CHAPTER V
Leo was awakened by being rudely jostled about and tumbled upon the floor. When he opened his eyes the cause was apparent. The elves had found their beds in disorder, and not being able to see him, had, in their efforts to restore order, pitched him out. Hardly had Leo reached the floor when in came Paz to the rescue.
"I beg your pardon, sir, for being so long absent," he said, "but the hunters had not come in with any game, and the cooks had use for all the skillets, so that I was obliged to go to the laboratory for a vessel large enough to hold your turnip. Soup is made in great quantities for our work-people, and by adding a few sauces I hope I have made it so that it will
please you. If you come with me now I think you may relish your meal."
Leo followed Paz to a small cavern hung with a velvety gray moss, on which were clusters of red berries. A small electric light burned in a globe of crystal, set in bands of turquoise, and shone upon a table which, like the bed he had used, was composed of several small ones, covered with a cloth of crimson plush, over which was again spread a white fabric of the thinnest texture and edged with lace. On this was laid a dinner service, so small that it was evidently more for ornament than use. Plates of crystal were bordered with gems, and jars and cups of embossed metal glittered with precious stones. He was obliged, however, to eat his soup from the tureen, and the turnip, now cooked in a sort of pâté, was presented on a silver platter. Slices of smoked rabbit, with salted steaks of prairie-dog, were offered in place of the quail, which had not come; but Leo, having a fondness for sweets, saw with wonder one tart made from about a quarter of an apple. This proved to be such a sweet morsel that he kept Paz running for more until he had eaten a dozen. No wine was offered, but ices which
looked like heaps of snow with the sun shining on them were dissolving in glass vases, and water as pure as the dew filled his goblet. Rising refreshed from his meal Leo met Knops coming towards him. He had exchanged his dress for what looked like a bathing suit of India rubber.
"Are you rested?" he inquired, kindly.
"Oh yes, very much, and I must thank you and Paz for so good a dinner," responded Leo.
"Don't mention it. If I had not acted on the spur of the moment, when the impulse to amuse you seized me, I would have been better prepared. We use many things for food which you would disdain, but I might have secured antelope meat or Rocky Mountain mutton, and by way of rarity something from Russia or China. Have you ever tasted birds' nests."
"Never."
"but I suppose you know why they are thought so great a delicacy?"
"No."
"It is merely the gluten with which they are fastened together, so to speak, by the birds, which renders them agreeable. The Chinese
like rats, and in this we agree with them. Well dressed, stuffed with chestnuts or olives, and roasted, they are delicious."
Leo made a wry face.
"Ah! you are not cosmopolitan."
"What is that?"
"A citizen of the world, a person free from national prejudices. Ah, these words are long for you; I will try to be simple: you have not learned to eat everything that is good."
"But rats are not good; they are vermin."
"Bah! yes, because you let them feed like your hogs on anything. We do better; we pen them, and give them grain until they are fat and sweet, and make them eatable."
Leo could not disguise his dislike, so Knops, shrugging his shoulders, did not attempt any longer to convince him, but said,
"Are you interested in what I have shown you?"
"Certainly I am," said Leo, with more spirit than he had ever put into words.
"And you care to go on?"
"Very much."
"Prepare then for great exertion. As you are so large it will be necessary for you to creep
through many passages. I am going to take you to see our water-work. The visit may be tiresome, but I think you will be repaid. It is generally supposed that giants have greater power than we. It may be that it is true, but I think it is doubtful. But you may wonder why I speak now of giants. It is because they have originated the opinion among men that the great water-falls and cataracts, such as those of the Nile and Niagara, are entirely of their producing, but we all know the familiar adage, 'Great oaks from little acorns grow.' I am going to show you where the little springs and rivulets have their rise."
Leo's attention had flagged during this speech—he was so unaccustomed to many words—now his interest revived.
"Do you remember a certain shady spot about half a mile from the monastery, beneath a group of birch-trees, and overhung with alders?" asked Knops.
"Do I not, indeed?" responded Leo, eagerly. "It is the sweetest, coolest water on the estate. The moss around that spring is just like green velvet. Many a time I have plunged my whole
head in it. The birds know it too, and always come there to drink. I sometimes find four or five of them dipping in at once; it is a pretty sight to see them bathe; they throw the water up under their wings until they drip, and then they are hardly satisfied."
