re flood the light of the blue
moon flowed abroad.

Under the light of many tapers within drawn curtains of tapestry, and
feasting her eyes upon the happiness of Hands, the Princess felt the
change that had entranced the outer world. "I feel," she said, "I do not
know how--as if the palace were standing siege. Come out where we can
breathe the fresh air!"

The light of the tapers grew ghostly and dim, as, parting the thick
hangings of the window, they stepped into the night.

"The blue moon!" cried Nillywill to her heart; "oh, Hands, it is the
blue moon!"

All the world seemed carved out of blue stone; trees with stems
dark-veined as marble rose up to give rest to boughs which drooped the
altered hues of their foliage like the feathers of peacocks at roost.
Jewel within jewel they burned through every shade from blue to onyx.
The white blossoms of a cherry-tree had become changed into turquoise,
and the tossing spray of a fountain as it drifted and swung was like a
column of blue fire. Where a long inlet of sea reached in and touched
the feet of the hanging gardens the stars showed like glow-worms,
emerald in a floor of amethyst.

There was no motion abroad, nor sound: even the voice of the nightingale
was stilled, because the passion of his desire had become visible before
his eyes.

"Once in a blue moon!" said Nilly-will, waiting for her dream to become
altogether true. "Let us go now," she said, "where I can put away my
crown! To-night has brought you to me, and the blue moon has come for
us: let us go!"

"Where shall we go?" asked Hands.

"As far as we can," cried Nillywill. "Suppose to the blue moon! To-night
it seems as if one might tread on water or air. Yonder across the sea,
with the stars for stepping-stones, we might get to the blue moon as it
sets into the waves."

But as they went through the deep alleys of the garden that led down to
the shore they came to a sight more wonderful than anything they had yet
seen.

Before them, facing toward the sea, stood two great reindeer, their high
horns reaching to the overhead boughs; and behind them lay a sledge,
long and with deep sides like the sides of a ship. All blue they seemed
in that strange light.

There too, but nearer to hand, was the moon-fay himself waiting--a great
figure of lofty stature, clad in furs of blue fox-skin, and with heron's
wings fastened above the flaps of his hood; and these lifted themselves
and clapped as Hands and the Pr