Ch. 4 - Lock-out Time

It is frightfully difficult to know much about the fairies, and almost
the only thing known for certain is that there are fairies wherever
there are children. Long ago children were forbidden the Gardens, and
at that time there was not a fairy in the place; then the children
were admitted, and the fairies came trooping in that very evening.
They can't resist following the children, but you seldom see them,
partly because they live in the daytime behind the railings, where you
are not allowed to go, and also partly because they are so cunning.
They are not a bit cunning after Lock-out, but until Lock-out, my
word!

When you were a bird you knew the fairies pretty well, and you
remember a good deal about them in your babyhood, which it is a great
pity you can't write down, for gradually you forget, and I have heard
of children who declared that they had never once seen a fairy. Very
likely if they said this in the Kensington Gardens, they were standing
looking at a fairy all the time. The reason they were cheated was
that she pretended to be something else. This is one of their best
tricks. They usually pretend to be flowers, because the court sits in
the Fairies' Basin, and there are so many flowers there, and all along
the Baby Walk, that a flower is the thing least likely to attract
attention. They dress exactly like flowers, and change with the
seasons, putting on white when lilies are in and blue for blue-bells,
and so on. They like crocus and hyacinth time best of all, as they
are partial to a bit of colour, but tulips (except white ones, which
are the fairy-cradles) they consider garish, and they sometimes put
off dressing like tulips for days, so that the beginning of the tulip
weeks is almost the best time to catch them.

When they think you are not looking they skip along pretty lively, but
if you look and they fear there is no time to hide, they stand quite
still, pretending to be flowers. Then, after you have passed without
knowing that they were fairies, they rush home and tell their mothers
they have had such an adventure. The Fairy Basin, you remember, is
all covered with ground-ivy (from which they make their castor-oil),
with flowers growing in it here and there. Most of them really are
flowers, but some of them are fairies. You never can be sure of them,
but a good plan is to walk by looking the other way, and then turn
round sharply. Another good plan, which David and I sometimes follow,
is to stare them down. After a long time they can't help winking, and
then you know for certain that they are fairies.

There are also numbers of them along the Baby Walk, which is a famous
gentle place, as spots frequented by fairies are called. Once
twenty-four of them had an extraordinary