TWELVE STORIES ABOUT FAIRIES - A Fairy Bumper Edition E-Book

Anon E. Mouse

• Herausgeber: Abela Publishing
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

In this bumper edition you will find 12 children’s stories about fairies drawn from around the world. Like people, some of the fairies are frustrated at having to work before they’re allowed to play. Some are impish and play tricks on people and have to be taught a lesson, but most are good fairies wanting to help and better their environment and in some cases, people. We have also included two fun poems for children. Each story is prefixed by our famous “Where in the World – Look it Up” challenge for young readers. The stories are: Cherry Princess Bluegreen Of The Seven Cities A French Puck The Crooked Man The Fairy Child Cured By Fairies The Fairy Nurse I Saw A Ship A-Sailing The Judgment Of The Flowers The Kite That Went To The Moon The Pen Fairy The Nut-Tree The Phynodderree The  Rubber  Fairy Twelfth Night Fairy You are also given access to 8 FREE DOWNLOADS. 10% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charities.

Leseprobe

Twelve

Tales about Fairies

A Special Bumper Edition

Tales of Fairies galore!

Part of the

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

Published By

Abela Publishing, London

2016

TWELVE TALES ABOUT FAIRY

Typographical arrangement of this edition

©Abela Publishing 2016

This book may not be reproduced in its current format

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except as permitted by law

without the prior written permission

of the publisher.

Abela Publishing,

London, United Kingdom

2016

Baba Indaba Children’s Stories

ISSN 23979607

Issue: 232

Bumper Edition

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.AbelaPublishing.com

Table of Contents

Table Of Contents

An Introduction To Baba Indaba

Cherry

Princess Bluegreen Of The Seven Cities

A French Puck

The Crooked Man

The Fairy Child

Cured By Fairies

The Fairy Nurse

I Saw A Ship A-Sailing

The Judgment Of The Flowers

The Kite That Went To The Moon

The Pen Fairy

The Nut-Tree

The Phynodderree

The Rubber Fairy

Twelfth Night Fairy

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An Introduction to Baba Indaba

Baba Indaba, pronounced Baaba Indaaba, lived in Africa a long-long time ago. Indeed, this story was first told by Baba Indaba to the British settlers over 250 years ago in a place on the South East Coast of Africa called Zululand, which is now in a country now called South Africa.

In turn the British settlers wrote these stories down and they were brought back to England on sailing ships. From England they were in turn spread to all corners of the old British Empire, and then to the world.

In olden times the Zulu’s did not have computers, or iPhones, or paper, or even pens and pencils. So, someone was assigned to be the Wenxoxi Indaba (Wensosi Indaaba) – the Storyteller. It was his, or her, job to memorise all the tribe’s history, stories and folklore, which had been passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years. So, from the time he was a young boy, Baba Indaba had been apprenticed to the tribe’s Wenxoxi Indaba to learn the stories. Every day the Wenxoxi Indaba would narrate the stories and Baba Indaba would have to recite the story back to the Wenxoxi Indaba, word for word. In this manner he learned the stories of the Zulu nation.

In time the Wenxoxi Indaba grew old and when he could no longer see or hear, Baba Indaba became the next in a long line of Wenxoxi Indabas. So fond were the children of him that they continued to call him Baba Indaba – the Father of Stories.

When the British arrived in South Africa, he made it his job to also learn their stories. He did this by going to work at the docks at the Point in Port Natal at a place the Zulu people call Ethekwene (Eh-tek-weh-nee). Here he spoke to many sailors and ships captains. Captains of ships that sailed to the far reaches of the British Empire – Canada, Australia, India, Mauritius, the Caribbean and beyond.

He became so well known that ship’s crew would bring him a story every time they visited Port Natal. If they couldn’t, they would arrange to have someone bring it to him. This way his library of stories grew and grew until he was known far and wide as the keeper of stories – a true Wenxoxi Indaba of the world.

Baba Indaba believes the tales he is about to tell in this book, and all the others he has learned, are the common property of Umntwana (Children) of every nation in the world - and so they are and have been ever since men and women began telling stories, thousands and thousands of years ago.

Where in the World? Look it Up!

This next story was told to him by a man who hailed from the small town called Fairlight Cove. Can you find Fairlight Cove on a map? What country is it in?

Cherry

 

A English Fairy Tale

 

 

A story, a story

Let it come, let it go

A story, a story

From long, long ago!

Umntwana Izwa! Children Listen!

