The Zankiwank and The Bletherwitch: An Original Fantastic Fairy Extravaganza

"Hush, my dears, the Nargalnannacus is afloat on the wild, wild main. We must be careful and depart, or he will turn us into something unpleasant – the last century or may be the next, as it is close at hand, and inexpensive. Follow me to the ship that is waiting in the Bay Window, and we will go and get some Floranges."

Carefully Maudie and Willie followed the Zankiwank, each holding on by the tails of his coat, glad enough to go anywhere out of the Blackness of the Dark.

Soon they found themselves in Window Bay, and climbing up the sides of a mighty ship with five funnels and a red-haired captain.

"Quick," called the Captain, "the Nargalnannacus is on the lee scuppers just off the jibboom brace. Make all sail for the Straights of Ballambangjan, and mind the garden gate."

Then the Zankiwank became the man at the wheel, and the vessel scudded before the wind as the two children went off into a trance.

Part II

The Fairies' Feather and

Flower Land

 
Faëry elves,
Whose midnight revels, by a forest side
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon
Sits arbitress.
 

Milton.

 
O then I see Queen Mab hath been with you:
She is the fairies' midwife; and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a train of little atomies,
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep.
 

Shakespeare.

The Fairies' Feather and
Flower Land

How long Maude and Willie had been rocking in the cradle of the deep they could not tell, nor how long it took them to steam through the Straits of Ballambangjan, for everything was exceptionally bleak and blank to them. By the way, if you cannot find the Straits of Ballambangjan in your Geography or on the Map, you should consult the first sailor you meet, and he will give you as much information on the subject as any boy or girl need require.

Both children experienced that curious sensation of feeling asleep while they were wide awake, and feeling wide awake when they imagined themselves to be asleep, just as one does feel sometimes in the early morning, when the sun is beginning to peep through the blinds, and the starlings are chattering, and the sparrows are tweeting under the eaves, outside the window.

They were no longer on the vessel that had borne them away from Fableland, and the approach of the Nargalnannacus, a fearsome creature whom nobody has yet seen, although most of us may not have heard about him.

The obliging Zankiwank was with them, and when they looked round they found themselves in a square field festooned with the misty curtains of the Elfin Dawn.

"Of course," said the Zankiwank, "this is Midsummer Day, and very soon it will be Midsummer Night, and you will see some wonders that will outwonder all the wonders that wonderful people have ever wondered both before and afterwards. Listen to the Flower-Fairies – not the garden flowers, but the wild-flowers; they will sing you a song, while I beat time – not that there is any real need to beat Time, because he is a most respectable person, though he always contrives to beat us."

Both children would have liked to argue out this speech of the Zankiwank because it puzzled them, and they felt it would not parse properly. However, as just at that moment the Elfin Orchestra appeared, they sat on the grass and listened: —

 
This is the Elfin Dawn,
When ev'ry Fay and Faun,
Trips o'er the earth with joy and mirth,
And Pleasure takes the maun.
Night's noon stars coyly peep,
O'er dale and dene and deep,
And Fairies fair float through the air,
Love's festival to keep.
 
 
We dance and sing in the Welkin Ring,
While Heather Bells go Ding-dong-ding!
To greet the Elfin Dawn.
The Flower-fairies spread each wing,
 
 
And trip about with mincing ging,
Upon the magic lawn.
And so we frisk and play,
Like mortals, in the day;
From acorn cup we all wake up
Titania to obey.
We never, never die,
And this the reason why,
Of Fancy's art we are the part
That lives eternalie.
 
 
We dance and sing in the Welkin Ring,
While Heather Bells go Ding-dong-ding!
To greet the Elfin Dawn.
The Flower-fairies spread each wing,
And trip about with mincing ging,
Upon the magic lawn.
 

"They keep very good time, don't they?" said the Zankiwank to the children, who were completely entranced with pleasure and surprise.

"Lovely, lovely," was all they could say.

Every wild flower they could think of, and every bird of the air, was to be seen in this beautiful place with the purling stream running down the centre, crossed by innumerable rustic bridges, while far away they could see a fountain ever sending upward its cooling sprays of crystal water.

"I think I shall spend my honeymoon here," said the Zankiwank. "I have already bought a honeycomb for my bride. I am so impatient to have her by my side that I have dispatched the Jackarandajam and Mr Swinglebinks in a four-wheeled cab to fetch her. When the Bletherwitch arrives I will introduce you, and you shall both be bridesmaids!"

"But I can't be a bridesmaid, you know," corrected Willie.

