The Little Lonely Girl and her friend, the bird.

There was once a little girl who was very ill; so ill that she had to stay in bed all the time and could never go out; Cherissa was her name.

But, one day a little bird came and perched upon her window and started to sing.

At first, her nanny tried to shoo the bird away but the pretty singing bird made the girl so happy that she begged her nanny to let the bird stay and, every day after that the little girl would put out food and water for the bird and pet it and talk to it.

And the bird stayed with the girl for months and months and they became the very best of friends.

But then, the winter came, frost was on all the branches of every tree and glistened upon every blade of grass and the bird said to the little girl,

“I have to go now; fly south for the winter as all birds do”.

“But why?”, asked Cherissa, feeling sad, “Don’t you like it here. Don’t you like being with me?”.

“I do”, said the bird, “But a bird has to fly, it cannot be kept a prisoner even by those he loves. But I promise that in the Summer I’ll come home to you again”.

Unfortunately, the little girl, because she was only a little girl felt hurt that the bird would want to leave her and got angry and started to shout at the bird, even throwing one of her stuffed animals at it.

“Go away then if you don’t want to be my friend”, she yelled, “And don’t come back”.

The bird did not like making the little girl so upset but it had no choice; it had to fly south and so, plucking a single feather from its head it left it behind for the girl then it flew away and, joining the other migrating birds travelled south to sunnier climbs.

But when the winter came, the girl started to miss the bird so much and she worried that it might never come back to her.

“I was so mean to it”, she said, crying into her pillow as she held onto the little feather, “I’m sure I drove it away and it will not come back”.

But then the chilly winter passed and Spring returned, flowers started to burst up from the green earth and birds once more began to sing in all the trees and, every day, the little girl would look out of her window at the garden beyond and wonder if the bird would return.

And, one night, the little girl even had a strange unhappy dream; a dream that the bird had forgotten all about her, a dream that it had flown to the golden palace of a rich Sultan’s daughter and that the little bird did not want to come home because it wanted to stay in the palace with the Princess.

“And what about that little girl you were telling me about”, the Princess asked the bird in her dream, “The one called Cherissa”.

“Cherissa?”, the little bird replied, confused, “What is a Cherissa?”.

And hearing this, the little girl cried, “No! No! Don’t forget about me please”.

But then, suddenly, the little girl was woken by the sound of loud but beautiful chirping and opening her eyes and looking over at her window she saw, to her amazement, not just one bird but five; her little bird and a little female bird and three little baby birds perched upon her window sill.

“You came back”, said the little girl, happily, running to the window, “And you’ve brought other birds too”.

“This is my wife”, said the bird, “I met her in a far of country where its hot and sunny all year round; her husband was shot by a hunter with an arrow and I said I would look after her and help her raise her three children and I told them all about you, Cherissa. I just couldn’t wait for them to meet you”.

Cherissa shook the wing of the little girl bird,

“Oh I’m very happy to meet you, mrs bird”, she said.

And, from that day on the little bird, his wife and their three children always spent their summers with the little girl and they all became the very best of friends and then, one day, when the girl was much older, she got better and could go outside again but she owed so much to the little bird and his family that she built a bird sanctuary in her garden where she could look after and feed all the birds and listen to their beautiful bright song all the year round.