ONCE upon a time long, long ago, in a far, far away land, there was once a poor labourer who had so many children that he was hardly able to buy food and clothing for them. For this reason, as soon as they grew old enough, they went out into the world to shift for themselves. One after another they left their home, until at last only the youngest one, Cherry by name, was left. She was the prettiest of all the children. Her hair was as black as jet, her cheeks as red as roses, and her eyes so merry and sparkling that it made one smile even to look at her.

Every few weeks one or another of the children who were out at service came back to visit their parents, and they looked so much better fed, and so much better clothed than they ever had looked while they were at home that Cherry began to long to go out in the world to seek her fortune, too.

“Just see,” she said to her mother; “all my sisters have new dresses and bright ribbons, while I have nothing but the old patched frocks they have outgrown. Let me go out to service to earn something for myself.”

“No, no,” answered her mother. “You are our youngest, and your father would never be willing to have you go, and you would find it very different out there in the world from here, where everyone loves you and cares for you.”

However, Cherry’s heart was set upon going out to seek her fortune, and when she found her parents would never give their consent, she determined to go without it. She tied up the few clothes she had in a big handkerchief, put on the shoes that had in them the fewest holes, and off she stole one fine morning without saying good-by to anyone but the old cat that was asleep upon the step.

As long as she was within sight of the house she hurried as fast as she could, for she was afraid her father or mother might see her and call her back, but when the road dipped down over a hill she walked more slowly, and took time to catch her breath and shift her bundle from one hand to the other.

At first the way she followed was well known to her, but after she had travelled on for several hours she found herself in a part of the country she had never seen before. It was bleak and desolate with great rocks, and not a house in sight, and Cherry began to feel very lonely. She longed to see her dear home again, with the smoke rising from the chimney and her mother’s face at the window, and at last she grew so homesick that she sat down on a rock and began to sob aloud.

She had been sitting there and weeping for some time when she felt a hand upon her shoulder. She looked up and saw a tall and handsome gentleman standing beside her. He was richly dressed and looked like a foreigner, and there were many rings upon his fingers. It seemed so strange to see him standing there close to her, when a little time before there had been no one in sight, that Cherry forgot to sob while she stared at him. He was smiling at her in a friendly way, and his eyes sparkled and twinkled so brightly that there never was anything like it.

“What are you doing in such a lonely place as this, my child?” said he. “And why are you weeping so bitterly?”

“I am here because I started out to take service with someone,” answered Cherry; “and I am weeping because it is so lonely, and I wish I were at home again;” and she began to sob.

“Listen, Cherry,” said the gentleman, once more laying his hand on her shoulder. “I am looking for a kind, bright girl to take charge of my little boy. The wages are good, and if you like, you shall come with me and be his nurse.”

This seemed a great piece of good luck to Cherry, for she was sure from the gentleman’s looks that he must be very rich as well as kind. She quickly wiped her eyes and told him she was more than willing to go with him.

He was richly dressed and looked like a foreigner

As soon as the stranger heard this he smiled again, and bidding her follow him he turned aside into a little path among the rocks that Cherry had not noticed before. At first this path was both rough and thorny, but the further they went the broader and smoother it grew, and always it led down-hill. After a while instead of thorns, flowering bushes bordered the path, and later still, trees loaded with such fruit as Cherry had never seen before. It shone like jewels, and smelled so delicious that she longed to stop and taste it, but that her master would not allow. There was no sunlight now, but neither were any clouds to be seen overhead. A soft, pale light shone over everything, making the landscape seem like something seen in a dream.

The gentleman hurried her along, and when he saw she was growing tired he took her hand in his and immediately all her weariness disappeared, and her feet felt so light it seemed as though she could run to the ends of the earth.

After they had gone a long, long way they came to a gate overhung with an arch of flowering vines. The garden within was filled with fruit trees even more wonderful than those along the road, and through them she could see a beautiful house that shone like silver.

The gentleman opened the gate, and immediately a little boy came running down the path toward them. The child was very small, but his face looked so strange and wise and old that Cherry was almost afraid of him.

The gentleman stooped and kissed him and said, “This is my son,” and then they all three went up the path together.

When they came near the house the door opened and a little, strange looking old woman looked out. She was gnarled and withered and gray, and looked as though she might be a hundred.

“Aunt Prudence, this is the nurse I have brought home to look after the boy for us,” said the gentleman.

The old woman scowled, and her eyes seemed to bore into Cherry like gimlets. “She’ll peep and pry, and see what shouldn’t be seen. Why couldn’t you have been satisfied with one like ourselves for a nurse?” grumbled the old woman.

