ONCE there lived a peasant whose only daughter, Martha, had eyes as blue as corn-flowers and long hair like the silk around an ear of corn. All the lads of the village were after her, but she cared only for John, a young huntsman, who was called by her father an idle vagabond, and sent away from his cottage in disdain. Now, the village where they lived was at the foot of a high mountain covered with a dense forest, into certain portions of which few were found to venture, so wild and lonely they were. One day Martha went, unknown to her father and mother, to ramble in the forest. She said to some of her friends that she meant to gather flowers and pick berries, to sell to a rich lady who lived near them; but the truth was, that a week had passed without John having set foot in the village, and she was anxious and uneasy, and wished to visit some of her lover's favorite haunts, to see if he might be there. It was no uncommon thing for John to be absent for several days, while trapping and hunting. He could sleep as well on a bank of moss as on his pallet at home, and he loved to go to rest under the broad canopy of the sky, studded with bright stars, and to be lulled by the music of falling waters.
Martha, dressed in her brown cotton frock, with the scarlet handkerchief knotted over her fair hair, was seen to go up a rocky pathway on the mountain-side, where the firs and larches made a bower overhead; but that night she did not come home, and next day, when John came into the village with a splendid string of birds he had shot miles away from there, in an opposite direction to the one Martha had taken, it was to hear the sad news of the poor girl's disappearance.
John's face grew pale and his stout heart grew faint; he thought of what all the others were thinking of—the Wild Woodsman, against whose magic his gun and staff might avail nothing!
The mountain above was believed to be the haunt of a mysterious being, half man, half brute, fierce and cruel, from whose den no living creature might ever be rescued. The Wild Woodsman, for so the natives called him, took many a shape to trap unwary travellers, and a fair young girl like Martha would be a rich prize for him. John had long vowed to capture the Wild Woodsman; and now he was filled with a mad thirst to seek him at once. Without stopping to hear more, the young man rushed off up the steep mountain path, bounding like a chamois from rock to rock, as the villagers, awe-struck and tearful, gazed after him and crossed themselves in superstitious fear.
Through brake and brier, John darted on; he was soon in the dark recesses of the forest, where the undergrowth was like a jungle. His fleet foot never tired in the chase, and, erelong, he spied a little red handkerchief upon the ground. Recognizing this to be Martha's, he gazed about him, and saw, by the token of broken bushes, that the girl had been dragged away from that spot up a rocky wall, which it seemed to him no foot could scale.
Struggling to keep down his sickening dread, John determined to follow. He began to climb the steep rock. His faithful dog, who had kept close beside him, suddenly gave a low fierce growl, and the hair on its back bristled up in fury. John was already half-way up the cliff, when, on looking down, there, just where
he had picked up the handkerchief, he saw a queer little old fellow, making shoes as quietly as if nothing at all had happened.
"Hallo, there!" roared John, for he suspected mischief.
The old man looked up, and John saw that he had a young and rosy face with hair as gray as a badger's. The odd creature made signs that he was stone deaf, and beckoned John to come down. All this time, the dog was growling fearfully, and John took warning from the sign. He levelled his gun without more ado, and said: