The Magician's Show Box, and Other StoriesTappan, Caroline Sturgis
Science
The Magician's Show Box, and Other Stories
Tappan, Caroline Sturgis
Children's stories; Fairy tales
Rosamond and her mother continued to mould, not only vases, but little
images, which were very much sought after by all the villagers.
Rosamond never knew that the violet flame once more burned upon her
forehead; but she knew that Alfred loved her, and long and happy was
their life, there, by the wide, sunny sea.
FLORIBEL.
One long, summer afternoon, old Zachary and his wife Betsy, having
finished their tea at four o'clock, and having nothing very
interesting to do, thought they would visit Hoppletyhop; the dwarf,
who had promised to grant three wishes to any one who would bring him
the three things he most desired in the world. Old Zachary took the
president's message, a pair of spectacles, and a pipe full of tobacco,
which he smoked by the way. The old woman carried a bowl of hot tea, a
looking glass, and her very best plaited cap. As they went out of the
door, they found their little grandchild, Floribel, reading on the
step, and called to her to follow them. So she ran along with Jack the
Giant-killer in one hand, and dragging with the other her tin wagon,
in which sat her favorite doll, Rosa, drawn by four high-stepping tin
horses.
As they passed through the village, their neighbors, who were sitting
in their porches, enjoying the cool breeze, and feeling much too
indolent to do any thing, called out to know whither they were going;
and when told they were on their way to visit the dwarf Hoppletyhop,
advised them to stay quietly at home, for he would be sure to do them
some mischief. Zachary was a little inclined to turn back, when he
heard this; but Betsy said, “Let us go on--I should like to see what
mischief he will do;” and Floribel begged them to go, because she
wished to see if a fairy dwarf was as large as her doll.
As they walked along, she asked them what they should wish. “I shall
wish to be young, and deacon of the church,” said her grandfather.
“And I, to have a whole chest of souchong tea, and to be young also,”
said the grandmother. “But I shall wish for a castle as high as the
sky, and a golden dress that will never wear out, and a stick of
barley candy six thousand miles long,” said the little girl.
After a long walk they found Hoppletyhop playing jackstraws with a
grasshopper, on a bank of violets. He received them very politely, and
asked each of them to take a stone among the violets. The grandfather
then offered his presents. The dwarf read two sentences in the
president's message, and said he could not stand that; it was too
stupid. He peeped through the spectacles, and said they gave every
thing a twist; and as for tobacco, he could not endure it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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