When Cud heard the first note of these pipes, he struck the old ones against a stone, and ran and caught the new pipes. The piper rushed to the wizard; the old man went out, threw himself on his knees, and begged mercy.
“Never give him mercy,” said Gold Boot, “till he burns the hill that is standing out opposite him.”
“You have no pardon to get till you set that hill there on fire,” answered Cud.
“That is as bad for me as to lose my head,” said the wizard.
“That same is not far from you unless you do what I bid,” replied Cud.
Sooner than lose his head he lighted the hill. When the hill began to burn, all the men except Gold Boot came from under enchantment as sound as ever, and rose off the spikes. Every one was making away, and no one asking who let him out. The hill was on fire except one spot in the middle of it. Gold Boot was not stirring. “Why did you not make him set all the hill on fire?” asked he.
“Why did you not set the whole hill on fire?” demanded Cud of the wizard.
“Is it not all on fire?”
“Do you see the centre is not burning yet?”