other. And when Nillywill heard that, she brought him into the palace through
the pansies by her own private way; then with her own hands she set food
before him, and made him eat. Hands, looking at her, said, "You are quite as
beautiful as I thought you would be!"

"And you--so are you!" she answered, laughing and clapping her hands. And "Oh,
the blue moon," she cried--"surely the blue moon must rise to-night!"

Low down in the west the new moon, leaning on its side, rocked and turned
softly in its sleep; and there, facing the earth through the cleared night,
the blue moon hung like a burning grape against the sky. Like the heart of a
sapphire laid open, the air flushed and purpled to a deeper shade. The wind
drew in its breath close and hushed, till not a leaf quaked in the boughs; and
the sea that lay out west gathered its waves together softly to its heart, and
let the heave of its tide fall wholly to slumber. Round-eyed, the stars looked
at themselves in the charmed water, while in a luminous azure flood the light
of the blue moon flowed abroad.

Under the light of many tapers within drawn curtains of tapestry, and feasting
her eyes upon the happiness of Hands, the Princess felt the change that had
entranced the outer world. "I feel," she said, "I do not know how--as if the
palace were standing siege. Come out where we can breathe the fresh air!"

The light of the tapers grew ghostly and dim, as, parting the thick hangings
of the window, they stepped into the night.

"The blue moon!" cried Nillywill to her heart; "oh, Hands, it is the blue
moon!"

All the world seemed carved out of blue stone; trees with stems dark-veined as