“Well, then, I’ll give it to you; but we must have some more wine.”
And the wine was brought, and he sang the “Foggy Dew,” and the Dwarf said it was the sweetest song he had ever heard, and that the Fairyman’s voice would coax the birds off the bushes!
“You asked me who I am?” said the Fairy.
“I did,” said the Dwarf.
“And I asked you who is yourself?”
“You did,” said the Dwarf.
“And who are you, then?”
“Well, to tell the truth, I don’t know,” said the Dwarf, and he blushed like a rose.
“Well, tell me what you know about yourself.”
“I remember nothing at all,” said the Dwarf, “before the day I found myself going along with a crowd of all sorts of people to the great fair of the Liffey. We had to pass by the King’s palace on our way, and as we were passing the King sent for a band of jugglers to come and show their tricks before him. I followed the jugglers to look on, and when the play was over the King called me to him, and asked me who I was and where I came from. I was dumb then, and couldn’t answer; but even if I could speak I could not tell him what he wanted to know, for I remembered nothing of myself before that day. Then the King asked the jugglers, but they knew nothing about me, and no one knew anything, and then the King said he would take me into his service; and the only work I have to do is to go once a month with a bag of corn to the hut in the lonely moor.”