Free Comet in Moominland by Tove Jansson Page B

silly little things aren't satisfied. They say my music isn't modern enough.'
    Then they realized that the place was swarming with all kinds of strange little people. Even the water-spooks who had come up out of the dried up marshes and forest pools were there, and groups of tree-spirits sat gossiping under the birch trees. (A tree-spirit is a beautiful little creature who lives in a tree-trunk, but at night she flies up to the top of the tree to swing in the branches - she isn't usually found in trees that have needles instead of leaves.)
    The Snork maiden picked up her looking-glass to see if the flower behind her ear looked all right, and Moomintroll put his medal straight. It was a long time since they had been to a real ball.
    'I don't want to offend the grass-hopper,' whispered Snufkin, 'but do you think I could play a little for them on my mouth-organ?'
    'Why don't you play together?' suggested the Snork. 'Teach him that song "All small beasts should have bows in their tails".'
    'That's a good idea,' said Snufkin. And he took the grass-hopper behind a bush (it wasn't a poisonous one this time) to teach him the song.
    After a while a few notes were heard, and then some trills and twiddles. All the small creatures stopped chattering and went down to the clearing to listen. 'That sounds modern,' they said. 'You can dance to that.'
    'Oh, mamma!' exclaimed one very small creature, pointing at Moomintroll's star, 'there's a general!'



whereupon they all gathered round the travellers with cries of astonishment and admiration.
    'How nice and fluffy you are!' they said to the Snork maiden. And the tree-spirits looked at themselves in the looking-glass with rubies on the back, and the water-spooks put their wet autographs in the Snork's exercise book.
    Then there were sounds from behind the bush, and out came Snufkin and the grass-hopper playing with all their might.
    There was a dreadful muddle at first while they all tried to sort each other out, but at last everybody found the person he wanted to dance with, and they started off.
    The Snork maiden taught Moomintroll how to dance the samba (which isn't at all easy if you have very short legs). The Snork danced with an elderly and respectable inhabitant of the marshes, who had sea-weed in her hair, and Sniff twirled round with the smallest of the small creatures. Even the midges danced, and every possible kind of creeping thing came out of the forest to have a look.
    And nobody gave a thought to the comet that was rushing towards them, lighting up the black night with its fierce glow.
    At about twelve o'clock a huge barrel of palm-wine was rolled out, and everybody got a little birch-bark mug to drink out of. Then the glow-worms rolled themselves together into a ball in the middle of the glade, and everybody sat round drinking wine and eating sandwiches (which had also been provided).
    'Now we should tell a story,' said Sniff, turning to the smallest of the small creatures, 'do you know one. Little Creep?'
    'Oh, no, really,' whispered the Little Creep, who was terribly shy. 'Oh, no, well, really, perhaps.'

    'Well, out with it then,' said Sniff.
    'There was a wood-rat called Poot?' said the Little Creep, looking shyly between her paws.
    'Well, what happened then?' prompted Sniff.
    'The story's finished now,' said the Little Creep, and burrowed into the moss in confusion.
    They all roared with laughter, and those who had tails beat them on the ground in appreciation. Then Moomintroll asked Snufkin for a song.
    'We'll take the Higgely-piggely song,' he said.
    'But that's so sad,' protested the Snork maiden.
    'Well, let's have it anyway,' said Moomintroll, 'because it's such a good whistling song.' So Snufkin played and everybody joined in with the refrain:
    Higgely-piggely,
Path is so wiggely,
Time is past four.
Almost dead beat
On tired little feet;
No friendly door.

    The Snork maiden leant her head on Moomintroll's shoulder. 'It's just what has happened to us,' she