e when
her own work was taken away? I fancy she knew that the best people and the
best dogs always work hard at something. Any way she did that same thing
as long as she lived, and she was always just as gentle, and silky-haired,
and loving as at first.

LITTLE DAYLIGHT[1]

[Footnote 1: Adapted from _At the Back of the North Wind_, by George
Macdonald.]

Once there was a beautiful palace, which had a great wood at one side. The
king and his courtiers hunted in the wood near the palace, and there it
was kept open, free from underbrush. But farther away it grew wilder and
wilder, till at last it was so thick that nobody knew what was there. It
was a very great wood indeed.

In the wood lived eight fairies. Seven of them were good fairies, who had
lived there always; the eighth was a bad fairy, who had just come. And the
worst of it was that nobody but the other fairies knew she _was_ a fairy;
people thought she was just an ugly old witch. The good fairies lived in
the dearest little houses! One lived in a hollow silver birch, one in a
little moss cottage, and so on. But the bad fairy lived in a horrid mud
house in the middle of a dark swamp.

Now when the first baby was born to the king and queen, her father and
mother decided to name her "Daylight," because she was so bright and
sweet. And of course they had a christening party. And of _course_ they
invited the fairies, because the good fairies had always been at the
christening party when a princess was born in the palace, and everybody
knew that they brought good gifts.

But, alas, no one knew about the swamp fairy, and she was not
invited,--which really pleased her, because it gave her an excuse for
doing something mean.

The good fairies came to the christening party, and, one after another,
five of them gave little Daylight good gifts. The other two stood among
the guests, so that no one noticed them. The swamp fairy thought there
were no more of them; so she stepped forward, just as the archbishop was
handing the baby back to the lady-in-waiting.

"I am just a little deaf," she said, mumbling a laugh with her toothless
gums. "Will your reverence tell me the baby's name again?"

"Certainly, my good woman," said the bishop; "the infant is little
Daylight."

"And little Daylight it shall be, forsooth," cried the bad fairy. "I
decree that she shall sleep all day." Then she laughed a horrid shrieking
laugh, "He, he, hi, hi!"

Everyone looked at everyone