June gazed fixedly at him, waved her wand, and willed him to look at Sally. He did so. The spell was on him. One glance was enough to influence his inexperienced heart--he was not old or wealthy enough to have learned caution in his charity. He could not now have enjoyed his cricket, remembering, as he must do, the pale, starved face of that weary child, and not have helped her. He hid his actions in the shelter of a convenient doorway, opened the packet, took out two sandwiches and a chunk of cake, shoved the rest in his jacket-pocket, and, running shamefacedly by, dropped the provender on Sally’s lap. He heard her give a gulp of joy as he went on with singing heart, to be the happiest lad in Kennington. Surrey did better than usual that day. While the child greedily munched and waited, June, grudging the wasting of time, flew skywards to investigate. She was soon above the roofs, and awed by the myriad chimneys. Her attention was caught by the dome of St. Paul’s, which gloomed like a round purple cloud, over and above all else. It was, as it is, the crown of London. She had never seen anything like it in Fairyland, and wondered at the patience of men. Truly, they were poor things, transient creatures, and all that; but they have faith in what is material, and manage many things in their few years. Her wings moved rapidly. She sped like a flash of fragrant light over the intervening courts and houses, and quickly came to St. Paul’s Churchyard. She passed between the branches of the trees in the railed garden, greeting sparrows and pigeons as she went, and wishing--wishing heartily--she could meet some of those bright-hued, happy-songed friends of hers, who bless the friends and skies of the country. But that could not be. The birds she loved had followed the fairies, leaving prose in feathers behind. She circled slowly right round the big dome, and wondered more than anything else at its crusted dirt--which dated from the Stuarts. She settled on the weather-ruined statue of an apostle--whom it represented being as indistinguishable as Shem in the nursery Noah’s Ark--and gazed with wonder and without admiration at the moving, stretching scene--the live panorama--before her. Roofs and steeples and streets--stretching on and on--that was the picture seen by the fairy. It had its wonders, no doubt; but oh, the pity of it, the crowding and the treelessness! What a woeful waste of space! The fairies, amongst their shortcomings, have absolutely no sense of political economy. Had June been told that ground-rent on Ludgate Hill is so many pounds sterling a square inch, she would have been totally unimpressed and possibly bored. "Where could the children find room to play?" she said to herself. "And the flowers must all be smothered!"