Snowballs and Blackballs

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 25, 29 July 1939, Page 25

Snowballs and Blackballs

(A Story for Small Folk.) T iiad beeu snowing very hard, and all the Winter Fairies had been having a most exciting time. They had skated upside down on icicles and the right way up on puddles; they had gathered bunches of flost flowers and decorated all the panes; and, best of all, they had snowballed. - Then the thaw came, and the icicles melted away, drop by drop; the puddles thawed, and the snow turned to pale brown, mushy mud. "We are going to snowball," cried a family of tiny fairies, as they pushed their heads above their bullfinch-down quilt. "You can't," said their mother, "there isn't any snow left." "I'll find some, then," said fairy Windwhistle. as he hopped out of bed. All .his brothers followed him, and they put on their winter suits and ran nimbly away. They hopped into the squishy, squelchy mud, and pretended that it was snow, and threw it at each other; then they flew on to a roof "to dry. A chimney was smoking and black smuts lay thickly on the tiles. "What fun," said Windwhistle, "this is black snow!". He gathered up a handful and threw it at his brothers, who all began to "blackball." Never had such black fairies been seen, but Windwhistle was the sootiest of them all. Presently a tabby cat strolled on to the roof and held up her paws in horror at the sight, then licked all of them clean, but Windwhistle, who flew up to a chimney-pot, began to build a black snowman. Suddenly he slipped and fell right down through the chimney, until lie came* at last to the fireplace. The flames couldn't hurt him, for he was a fairy, and he hopped right across on to the dimpled knee, of Baby Michael,'who was having his bath by the fire. How Windwhistle splashed in the soapy water, and how that baby crowed and gurgled, he had never been so good in his bath before! "I can't think what has made the water so dirty," said nurse. Windwhistle, who was hiding in a soap-bubble, knew quite well, and so did the black cat, Joseph, who had just walked in through the door; but he told no tales. Five minutes later a clean, dry baby lay in his cot, and a clean 4 dry fairy flew out of the window.