FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147  
148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   >>  
he snow--for she was very very old--in fact, as old as anything which you are likely to come across, except the difference between right and wrong. And, when she saw Tom, she looked at him very kindly. "What do you want, my little man? It is long since I have seen a water-baby here." Tom told her his errand, and asked the way to the Other-end-of-Nowhere. "You ought to know yourself, for you have been there already." "Have I, ma'am? I'm sure I forget all about it." "Then look at me." And, as Tom looked into her great blue eyes, he recollected the way perfectly. Now, was not that strange? "Thank you, ma'am," said Tom. "Then I won't trouble your ladyship any more; I hear you are very busy." "I am never more busy than I am now," she said, without stirring a finger. "I heard, ma'am, that you were always making new beasts out of old." "So people fancy. But I am not going to trouble myself to make things, my little dear. I sit here and make them make themselves." "You are a clever fairy, indeed," thought Tom. And he was quite right. That is a grand trick of good old Mother Carey's, and a grand answer, which she has had occasion to make several times to impertinent people. There was once, for instance, a fairy who was so clever that she found out how to make butterflies. I don't mean sham ones; no: but real live ones, which would fly, and eat, and lay eggs, and do everything that they ought; and she was so proud of her skill that she went flying straight off to the North Pole, to boast to Mother Carey how she could make butterflies. But Mother Carey laughed. "Know, silly child," she said, "that any one can make things, if they will take time and trouble enough: but it is not every one who, like me, can make things make themselves." But people do not yet believe that Mother Carey is as clever as all that comes to; and they will not till they, too, go the journey to the Other-end-of-Nowhere. "And now, my pretty little man," said Mother Carey, "you are sure you know the way to the Other-end-of-Nowhere?" Tom thought; and behold, he had forgotten it utterly. "That is because you took your eyes off me." Tom looked at her again, and recollected; and then looked away, and forgot in an instant. "But what am I to do, ma'am? For I can't keep looking at you when I am somewhere else." "You must do without me, as most people have to do, for nine hundred and ninety-nine thousandths of th
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147  
148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   >>  



Top keywords:
Mother
 

looked

 

people

 
things
 

clever

 

trouble

 

Nowhere


recollected

 

thought

 

butterflies

 

instant

 
ninety
 

thousandths

 
hundred

forgot
 

flying

 

journey

 

pretty

 

behold

 

forgotten

 

utterly


straight

 

laughed

 

making

 

errand

 
forget
 

difference

 

kindly


perfectly

 

answer

 

impertinent

 

occasion

 
ladyship
 

strange

 

stirring


finger

 

beasts

 

instance