w tired and hungry and began to unpack their baskets and
to put their lunch on a mossy spot near the brook. Such a feast you
never saw! Everything a child likes best came out of those baskets. How
the four children did eat and eat and eat! And when they had eaten and
eaten and eaten until they could eat no more, there were still some good
things left.

"Let's rest a while," said Mary, "and perhaps we'll be hungry again.
Shall I tell you a fairy story?"

"Oh, please do," said Betty; and Peggy and Dot echoed together, "Please
do."

So Mary told them of a fairy ball where all the little fairies came out
of their flower cups and danced by the light of the moon.

"Wouldn't this spot be a lovely place for a fairy ball?" said Peggy,
when Mary had finished the story. "I wonder if there are any fairies in
this wood."

"I know how we can find out," cried Betty. "We can give the fairies a
party."

"But they only come out at night," said Dot, "so we couldn't see them."

"But," replied Betty, "we can make a feast for them; and, if the next
morning we find the feast is gone, we shall know the fairies really
came."

"Oh, let's do it," cried Dot and Peggy. And Mary said, "If we want the
fairies to come we must make a magic ring of flowers." "That will be
lots of fun," cried the children.

So for the rest of the afternoon they were very busy indeed.

They went to the meadow and gathered clover blossoms. Then they sat
down on the moss and made a magic ring.

When the magic ring was placed around a lovely mossy spot they began to
set the table for the feast.

"We'll give them cake and some ripe strawberries," said Betty.

"But fairies eat dewdrops served on rose leaves," said Peggy.

[Illustration]

"When they come to a party given by little girls, they eat just what
little girls give them. You'll see," said Betty. So the moss table was
set with leaf plates, and on each plate were a ripe, red strawberry and
a fairy-size piece of cake. When everything was ready the children
danced around the magic ring three times to make it more magic. Then
they packed their baskets and went home, feeling very tired but very
happy and much pleased with the picnic.

That night Betty could not go to sleep for a long, long time. She lay in
bed and watched the moonbeams.

"I wonder," she thought, "whether the fairies will come. I wonder
whether the man in the moon is looking down at them now. I wonder"--and
then she went to sleep and dr