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She got into her sleigh which is made of a dove-feather, curling up in front, and which is drawn by twelve lady birds: the lady birds all had on robes of caterpillar fuz to keep them warm. The retinue of eleven Faeries were all riding on milk-white steeds of dandelion-down. The Queen held the reins herself, and cracking the whip which is made of a musquito leg, away they went over the moon-beam.
This they put in the middle; but where was the dew? there was none of course, so one of the Faeries had crept down, got on a dandelion-down horse's back and ridden over the moon-beam to the window. In the crack of the sash he got a wee bit of ice that made part of a drop of water when he held it in his hand. It looked like dew, and he managed to get it safely back without spilling much.
Despair instantly renewed his vigour; he started from the ground, and throwing round him a look of eager desperation, his eye caught the glimpse of a small door, upon which the moon-beam now fell. He made towards it, and passed it just as the light of a torch gleamed upon the walls of the vault. He groped his way along a winding passage, and at length came to a flight of steps.
The Queen saw me just as they left the palace, and gave me a nod. She is very gracious! It did not take them long to reach the bed, I can tell you, and they reined up at the other end of the moon-beam, which rested on Milly's breast. I wondered what they were going to do here, but it was very soon evident.
I charm the world; I am everywhere on a moon-beam, in the trembling of a hidden spring, in the moving of leaves that murmur, in the white vapours that rise each morning from the hollow meadow, in the thickets of pink brier everywhere!... I am seen; I am loved. There are sighs uttered, weird thrills of pleasure felt by those who follow the light print of my feet, as I make the dead leaves whisper.
The moon-beam ends right here," said the red squirrel-girl, pointing to her looking-glass, and, surely enough, there the bright shaft of light ended. "But there is no fortune here, Uncle Wiggily, I am sorry to say," she added. "I see there isn't," answered the rabbit. "Well, I must travel on again to-morrow, then. But now I will see that you get safely home, for it is getting late."
The room was full of water, and by a misty moon-beam, which found its way through a hole in the shutter, they could see in the midst of it an enormous foam globe, spinning round, and bobbing up and down like a cork, on which, as on a most luxurious cushion, reclined the little old gentleman, cap and all. There was plenty of room for it now, for the roof was off.
Why, there was a nice, little, red squirrel-girl, and she had a comb and a brush, and little looking-glass. And the glass was stuck up on a stump where the moon-beam that Uncle Wiggily was following shone on it and reflected back again. And by the light of the moon-beam the red squirrel was combing and brushing out her tail as hard as she could comb and brush it.
"That must have gold at the end, and, if I find it, my fortune is made." So off he started to follow the moon-beam to where it came to an end. It seemed to go quite a distance through the dark woods, and Uncle Wiggily traveled on for several hours, and he didn't seem to be any nearer the end by that time than he was at first. "My land, this is a very long beam," he exclaimed.
He imagined her melting, like a moon-beam, into all manner of sweet compliances, becoming an image and reflection of his own better self; and repeated to himself the lines of Wordsworth, "I saw her, on a nearer view, A spirit, yet a woman too, Her household motions light and free, And steps of virgin liberty.
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