ulee said, but he privately resolved never to follow her to sea at any
rate. Even Miss Phely appeared so much the worse for her knocking about
that I think she must have been better satisfied with her corner in the
nursery; but as for repenting of her folly or blaming Yulee, I never
heard of her doing so. She always looked contented and indifferent.

[Illustration]

A Faery Surprise Party.

LILLIE'S STORY.

A Faery Surprise Party.

[Illustration]

My name is Jack Frost, and I have a story to tell. If you don't know who
I am, ask my friend North East Wind, Esq., and he will tell you, and
whistle a tune which he made up about me. I am Painter to her Beauty
Mab, Queen of the Faeries. She gives me plenty of work to do; in the
summer-time I go North, like other artists, to take sketches, but when
the winter comes then I come back and paint my pictures. I paint chiefly
on glass, though sometimes on pottery, the night is the time I like
best to work in, for in the day-time the sun tries to put some colour
into the paintings, which spoils them; white is the only colour I ever
use.

I was going to tell you, however, a story about what I saw the other
night. Queen Mab sent a snow-flake to me with a message. I was to paint
eight large squares of glass in a certain window of a certain house. I
might paint what I chose only it must be done in good season, for the
Queen was to visit the painting when it was finished. So I was at the
glass and at work early--'twas only a little after sundown; my friend,
North East Wind, jolly old fellow! was whistling a tune right merrily as
I handled my brush.

There was a light inside the room, and I could see everything that was
going on there; I could hear everything too, for there was a crack in
one of the panes of glass; these cracks spoil my paintings--I never can
make any mark on the glass close to them--but how ever, here was this
crack, and I could make out through it everything that was going on. A
nurse was putting a little girl named Milly to bed, and they talked
incessantly. Milly was to have a party the next day, which was her sixth
birth-day; it was to be her first party. All things had been made ready
for it; she had had a new dress, white with red spots like wafers all
over it, and she was to wear a red sash and bronze kid slippers. Twelve
little girls had been invited, but only eleven were sure to come; Susan
Peabody was sick, and might not be there.

All t