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Rewards and Fairies

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<h1> REWARDS AND FAIRIES </h1> <h2> By Rudyard Kipling </h2> <hr /> <h2> A Charm </h2> Take of English earth as much As either hand may rightly clutch. In the taking of it breathe Prayer for all who lie beneath— Not the great nor well-bespoke, But the mere uncounted folk Of whose life and death is none Report or lamentation. Lay that earth upon thy heart, And thy sickness shall depart! It shall sweeten and make whole Fevered breath and festered soul; It shall mightily restrain Over-busy hand and brain; it shall ease thy mortal strife 'Gainst the immortal woe of life, Till thyself restored shall prove By what grace the Heavens do move. Take of English flowers these— Spring's full-faced primroses, Summer's wild wide-hearted rose, Autumn's wall-flower of the close, And, thy darkness to illume, Winter's bee-thronged ivy-bloom. Seek and serve them where they bide From Candlemas to Christmas-tide, For these simples used aright Shall restore a failing sight. These shall cleanse and purify Webbed and inward-turning eye; These shall show thee treasure hid, Thy familiar fields amid, At thy threshold, on thy hearth, Or about thy daily path; And reveal (which is thy need) Every man a King indeed! <h2> Introduction </h2> Once upon a time, Dan and Una, brother and sister, living in the English country, had the good fortune to meet with Puck, alias Robin Goodfellow, alias Nick o' Lincoln, alias Lob-lie-by-the-Fire, the last survivor in England of those whom mortals call Fairies. Their proper name, of course, is 'The People of the Hills'. This Puck, by means of the magic of Oak, Ash, and Thorn, gave the children power To see what they should see and hear what they should hear, Though it should have happened three thousand year. The result was that from time to time, and in different places on the farm and in the fields and in the country about, they saw and talked to some rather interesting people. One of these, for instance, was a Knight of the Norman Conquest, another a young Centurion of a Roman Legion stationed in England, another a builder and decorator of King Henry VII's time; and so on and so forth; as I have tried to explain in a book called PUCK OF POOK'S HILL. A year or so later, the children met Puck once more, and though they were then older and wiser, and wore boots regularly instead of going barefooted when they got the chance, Puck was as kind to them as ever, and introduced them to more people of the old days. He was careful, of course, to take away their memory of their walks and conversations afterwards, but otherwise he did not interfere; and Dan and Una would find the strangest sort of persons in their gardens or woods. In the stories that follow I am trying to tell something about those people. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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