“Who is to be invited?” asked the night-jar.
“Well, everybody may come to the big ball, even human beings, if they can only talk in their sleep, or do something else after our fashion. But the choice is to be strictly limited for the grand feast. We will only have the most distinguished people. I have had a battle with the Elf-king about it; because I hold that we mustn’t even include ghosts. The merman and his daughters must be invited first. I don’t suppose they care much about coming on dry land, but I shall see that they each have a wet stone to sit on, or something better; so I expect they won’t decline this time. All the old demons of the first-class, with tails, the River-god, and the wood-sprites. And then I don’t think we can pass over the Grave-pig, the Hell-horse, and the Church-grim, although they belong to the clergy, who are not of our people; but that is merely on account of their office, and they are closely connected with us, and visit us very frequently.”
“Croak,” said the night-jar, and he flew off to issue the invitations.
The elf-maidens had already begun to dance, and they danced a scarf-dance, with scarves woven of mist and moonshine; these have a lovely effect to those who care for that kind of thing. The great hall in the middle of the Elf-hill had been thoroughly polished up for the occasion. The floor was washed with moonshine, and the walls were rubbed over with witches’ fat, and this made them shine with many colours, like a tulip petal. The kitchen was full of frogs on spits, stuffed snake skins, and salads of toad-stool spawn, mouse snouts and hemlock. Then there was beer brewed by the marsh witch, and sparkling saltpetre wine from the vaults. Everything of the best, and rusty nails and church window panes among the kickshaws.
The old Elf-king had his golden crown polished with pounded slate-pencil, ay, and it was a head-boy’s slate-pencil too, and they are not so easy to get. They hung up fresh curtains in the bedroom, and fixed them with the slime of snails. Yes, indeed, there was a humming and a buzzing.
“Now we will fumigate, with horse-hair and pig’s bristles, and then I can do no more!” said the old elf-servant.
“Dear father!” said the youngest of the daughters, “are you not going to tell me who these grand strangers are?”
“Well, well,” he said, “I suppose I must tell you now. Two of my daughters must prepare themselves to be married,—two will certainly make marriages. The old Trold chieftain from Norway, that lives on the Dovrefield among his many rock castles and fastnesses and gold works, which are better than you would expect, is coming down here with his two sons. They are coming to look for wives. The old Trold is a regular honest Norwegian veteran, straightforward and merry. I used to know him in the olden days, when we drank to our good fellowship. He came here to fetch a wife, but she is dead now. She was a daughter of the king of the chalk cliffs at Möen. As the saying is, ‘he took his wife on the chalk,’ that is, bought her on tick. I am quite anxious to see the old fellow. The sons, they say, are a pair of overgrown, ill-mannered cubs; but perhaps they are not so bad; I daresay they will improve as they grow older. See if you can’t lick them into shape a bit.”
“And when do they come?” asked one of the daughters.
“That depends upon wind and weather,” said the Elf-king. “They travel economically, and they will take their chance of a ship. I wanted them to come round by Sweden, but the old fellow can’t bring himself to that yet. He doesn’t march with the times, but I don’t hold with that!”