me, because I love your race, and often hear wonder-stories of you from the humming-birds that live among my flowers."
Lifting her dim eyes, Moss saw a child's pitying face above her; but she could only smile her thanks and kiss the small hand where she lay. Placing the elf on a vine-leaf that fluttered in the wind, the child went back to her wheel, for no bee was busier than she; and as she spun, she sang like any bird, because the blind old grandmother, knitting in the sun, loved to hear her cheery voice above the music of the wheel.
"O flower at my window,
Why blossom you so fair,
With your green and purple cup
Upturned to sun and air?
'I bloom, blithesome Bessie,
To cheer your childish heart;
The world is full of labor,
And this shall be my part.'
Whirl, busy wheel, faster,
Spin, little thread, spin;
The sun shines fair without,
And we are gay within.
"O robin in the tree-top,
With sunshine on your breast,
Why brood you so patiently
Above your hidden nest?
'I brood, blithesome Bessie,
And sing my humble song,
That the world may have more music
From my little ones erelong.'
Whirl, busy wheel, faster.
Spin, little thread, spin,
The sun shines fair without.
And we are gay within.
