276 THE GOLD OF FAIRNILEE.

 

was fancied that the hill-side would open,
like a door, and show a path into Fairyland.
But the hill-side never opened, and she never
saw a single fairy; not even old Whuppity
Stoorie sit with her spinning-wheel in a green
glen, spinning grass into gold, and singing
her fairy song :—

“T once was young and fair,
My eyes were bright and blue,
As if the sun shone through,
And golden was my hair.

“Down to my feet it rolled
Ruddy and ripe like corn,
Upon an autumn morn,

In heavy waves of gold.

“ Now am I grey and old,
And so I sit and spin,
With trembling hand and thin,
This metal bright and cold.

“‘T would give all the gain,
These heaps of wealth untold
Of hard and glittering gold,
Could I be young again!”