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FAIRIES I HAVE MET Mountain. Take it for me, and dip it into the darkest and deepest deep of the blue sea."

So the mermaid took the crystal chip and dived down with it into the darkest and deepest deep of the blue sea.

Now, it is well known that whatever is touched by the deepest deep of the sea is changed by it for ever, and becomes itself a part of the sea. And so, when the mermaid brought the chip of crystal back to the fairy it had become like a chip of the sea—shining and gleaming and deep, deep blue.

And that was the first sapphire.

And when the second fairy left the Crystal Mountain with his little bit of rock under his arm, he flew to the great forest where the wood-pixies lived.

"Pixies, pixies," he called to them, "here is a chip from the Crystal Mountain. Take it for me into the darkest and deepest deep of the green forest, and do not bring it back to me till the green of the forest has sunk into its very heart."

Of course you must have noticed that the wood-pixies have the gift of making things green; for every one knows that in the forest where they live everything is green—the trees and the grass and the soft moss. And the shade under the trees is dark, dark green, and here and there where the sun peeps through, the green is very bright. So the pixies took the chip of crystal away with them into the darkest deep of the forest and laid it in the green moss where the green shadows were darkest under the green trees. And after a time the magic of the pixies began to work, and the greenness of the forest sank into the very 64