The Hattiesburg news., 1915-09-21
Bedtime Stories
For Little Folks
THE GOLDEN WEB.

Once upon time there lived beau
tiful Princess whose fathers country
extended from one ocean to the other.
1t was full of happy people, but the
King was very sad. And the reason
was that his only child, the Princess,
was so delicate that it was impossible
for her even to walk.
All day long she lay in bed of soft
est silk on mattress of pillows
stuffed with swans down. But still
she did nothing but moan, for the
touch of even the softest thing seemed
to hurt her. The poor King was al
most wild with worry and the Queen
grew SO gray that all the hairdressers
in the kingdom could not keep her
curls brown.
Cecil was a poor boy who worked
about the gardens. He had seen the
Princess and felt very sorry for her as
he worked over his flowers. All day
he hoed and weeded and so fond was
he of the plants that he sometimes
imagined that they talked among
themselves. One day he saw growing
a very strange plant which he had
never seen before. It's stem was OF
silver, its leaves of gold and on top
was tiny cup of pearl filed with
what seemed sweet dew.
So, without thinking, the boy
plucked the bloom and drank the dew.
1t had an odd effect, for as soon as he
had swallowed it he found he could
hear everything going on around him
l-the grass growing, the leaves sigh
Il ing and the whispers of the roses.
Even the chat of the butterflies and
insects he understood.
AS Cecil went about his work he
saw that another plant was covered
with spider webs, SO he got his broom
and was about to brush the web ava,
when the mother spider came running
out from under leaf.
"Oh! what shall 1 do?" she cried
and Cecil knew every word she said
"That great man is going to destroy
my home and my babies"
"Oh, no." said Cecil. laying down tn,
broom. Il will not touch you at ALL
"How can thank your tremblingl.
asked the mother spider. Ceci
laughed, but a funny thought poppe,
into his head. .t .
There. is only one thing in, tn
world I wish" he replied. "And tha
is something which could cure tn
Princess But, of course, that is no
in your power"
Maybe it isl replied the spider
mo one ever understood how to tail
to us before. But we spiders hav,
talked 1t over and we learned that IL,
in the great White Vine is colder
spider, who spins a golden web so fint
that it can hardly be seen. The onl!
way to reach this vine is to get on {
log which is drifting down the Blacl
Whirlpool and the current will dras
you down under the shore. About {
mile away from the pool is the vine
hanging over the water and there yor
will see golden web stretching ava,
for ten miles,"
Without waiting a moment Cecil ran
as fast as his legs could carry him tc
where black stream of water whirled
around and around at dizzy rate
Logs were floating by and disappear
ing, but no one had ever ventured into
its depth. Cecil jumped on a tree
trunk as 1t swept by and in a moment
was carried swiftly down the whirl
pool and under the bank.
1t was dark and the roar Of the
water almost deafened him, but he
clung desperately to the log, which at
last swept under a great white vine.
Over the vine was misty, golden web
which seemd to reach to the ends of
the earth.
Cecil reached up and pulled it to-
ward him till he had an armful of it's