Sandman's Goodnight Stories

<SPAN name="chap25"></SPAN> <h3> ORIANNA </h3> <SPAN name="img-140"></SPAN> <center> <ANTIMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-140.jpg" ALT="Orianna" BORDER="2" width-obs="351" height-obs="178"> <H3 STYLE="width: 351px"> Orianna </h3> </center> <p>Bunny White, one night when the Fairies were holding a revel, peeped out of his window to see the frolic, for Bunny and the Fairies were the best of friends because members of Bunny's family had for ages drawn the carriage of the Queen.</p> <p>But to-night Bunny saw a stranger in the midst of the Fairy group, tiny like the others, but very differently dressed, and the Fairies were all listening to what she had to say, rather than making merry, as was their custom.</p> <p>"Who can she be?" thought Bunny White, and, being a very inquisitive creature, he ran out of his house and over to the carriage of the Fairy Queen to ask her about the little stranger.</p> <p>"Oh, that is our dear Orianna, the Indian Fairy," answered the Queen, "and only once in a while does she come to visit us"; and then because Bunny White was so interested the Queen told him all about Orianna.</p> <p>"You see," said the Queen, "all children are afraid of Indian dreams, so I had to have a Fairy who would make the Indians kind and loving to the 'Pale Face,' as the Indians call the white folk.</p> <p>"Orianna lives near the Indians in a forest, and when you see a tall tree with an opening at the bottom like the door of a wigwam you may be sure that it is one of Orianna's homes.</p> <p>"Did you notice her pretty costume?"</p> <p>Bunny White told the Queen he had not had a very close view of Orianna, so the Queen told him to run over to the Fairies and see the pretty dress she wore.</p> <p>Orianna wore the dress of an Indian girl, tiny moccasins on her little feet and two tiny black braids, one over each shoulder, but the thing that attracted Bunny White the most was her wings.</p> <p>They were not at all like those of the other Fairies. Orianna's wings were feathers of an eagle.</p> <p>Her wand, too, was different, for instead of a wand she carried a tiny silver bow and arrow, the tip of the arrow being of gold.</p> <p>Bunny ran back to the Queen and told her he thought Orianna the very prettiest of all the Fairies. "But what is it that shines so on the tip of the arrow?" she asked.</p> <p>"Oh, that is the love she shoots straight into the hearts of all the Indians," replied the Queen.</p> <p>"Orianna flies up through her tree house to the tallest branch and shoots her love-tipped arrow straight into the heart of all Indians, and so you see the children need never be afraid any more of dreaming of Indians, for all Indians are good and Orianna is always on the lookout from the top of one of her homes, and that is the reason she so seldom comes to visit us."</p> <p>Just then Orianna came to bid the Queen good night, and Bunny White ran off to his home, but the next morning he was up bright and early to look for the wigwam trees.</p> <p>But not one did he find, for the Fairies are very clever, and who ever did find the places where they live; but for all that we know, there are Fairies, and now that Orianna is taking care of the Indians no little boy or girl need ever be afraid of Indian dreams, because the Fairy Queen has given them a Fairy.</p> <br/><br/><br/> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />