opened by a fairy wand, so that he sees the little goblins and
imps dancing around him on the green sward, sitting on mushrooms,
or in the heads of the flowers, drinking out of acorn-cups,
fighting with blades of grass, and riding on grasshoppers.

So, too, the gallant knight, riding to save some poor oppressed
maiden, dashes across the foaming torrent; and just in the
middle, as he is being swept away, his eyes are opened, and he
sees fairy water-nymphs soothing his terrified horse and guiding
him gently to the opposite shore. They are close at hand, these
sprites, to the simple peasant or the gallant knight, or to
anyone who has the gift of the fairies and can see them. but the
man who scoffs at them, and does not believe in them or care for
them, he never sees them. Only now and then they play him an
ugly trick, leading him into some treacherous bog and leaving him
to get out as he may.

Now, exactly all this which is true of the fairies of our
childhood is true too of the fairies of science. There are
forces around us, and among us, which I shall ask you to allow me
to call fairies, and these are ten thousand times more wonderful,
more magical, and more beautiful in their work, than those of the
old fairy tales. They, too, are invisible, and many people live
and die without ever seeing them or caring to see them. These
people go about with their eyes shut, either because they will
not open them, or because no one has taught them how to see.
They fret and worry over their own little work and their own
petty troubles, and do not know how to rest and refresh
themselves, by letting the fairies open their eyes and show them
the calm sweet picture of nature. They are like Peter Bell of