were always trying to
lead them astray. Many a poor man going home in the dark had been
enticed by these malevolent things into quicksands and mud pools. When
the Moon was away and the night was black, these vile creatures had
their will.

When the Moon learned about this, she was very grieved, for she is a
sweet, kind body, who spends nights without sleep, so as to show a light
for people going home. She was troubled about it all, and said to
herself, 'I'll just go down and see how matters stand.'

So, when the dark end of the month came round, she stepped down out of
the sky, wrapped from head to foot in her black travelling cloak with
the hood drawn over her bright golden hair. For a moment she stood at
the edge of the marshes, looking this way and that. Everywhere, as far
as she could see, was the dismal bog, with pools of black water, and
gnarled, fantastic-looking snags sticking up here and there amid the
dank growth of weeds and grasses. There was no light save the feeble
glimmer of the stars reflected in the gloomy pools; but, upon the grass
where she stood, a bright ring of moonlight shone from her feet beneath
her cloak.

She saw this and drew her garments closer about her. It was cold, and
she was trembling. She feared that vast expanse of bog and its evil
creatures, but she was determined to face the matter out and see exactly
how the thing stood.

Guided by the light that streamed from her feet, she advanced into the
bog. As the summer wind stirs one tussock after another, so she stepped
onward between the slimy ponds and deadly quagmires. Now she reached a
jet-black pool, and all too late she saw the stars shining in its
depths. Her foot tripped and all she could do was to snatch at an
overhanging branch of a snag as she fell forward. To this she clung,
but, fast as she gripped it, faster still some tendrils from the bough
whipped round her wrists like manacles and held her there a prisoner.
She struggled and wrenched and tugged with all her might and main, but
the tendrils only tightened and cut into her wrists like steel bands.

[Illustration: THE BURIED MOON

In her frantic struggles the hood of her cloak fell back from her
dazzling golden hair, and immediately the whole place was flooded with
light.

_See page 9_]

As she stood there shivering in the dark and wondering how to free
herself, she heard far away in the bog a voice calling through the
night. It was a wailing cry, dying away in d