192 A MISCHIEVOUS FAIRY 



very angry, and they put their heads together to 

 find out how to stop her mischief. 



" A rabbit whose ears she had boxed gave them 

 a bit of advice: ' Scare her,' he said, ' scare her; 

 when I'm frightened I lie right down and am not 

 a bit mischievous.' 



" The flowers thought this advice was very sen- 

 sible. They whispered to the earth, and to the 

 wind, and lifted up their heads to the sun, for 

 all these things make the flowers grow, and begged 

 that a flower might come dressed like a ghost to 

 scare the mischievous fairy away from the woods. 



" It was growing late one day and many flow- 

 ers were thinking about sleeping when along 

 tripped the mischievous fairy. She was dressed 

 like Meadow Lily and began to make fun of the 

 flowers because they always had to stay in the same 

 places. Then suddenly she gave a frightful 

 scream. It was so sharp and piercing that the 

 flowers lost their tongues that very minute, and the 

 mischievous fairy and all her people forever left 

 the earth. 



" The reason she gave that scream was because 

 a little flower, white as a ghost and shaped like 

 a pipe, had sprung up in the path before her." 



