“‘Ach! it is mine sugar.’
“‘The fairies put it in the woods for thee, Gretchen,’ said her sister; ‘take it and run away.’
“Gretchen ran away with Sugar-Boy, and sat in her little garden.
“‘If it is a fairy lump I will plant it,’ said the child, ‘and then a fairy tree will grow with lumps of sugar.’
“She dug a tiny hole with her hands and placed my brother in it, covering him over with the soft earth. Then she watered her new bed and went away to tell about her fairy sugar tree.
“Now it so happened that not far from the spot where Sugar-Boy was planted lived a colony of ants. One long-legged fellow chanced to see Gretchen dispose of a nice lump of sugar and he ran to the hill where the queen of the ants lived and told her about it.
“She sent an army of faithful ants at once, and Sugar-Boy was removed little by little to the queen’s palace.
“Then the queen decided to give a grand party, inviting all her sisters, cousins and ants and in a short time the long-legged fellow was despatched with written invitations that read as follows:
“‘The queen invites you to be present at a grand dinner party, given in the courtyard of the imperial palace (Ant Hill—southwest) on Monday at Ten A. M.’
“There was great excitement among the ants when they learned about the party and they vied with each other in their efforts to thank the queen. When the morning of the party arrived you might have seen swarms of ants hurrying to the palace on Ant Hill.