"Well," said Knops, "We have the supplying of that spring."
All the time they had been talking, Knops had been leading the way through long passages and down steep steps, of which Leo's long legs had to compass several at a stride.
Now they came to a low tunnel through which Leo had to creep for what seemed to him miles. Strange to say, the weariness which so often compelled him to rest or doze seemed to be leaving him. He felt an altogether new impulse, a desire to explore these recesses, and a great respect for Knops's learning also made him desirous of conversation, which was something he had always avoided by answering questions in the shortest possible way.
The tunnel was not only long and low, but it was dripping with moisture, and the air oppressive with what seemed to be steam. Leo
heard wheezing and groaning sounds, which, though not frightful, were very peculiar, and then the thump-thump, as of engines.
Very glad was he when the tunnel opened into another large cavern, at the bottom of which was a lake. He could not have seen this had it not been for the electric fluid which blazed like daylight from a great globe overhead. On the margin of the lake were all kinds of hydraulic machines, small as toys, but of every conceivable form; derricks and wheels and screws and pumps, and all under the management of busy little elves, who panted and puffed and tugged at ropes and wheels and pipes as they worked, and kept up a constant chant not unlike the song of the wind on a stormy night.
Leo watched them intently. Once in a while one restless little sprite would turn a hose upon his companions, when the chant would stop long enough for the rest to dip him head and heels into the lake, which had a very quieting effect. Leo noticed great numbers of pipes running up the sides of the cavern in all directions, but Knops soon opened the door of what he called "The model-room," and here were new wonders displayed.
CHAPTER VI
The model-room of the elves' water-work department was a grotto of salt—glittering, dazzling, sparkling, and flashing—divided into two equal parts, or as if a huge shelf had been placed across it.
On the top of the shelf was a tiny park or forest, with all the natural differences of the ground exactly represented by grasses, plants, flowers, rocks, and trees, living and growing, but on a scale so small that Leo was forced to use a microscope to properly enjoy its beauty. Even the herbage was minute, and the trees no larger than small ferns, but as his eyes grew accustomed to the glass he was amazed to find the hills and dales of his home here reproduced in the most familiar manner.
It was truly an exquisite scene. Field upon field dotted with daisies, woodland as dense and wild as untrained nature leaves it, and hill upon hill clambering over one another, all so minute and yet so real, and dashing down from the tiny mountains was a stream of foaming water, winding about and gathering in from all sides other
tributary brooks, so small that they would hardly have floated a good-sized leaf.
And now Leo understood the meaning of it all, as he looked underneath the shelf where tiny pumps and rams were forcing up the water for this stream.
Knops touched a spring and set a new series of wheels in motion, when, instantly, a gushing fountain flowed up in a small stone basin beneath a rustic cross; then a little lake appeared, on which were sailing small swans; and finally a rushing, roaring flood started some mill-wheels and almost threatened destruction to the tiny buildings upon its banks.
"This," said Knops, "shows you how we use the power of our reservoirs, but it can give you no idea of the immense trouble we have in laying pipes for great distances. Some of our elves find it so difficult that they beg for other work, and many run off altogether and live above-ground, inhabiting the regions of springs and brooks, and so muddying them and filling them up with weeds that men let them alone, which is just what they desire."
"Do fish ever clog your pipes?" asked Leo.
"Never. We have none in our lakes; the
water is too pure and free from vegetable matter for fish. It is doubly distilled. Taste it."
Leo took the glass which Knops offered, and confessed he had never tasted anything more delicious.
"We sometimes force carbonic gas into mineral springs, but that, as well as the salts considered so beneficial, is left to our chemists to regulate. Paz, do you know anything about this?"
"Not much, Master Knops. I have seen iron in various forms introduced, but think that is usually controlled by the earth's formation."
Leo sighed at his own ignorance, and vowed to study up these matters; but Knops, seeing his look of dejection, asked, "How would you like a bath?"
"Delightful. Where? Surely not in the lake; it looks so cold and glassy I should not dare."
"Oh, no, no," laughed Knops. "Do you think I'd let you bathe in a reservoir? Never! We are too cleanly for that, begging your pardon. Here is our general bath. It's quite a tub, isn't it?"
"I should think so," said Leo, surveying quite a spacious apartment, about which were pipes and faucets, clothes-lines and screens.
