“It is the same color, and the same metal, in the crimson flowers, as that laid on the faces of the pretty girls, in their boudoirs; or that comes naturally to the cheeks of the healthy [[63]]young men and maidens. Now I can tell you how you can make a new flower, as red as blood, that will spring up all over the fields of Flanders.”
The fairy clapped her hands with delight.
“O tell me how. I should gladly die, if I might end the quarrels of the fairies and leave behind me a crimson flower. I want something, on Belgian soil, that shall make its people love their land all the more, and, by its color, remind them of the blood of the slain of many generations of men. Let the red flower spring up everywhere, without thought or labor. So will they value the more their beloved country, when they plant and cultivate the white lilies of peace.”
“So shall it be, if you say it,” said the old kabouter, “but life for life. You must give up your own life, and the flower will be your transformation. Die, and the red flowers shall live. And we kabouters also love Belgium. We shall let the iron atoms, gathered during ages, from the dead, enter with your life into the new blooms which shall spring up. There is already enough iron in the soil to tint the petals for a thousand years to come.”
At this word of promise, the fairy cried out “Good! it shall be a memorial of the thousand generations of the brave men, who have died on Belgic soil, and on Flanders fields, and it will [[64]]also heal the quarrels of my people.” Then, sinking down, she breathed out her life, and was no more.
That night, there was a funeral among the fairies. In the softest spot, in the centre of a fairy ring, among the grass and yellow and blue flowers, they laid her to rest in a sad burial. Nevertheless the burden of their song was of promise and joy, and in praise of beauty; for the earth’s surface was now to wear a new floral jewel.
And behold, in the next spring time, the earth seemed dotted with jets of flame, as if a thousand fairies were each one kindling a tiny memorial fire, in remembrance of human lives given for others.
From that day of the grave in the fairy’s ring, there was peace among the fairies. And in our time, the poppies of Belgium keep a perpetual Decoration Day, because of the generations of the slain on the soil of Belgium the Beautiful. [[65]]