It was a wonderful journey which Ole-Luk-Oie had made him take this night.
THURSDAY
"What do you think I have here?" said the Dream Man. "Do not be frightened, and you shall see a little mouse." And then he held out his hand, in which lay a lovely little creature. "It has come to invite you to a wedding. Two little mice are going to be married to-night. They live under the floor of your mother's storeroom, and that must be a fine dwelling place."
"But how can I get through the little mouse-hole in the floor?" asked the little boy.
"Leave me to manage that," said the Dream Man. "I will soon make you small enough." And then he touched the boy with his magic wand, upon which he became smaller and smaller until at last he was no longer than a little finger. "Now you can borrow the dress of your tin soldier. I think it will just fit you. It looks well to wear a uniform when you go into company."
"Yes, certainly," said the boy, and in a moment he was dressed as neatly as the neatest of all tin soldiers.
"Will you be so good as to seat yourself in your mamma's thimble," said the little mouse, "that I may have the pleasure of drawing you to the wedding?"
"Will you really take so much trouble, young lady?" said he. And so in this way he rode to the mouse's wedding.
First they went under the floor, and then through a long passage which was scarcely high enough to allow the thimble to drive under, and the whole passage was lit up with the light of rotten wood.
"Does it not smell delicious?" asked the mouse, as she drew him along. "The wall and the floor have been smeared with bacon rind; nothing could be nicer."