"Oh yes, you can. You can be anything here you like. You only have to eat some Fern seeds and you become invisible, and nobody would know you. It is so simple, and saves a lot of argument. And you should never argue about anything unless you know nothing about it, then you are sure to win."

"But," interrupted Maude, "how can you know nothing about anything?"

"'Tis the easiest thing out of the world," said the Zankiwank. "What is nothing?"

"Nothing."

"Precisely. Nothing is nothing; but what is better than nothing?"

"Something."

"Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Where is your logic? Nothing is better than something! I'll prove it: —

 
"Nothing is sweeter than honey,
Nothing's more bitter than gall,
Nothing that's comic is funny,
Nothing is shorter than tall."
 

"That is nonsense and nothing to do with the case," exclaimed Maude.

"Nonsense? Nonsense? Did you say nonsense?"

"Of course she did," said Willie, "and so do I."

"Nonsense! To me? Do you forget what my name is?"

"Oh, no, nothing easier than to remember it. You are the Great Zankiwank."

"Thank you, I am satisfied. I thought you had forgotten. I am not cross with you."

Maude and Willie vowed they would not cross him for anything, let alone nothing, and so the Zankiwank was appeased and offered to give them the correct answer to his own unanswerable conundrum. Do you know what a conundrum is though? I will tell you while the Zankiwank is curling his whiskers: —

A conundrum is an impossible question with an improbable answer. Think it over the next time you read "Robinson Crusoe."

 
"Nothing is better than a good little girl;
But a jam tart is better than nothing,
Therefore a jam tart is better than the best little girl alive."
 

"What do you think of that?" said the Zankiwank.

"I have heard something like it before. But that is nothing. Anyhow I would much rather be a little girl than a jam tart – because a jam tart must be sour because it's tart, and a little girl is always sweet," promptly replied Willie, kissing his sister Maude on the nose – but that was an accident, because she moved at the wrong moment.

"You distress me," said the Zankiwank. "Suppose I were to try to shoot Folly as it flies, and hit a Fool's Cap and Bells instead, what would you say?"

"I should say that you had shot at nothing and missed it."

At this Maude and Willie laughed girlsterously and boysterously, and the Zankiwank wept three silent tears in the teeth of the wind and declared that nothing took his fancy so much as having nothing to take. So they took him by the arm and begged him, as he was so clever and had mentioned the name, to take them to Fancy's dwelling-place.

"I think Fancy must dwell amongst the wild flowers – the sweet beautiful wild flowers that grow in such charming variety of disorder." Saying this, Maude took Willie's hand and urged the Zankiwank forward.

Before the Zankiwank could reply, a company of fairies, all dressed in pink and green, leapt from the petals of the flowers and danced forward, singing to the buzz of the bees and the breaking note of the yellow-ammer with his bright gamboge breast: —

Where is Fancy Bred

 
O would you know where Fancy dwells?
And where she flaunts her head?
Come to the daisy-spangled dells,
And seek her in her bed.
For Fancy is a maiden sweet,
With all a maiden's whims;
As quick as thought – as Magic fleet —
Like gossamer she skims.
 
 
O seek among the birds and bees,
And search among the buds;
In babbling brook, in silver seas,
Or in the raging floods.
Gaze upward to the starry vault;
Or ask the golden sun:
Though ever you will be at fault
Before your task is done.
 
 
O would you know where Fancy dwells?
It is not in the flow'rs;
It is not in the chime of bells,
Nor in the waking hours.
It is not in the learnëd brain,
Nor in the busy mart;
It lives not with the false and vain,
But in the tender heart.
 

As mysteriously as they had appeared, the fairies vanished again, and only the rustling of the leaves and the twittering of the birds making melody all around, reminded the children that they were on enchanted ground. Now and then the bull-frogs would set up a croaking chorus in some marshy land far behind, but as no one could distinguish what they said it did not matter.

 
O to be here for ever,
With the fairy band,
O to wake up never
From this dreamy land!
For the humblest plant is weighted
With some new perfume,
And the scent of the air drops like some prayer
And mingles with the bloom.
O to be here for ever, and never, never wake.
 

Was that the music of the spheres they wondered? Somehow it seemed as though their own hearts' echo played to the words that fell so soft, like a fair sweet tender melody of fairies long ago.

The Zankiwank had left them again, to send another telegram, perhaps, and Maude and Willie went rambling through the meadow and down by the brook, where they gathered nuts and berries and sat them down to enjoy a rural feast.

