TOLD BY READERS^

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 83, 8 April 1933, Page 2 (Supplement)

TOLD BY READERS^

piper of The dawn, (By Elsa Plavell, P.O. Box 313, Haweia: age 16.) Trixie came out of her tent' and looked around at a scene of awakened loveliness. It was very early. The sun had just risen, and the sky was flushed with rosy light and barred with golden cloud. Below the little rise on which the tent wa« pitched the bush was yet veiled in shadow, and all was- very still. Not even a bird sang. Then, as Trixie watched, entranced by the beauty and freshness of the dawn, there came a sudden sound of shrill, piercing sweetness, ringing up from the shadowy bushland, i •

Trixie stood with clasped hands and eyes that glowed with a light of joy and wonder. Surely it was fairy piping that came clear and reed-like, thrilling through the magic beauty of the dawn. Or was it Pan, god of the woods, who |iipcd so sweetly? She must find out; she could not stay, content to listen.

They were all asleep within the tent. She might go without awakening them, if she ran straight down the hill Without stopping to dress. Why shouldn't she—there was no one to see, and, if she did not go at once the piper might stop. At that thought Trixie went running down the slope, and disappeared among the trees.

The sound of the piping led her through the bush, with a melody of dreamy sweetness, a melody that seemed to belong to the dawn as much as the colours in the eastern sky. The birds awoke and sang, but though their songs were wonderfully sweet, the piping rang vet sweeter.

Trixie danced along, her heart beating high with excitement. Who was it played so sweetly in the light of the early dawn? There was magic in 'the sound. (Surely no human being could pipe like that. Now it was like a soft breeze among the leaves, now like a brooklet murmuring; now the colours of the dawn sky, interpreted •_ into melody; now a tune that sang of the loveliness of trees and flowers. Trixie jumped up and broke off a cluster of brilliant pohutukawa flowers as she ran; the belody seemed to tell of their glowing beauty at that moment.

It was only a man who was piping, j .after all. Trixie saw him when she! came out of the b'ush on the side fur- I ther away from the tent. She teaned against a tree, a little breathless and disappointed, and looked at him. He was sitting on a low stool, and before him was a canvas with a half-painted picture upon it; but he was looking up at the glowing sky and playing a flute. Oh. well! It. couldn't possibly have been a Fairy; no one believed in them now. As for Pun, he belonged only to ' old myths. How clever this man must ! be to pipe like that. Trixie stood still and listened, entranced.

Thru the piper turned and saw her, nnil. shy and half afraid, Trixie turned to run.

"Stop—stay as you are." the piper called, and she stayed, looking back at him uncertainly.

'"Stay still and let me see how you arc standing," h e said, excitedly. "You look like a little wood-nymph." Indeed, Trixie looked' like a wood- J nymph, clad only in her long white j nightdress. Leaves had fallen upon her 1 dark hair, which huilg over her shoulders in shining curls, and she still held the I-;ight polmtukawa (lowers. One hand rested on the trunk of a tree, the brandies of which swept down just al.ovp ]~.,. Ilead J Tlv piper si nod and "razed at her for a nil. ... Then he smiled. "I erme here lo seek inspiration." he eiikl, "and I've found it. You see this picture? rv e i,cen painting it for a long tunc—Pan and his satvvs; but it' isn't the success I'd planned; so I came here early, thinking that the atmosphere ' of the hush at dawli—" he paused Middenly, realising that Trixie was oillv a! child, and probably would not understand, j

Original Stories under this heading are invited for our Fortnightly Competition.

"I want to paint you, just as you are standing now," he continued; "that is, if your parents are willing. Will you take me to ask them?"

As they went back through the bush he asked Trixie how she had found him.

"1 heard you piping," she told him, "and I came to see who it was. I—l thought it might be a fairy, or Pan."

'"It was Pan I was thinking of, anyway," the piper laughed, "though he had a pipe of reeds, and mine is a flute. I'm certainly not a fairy, though I begin to think there's magic about my flute, for it culled a nymph to me."

Trixie's mother was greatly surprised when she saw the stranger and heard his request, but she consented readily, ahd nearly every remaining day of the holidays Trixie went and stood beneath the tree while "The Piper" (she always called him thatK busily painted her picture. When it was at length finished, the artist turned to her with a smile

"There, little wood-nymph," he said "your portrait's done."

"You've made me look sad," Trixie said.

"That's just how you looked when I saw you," he answered. "You were disappointed because I was only a human, after all. I shall call the picture 'The Disappointed Nymph.' "

The name was soon to become famous, for the picture was acclaimed as a masterpiece. In after years its painter became a very wealthy and muchhonoured man, but he never forgot a certain lovely morning in the New Zealand bush, and the shy little nymph who had come in answer to his piping. Trixie. for her part, even when she was grownup, always thought of him as "The Piper."

WHAT A BOOK SAID

(Sent'in by Cyril Treby, 4, Queen Street, New Lynn.) Once upon a time a library book was overheard talking to a little boy who had just borrowed it. The words seem worth recording, and here they are:— "Please don't handle me with dirty hands. I should feel ashamed to be seen when the next little boy borrowed me. "Or lean on me with your elbows when you are reading me. It hurts. "Or open me and lay me face down upon the table. You wouldn't like to be treated so. "Or put in between my leaves a pencil or anything thicker than a Single sheet of thin paper. It would strain my back. "Whenever you have finished reading hie, if you are afraid of losing your place, don't turn the corner of one of my leaves, but have a Ue'at little bookmark to put in where you stopped, and then close me and lay nie down on my side *o that 1 can have a good, comfortable rest. "Ivcniember that I Want to visit a great many other little boys after you have done with me. Besides, I may meet you agajn some day, and yo'u would be very sorry to see me looking old and torn and soiled. Help to keep me fresh and clean, and I will help you to bo happy."—Copied.

OUR WEEKLY MOTTO. Scores of entries were »<rc'C©ivp(l fur tin- motto competition this wt'ek. and I lie Standard w um-l; \Vus vcfev bisli I In-' usual half-crown ' prlfcc was awarded to Dorothy Carter. Soahroolt AvcnTH'. .Yew J.run. iiirtol 10; lilghly cimioten.lcd entries eoininjr. fi'mn .lovcc Nicholson, Rita Jones. Hazel Ford. Dnrolli.v Price and Joan PnWngtnn. Wouldn't this old world be better If the folks wie meet would say, "I know something good about you»" And then treat us just that Way? Wouldn't it be nice to practise That fine Way of thinking, tO6? You know something good about rile, I know something good about you*