thought he could distinguish the vapoury form of North Wind, seated as

he had left her, on the other side. Hastily he descended the tree, and

to his amazement found that the map or model of the country still lay at

his feet. He stood in it. With one stride he had crossed the river; with

another he had reached the ridge of ice; with the third he stepped over

its peaks, and sank wearily down at North Wind's knees. For there she

sat on her doorstep. The peaks of the great ridge of ice were as lofty

as ever behind her, and the country at her back had vanished from

Diamond's view.

North Wind was as still as Diamond had left her. Her pale face was white

as the snow, and her motionless eyes were as blue as the caverns in the

ice. But the instant Diamond touched her, her face began to change like

that of one waking from sleep. Light began to glimmer from the blue of

her eyes.

A moment more, and she laid her hand on Diamond's head, and began

playing with his hair. Diamond took hold of her hand, and laid his face

to it. She gave a little start.

“How very alive you are, child!” she murmured. “Come nearer to me.”

By the help of the stones all around he clambered up beside her, and

laid himself against her bosom. She gave a great sigh, slowly lifted her

arms, and slowly folded them about him, until she clasped him close. Yet

a moment, and she roused herself, and came quite awake; and the cold of

her bosom, which had pierced Diamond's bones, vanished.

“Have you been sitting here ever since I went through you, dear North

Wind?” asked Diamond, stroking her hand.

“Yes,” she answered, looking at him with her old kindness.

“Ain't you very tired?”

“No; I've often had to sit longer. Do you know how long you have been?”

“Oh! years and years,” answered Diamond.

“You have just been seven days,” returned North Wind.

“I thought I had been a hundred years!” exclaimed Diamond.

“Yes, I daresay,” replied North Wind. “You've been away from here seven

days; but how long you may have been in there is quite another thing.

Behind my back and before my face things are so different! They don't go

at all by the same rule.”

“I'm very glad,” said Diamond, after thinking a while.

“Why?” asked North Wind.

“Because I've been such a long time there, and such a little while away

from mother. Why, she won't be expecting me home from Sandwich yet!”

“No. But we mustn't talk any longer. I've got my orders now, and we must

be off in a few minutes.”

Next moment Diamond found himself sitting alone on the rock. North Wind

had vanished. A creature like a great humble-bee or cockchafer flew past

his face; but it could be neither, for there were no insects amongst the

ice. It passed him again and again, flying in circles around him, and he

concluded that it must be North Wind herself, no bigger than Tom Thumb

when his mother put him in the nutshell lined with flannel. But she was

no longer vapoury and thin. She was solid, although tiny. A moment more,

and she perched on his shoulder.

“Come along, Diamond,” she said in his ear, in the smallest and highest

of treble voices; “it is time we were setting out for Sandwich.”

Diamond could just see her, by turning his head towards his shoulder as

far as he could, but only with one eye, for his nose came between her

and the other.

“Won't you take me in your arms and carry me?” he said in a whisper, for

he knew she did not like a loud voice when she was small.

“Ah! you ungrateful boy,” returned North Wind, smiling “how dare you

make game of me? Yes, I will carry you, but you shall walk a bit for

your impertinence first. Come along.”

She jumped from his shoulder, but when Diamond looked for her upon the

ground, he could see nothing but a little spider with long legs that

made its way over the ice towards the south. It ran very fast indeed for

a spider, but Diamond ran a long way before it, and then waited for

it. It was up with him sooner than he had expected, however, and it

had grown a good deal. And the spider grew and grew and went faster and

faster, till all at once Diamond discovered that it was not a spider,

but a weasel; and away glided the weasel, and away went Diamond after

it, and it took all the run there was in him to keep up with the weasel.

And the weasel grew, and grew, and grew, till all at once Diamond saw

that the weasel was not a weasel but a cat. And away went the cat, and

Diamond after it. And when he had run half a mile, he found the cat

waiting for him, sitting up and washing her face not to lose time. And

away went the cat again, and Diamond after it. But the next time he came

up with the cat, the cat was not a cat, but a hunting-leopard. And the

hunting-leopard grew to a jaguar, all covered with spots like eyes.

And the jaguar grew to a Bengal tiger. And at none of them was Diamond

afraid, for he had been at North Wind's back, and he could be afraid of

her no longer whatever she did or grew. And the tiger flew over the snow

in a straight line for the south, growing less and less to Diamond's

eyes till it was only a black speck upon the whiteness; and then it

vanished altogether. And now Diamond felt that he would rather not run

any farther, and that the ice had got very rough. Besides, he was near

the precipices that bounded the sea, so he slackened his pace to a walk,

saying aloud to himself:

“When North Wind has punished me enough for making game of her, she will

come back to me; I know she will, for I can't go much farther without

her.”

“You dear boy! It was only in fun. Here I am!” said North Wind's voice

behind him.

Diamond turned, and saw her as he liked best to see her, standing beside

him, a tall lady.

“Where's the tiger?” he asked, for he knew all the creatures from a

picture book that Miss Coleman had given him. “But, of course,” he

added, “you were the tiger. I was puzzled and forgot. I saw it such a

long way off before me, and there you were behind me. It's so odd, you

know.”

“It must look very odd to you, Diamond: I see that. But it is no more

odd to me than to break an old pine in two.”

“Well, that's odd enough,” remarked Diamond.

“So it is! I forgot. Well, none of these things are odder to me than it

is to you to eat bread and butter.”

“Well, that's odd too, when I think of it,” persisted Diamond. “I should

just like a slice of bread and butter! I'm afraid to say how long it

is--how long it seems to me, that is--since I had anything to eat.”

“Come then,” said North Wind, stooping and holding out her arms. “You

shall have some bread and butter very soon. I am glad to find you want

some.”

Diamond held up his arms to meet hers, and was safe upon her bosom.

North Wind bounded into the air. Her tresses began to lift and rise and

spread and stream and flow and flutter; and with a roar from her hair

and an answering roar from one of the great glaciers beside them, whose

slow torrent tumbled two or three icebergs at once into the waves at

their feet, North Wind and Diamond went flying southwards.

As THEY flew, so fast they went that the sea slid away from under them

like a great web of shot silk, blue shot with grey, and green shot with

purple. They went so fast that the stars themselves appeared to sail