Here his friend left him, and he was glad to doff his garments for a plunge. He found that he could make the water hot or cold at will, and so luxurious was it that he would have stayed in any length of time had not a crowd of elves come chattering in, and with whoop and scream surrounded him. Though they could not see him, they were conscious of some disturbing force in the water, and in an instant a lot of them had scrambled on his back, and were making a boat of him. They pulled his hair and his ears unmercifully, and because he swam slowly, with their weight upon him, they whacked and thumped him like little pirates. But he had his revenge, for with one turn he tumbled them all off, and sprang from the bath, leaving them to squirm and squabble by themselves.
Laughing heartily at their antics, he rejoined Knops and Paz, whom he found poring over some maps spread out before them.
"We have been discussing the length of a journey to the Geysers of Iceland, also to the hot springs of the Yellowstone, but I am afraid
either would require too much time. Was your bath agreeable?"
"Very," said Leo, describing how he had been pummelled.
"Those were the fellows from the steam-rooms—stokers probably. Rough enough they are. Do you care to have a glance at them at work?"
"Don't care if I do," said Leo, in his old drawling manner; then, correcting himself, he added: "If it suits your convenience, I shall be very happy to take a look."
"That is all it will be, I promise you," said Paz; "The heat is awful."
Leo thought as much when Knops, having tied a respirator over his mouth, opened another door. Such a cloud of vapor puffed out that he could but dimly discern what seemed to be a tank of boiling, bubbling water, resting on a bed of soft coal, about which stark little forms were dancing and poking with long steel bars until flames leaped out like tongues of fire.
"Oh," said Leo, as he quickly turned from his place, "how do they endure it? It is dreadful!"
"They are used to it; they all came from
Terra del Fuego," replied Knops, calmly. "And now, as a contrast to them, look in here."
A hut of solid ice presented itself. Long pendants of ice hung from the ceiling, snow in masses was being formed into shapes of statue-like grace by a company of little furry objects whose noses were not even visible, and others were tracing out, on a broad screen of lace-like texture, patterns of every star and leaf and flower imaginable.
Leo was so delighted that, although shivering, he could not bear to leave them, but begged Knops to lend him a wrap.
Taking from a pile of furs in a corner several small garments, Paz pinned them together and threw them over Leo's shoulders, and as he continued to watch the beautiful work Knops explained its character.
"This is our place for working out designs for those who are unskilled in frost-work. Frostwork is something too delicate for human hands, but in it we excel. Have you never seen on your window-pane of a cold winter morning the picture of a forest of pines, or sheets of sparkling stars and crystals? I am sure you have. Well, we do all that work on your windows, not
with artificial snow and ice such as you see here, but by dexterous management we catch the falling flakes and mould them to our will, sometimes doing nothing more than spangling a sheet of glass, and again working out the most elaborate and fantastic marvels of embroidery. But in art our productions are almost endless. We color the tiniest blades of grass and beds of strawberry leaves until the moss upon which they rest look like velvet with floss needlework. We polish the chestnuts till they appear as if carved of rosewood. We strip thistles of their prickly coat, and use the down for pillows. The milk-weed, as it ripens its silken-winged seeds, serves us for many beautiful purposes. We tint the pebbles of a brook till they compare with Florentine mosaics. We wreathe and festoon every bare old bowlder and every niche made barren by the winds. Indeed, the list of our works would fill a volume."
Leo listened and looked, though his feet were getting numb and his fingers nearly frozen. Many a time he had seen just such cappings to gate-posts and projections as were here being moulded, and just such rows of pearly drops on a gable's edge; but when, as if to specially please
him, the busy workers carved a little snow maid winding a scarf about her curly locks, he clapped his hands in admiration, making such a noise that each little Esquimau dropped his tool in alarm.
"Gently! gently!" said Paz and Knops; "They are easily frightened. Though they do not see you, their instinct is so fine that they can nearly guess your presence."
"I am sorry if I have frightened them," said Leo. "Can't you say something to soothe them? Tell them how lovely their things are. I long to try and imitate them."
Knops said a few words in a language Leo did not comprehend, and the little people gathered up their trowels again. But it was time to go, and Leo had to follow his guides and leave the snow people with more reluctance than anything he had yet seen.