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THE QUEST FOR THE NIGHTINGALE[6]

Oh, who would go to fairyland?
The moon is shining bright, oh,
And who would go to fairyland
Upon a summer’s night, oh!

Across a field of fragrant fern
All sparkling with the dew, oh!
Come trip it light to fairyland
And I will go with you, oh!

To fairyland, to fairyland,
Who seeks may find the way, oh,
And we shall see the fairies dance
Before the break of day, oh!

[Footnote 6: I am indebted to one William Shakespeare, whose intimate acquaintance with fairyland none can dispute, for the name “Pease-Blossom”; to Joseph Rodman Drake for the idea of my story; and to some of the folk tales which suggested to me one or two of Pease-Blossom’s adventures.]

In the deepest dell of the Enchanted Wood, where the moss grew the greenest and the violets bloomed the sweetest, the fairies lived. It was they who kept the brooks and the springs free from dirt or clog, and tended the wild flowers and watched over the young trees. And they were friends with all the harmless birds and beasts from wood’s end to wood’s end.

But for those creatures that work harm to others, and for the goblins who delight in mischief they had no love, and every day and every night a watch was set to drive them from the fairy dell.

Each fay in turn kept guard and all went well till one evening when Pease-Blossom, the best-loved fairy in the dell, fell asleep at his post and the goblins stole away the nightingale that sang each night at the queen’s court.

Great was the sorrow in fairyland when this was known.

“I will fly to catch them before they have had time to hide her away,” cried a fay whose name was Quick-As-Lightning.

“I will go, too,” said little Twinkle-Toes.

“And I, three,” said Spice-of-Life; “and my good thorn sword with me, which will make four against them.”

But the fairy queen would not consent to this.

“Pease-Blossom in his trust did fail;
And he must seek the nightingale,”

she said; and no sooner had she spoken than the little fay bade his companions good-bye and hastened out upon his quest alone.

The goblins had left no trace behind them and Pease-Blossom wandered hither and thither over dewy fells and fields asking of every piping cricket and brown winged bat he met: “Passed the goblins this way?”

No one could aid him, and he was ready to drop from weariness and sorrow when the moon came over the hill and called:

“Whither away, Pease-Blossom? Whither away?”

“In quest of the nightingale that the goblins have stolen; but where they have taken her I cannot find,” answered the little fay sadly.

Then said the moon: “Many a nightingale there is in the wide world, both free and caged, and how may I know yours from any other? But this I can tell you: through a window in the castle of the Great Giant, which stands upon a high hill beside the Silver Sea, I spy a nightingale in a golden cage which was not there when I shone through that same window yester eve; and moreover, at the World’s End, which is beyond the Giant’s castle, I see a band of goblins counting money.”

“A thousand thanks to you, oh moon,” cried Pease-Blossom joyfully when he heard this; for he could put two and two together as well as any fay in fairyland, and he did not doubt that the goblins had sold the nightingale to the Great Giant.

“I shall be at the castle before you shine in the dell,” he called to the moon as he flew swift as a humming bird through the air.

But when he reached the hedge of thorns that guarded the palace of a lovely princess who was next neighbor to the Giant, he tripped against a candle-fly that was hurrying to an illumination in the palace, and tumbled headlong into the thorns.