“That is a good name. And now, if I promise to send you safe home, will you try your magic power and forge me such a mill? Have you the skill to fit it with wheels and levers? Can you hammer into shape a becoming lid for it—a lid of rainbow colors?”
Wainamoinen sat silent for a long time, shaking his head and thinking. Then he said:
“It is a thing so strange and so difficult that I must have time to consider my strength. In three days you shall have my answer.”
He went out alone, and for many tedious hours he walked up and down by the seashore pondering upon the subject. He repeated all the magic runes that he remembered, he recited [[11]]spells to the winds and the waves and the gray-blue sky, he recalled all the words of power that he had learned from the sages of old. Then, at length, on the third day, he went back to the house where Dame Louhi was still sitting by her fireside.
“I cannot make the Sampo for you,” he said. “My magic is not strong enough; my skill is not of the kind that forges mills of fortune. But I have a friend who can do wonderful things. It was he who shaped the sky that bends above our country; and, surely, to forge the Sampo is no more difficult than that.”
“Ah, that is the man whom I am looking for,” cried the woman eagerly. “What is his name? Will you send him to me?”
“His name is Ilmarinen, and he is dear to me as a brother,” answered the Minstrel. “He is the prince of all smiths, and there is nothing in magic or in smithing that he cannot do. If you will permit me to return to my dear home land, to the Land of Heroes, I will send him to you without delay.”
“But suppose he doesn’t wish to come?”
“Then I will send him against his will. My magic is strong enough to command him.” [[12]]
“Can I trust you? Do you promise?”