Page:Fairy Book by Sophie May.djvu/85

Rh caught in a nixie's net spread upon the grass.

But, in time, her wings dwindled and disappeared; and then the lord, who was now her father, could not remember that she had ever been other than an earthly child.

"You fancy you were once a sylphid," said he; "but there are no sylphids, my sweet one, and there is no Summer-land."

The child became as dear to the lord and lady as their very heart's blood; and they forgot her foreign birth, and almost believed, as all the world did, that she was their own little daughter. But the child did not forget. She longed for the true home she had left; but whither should she go to seek it?

"Dear papa," said she, one day, "I beg you will not say again there are no sylphids; for I remember so well how I spread my