A. FAIRY TALE FOR THE LITTLE FOLKS OF THE OTAGO WITNESS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2078, 21 December 1893, Page 18

A. FAIRY TALE FOR THE LITTLE FOLKS OF THE OTAGO WITNESS.

(Specially Written for the Witness Christmas

Number of 1803.)

By AJOB,

BAB LITTLE FOLKS,— Every - year before Father Ohristmaß comes I like to go and have a friendly chat y^ith him in Mb own home, which is far away down in the middle of a great wild but beautiful country fall

of tiny blue lakes, crystal rivers, and hills and lordly mountains dressed in blue and green clothes and snow-white caps. When I went to see him last, although he was very busy he yet received me kindly, and showed me between rests he sometimes took from a wonderful work the many strange thirgs about which I am now going to tell you. But first let me tell you what this merry old friend of little folks was doing. His beautiful home i 3 at the foot of Mount Cook, which your teachers tell you is the biggest mountain in the whole of the Australasian colonies — a group beautifully styled by a great historian Oceania — and Santa Claus (he had grown so small since last year that I scarcely recogDised him ; in fact, he was no bigger than — let me see, a good-sized sandfly) was building a tix>y ladder up the side of Mount Cook with the metal types used in the last Christmas Number of the Otago Witness ; and he was tying ifcs rungs and sides together with little strips of paper cut from the children's letters to Dot, each strip being a line.

When I got there Santa Claus was many thousands of feet up the side of this great mountain, and his tiny ladder, which had been getting higher and higher all the year since January had married May, had long passed up from the evergreen, softly- sighing pines bowing their stately heads in reverence as this active children's friend went by. And the bashful ratas blushed like coy maidens at bis approach, and the mountain lilies by gurgling brooklets laughed in glee as they caught eight of his merry face, and the stately edelweiss gave him a royal greeting, and the little Bby mountain wrens flattered fearlessly round his silvery head, and even Aorangi, the terrible genii of the mount, forgot his frowns to wish him good speed with his annual work. At the foot of the ladder and all round about were hundreds of tiny little boys and girls, much less than Father Christmas, all working diligently ; but when they saw me they all ran and hid among the millions of pebbles on the shores of a beautiful lake by the dwelling of Santa Claus. Presently Father Christmas came running down the ladder, and when he saw none of his little workers there he frowned ; but his naturally kind heart soon divining the cause, he came to me and, extending his wee hand, said with a smile : " O friend of last year and of the -waste of years gone before, 'tis thou hast affrighted my little army."

And I, answering with much concern, said : " Wherefore, O friend of little ones, 'tis sorry 1 am."

Bat he answered kindly : " Nay, sorrow not. Bat, O dear ! I'm so busy, and the time is Bhort. Pardon me, sir, and eat of this little cake," added he, as with a merry twinkle in his bine eyes he handed me a tiny golden speck, and then he was away off up the ladder.

Having always had a wonderful respect for Father Christmas, I did as he bid me, when an astounding change came over me. The first things I noticed were the trees all shooting away up skywards, and tha earth and pebbles at my feet came closer and closer, till they were right up to my eyes. Then I heard Father Christmas clapping his hands joyously and laughing merrily, and shouting out: "He's now small enough; hurrah, he's now small enough 1 " And all the little people came out of their hiding placas and surrounded me joyfully, clapping their hands too and dancing, and gleefully shouting : " He's one of us, now ; he's one of us I "

And when I looked into the blue lake I trembled to see that I was no bigger than a eandfly. But Father Christmas came, and putting his band on my shoulder whispered comfort, saying reassuriDgly : " Look, my friend, we have no sorrow, sickness, ache or pain; no disappointments, hopes, fears, jealousies, or terrors ; no bills to meet, direct vetoes or woman's franchise to war with. Our lives are, from day to day, and from year to year, a labour of love and a joyous holiday in the golden sunlight of our ten million children. See me," continued the cage. " Although I had my birth when the mountains were brought forth, and long before the trees grew or the lilies bloomed, yet Time, my twin brother, has left no wrinkle here." pointing to his kingly brow. " Silver hair I have, 'tis true, but not to that is due the weight of years. It seems but yesterday since I bsheld Alfred the Great welcome in childish glee my Christmas gift. And 25 years ago, dost thou not remember taking this top from thy stocking ? Come, friend, side with me that this is the acme of existence and join my happy workers,"

Then he was off away up the ladder again, leaving delightful feelings stealing over me, and still encircled by Qanta Olaus's gleeful boys and girl?, all bidding roe we) corns.

