44 THE SECOND FROGGY FAIRY BOOK.

Froggy squatted and kissed Elsie’s shoes.
Then he drew from his pocket a little package,
tied in pink ribbons. He handed it to Elsie,
saying:

“ Keep this until I’m gone, never to see you
more. Then open it.”

There was a noise on the garden path.

‘Tere comes Prosey the Prince; ysard
Froggy, and he hopped away looking downcast
and miserable.

Elsie shrugged her shoulders, and laughed—
it was very funny. Froggy the Prince came up.
He was certainly a pretty little beast. And he
was dressed in royal fashion. Welcoming Elsie
with courtly grace, he told her she was under
the brook in fairyland. What had seemed to
her the sky was really the water closed off over-
head by far-stretching panes of glass.

Exquisite little fairies came flitting into the
garden, and Elsie thought several of them had
a familiar look. Froggy the Prince said:

“These are the fairies who live in the trees.
Every fairy has a private underground passage
leading from her tree here, where all is safe from
people, and their wrong doings. The fairies
can always come here; but they dare not ven-
ture out into the woods excepting at night, and
when they hear the knocking of the gnomes,
telling them the world’s asleep. My messenger,