There are also numbers of them along the Baby Walk, which is a famous
gentle place, as spots frequented by fairies are called. Once
twenty-four of them had an extraordinary adventure. They were a
girls' school out for a walk with the governess, and all wearing
hyacinth gowns, when she suddenly put her finger to her mouth, and
then they all stood still on an empty bed and pretended to be
hyacinths. Unfortunately, what the governess had heard was two
gardeners coming to plant new flowers in that very bed. They were
wheeling a handcart with flowers in it, and were quite surprised to
find the bed occupied. "Pity to lift them hyacinths," said the one
man. "Duke's orders," replied the other, and, having emptied the
cart, they dug up the boarding-school and put the poor, terrified
things in it in five rows. Of course, neither the governess nor the
girls dare let on that they were fairies, so they were carted far away
to a potting-shed, out of which they escaped in the night without
their shoes, but there was a great row about it among the parents, and
the school was ruined.
As for their houses, it is no use looking for them, because they are
the exact opposite of our houses. You can see our houses by day but
you can't see them by dark. Well, you can see their houses by dark,
but you can't see them by day, for they are the colour of night, and I
never heard of anyone yet who could see night in the daytime.
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