The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Blue Moon, by Laurence Housman

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Title: The Blue Moon

Author: Laurence Housman

Posting Date: February 28, 2009 [EBook #3527]
Release Date: November, 2002

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLUE MOON ***

Produced by A. Elizabeth Warren

THE BLUE MOON

By Laurence Housman

CONTENTS

THE BLUE MOON
A CHINESE FAIRY-TALE
THE WAY OF THE WIND
A CAPFUL OF MOONSHINE
THE MOON-STROKE
HOW LITTLE DUKE JARL SAVED THE CASTLE
THE WHITE DOE
THE GENTLE COCKATRICE
THE RAT-CATCHER'S DAUGHTER
WHITE BIRCH

THE BLUE MOON

Nillywill and Hands-pansy were the most unimportant and happy pair of
lovers the world has ever gained or lost.

With them it had been a case of love at first blindness since the day
when they had tumbled into each other's arms in the same cradle. And
Hands-pansy, when he first saw her, did not discover that Nillywill was
a real princess hiding her birthright in the home of a poor peasant; nor
did Nillywill, when she first saw Hands, see in him the baby-beginnings
of the most honest and good heart that ever sprang out of poverty and
humble parentage. So from her end of their little crib she kicked him
with her royal rosy toes, and he from his kicked back and laughed: and
thus, as you hear, at first blindness they fell head over ears in love
with one another.

Nothing could undo that; for day by day earth and sun and wind came to
rub it in deeper, and water could not wash it off. So when they had been
seven years together there could be no doubt that they felt as if they
had been made for each other in heaven. And then something very big and
sad came to pass; for one day Nillywill had to leave off being a peasant
child and become a princess once more. People very grand and grown-up
came to the woodside where she flowered so gaily, and caught her by the
golden hair of her head and pulled her up by her dear little roots, and
carried her quite away from Hands-pansy to a place she had never been
in before. They put her into a large palace, with woods and terraces and
landscape garde