“‘OH,’ SAID PRINCESS HILDA, ‘YOU LOOK LIKE OUR MAMMA’”

“Yes, my darlings,” said the beautiful lady, taking the three children in her arms; “I am the Queen, your mother, though, by Rumpty-Dudget’s enchantments, I was obliged to leave you, and only be seen by you at night in your dreams. And I was the Queen of the Air-Spirits, Hilda, whose voice you had heard before, and I was the King of the Gnomes, though I seemed so harsh and stern at first. But my love has been with you always, and has followed you everywhere. And now you shall come with me to our home in Fairy Land. Are you all ready?”

“Oh, but where is Tom the cat?” cried all the three children together. “We cannot go and be happy in Fairy Land without him!”

Then the Queen laughed, and kissed them, and said: “I am Tom the cat, too!”

When the children heard this, they were perfectly contented; and they clung about her neck, and she folded her arms around them, and flew with them over the tops of the forest trees to their beautiful home in Fairy Land; and there they are all living happily to this very day. But Princess Hilda’s eyes are blue, and her hair is golden, still.

THE END

Transcriber’s Notes

The following changes have been made to the text as printed:

  1. Illustrations within chapters have been moved close to the text they illustrate. The page numbers shown in the [list of illustrations] refer to their placement in the printed text.
  2. A [heading] “Rumpty-Dudget’s Tower” has been moved from Page 3 to Page 1. The hyphen has also been inserted into this heading.
  3. On Page 4 the [two lines] “and fasten down their eyelids, they saw stars,” and “white, blue, and red, twinkling in the sky overhead;” were transposed. This has been corrected.
  4. On Page 36 a superfluous [quote mark] has been removed from the start of the line “But where are the Golden Ivy-seed and ...”
  5. On Page 55 “answered the king” has been changed to [“answered the King”], for consistency.
  6. On Page 61 “pine tree” has been changed to [“pine-tree”], for consistency.