Tiny elves and fairies were constantly coming and going, some driving in wee chariots with ants for horses and oak leaves for carriages. And while all the other flowers seemed quite gay and merry in the sunshine, the Poppies were nodding their scarlet heads and gently dozing, what time some wild Holly Hocks beat to and fro murmuring —

 
Sleep! Sleep! Sleep!
While the corn is ready to reap.
Sleep! Sleep! Sleep!
And the lightest hours a-creep.
Sleep! Sleep! Sleep!
On the edge of the misty deep.
 

As they lay upon the bank, to their surprise a procession of birds came along, the two foremost being fine handsome thrushes, carrying a large banner of ivy leaves, on which was inscribed, in letters of red clover, the following legend: —

Bean-Feast of Birds

from London and

the Suburbs

"Fancy," said Maude, "all the birds of London Town come to Fairy-land for a change of air!"

"And why not?" asked a saucy Cock-sparrow. "We can't be always singing the same song, so we come here for a change of air, and of course when we get a change of air we return with new melodies. If you were to Reed your books properly you would know that the Pipes of our Organs – our vocal Organs – want tuning occasionally."

Then, without any warning, they all struck up a new song, and marvel of marvels, instead of merely singing like ordinary birds, they sang the words as well. But before giving you the lyric that they voiced so melodiously I must tell you the names of some of the birds they saw, and if you live in London or any large town you will perhaps know several of them by sight, as well as by cognomen. First in the throng were the Mistle-Thrushes and the song Thrushes; the Redwing and the Fieldfare, the Blackbird and the Redstart, and the Redbreast with faithful Jenny Wren; the large family of Titmouse and the merry Chiff-chaff, with his pleasant little song of "Chiff-chaff; chiff-chaff; chiv-chave." The humoursome Wagtails and that rare visitant the Waxwing, hopped along together, followed by the Swallows and the Martins, and a whole posse of Finches of various orders, particularly the Chaffinches who were joking with the Linnets.

Then came the noisy Starlings, the Magpies and the Sparrows chattering incessantly and evidently talking scandal. The sly Jackdaws and the Ravens looking as sleek as Sunday Sextons, but evidently plotting mischief, were also present, in close proximity to the Rooks and the Crows, who were well able to take care of their own caws. Afterwards came the Swifts and the Larks up to all sorts of games. A few Woodpeckers joined their feathered friends, and one Cuckoo was there, because Willie heard him, but he kept somewhere in the background as usual. Owls and Bats and Millards with Wigeons and Pigeons brought up the rear with a few Plovers, including the Lapwing. Jack Snipe came tumbling after in a hurry, with a stranger called the Whimbrel and a Puffin out of breath. There were other birds as well, but I don't think you would know them if I mentioned them. Maude and Willie did not, and they were quite authorities on ornithology, and perhaps you are not.

The Song of the Birds

 
We are the birds of London Town,
Come out to take the air,
To change our coats of grey and brown,
And trim our feathers rare.
 
 
For London fogs so very black
Our tempers disarrange,
And so we skip with piping trip,
To have our yearly change.
 
 
Pee wit! Tu! whoo!
How do you do?
Tweet! tweet! chip! chip!
Chiff! chaff! chiff chay!
Weet wee! weet weet! sweet way!
Cuckoo!
 
 
We sing our songs in London Town,
To make the workers gay;
And seeds and crumbs they throw us down —
'Tis all we ask as pay.
 
 
We make them think of fields all green
And long-forgotten things;
Of far-off hopes and dreams a-sheen
And love with golden wings.
 
 
Pee wit! Tu! whoo!
How do you do?
Tweet! tweet! chip! chip!
Chiff! chaff! chiff chay!
Weet wee! weet weet! sweet way!
Cuckoo!
 

After this very entertaining song each bird stood on one leg, spread one wing, and joined partners for one of the prettiest dances you ever saw. It was called the Birds' Quadrille, and was so charmingly executed that even the flowers left their beds and borders to look on – the fairies peeping meanwhile from the buds to join in the general enjoyment. The voices of the flowers were lifted in gentle cadences to the rhythm of the feathered dancers' featly twists and turns.

How happy the children felt in this beautiful place with all Nature vieing to show her sweetest charms. And how rich and rare were the gems of foliage and tree and humble creeping plants. How easy to forget everything – but joy – in this fairy paradise that Fancy so deftly pictured for them! Could there be anything sad in Flower Land? They could not believe it possible, and yet when a tiny little fairy stepped from a cluster of wild flowers and sang them the song of the Lily and the Rose, diamond tears stole down the cheeks of the little lass and the little lad.