Occasionally, in rambling through the ice halls, [[225]]the fairies could discern, embedded in the crystal walls, black spots. Asking whether these were flies in amber, such as they had heard of, they were told that these specks were mortals, men and women, mountain climbers, who had fallen down precipices, or upon the ice, or slipped into crevices. Having ended their lives thus, they were kept in the crystal for years, until their bodies were shot out on the moraines, or washed down the rivers. Sometimes the fairies found bits of rope and alpenstocks. They even learned to tell the difference between blondes and brunettes.

Often some of the fairies wondered how it would feel to be born as a baby, and drink milk, and eat candy, and first crawl over the floor, and then walk and grow up to be a man or a woman. They could only guess vaguely what it was to die. For that is the curious thing about fairies, they cannot die, because they were never born. They do not have to grow like human babies, or big elephants, or little kangaroos, or be hatched out of eggs, like chickens, or wriggle in the ponds, or swim in the water like frogs, or fishes, or whales, or porpoises. Once in a while, some fairy thought she would like to try it, just once, to live and die, just to see how it felt, but the other fairies, who did not admire her taste, only laughed at her. [[226]]

As a rule, these passengers on the glacier did not pay close attention to such matters. They were not much interested in mortals, but more in themselves, for they considered boys and girls, and men and women, to be very inferior creatures. They gave more attention to what they saw, as they traveled through the country, changing climate every few thousand feet and every century or so.

At first, all was snow, ice and rocks, with no birds, shrubs, or trees, or flowers, and not even moss. Indeed, some of them grumbled and declared they would not have left home, if they thought they were to see nothing more than mere human beings. But very soon, that is, after a few years, ten or twenty, perhaps, their ice chariot or train had carried them past this old scenery.

Now they began to see mosses and lichens, and occasionally a condor, or Alpine eagle, on a crag, eating his dinner—perhaps a young lamb, or a rabbit, or a marmot, or a chamois kid, or something from a cow’s carcass, which the big bird of prey had stolen from some butcher’s slaughter house. This was the first sign of that uncanny thing they called life; which, inside of mortals and other animals, makes them move about. [[227]]

It was a stunning novelty, when the conductor called out the name of a new station:

“Flowers!”

Then they saw, overhanging the rocks, or near the edges of the precipices, or in the crevices and crannies of the cliffs, what they called flowers. Yet to us folks, who live in the house and nursery, these plants, so bundled up in white, hardly seemed to be flowers. They rather looked like babies, ready to be taken out to ride, for they were well swaddled in what appeared to be fur or flannel. In fact, their flowers, so called, were so woolly, and cushiony, and flat, and low, and they kept holding on so hard, as if for dear life, in the biting cold wind, that they looked bleak and ghostly. Some of these Alpine flowers were as downy as a duckling, and as hairy as a poodle. But this was to keep the plants warm. For life is warm. Death is cold.

Even more wonderful, to most of these fairies, that had lived so long up among the highest mountain tops, and had never been lower down than eight thousand feet or so, was another lovely sight—that of green meadows, spangled with blooms. It was that of the summer pastures.

Now they began to hear the tinkling of bells and saw many cows. They laughed uproariously, as they saw that the billy goats waved their chin beards, up and down, and stood on their [[228]]hind legs. On the roofs of the shepherds’ chalets, they noticed the big stones. These were laid in rows, to keep down the strips of bark or shingles, when the tempests roared. While they were wondering how funny it must feel, to be a boy or a girl, and live in a skin, with clothes on, they heard the Alpine horn. While listening to its sweet echoes, some of the fairies actually began to think that perhaps, after all, mortals might have a good time, and, possibly, as much enjoyment as fairies do, and always have had. Most of them, however, scouted the very idea.