So day followed day, and it was always the same thing over and over for Dame Pridgett, and every day after she had washed the child she rubbed salve on its eyelids. Soon its eyes, that had at first been dull, grew so bright and strong they sparkled like jewels. Dame Pridgett thought it must be a very fine salve. She would have liked to try some of it on her own eyes, for her sight was somewhat dim, but the mother watched her so closely that she never had a chance to use it.

Now, every day, after Dame Pridgett had washed the baby, she left the basin on a chair beside her while she rubbed the salve on the child's eyes. One day she managed to upset the basin with her elbow as though by accident, though really by design. She gave a cry and bent over to pick up the basin, and as she did so, unseen by her mistress, she rubbed her right eye with the finger that still had some salve left on it.

When Dame Pridgett straightened up and looked about her she could hardly keep from crying out again at what she saw. The room and everything in it looked different. Instead of being poor and mean, it was like a chamber in a castle. Where there had been cobwebs were now shimmering silken hangings. The bed and all the furniture was of gold, magnificently carved. The sheets and pillow cases were of silk, and instead of a coarse, snub-nosed little woman, there among the pillows lay the most exquisite little lady the old dame had ever set eyes on; her skin was as fine as a rose leaf, her hair like spun gold, her lips like coral, and her eyes as bright as stars. The babe, also, from being a very ordinary looking child, had become the most exquisite little elfin creature that ever was seen.

Dame Pridgett managed somehow to keep quiet and hide her amazement, but now she knew very well that it was to fairyland she had come, and that these were fairy folk.

She made some excuse to go to the window and look out. The change outside was no less wonderful than that within. The muddy pool she now saw was a shining lake; the rocks were grottoes; the trees were covered with leaves and shining fruit, and the weeds were beds of flowers of wondrous colors, such as she had never seen before. As for the ragged children, she saw them now as fairy children clothed in the finest of laces and playing, not with pebbles, but with precious jewels so brilliant that they fairly dazzled the eyes.

Dame Pridgett managed to keep her mouth shut and acted in such a way that the fairies never suspected she had used the magic ointment, and could now see them as they were. But it was only with the right eye, the one she had touched with the salve, that she could see thus. When she closed that eye and looked with the other, everything was just as it had been before, and seemed so mean and squalid it was difficult to believe it could appear otherwise.

So time went on until the fairy lady was well again and had no need of a nurse to care for her. Then one day the little man came again on his black steed and called the old dame out to him.

"You have served us well," said he, "and here is your reward," and he placed a purse of gold pieces in her hand. Then he caught hold of her and lifted her up behind him on to the horse, and away they went, swifter than the wind. Dame Pridgett had to shut her eyes to keep from growing dizzy and falling off. So it was that when she reached home she knew no more of the way she had come than she knew of the way she had gone.

But this was not the last Dame Pridgett saw of the fairy folk. The little man on the black steed came to her house no more, but there were other little people about in the world who were now visible to her salve-touched eye. Sometimes as she came through the wood she would see them busy among the roots of the trees, setting their houses in order, or bartering and trading in their fairy markets; or on moonlight nights she would look out and see them at play among the flowers in her garden; or she would pass them dancing in fairy rings in the pastures or meadow lands, but she never told a soul of what she saw, nor tried to speak to the wee folk, and they were so busy about their own affairs that they paid no attention to her and never guessed she could see them.

And then at last came a day (and a sad day it was for Dame Pridgett) when she again met the little man who had come for her on the great black horse.

She had gone to market to buy the stuff for a new apron and was walking along, thinking of nothing but her purchase, when suddenly she saw the little man slipping about among the market people, never touching them and unseen by any. He was peeping into the butter firkins, smelling and tasting, and wherever he found some very good butter he helped himself to a bit of it and put it in a basket he carried on his arm.

Dame Pridgett pressed up close to him and looked into his basket, and there in it was a dish almost full of butter. When the good dame saw that, she was so indignant that she quite lost all prudence.

"Shame on you," she cried to the little man. "Are you not ashamed to be stealing butter from good folk who are less able to buy than yourself."

The little man stopped and looked at her. "So you can see me, can you?" he said.

"Yes, to be sure I can," said the old dame boldly.

"And how does that happen?" asked the little man smoothly, and without any show of anger.

"Oh, when I was nursing your good lady, I managed to rub a bit of her salve on one of my eyes, and that is how I can see you."

"And which eye did you rub with the salve?"

"My right eye."

"And it is only with your right eye you see me?"

"Only with my right eye."

When the little man heard that, quick as a flash he pursed up his lips and blew into her right eye, and he blew so hard he blew the sight right out of it. The old dame blinked and winked and rubbed her eye with her fingers. The little man had vanished from before her. She could see everything else, but what she saw was with her left eye only, and she could see no fairies with it for it had not been touched with salve.

So that was the end of it for Dame Pridgett, as far as the wee folk were concerned, for she never got back the sight of her right eye; only she still had the purse of gold pieces left, and that was enough to comfort the old dame for a great deal.

- Transcriber's Note: The page numbers numbers in the list of Illustrations have been changed to match their position in this ebook. -