Phil had, too, a passion for music, and would listen intently to the commonest strains of a hand-organ, and Lisa had given him a little toy harmonica, from which he would draw long, sweet tones and chords with much satisfaction.

Old Joe, who blackened boots for some of the lodgers, had heard the child’s attempts at music, and had brought his violin and played for him.  One day, happening to leave it for a while on the window-ledge, Phil’s quick ear had detected a low vibration from the instrument.  This circumstance, and something he had read about a wind harp, had given him the wish to make one—­with what success he was anxious to find out, when Lisa laid it in the open window for him.

A soft south wind was blowing, and, as Phil spoke, it had stirred the loose strings of the rude Aeolian harp, and a slight melodious sound had arisen, which Phil had thought so beautiful.  He drew his breath even more softly, lest he should lose the least tone, and finding that Lisa was really asleep, propped himself up higher on his pillows, and gazed out at the starlit heavens.

He often talked to the stars, but very softly and wonderingly, and somehow he could never find any answers that suited him; but to-night, as the breeze made a low soft music come from his wind harp, filling him with delight, it seemed to him that a voice was accompanying the melody, and that the stars had something to do with it; for, as he gazed, he saw a troop of little beings with gauzy wings fluttering over the window-ledge, and upon the brow of each twinkled a tiny star, and the leading one of all this bevy of wee people sang: 

  “Come from afar,
  Here we are! here we are! 
  From you Silver Star,
  Fays of the Wind,
  To children kind.”

“How lovely they are!” thought Phil.  “And so these really are fairies.  I never saw any before.  They have wings like little white butterflies, and how tiny their hands and feet, and what graceful motions they have as they dance over my harp!  They seem to be examining it to find out where the music comes from; but no, of course they know all about it.  I wonder if they would talk to me?”

“Of course we will be very glad to,” said a soft little voice in reply to his thoughts.

“I was afraid I would frighten you away if I spoke,” said Phil, gently.

“Oh no,” replied the fairy who had addressed him; “we are in the habit of talking to children, though they do not always know it.”

“And what do you tell them?” asked Phil, eagerly.

“All sorts of nice things.”

“Do you tell them all they want to know?”

“Oh no,” laughed the fairy, with a silvery little voice like a canary-bird’s.  “We cannot do that, for we do not know enough to be able to:  some children are much wiser than we.  I dare say you are.”

“Indeed I am not,” said Phil, a little sadly; “there are so many things that puzzle me.  I thought that perhaps, as you came from the stars, you knew something of astronomy.”