Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1908-10-14

six mOnthS-Seven almost, by mud
and water. O, how the winds howl,
How the trees toss and roar. How
the rain patters That is not plea
SAINT. l wish, do wish, l were a
squirrel; then / would coil myself III
a corner lined with moss, and crack
nuts in doze till the sun came again
and woke me up with the flowers
Then | would throw out all my
cracked nutshells with both paws, and
leap to the foot of a tree, run up it,
and skip from branch, and swing in
the summer sunshine on the tonmost
twig. o, Mr.. Jasper, how much wiser
than we the swallows are! I would
rather be swallow than a squirrel
and sail away when | felt frost to the
land of eternal summer, into the blaz-
| ing eye of the SUM-
But as you have no wings
I sit and NOPE and talk to Barbara
about cows and cabbages, and to
father about any nonsense that comes
into my head
AS yet you have given me no de-
scription OF the pixy
How can I, when scarce saw him
I will tell you exactly what happened,
If you will not curl up the corner of
your lips, as though hooking me
That papa never does. / tell him all
the rhodomontade | can, and he lis
tens gravely, and frightens and
abashes me sometimes by swallowing
it whole
Where did you see, or not see, the
pixy?
| On my way to you. heard some
thing stirring in the wood, and / half
saw what / took to be boy, or q
little man the size of a boy. When
stood still, he stood; when I moved, I
| fancied he moved. | heard the
crackle of sticks and the stir of the
bushes. I am sure of nothing
Were you frightened?'
| No; puzzled, not frightened. If this
had occurred at night, it would have
been different. l thought it might
have been red-deer; they are here
sometimes, strayed from Exmoor, and
have such pretty heads and soft
eyes; but this was not. / fancied
once l saw a queer little face peering
at me from behind a pine tree. |
uttered feeble cry and ran on
I know exactly what it was said
Jasper, with a grave smile. There
| is pixy lives in the Raven Rock; he
has a smithy far down in the heart of
the cliff, and there he works all win
ter at vein of pure gold, hammering
and turning the golden cups and
marsh marigolds with which to strew
the pastures and watercourses i'll
spring. But it is dull for the pixy
sitting alone without light; he has no
one to love and care for him, and,
though the gold glows in his forge, his
little heart is cold. He has been
dreaming all winter of a sweet fairy
he saw last summer wearing a crown
|of marigold, wading in cuckoo flow
|ers, and now he has come forth to cap
ture that fairy and drawn her down
into his stony palace
TO waste her days. laughed Eve,
in signing for the sun, whilst her
roses wither and her eyes grow dim,
away from the twitter of the birds and
the scent of the gorse. He shan't
have me- Then, after pause, dur
ing which she gathered some mari
colds and put them into her hat, she
said, half seriously, half jestingly, Do
you believe in pixies?'
You must not ask me. | have seen
but one fairy in all my life, and she
now sits before me-
Mr.. Jasper said Eve, with a dim
pie in her cheek, in recognition of the
compliment,-'Mr. Jasper, do you know
nv mother is mystery to me as
much as pixies and fairies and white
ladies?'
No, | was not aware of that
She was called, like me, Eve
/ had a sister of that name who is
dead. and my mothers name was Eve.
She is dead
I did not think the name was
SO common, and the girl, |