Then with new trumpetings came Oberon and Titania, the most puissant of kings and queens; whose realms and governance extend from the depths beneath, where the brownies in their fire-shops labour and create, to the high-built hidden palaces of the clouds. All castles in the air are in the kingdom of Oberon. Remember that! The royalties of Fairyland are royal indeed. They were accompanied by an escort of princes and princesses, of knights, elves, and gnomes; until the procession ended. Oberon and his queen sat on the double throne. He raised his sceptre in signal; the revels began. Many of the fairies who had been waiting, thereupon ran to the dancing-green, and on wings and feet as light and graceful as moonbeams on flowing water, danced. It was a vision of loveliness, the perfect poetry of music and motion. And so it went on and on, a kind of dream and of worship, till every one of the fairies had sung and danced her share. All the while there was the singing of elf-songs, to an accompaniment of nightingale voices, and joyous feasting on honeyed nectar and cates, the produce of fairy kitchens. The moon drifted along, jealous of the passing clouds which occasionally veiled her view, watching, and, from her loneliness, rejoicing with the fairies in their joy. Till Oberon arose. The birds ceased their songs. An owl hooted five times. Bim, forgetting caution, came boldly out of his hiding-place, the better to watch. The king raised an opal cup and gave the word: "June!" Every voice in Fairyland echoed him. The woods repeated the name: "June! June! June!" *CHAPTER II* *THE MADNESS OF JUNE* Throughout the revels June was sitting but three hand’s-breadth distance from Bim, so that he--who is our chief authority for these pages of history--better than anyone else could see, hear, and know all that happened in Fairyland on that very, very young May morning. June had been sitting there smiling, enjoying herself supremely. It was hard for her to believe that this banquet of sheer delight was entirely to her honour. Even Oberon, Titania, and those others whose names are as immortal as the passing pages of the books of humankind can make them, were there in a new relation--her subjects for the time being. The crowning was the only event which remained undone: it was the culmination of the revels, and would not happen until the cock which crows in the last of the morning darkness had duly squawked and shrilled.