“I hear nothing so wonderful,” said Essper, putting the two middle fingers of his right hand before his mouth and sounding a note so clear and beautiful, so exactly imitative of the fall which Vivian had noticed and admired, that for a moment he imagined that the huntsman was at his elbow.
“Thou art a cunning knave! do it again.” This time Essper made the very wood echo. In a few minutes a horseman galloped up; he was as spruce a cavalier as ever pricked gay steed on the pliant grass. He was dressed in a green military uniform, and a gilt bugle hung by his side; his spear told them that he was hunting the wild boar. When he saw Vivian and Essper he suddenly pulled up his horse and seemed astonished.
“I thought that his Highness had been here,” said the huntsman.
“No one has passed us, sir,” said Vivian.
“I could have sworn that his bugle sounded from this very spot,” said the huntsman. “My ear seldom deceives me.”
“We heard a bugle to the right, sir,” said Essper.
“Thanks, my friend,” and the huntsman was about to gallop off.
“May I ask the name of his Highness?” said Vivian. “We are strangers in this country.”
“That may certainly account for your ignorance,” said the huntsman; “but no one who lives in this land can be unacquainted with his Serene Highness the Prince of Little Lilliput, my illustrious master. I have the honour,” continued the huntsman, “of being Jagd Junker, or Gentilhomme de la Chasse to his Serene Highness.”
“‘Tis an office of great dignity,” said Vivian, “and one that I have no doubt you admirably perform; I will not stop you, sir, to admire your horse.”