ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOL. I.
PAGE [THE MARCH-UP] 3 [VISITING THE PROFESSOR] 11 [BOOTS FOR HORIZONTAL WEATHER] 15 [A PORTABLE PLUNGE-BATH] 24 [REMOVAL OF UGGUG] 41 [‘WHAT A GAME!’] 48 [‘DRINK THIS!’] 53 [‘COME, YOU BE OFF!’] 62 [THE GARDENER] 66 [A BEGGAR’S PALACE] 72 [THE CRIMSON LOCKET] 77 [‘HE THOUGHT HE SAW A BUFFALO’] 79 [‘IT WAS A HIPPOPOTAMUS’] 91 [THE MAP OF FAIRYLAND] 96 [‘HE THOUGHT HE SAW A KANGAROO’] 106 [THE MOUSE-LION] 108 [‘HAMMER IT IN!’] 115 [A BEAR WITHOUT A HEAD] 117 [‘COME UP, BRUIN!’] 123 [THE OTHER PROFESSOR] 135 [‘HOW CHEERFULLY THE BOND HE SIGNED!’] 144 [‘POOR PETER SHUDDERED IN DESPAIR’] 147 [‘SUCH BOOTS AS THESE YOU SELDOM SEE’] 150 [‘I WILL LEND YOU FIFTY MORE!’] 154 [‘HE THOUGHT HE SAW AN ALBATROSS’] 165 [THE MASTIFF-SENTINEL] 172 [THE DOG-KING] 176 [FAIRY-SYLVIE] 193 [BRUNO’S REVENGE] 213 [FAIRIES RESTING] 226 [A CHANGED CROCODILE] 229 [A LECTURE ON ART] 240 [‘THREE BADGERS ON A MOSSY STONE’] 247 [‘THE FATHER-BADGER, WRITHING IN A CAVE’] 249 [‘THOSE AGED ONES WAXED GAY’] 252 [‘HOW PERFECTLY ISOCHRONOUS!’] 268 [THE LAME CHILD] 280 [‘IT WENT IN TWO HALVES’] 285 [FIVE O’CLOCK TEA] 296 [‘WHAT’S THE MATTER, DARLING?’] 307 [THE DEAD HARE] 321 [CROSSING THE LINE] 341 [‘THE PUG-DOG SAT UP’] 351 [THE QUEEN’S BABY] 363 [THE FROGS’ BIRTHDAY-TREAT] 373 [‘HE WRENCHED OUT THAT CROCODILE’S TOOF!’] 380 [‘LOOK EASTWARD!’] 395
ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOL. II.
PAGE [SYLVIE’S TRUANT-PUPIL] 8 [KING FISHER’S WOOING] 15 [‘SPEND IT ALL FOR MINNIE’] 22 [‘ARE NOT THOSE ORCHISES?’] 50 [A ROYAL THIEF-TAKER] 62 [‘SUMMAT WRONG WI’ MY SPECTACLES!’] 64 [BESSIE’S SONG] 75 [THE RESCUE OF WILLIE] 83 [WILLIE’S WIFE] 88 [FORTUNATUS’ PURSE] 103 [‘I AM SITTING AT YOUR FEET’] 119 [MEIN HERR’S FAIRY-FRIENDS] 163 [‘HOW CALL YOU THE OPERA?’] 178 [SCHOLAR-HUNTING: THE PURSUED] 188 [SCHOLAR-HUNTING: THE PURSUERS] 189 [THE EGG-MERCHANT] 197 [STARTING FOR BRUNO’S PICNIC] 230 [‘ENTER THE LION’] 236 [‘WHIHUAUCH! WHIHUAUCH!’] 242 [‘NEVER!’ YELLED TOTTLES] 248 [BRUNO’S BED-TIME] 265 [‘LONG CEREMONIOUS CALLS’] 266 [THE VOICES] 267 [‘HIS SOUL SHALL BE SAD FOR THE SPIDER’] 268 [LORDS OF THE CREATION] 271 [‘WILL YOU NOT SPARE ME?’] 277 [IN THE CHURCH-YARD] 291 [A FAIRY-DUET] 304 [THE OTHER PROFESSOR FOUND] 317 [‘HER IMPERIAL HIGHNESS IS SURPRISED!’] 326 [‘HE THOUGHT HE SAW AN ELEPHANT’] 335 [AN EXPLOSION] 345 [‘A CANNOT SHAK’ HANDS WI’ THEE!’] 350 [THE OTHER PROFESSOR’S FALL] 352 [‘TEACHING TIGRESSES TO SMILE’] 365 [‘HORRID WAS THAT PIG’S DESPAIR!’] 367 [THE FATAL JUMP] 369 [‘BATHING CROCODILES IN CREAM’] 371 [‘THAT PIG LAY STILL AS ANY STONE’] 372 [‘STILL HE SITS IN MISERIE’] 373 [‘BLESSED BY HAPPY STAGS’] 377 [THE OLD BEGGAR’S RETURN] 382 [‘PORCUPINE!’] 388 [‘GOOD-NIGHT, PROFESSOR!’] 398 [‘HIS WIFE KNELT DOWN AT HIS SIDE’] 404 [THE BLUE LOCKET] 409 [‘IT IS LOVE!’] 411
SYLVIE AND BRUNO
CONCLUDED.
CHAPTER I.
BRUNO’S LESSONS.
During the next month or two my solitary town-life seemed, by contrast, unusually dull and tedious. I missed the pleasant friends I had left behind at Elveston—the genial interchange of thought—the sympathy which gave to one’s ideas a new and vivid reality: but, perhaps more than all, I missed the companionship of the two Fairies—or Dream-Children, for I had not yet solved the problem as to who or what they were—whose sweet playfulness had shed a magic radiance over my life.
In office-hours—which I suppose reduce most men to the mental condition of a coffee-mill or a mangle—time sped along much as usual: it was in the pauses of life, the desolate hours when books and newspapers palled on the sated appetite, and when, thrown back upon one’s own dreary musings, one strove—all in vain—to people the vacant air with the dear faces of absent friends, that the real bitterness of solitude made itself felt.
One evening, feeling my life a little more wearisome than usual, I strolled down to my Club, not so much with the hope of meeting any friend there, for London was now ‘out of town,’ as with the feeling that here, at least, I should hear ‘sweet words of human speech,’ and come into contact with human thought.
However, almost the first face I saw there was that of a friend. Eric Lindon was lounging, with rather a ‘bored’ expression of face, over a newspaper; and we fell into conversation with a mutual satisfaction which neither of us tried to conceal.