ter-mother to
find you working at it.'

'That is true,' answered the swallow. And flying up to the
roof,--which, after all, was not very high above them--he set to work
with his bill, and soon let a flood of sunshine into the dark place.

'_Won't_ you come with me, Maia?' said he. And though her heart longed
for the trees and the flowers, she answered as before:

'No, I cannot.'

That one glimpse of the sun was all Maia had for some time, for the
corn sprung up so thickly over the hole and about the house, that
there might almost as well have been no sun at all. However, though
she missed her bird friend every moment, she had no leisure to be
idle, for the field-mouse had told her that very soon she was to be
married to the mole, and kept her spinning wool and cotton for her
outfit. And as she had never in her life made a dress, four clever
spiders were persuaded to spend the days underground, turning the wool
and cotton into tiny garments. Maia liked the clothes, but hated the
thought of the blind mole, only she did not know how to escape him. In
the evenings, when the spiders were going to their homes for the
night, she would walk with them to the door and wait till a puff of
wind blew the corn ears apart, and she could see the sky.

'If the swallow would only come now,' she said to herself, 'I would
go with him to the end of the world.' But he never came!

'Your outfit is all finished,' said the field-mouse one day when the
berries were red and the leaves yellow, 'and the mole and I have
decided that your wedding shall be in four weeks' time.'

[Illustration: MAIA AND THE SPIDERS IN THE EVENING]

'Oh, not so soon! not so soon!' cried Maia, bursting into tears; which
made the field-mouse very angry, and declare that Maia had no more
sense than other girls, and did not know what was good for her. Then
the mole arrived, and carried her on his back to see the new house he
had dug for her, which was so very far under ground that Maia's tiny
legs could never bring her up even as high as the field-mouse's
dwelling, from which she might see the sunlight. Her heart grew
heavier and heavier as the days went by, and in the last evening of
all she crept out into the field among the stubble, to watch the sun
set before she bade it good-bye for ever.

'Farewell, farewell,' she said 'and farewell to my little swallow. Ah!
if he only knew, he would come to help me.'

[Illustration: HE HELPED HER TO JUMP FROM THE SWAL