THE BLOOM FAIRY

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1070, 6 September 1930, Page 29

THE BLOOM FAIRY

I SECOND-PRIZE KTOIiY

“Oh, Belinda,” said Sally to her doll. ! “look at mother’s beautiful v’iolets: ! they are blooming in one great purple \ mass, and in the little garden of vio- j lets I have not one bud is showing, j 1 am sure something must have hap- | pened—perhaps the Bloom Fairy libs j passed over it, and not noticed it.” “You are right,” said a tiny voice. j Sally looked up, and, to her surprise, she saw* a. dainty fairy coming toward j her. She was dressed in a beautiful j frock of butterflies’ wings, while on her feet were the daintiest slippers, j made of violet petals. Her ebon hair fell over her shoulders, and her frail wings glistened in the sunlight. • [ am the Bloom Fairy,” said the little creature. “I heard you saying j your violets were not blooming, and as j I am responsible for the blooming | of all flowers, I came to see what was : the matter. My fairy assistants must j either have forgotten it, or not seen ; it. I must tell them about it —but j perhaps you would like to tell them \ yourself.” By this time Sally had opened her ! eyes very widely. “Oh,” she gasped, j 1 should love to. Will you let me?” j “Come,” replied the Bloom Fairy, ] “drink this,” and she handed Sally a ; rose petal containing a purple liquid. ; Sally did as she was bid. and sud- j denly she felt herself becoming smaller j till she was the same s*ize as her fairy j companion. “Now,” said the Bloom Fairy, “we have no time to waste: it is nearly sunset, and then you will not be able to see my assistants.” She led Sally through the door in the garden wall, which Sally had alI ways found led to the next-door neigh- | hour’s garden, but instead of this Sally found herself in a street of small white houses. “These belong to my assistants.” said the Bloom Fairy. “There is the Bloom Workroom oveg yonder. There , we shall find the fairy you want.” They **soon reached the workroom, and Sally stared in astonishment. for sitting on little toadstools, at small tables, were hundreds of fairies either painting, stitching, or glueing flower buds.

“They are making blooms for mortals' gardens,” explained her companion. “Oh, here is the fairy who attends to the blooms in your street.”

“Please don’t forget to make my flowers bloom,” said Sally. “My garden is just opposite mother’s —underneath the dream tree.”

“Why. of course not,” replied the fairy. “I did not know before that there was a garden there. It shall not be forgotten again.”

“Thank you,” said Sally, with a polite bow. “Please, Bloom Fairy, will you tell me how a violet is made to bloom ?”

“Well,” said the Bloom Fairy, “first j we say a few magic words over the j violet plant, and suddenly a little bud : appears. This is invisible to mortal eyes until these magic words are ut- I tered. Next we gently tickle the sheaf of the bud till it begins to open. As soon as it does, we quickly drop two j grains of wideawake powder into the ; very heart of it. This stops it from | closing again, and going to sleep. Now, I I shall tell you how they are put to sleep. At sunset we place a fairy i crystal on the biggest petal of the ; violet, which immediately closes and goes to sleep. Sometimes my assistants are very careless, and forget that there are violets under leaves, and so they do not close them. The nexc day the violet is so sleepy, having had no rest during the night, it cannot hold its petals in the right position, and so withers up and dies.” “Oh. how sad,” said Sally. “I hope they don’t forget very often. Please tell me some more about blooms.” “Dear me, there go the Sunset Bells. I must go to help my assistants close ; the flowers. Good-bye, Sally. I’m ] sorry I have to leave you in such a hurry.” Sally suddenly felt herself growing taller, then she opened her eyes, and 1 she was back in her own garden. She : looked at her violet plants, and to her surprise she saw a tiny violet peeping out from bneath a leaf. “A violet!” gasped Sally. “The Bloom Fairy has kept her word. How quickly she did it. I wish that the Sunset Bells hadn’t gone so soon. I should have asked her if I might stay with her in one of the little houses I saw’ in her streets.” Sally often opens the wooden gate

• in the garden fence, in the hope of ! seeeing the row of little white houses. ! out she sees only the next-door neigh - ! hour’s garden. She still believes, how- ; ever, that the Bloom Fairy will again ; visit her, and take her through the : wooden gate to see those little white I houses. —Nola Craig (aged 13.)

THE BORE The blackbirds sing a lovely song. And so do thrushes, too; But Big Brown Owl the whole night long Can only say “Too-whoo.”