the hills, and were afraid to come in their best clothes. They were rich and powerful at home, and they came shabbily dressed, and behaved humbly, lest their enemies should envy them. It was very dangerous, she said, to fairies to be envied.
Jack wanted to listen to their strange whistling talk, but he could not for the noise and cheerful chattering of the brown folks, and more still for the screaming and talking of parrots.
Among the goods were hundreds of splendid gilt cages, which were hung by long gold chains from the trees. Each cage contained a parrot and his mate, and they all seemed to be very unhappy indeed.
The parrot could talk, and they kept screaming to the discontented women to buy things for them, and trying very hard to attract attention.
One old parrot made himself quite conspicuous by these efforts. He flung himself against the wires of his cage, he squalled, he screamed, he knocked the floor with his beak, till Jack and one of the customers came running up to see what was the matter.
“What do you make such a fuss for?” cried the discontented woman. “You’ve set your cage swinging with knocking yourself about; and what good does that do? I cannot break the spell and open it for you.”
“I know that,” answered the parrot, sobbing; “but it hurts my feelings so that you should take no notice of me now that I have come down in the world.”
“Yes,” said the parrot’s mate, “it hurts our feelings.”
“I haven’t forgotten you,” answered the woman, more crossly than ever; “I was buying a measure of maize for you when you began to make such a noise.”
Jack thought this was the queerest conversation he had ever heard in his life, and he was still more surprised when the bird answered: