s very likely that they will want to keep you
altogether. I think you had better make up your mind to it. They are
kindly little folk, and will make a pet of you in the end."

"Oh, no! no!" moaned poor Amelia; "I want to be with my mother, my poor
dear mother! I want to make up for being a bad child so long. Besides,
surely that 'stock,' as they called her, will want to come back to her
own people."

"As to that," said the woman, "after a time the stock will affect
mortal illness, and will then take possession of the first black cat
she sees, and in that shape leave the house, and come home. But the
figure that is like you will remain lifeless in the bed, and will be
duly buried. Then your people, believing you to be dead, will never
look for you, and you will always remain here. However, as this
distresses you so, I will give you some advice. Can you dance?"

"Yes," said Amelia; "I did attend pretty well to my dancing lessons. I
was considered rather clever about it."

"At any spare moments you find," continued the woman, "dance, dance all
your dances, and as well as you can. The dwarfs love dancing."

"And then?" said Amelia.

"Then, perhaps some night they will take you up to dance with them in
the meadows above-ground."

"But I could not get away. They would tread on my heels--oh! I could
never escape them."

"I know that," said the woman; "your only chance is this. If ever, when
dancing in the meadows, you can find a four-leaved clover, hold it in
your hand, and wish to be at home. Then no one can stop you. Meanwhile
I advise you to seem happy, that they may think you are content, and
have forgotten the world. And dance, above all, dance!"

And Amelia, not to be behindhand, began then and there to dance some
pretty figures on the heath. As she was dancing the dwarf came by.

"Ho, ho!" said he, "you can dance, can you?"

"When I am happy I can," said Amelia, performing several graceful
movements as she spoke.

"What are you pleased about now?" snapped the dwarf, suspiciously.

"Have I not reason?" said Amelia. "The dresses are washed and mended."

"Then up with them!" returned the dwarf. On which half-a-dozen elves
popped the whole lot into a big basket and kicked them up into the
world, where they found their way to the right wardrobes somehow.

As the woman of the heath had said, Amelia was soon set to a new task.
When she bade the old woman farewell, she asked if she could do nothing
for her if