the railway line at Smeeth.

But it was light under these trees for all that, and on the leaves and
amidst the turf shone a multitude of glow-worms, very bright and fine.
Mr. Skelmersdale's first impression was that he was SMALL, and the next
that quite a number of people still smaller were standing all about him.
For some reason, he says, he was neither surprised nor frightened, but
sat up quite deliberately and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. And
there all about him stood the smiling elves who had caught him sleeping
under their privileges and had brought him into Fairyland.

What these elves were like I have failed to gather, so vague and
imperfect is his vocabulary, and so unobservant of all minor detail
does he seem to have been. They were clothed in something very light and
beautiful, that was neither wool, nor silk, nor leaves, nor the petals
of flowers. They stood all about him as he sat and waked, and down the
glade towards him, down a glow-worm avenue and fronted by a star, came
at once that Fairy Lady who is the chief personage of his memory and
tale. Of her I gathered more. She was clothed in filmy green, and about
her little waist was a broad silver girdle. Her hair waved back from
her forehead on either side; there were curls not too wayward and yet
astray, and on her brow was a little tiara, set with a single star. Her
sleeves were some sort of open sleeves that gave little glimpses of her
arms; her throat, I think, was a little displayed, because he speaks of
the beauty of her neck and chin. There was a necklace of coral about
her white throat, and in her breast a coral-coloured flower. She had the
soft lines of a little child in her chin and cheeks and throat. And
her eyes, I gather, were of a kindled brown, very soft and straight and
sweet under her level brows. You see by these particulars how greatly
this lady must have loomed in Mr. Skelmersdale's picture. Certain things
he tried to express and could not express; "the way she moved," he said
several times; and I fancy a sort of demure joyousness radiated from
this Lady.

And it was in the company of this delightful person, as the guest and
chosen companion of this delightful person, that Mr. Skelmersdale set
out to be taken into the intimacies of Fairyland. She welcomed him
gladly and a little warmly--I suspect a pressure of his hand in both of
hers and a lit face to his. After all, ten years ago young Skelmersdale
may have been a very comely y