Will it hold you? Goodness, yes
But you can not have a seat
In the Bumblebee Express
If you are not good and sweet.
Hardly had the last note of this Fairy summons died away, when there
came a soft, whirring sound below them.
"Look!" cried Lulu. They peered over the edge of the room in the rock
far down along the Golden Ladder; and there, approaching them rapidly,
they saw a bright light. A faint click came along the Ladder, as one
may sometimes hear the rails click when a railway train is far away.
Rapidly this light grew more distinct, and almost at once, with a whizz
and a whir about as loud as ordinarily may be heard across a room, but
which in that place sounded very much louder, there drew up at the edge
of the chamber a strange and wonderful little coach, such as perhaps no
Twins in the world ever saw before.
It was made of a walnut shell for a body, although the shell was traced
with lines of silver and gold. It had a canopy over the top, made of
such gossamer as blows upon the air of evenings. Within it were two
seats, each as large as a silver dime, and there was another seat or
high box for the coachman. The coachman was a small blue grasshopper,
who sat very erect and straight upon his seat and drove with wonderful
skill, holding tight to the lines, which were made of single strands of
silk. The most wonderful of all was the team which drew this little
Fairy coach, for such at once they saw it was. Its horses were nothing
in the world but great golden bumblebees, with black and yellow bodies,
with fuzzy legs and large, bright, dark eyes, which shone so clearly
that no other lamps were needed for the coach. Indeed, it had been
their eyes which the Twins saw as they leaned over the edge; and it was
their strange, steady buzzing which had made the noise they heard--a
very busy and pleasant sound when bumblebees are going as fast as these
had been. They panted a little as the coachman pulled them up and drove
slowly into the little room in the rocky wall where the Twins were
sitting. The latter looked at the Fairy coach with delight, for it was
the most beautiful thing they had ever seen in all their lives. At first
they did not know whether there was any one about the coach but the
driver, but now there stepped down a footman, about as large as a green
house-fly and much resembling one. With a deep bow, he swung open the
door in the side of the coach as though inviting the Twins to enter. As
he did this, the driver tightened up his reins and the golden harness of
the bumblebee horses jingled and jangled and tinkled as they began to
toss their heads and champ at their bits, eager to start.
"Dear me," said Lulu, "isn't this the sweetest little coach in all the
world? How fine it must be to be a Fairy and ride in such a coach as
this!"
"What is this, Banjo," asked Zuzu, "and where has it come from?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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