The old woman scowled…..

“It’s best as it is,” answered the gentleman in a low voice. “Many a one has sent her child to rest in a cradle there above, and they’ve been all the better for it.”

Cherry did not know what he was talking about, but if she had been afraid of the child she was even more afraid of the old woman.

And indeed in the next few days Aunt Prudence made the girl’s life very unhappy. The gentleman gave Cherry full charge of the child, and seemed very contented with her, but the old woman grumbled and scolded, and found fault with everything she did.

the old woman grumbled, scolded and found fault

It was Cherry’s duty to bathe the child every morning, and after she had washed him she was obliged to anoint his eyes with a certain ointment that was kept in a silver box. “And be very careful,” said her master, sternly, “that you never touch the least particle of it to your own eyes, for if you do, misfortune will certainly come upon you.”

Cherry promised that she would not, but she felt very curious about this ointment. She was sure it must have some very wonderful properties, for always after she had rubbed the child’s eyes with it they looked stranger and brighter than ever, and she was sure he saw things that she could not see. Sometimes he would seem to join in games invisible to her, and sometimes he would suddenly leave her and run down a path to meet someone, though as far as she could see not a living soul was there. But if Cherry asked him any questions he would become quite silent, and look at her sideways in a strange way.

There were doors in the house that Cherry was forbidden to open, and she used to wonder and wonder what was behind them. Once she saw her master come out from one of the rooms beyond, but he shut the door quickly behind him, and she caught no glimpse of what was within.

However, she was very comfortable there—well-fed, well-clothed and well-paid, and she would have been quite happy if it had not been for Aunt Prudence. Instead of growing kinder to her as time went on, the old woman grew crosser and crosser. She was always scolding, and her tongue was so sharp that she often made Cherry weep bitterly, and wish she was at home again, or any place but there. Once when she was sobbing to herself in the garden, her master came to her. “Cherry,” he said, “I see that you and Aunt Prudence can never live in peace together, and I am going to send her away for a while, but if I do, you must promise to do nothing that might displease me.”

Cherry promised, and after that the old woman disappeared, and the girl did not know what had become of her.

Cherry was now very happy. Her master was never cross with her, and the child was very obedient, and if he did not ever laugh, neither did he ever weep. She helped her master in the garden very often, and when she had done very well he would sometimes kiss her and call her a good child and then she was happier than ever.

But one time he went away for a few days, and Cherry seemed quite alone in the house except for the child, for the other servants she had never seen. The little boy went out to play in the garden, and suddenly Cherry began to feel so curious as to what was back of the forbidden doors that it seemed as though she would die if she did not look. She tried to think of other things, and to remember how displeased her master would be if she opened the doors, but at last she could bear it no longer. She would just see what was behind one of them, and then she would look no further. But first she made sure that the little boy was still at play in the garden. He was sitting on the edge of a fountain, looking down into it, and suddenly he waved his hand and called out as though to something in the water.

A long hall of black and white tiles

Then Cherry opened the door and slipped through. She found herself in a long hall entirely of marble. The floor, the ceilings and walls all were of blocks of marble, black and white, and ranged up and down it were many marble statues. Some were the figures of beautiful women, some were of princes with crowns upon their heads or of young men magnificently dressed. She went slowly down the hall, staring and wondering, and at the very end she came upon Aunt Prudence, but it was an Aunt Prudence turned into marble, and scowling at her with marble, unseeing eyes. When she saw that, Cherry knew that she was in fairyland, and that her master had by his magic powers turned the old woman into this shape to quiet her scolding tongue.

She was terrified, for she was afraid that, as her master was a fairy, he would know that she had disobeyed him, and she went out quickly and closed the door behind her. However, when the gentleman came home that evening he was as kind and pleasant as ever, so she made sure that he knew nothing of what she had done.

But there was one thing Cherry was even more curious about than she had been about the doors, and that was about the ointment she rubbed upon the child’s eyes. Every day, more and more, she longed to rub her own eyes with it and try whether she, too, would not see invisible things. But beside her fear of disobeying her master the child’s eyes were always upon her while she had the box open, and as soon as she had rubbed his eyes and closed it she was obliged to give it to him, and she never could tell what he did with it or where he put it.

One morning, however, just after she had rubbed his eyes, and before she had washed her hands, she made out she had dropped the box by accident, and when she stooped to pick it up she managed to rub one eye with a finger that had a little ointment upon it. The child did not see what she had done, but when Cherry looked about her what a wonderful change had come

The bottle of Fairy Ointment