ld Mother Fate, but not about causes and reasons. She
believed, as we do in this world, that

That that is, is;

but the fairies go further than this; they say:--

That that is, is; and when it is, that is the reason that it is.

This sounds like nonsense to us, but it is all right to them.

So Mopsa, thinking she had explained everything, said again,--

"And, dear Jack, will you give the silver fourpence to me?"

Jack took it out; and she got down from the dame's knee and took it in
the palm of her hand, laying the other palm upon it.

"It will be very hot," observed the dame.

"But it will not burn me so as really to hurt, if I am a real queen,"
said Mopsa.

Presently she began to look as if something gave her pain.

"Oh, it's so hot!" she said to the other Jack; "so very hot!"

"Never mind, sweet Queen," he answered; "it will not hurt you long.
Remember my poor uncle and all his knights."

Mopsa still held the little silver coin; but Jack saw that it hurt
her, for two bright tears fell from her eyes; and in another moment he
saw that it was actually melted, for it fell in glittering drops from
Mopsa's hand to the marble floor, and there it lay as soft as
quicksilver.

"Pick it up," said Mopsa to the other Jack; and he instantly did so,
and laid it in her hand again; and she began gently to roll it
backwards and forwards between her palms till she had rolled it into a
very slender rod, two feet long, and not nearly so thick as a pin; but
it did not bend, and it shone so brightly that you could hardly look
at it.

Then she held it out towards the real Jack, and said, "Give this a
name."

"I think it is a----" began the other Jack; but the dame suddenly
stopped him. "Silence, sire! Don't you know that what it is first
called that it will be?"

Jack hesitated; he thought if Mopsa was a queen the thing ought to be
a sceptre; but it certainly was not at all like a sceptre.

"That thing is a wand," said he.

"You are a wand," said Mopsa, speaking to the silver stick, which was
glittering now in a sunbeam almost as if it were a beam of light
itself. Then she spoke again to Jack:

"Tell me, Jack, what can I do with a wand?"

Again the boy-king began to speak, and the dame stopped him, and again
Jack considered. He had heard a great deal in his own country about
fairy wands, but he could not remember that the fairies had done
anything particular with them, so he gave what he thought was true,
bu