ot much
bigger than my finger, lost his head, and dropped a berry in the wood.

When the feast was ended the fairies went back to fairyland, and were at
home for more than a week before they knew of the little fellow's fault,
and this is how they came to know of it.

A great wedding was about to come off, and the queen of the fairies sent
six of her pages to Dooros Wood to catch fifty butterflies with golden
spots on their purple wings, and fifty white without speck or spot, and
fifty golden, yellow as the cowslip, to make a dress for herself, and a
hundred white, without speck or spot, to make dresses for the bride and
bridesmaids.

When the pages came near the wood they heard the most wonderful music,
and the sky above them became quite dark, as if a cloud had shut out
the sun. They looked up, and saw that the cloud was formed of bees, who
in a great swarm were flying towards the wood and humming as they flew.
Seeing this they were sore afraid until they saw the bees settling on a
single tree, and on looking closely at the tree they saw it was covered
with fairy berries.

The bees took no notice of the fairies, and so they were no longer
afraid, and they hunted the butterflies until they had captured the full
number of various colors. Then they returned to fairyland, and they told
the queen about the bees and the berries, and the queen told the king.

The king was very angry, and he sent his heralds to the four corners of
fairyland to summon all his subjects to his presence that he might find
out without delay who was the culprit.

They all came except the little weeny fellow who dropped the berry, and
of course everyone said that it was fear that kept him away, and that he
must be guilty.

The heralds were at once sent in search of him, and after a while they
found him hiding in a cluster of ferns, and brought him before the king.

The poor little fellow was so frightened that at first he could scarcely
speak a word, but after a time he told how he never missed the berry
until he had returned to fairyland, and that he was afraid to say
anything to anyone about it.

The king, who would hear of no excuse, sentenced the little culprit to
be banished into the land of giants beyond the mountains, to stay there
for ever and a day unless he could find a giant willing to go to Dooros
Wood and guard the fairy tree. When the king had pronounced sentence
everyone was very sorry, because the little fellow was a favorit