One evening, the Fairies decided to throw a party and invited the Goblins, but they did not ask the Gnomes because they did not think of them. The Gnomes lived so deep underground that the Fairies rarely met them, and so they really forgot and had no intention of snubbing them. But one evening, the Gnomes overheard the Goblins talking about the party and they were very angry that they were not invited too.
The woods were very beautiful and some trees already had red and yellow leaves, for it was late in the summer. When the moon came out, the green, red, and yellow colors made a beautiful picture, and the Fairies were delighted with the setting for their party.
The Fairy Queen had made a new carriage from a petal of a white lily, pulled by two butterflies. The Fairies all had new dresses made of pink rose petals, and in all the bushes and trees they had placed fireflies, where they looked like many tiny electric lights.
Their table was spread out on a large rock. The rabbits had to serve at the table because their coats were white, and squirrels had to cook in a small hole. The tablecloth was spun by a spider and was so beautiful that the Queen, when she saw it, felt it was a shame to cover it with plates, so she had the rabbits place the food on a rock behind a tree and the beautiful tablecloth remained empty so the Goblins could see it.
But when the Goblins arrived, they looked in horror at the table. “Would there be nothing to eat?” they asked each other as they sat down and looked around with fearful eyes.
They did not speak a word to the Queen about the beautiful cloth, and she discovered that the beautiful cloth was rather wasted effort for the greedy little Goblins.
There were so many Goblins that the Fairies were forced to spread another table for themselves on the ground. When the rabbits appeared with the food, the Goblins jumped up and helped themselves before the rabbits could serve them.
When the Queen finally realized that it was pointless to have waiters for the Goblins, she told the rabbits to put the ice cream, cake, lemonade, and all the goodies on the table and let the Goblins help themselves.
The bad Goblins ruined the beautiful fabric of the tablecloth, which the spider had woven with so much effort. They spilled the lemonade and crumbled the cake, and the poor Queen was desperate.
The Goblins, who had not received the food quickly enough, climbed onto the table, which, as you know, was spread out on a rock. Now, this rock was not covered with moss, and it happened that one of the doors of the Gnomes’ house was here.
The Gnomes are small brown men and they hide under the leaves and branches. Their color is exactly like the colors of the forest so they cannot be seen. So they had been keeping an eye on everything that happened at the party, and when they saw the Goblins atop one of their rocks, a part of their number hurriedly went into the earth and opened the stone, exactly where the Goblins were.
Some Goblins were quick enough to escape, but most fell to the ground, with all the cake, candy, and ice cream with them.
The Queen and her Fairies jumped up and looked around. Everything had changed, and the Fairies shivered when they saw it.
The trees and bushes were suddenly brown, and the leaves fell from the trees, making the ground look like a brown carpet.
The air was icy, and the poor fairies looked around in amazement at the gloomy scene before them. The escaped Goblins ran around and called for the queen to help them rescue their brothers.
“It’s all your fault,” they said to her. “If you had invited the gnomes to your party, this wouldn’t have happened. Now you must help us get our brothers out of the hands of those wicked gnomes.”
“What shall I do?” asked the poor queen. She felt like her party had been a failure and thought that if she had invited the gnomes, it couldn’t have been worse.
At that moment, a goblin ran up to them. He had been sent by the gnomes. They had told him to say that his brothers would all be held captive until the fairies sent them all the ice they wanted.
The fairies and the goblins hurried to the kitchen in the hollow, but it was completely empty. The squirrels and the rabbits had run away when they felt the icy air and saw everything turning brown.
“What should we do now?” asked the goblins. “You should help us,” they said again to the queen. “If we hadn’t come to your party, we wouldn’t be in trouble.”
The queen couldn’t help but respond to this remark. “If you and your brothers hadn’t climbed on the table but had kept your seats, as well-behaved goblins should, you wouldn’t need help now.”
“We have to get to work,” she said to her fairies. “Spread your wings and pin up your skirts. We have to make ice for those wicked gnomes.”
They worked all night, and just before dawn, the goblins carried a large amount of ice in nutshells to the rocks of the gnomes. Gradually, the captive goblins came out and joined their comrades.
“We lost our dinner,” said the goblins to the fairies, “and you should give us back our breakfast. We’re hungry. If you hadn’t partied, we wouldn’t have lost our dinner.”
This was more than the poor, tired queen and her fairies could bear. They took their wands out from under their wings and waved them, flying towards the goblins.
Little sparks shot out of the wands, and each time a spark hit a goblin, it left a small red mark and pricked them at the same time.
You never saw such tumbling and running as the goblins tried to get away. And when a goblin with a red spot on his face met a fairy, he quickly hid or ran away, knowing she would point him out as one of the greedy goblins who tried to make the fairies cook their breakfast for them.
