“Well, Dyeermud, eat your dinner, and then I will tell you; though I have never told any one yet, not even my own lawful wife.”
When the dinner was over, the knight told his story to Dyeermud, as follows,—
“I was living once in this place here, both happy and well. I had twelve sons of my own and my own wife. Each of my twelve sons had his pack of hounds. I and my wife had one pack between us. On a May morning after breakfast, I and my sons set out to hunt. We started a deer without horns, and, rushing forward in chase of her, followed on swiftly all day. Toward evening the deer disappeared in a cave. In we raced after her, and found ourselves soon in the land of small men, but saw not a trace of the deer.
“Going to a great lofty castle, we entered, and found many people inside. The king of the small men bade us welcome, and asked had I men to prepare us a dinner. I said that I had my own twelve sons. The small men then brought in from a forest twelve wild boars. I put down twelve kettles with water to scald and dress the game. When the water was boiling, it was of no use to us; and we could not have softened with it one bristle on the wild boars from that day to this. Then a small man, putting the twelve boars in a row with the head of one near the tail of the other, took from the hall-door a whistle, and, blowing first on one side of the row and then on the other, made all the twelve white and clean; then he dressed, cut, and cooked them, and we all ate to our own satisfaction.
“In the course of the evening, the king of the small men asked had I anyone who could shorten the night by showing action. I said that I had my own twelve sons. Twelve small men now rose, and drew out a long weighty chain, holding one end in their hands. My sons caught the other end, pulled against the twelve small men, and the small men against them; but the small men soon threw a loop of the chain around the necks of my twelve sons, and swept the heads off them; one of the small men came then with a long knife, and, opening the breasts of my sons, took out their twelve hearts, and put them all on a dish; then they pushed me to a bench, and I had to sit with my twelve sons stretched dead there before me. Now they brought the dish to make me eat the twelve hearts for my supper. When I would not, they drove them down my throat, and gave me a blow of a fist that knocked one eye out of me. They left me that way in torment till morning; then they opened the door, and threw me out of the castle.
“From that day to this I have not seen my children, nor a trace of them; and ’tis just twenty-one years, coming May-day, since I lost my twelve sons and my eye. There is not a May-day but the deer comes to this castle and shouts, ‘Here is the deer; but where are the hunters to follow?’ Now you have the knowledge, Dyeermud, of how I lost my eye and my laugh.”
“Well,” asked Dyeermud, “will May-day come soon in this country?”
“To-morrow, as early as you will rise.”
“Is there any chance that the deer will come in the morning?”
“There is,” said the knight; “and you’ll not have much of the morning behind you when she’ll give a call.”