BEYOND THE BLUE MOUNTAINS.

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1)

“T ate four or five of the strawberries, and I am in very great
pain,” he replied. He leant up against the wall as he spoke. He
had thought nothing of his own discomfort, as long as his sister
was in danger, but now the effects of the poisoned fruit made him sick
and giddy.

“There is another white bedroom waiting for you,” said Charity.
“You are a very brave boy to have thought nothing of yourself while your
sister was ill. Now I shall ask my sister Faith to sit by Cowslip
while I attend to you. It is well you ate no more of the fruit, for I
know from old experience that that wicked little Bluebell put even
more poison into the strawberries than she did into the peaches. Stall,
you ate so very few, that you will soon be well again.”

So Charity gave some of the antidote to Clover also, and after
giving him a refreshing warm bath, popped him into a snug white
bed, in the room which exactly faced the one in which Cowslip slept.
The tired boy had scarcely laid his head on the pillow before he fell
asleep.

All night long the children slept, and the next morning Clover
and Cowslip remembered very little of the effects of the night
before.

Clover felt perfectly well again, but Cowslip was so weak that
Charity and her sisters would not allow her to move from the palace
that day.

The little girl spent most of her time in bed, sleeping off the
effects of all the poison she had taken, but Clover wandered about the
palace, and saw the room where the armour was kept, and the room
where all the fairies of the glen used to assemble for their monthly
balls. He went into the museum too, where all kinds of curious things
were, and finally he went out on the battlements of the palace, and
taking a telescope in his hand tried hard to see the brightness which
came from the country beyond the Blue Mountains.

Look as he would, however, he could not discover it.

“ Never mind,” said Faith, looking at the boy with her deep and
wonderful eyes, “ you have not gone far enough on your journey yet,
but you will see the brightness by-and-by.”