Presently they cea3ed play, and all but one went on again with the work my first appearance had suspended. This one happened to be a lltllsi maa nearly as big- as Saata Clau^, who c^Tne gravely to me acd said hi& name was Tsmpu-3, and he would sbow me how to make life & pleasant dream. Then he set hefore me a tatk, and hurriedly went his way.

Now when I was a boy I always hated arithmetic, and as a in au I never took kindly to that abstruse art or science. Judge, then, of my feelings when I saw that Tempun, as a means of making my life happier, had left me

the following problems to solve, as my first work in the Land of Pigmy Lilyf uchsia. This is how the problems ran :

"If our dear Otago Witness's Christmas Number had 52 pages of beautiful stories, and each page had five columns, and each column had 15G lines, and each line had 35 letters;— how many letters would that be?"

I felt my sand fly heart beat and my little bosom heave for a moment at sight of such an array of figures ; but it was only for a moment. The next instant I dived into the next problem, and this is what it was : " If this Christmas Number, with its 52 pages of fivo columns of 156 lines of 35 letters, requires the grand total of 283,920 metal types each lin long, and Mount Cook, the frosted spire of our pigmy home, be, say, 12,000 ft high, how many metal types of it are required to build our lin hung ladder to the top thereof 1 " "Well, I am not going to burden the minds of my little friends with the working out of the hideous calculations, but these are the answers I had when Tempus, whose work was to go continually about amoag the little workers, returned to me : — Approximate number of letters, 1,125,000. (2) About 432,000 types ; or the total number used in the Christmas edition would build a ladder, of lin rungs, right up one side and down the other of Mount Cook, and then leave enough over to print many of the succinct Notes of the Week, Passing Notes of classic " Oivis," racy Topics of " Mazeppa," M Pater's " interesting talks, mathematical replies of good Mr Arthur Beverly, dear "Dot's" contributors, and the chaste lines of " Wych Elm." I hope I am not wrong in my figures, dear boys and girls, as I have yet to go up and down that ladder with Santa Claus, and tell you of all the wonderful things I saw on the way. However, to return. Tempus appeared to be satisfied with my answers, for as soon as he had scrutinised them he turned with a smile and said : " Now help Father Christmas." Then we two went to the foot of the fairy ladder, and I paw for the first time, with my bright little eyes, a web-like, but very strong double line from us all the way to the top of Mount Cook. It was an endless line, moving up and down after the manner of an aerial tram, continually taking up with it many metal types. Looking round behind me I saw that the motive power was being supplied by hundreds of little boys and girls running round a thing like a ship's capstan. It was just play to them, and long before one little circle wearied another and another joyously awaited each their tarn. How I longed to be one of the group. " Presently, gently," said Tempus, observing my evident desire. II But see.'Santa, Claus signals to you. Listen to what 'the telephone says," added he, placing a miniature gold cup to my ear. " Yes ; he calls me to come up," said I, eagerly. "Speak back to him," replied Tempus, reassuringly. " Say, 'I am coming.' "

I did so, and then Tempus said very gravely : " Time flies. Go I " and I started away up on the ladder of metal types, but first, on Tempus's advice, supplying myself with a Whymper. I camped that night on an arete, one side of which looked straight down upon Mount Buster, the other being a sheer abyss of 6000 ft. Above me towered a mighty snow peak, against the steepled flank of which the ladder lay.

Whilst I ate my tea of all the delicious things of which Father Christmas has such a stock, I saw the sun sink like a ball of red gold into the sapphire waters of the Tasman sea, and as the twilight closed and up from the far forest lands rose the moon, I hid my head from the dark shadows which were thrown out everywhere from bis silvery light on the fantaetic rocks.

