Once upon a time, the Queen of Fairyland, finding her own subjects far too well-behaved to be amusing, took a sudden longing to have a mortal or two at her Court. So, after looking about her for some time, she fixed upon two to bring to Fairyland.
But how were they to be brought?
"Please your majesty," said at last the daughter of the prime-minister,
"I will bring the girl."
The speaker, whose name was Peaseblossom, after her great-great-grandmother, looked so graceful, and hung her head so apologetically, that the Queen said at once,-
"How will you manage it, Peaseblossom?"
"I will open the road before her, and close it behind her."
"I have heard that you have pretty ways of doing things; so you may try."
The court happened to be held in an open forest-glade of smooth turf, upon which there was just one mole-heap.