“We’re not sparrows, to live on the housetops,” said the boys sadly, as they saw only the roofs sticking out of the water, “and we’re not foxes, to live in burrows in the hills. If someone could clear our villages of the water, we might make shift to get along somehow, but as it is, we might as well jump into the water with our flocks and be drowned like the rest, for we have nowhere and no one to turn to.”
That was a sad plight indeed, and Reygoch himself was dreadfully sorry for them. But here was an evil he could in no wise remedy. He looked out over the water and said: “There’s too much water here for me to bale out or to drink up so as to clear your villages. Eh, children, what shall I do for you?”
But then up and spoke Lilio, that was the wisest lad in these parts:
“Reygoch, daddy, if you cannot drink so much water, the Earth can. Break a hole in the ground, daddy, and drain off the water into the earth.”
Dearie me! and wasn’t that great wisdom in a lad no bigger than Reygoch’s finger?
Forthwith Reygoch stamped on the ground and broke a hole; and the Earth, like a thirsty dragon, began to drink and to drink, and swallow, and suck down into herself all that mighty water from off the whole plain. Before long the Earth had gulped down all the water; villages, fields, and meadows reappeared, ravaged and mud-covered, to be sure, but with everything in its right place.
The young castaways cheered up at the sight, but none was so glad as Curlylocks. She clapped her hands and cried:
“Oh, won’t it be lovely when the fields all grow golden again and the meadows green!”
But hereupon the herd boys and girls were all downcast once more, and Lilio said:
“Who will show us how to till the ground now that not one of our parents is left alive?”