Chapter 6

Ethel gave the white star on the cow's forehead a gentle pat and, looking into her great dark eyes, she said, "Surely you are my friend, Bossy." But the fairy said, "Come on, little girl, there are many more friends to see." So Ethel visited all the friendly animals,--the sheep with their woolly coats, the pigs in their sty, the chickens, the ducks and the geese in the barnyard, the pigeons in their home on the roof, the great clever collie in his kennel; and she found that she owed something to every one of them.

Just as she was giving Rover a farewell pat, old Dobbin, harnessed to the farm wagon, came clattering up to the barn. "Here comes the best friend of all!" cried Ethel. "What should we do without Dobbin to carry the milk and the butter and the eggs to the city, to draw the wood and the coal that keep us warm, to help the farmer plow and harrow the ground in the springtime, to draw in the hay and the grain in the autumn, and to trot cheerfully along the country road when the children take a ride? Oh! I hope the farmer gives him a good, dry bed to sleep upon, a manger of hay and a measure of oats when he is hungry. I hope he combs and smooths Dobbin's black coat well, and puts a blanket on his back when the weather is cold. I'm sure the farmer wouldn't cut off Dobbin's shiny black tail for the world, for how could Dobbin drive away the flies that trouble him, without his tail? I know that there is always plenty of fresh water for Dobbin to drink whenever he is thirsty, and that, sometimes, the children give him a lump of sugar to eat. The farmer never lets Dobbin lose a shoe, I'm sure, for fear he might go lame, but always takes him to the blacksmith if only a nail is loose."

Buzz z z z! buzz z z z! sounded close to Ethel's ear. She opened her eyes and looked about. There she sat upon a bench in the park. The sun had gone down behind the tall buildings, and it was almost dark. The pretty elfin in green had vanished. Her country friends were nowhere to be seen. A bee's gauzy wings and yellow legs were disappearing in the distance. "There goes another of my friends," said Ethel, "I think he must have come to tell me that it is time to go home."

So Ethel ran home and told her mother all about the fairy and her friends. "Oh, mamma! do you suppose the fairy really and truly took me to the country?" said Ethel.

"No," said mamma, "I think my little girl was asleep and dreaming; but, for all that, the animals on the farm are really among our very best friends."

"Yes, I know that," said Ethel, "how I wish I could see them!" And for many days after her wonderful dream Ethel never went to the park without thinking of how the little fairy in green took her to visit all her friends in the country.

End of Project Gutenberg's A Kindergarten Story Book, by Jane L. Hoxie