“You have displeased your friend,” said Nymphalin.
“Yes; he likes no allusions to the amorous follies of his youth. Did you ever hear of his rivalry with the dog for the cat’s good graces?”
“No; that must be very amusing.”
“Well, my queen, when we rest by and by, I will relate to you the history of the fox’s wooing.”
The next place they came to was a vast Runic cavern, covered with dark inscriptions of a forgotten tongue; and sitting on a huge stone they found a dwarf with long yellow hair, his head leaning on his breast, and absorbed in meditation. “This is a spirit of a wise and powerful race,” whispered Fayzenheim, “that has often battled with the fairies; but he is of the kindly tribe.”
Then the dwarf lifted his head with a mournful air; and gazed upon the bright shapes before him, lighted by the pine torches that the prince’s attendants carried.
“And what dost thou muse upon, O descendant of the race of Laurin?” said the prince.
“Upon TIME!” answered the dwarf, gloomily. “I see a River, and its waves are black, flowing from the clouds, and none knoweth its source. It rolls deeply on, aye and evermore, through a green valley, which it slowly swallows up, washing away tower and town, and vanquishing all things; and the name of the River is TIME.”
Then the dwarf’s head sank on his bosom, and he spoke no more.
The fairies proceeded. “Above us,” said the prince, “rises one of the loftiest mountains of the Rhine; for mountains are the Dwarf’s home. When the Great Spirit of all made earth, he saw that the hollows of the rocks and hills were tenantless, and yet that a mighty kingdom and great palaces were hid within them,—a dread and dark solitude, but lighted at times from the starry eyes of many jewels; and there was the treasure of the human world—gold and silver—and great heaps of gems, and a soil of metals. So God made a race for this vast empire, and gifted them with the power of thought, and the soul of exceeding wisdom, so that they want not the merriment and enterprise of the outer world; but musing in these dark caves is their delight. Their existence rolls away in the luxury of thought; only from time to time they appear in the world, and betoken woe or weal to men,—according to their nature, for they are divided into two tribes, the benevolent and the wrathful.” While the prince spoke, they saw glaring upon them from a ledge in the upper rock a grisly face with a long matted beard. The prince gathered himself up, and frowned at the evil dwarf, for such it was; but with a wild laugh the face abruptly disappeared, and the echo of the laugh rang with a ghastly sound through the long hollows of the earth.