I went sound asleep, only [starting at intervals to the sometimes deafening roar of avalanches as they thundered down to unexplored gulfs. Once I woke, long after. The sun had put his nightcap on, and covered up his head, When countless stars appeared amid the cur-

tains round his bed. The moon arose, most motherly, to take a peep

how all The stars behaved while he, her sovereign, was

asleep. She saw them winls their silvery eyes, as if in

roguish play ; Though silent all, to her they seemed as if

they'd much to say. So lest their frolic 3 should disturb the sleeping

king of light, She rose so high that her mild eye could keep

them all in sight. The stars, abashed, stole softly back, and looked demure and prim, Until the moon began to nod, her eyes becom-

ingdira. Then sleepily she sought her home— that's some-

where ; who knows where ?—? — But as she went, the twinkling stars commenced their twinkling glare. And when the moon was fairly gone, The imps with silvery eyes Had so much fun it woke the sun, And he began to rise.

And I beheld all this so beautifully described by the poet, which many little folks may have heard of. Ere he was right up I resumed my ascent through the brilliant morning and a cloudless iky. E'ght overhead a great mass of snow and ice had lodged on a crevasso. One roll more and I would have been ground to powder. Trembling 1 , I climbed past the tottering mass.

Presently the stillness of the morning was broken by Lul— l— l— l— w— lul— la— he— o— o— o— o !

" What joyous musical notes were those ? " I asked myself delightedly.

Harkl theie they aia again and again. They fill with lovely echoes mountain and defile, crevasse and chasm, with their mellow music, and they come from yonder dome. I look up and tee Father Christmas on the highest peak of Mount Cock, and perceive he is welcoming the new-born day iv that powerful inountaiu nonce which thrj'ls me through and tbrrvgh. He beckons me, and I recommerce my delightful journey vp — up — up— -leaving iho .stunted pines, lUl<3*, edelweiss, mosses lichen, and grey rock behind, aud over spotless wiow aad glistening ice, catching glimpses of the perpetually bnruiug cord mine at Po'mi Elizabeth, along the northern coast lino; arid nearer feti'l, Gieymouth, with its black serpentine breakwater, like a huge .sea serpent afeltcp on tho watar ; aw»y southwards, but almost at my feet, Jackson's Bay, Milford Sound, and Mount Barcslaw, laved by its lovely lake; Big Ji-xy and Mount Aspiring towering up behind that

inlet. Up — vp — vp — till at length I sit astride of a knife-like portion of the arete connecting Cook and Tasman ; and here I found Santa Claus making all the millions of nice things for his friends, the little folks. But not waiting to show them, only bidding mo follow, away went the merry old gentleman up the ladder, which led straight up to tha highest peak of Aorangi ; and at noon of the cloudless, breathless day, we two, holding each other's hands, stood on top of the highest pinnacle in Oceania — the only people who ever got there— l2,349ft above yonder seas on either side of us.

New Zealand stretches out like a huge map before vs — a variegated patch of land in the midst of a blue ocean asleep. We can look straight down into Lake Pukakl shining like a brilliant in an eardrop, no bigger does it seem ; yet we know that on its expansive bosom thousands of snow peaks are mirrored ; we can pick out Scaly Peak, 8651 f t; Mount Sefton, 10,350 ft; the Footstool, 9703 ft; Mount Burnett, 9029 f t; and were it not for intervening mountains — St. Bathans, Ida, and ope or two others — we could probably catch sight of Dunedin. Ah 1 my dear boys and girls, you would scarcely credit what a brilliant living panorama is to be seen from the top of Mount Cook. There is nothing half so beautiful anywhere else in the world that I know of. But to be up there makes one feel very small indeed ; it will cure the most conceited of persons, and make him feel good all over, and I am thankful I went there.

Well, in due time we — that is, Santa CJaus and I — got down again, and as I expressed a wish to go home, this kind old sage gave me another little cake, bidding me first, ere eating it, say farewell to all the inhabitants of Pigmy Lilyfuchsia. I ate the little cake, which changed me back to my original size, and as I half regretfully left Lilyfuchsia all the pines of the forest sighed softly, and I felt sure these were the parting regrets of the Lilyfuchsians.