{"collection":"folklore-oral-tradition","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_34339/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_34339","id":"gutenberg_34339","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34339","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Children & Young Adult Reading","Category: Science-Fiction & Fantasy","Children's stories","Fairy tales","Fantasy literature","Goblins -- Juvenile fiction","Princesses -- Juvenile fiction"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by Suzanne Shell, Emmy and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was\nproduced from images generously made available by The\nInternet Archive/American Libraries.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN\n\n_Illustrations especially engraved and printed by the Beck Engraving\nCompany, Philadelphia_\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN\n\n_By_ George MacDonald\n\n[Illustration]\n\n          ILLUSTRATED BY\n          JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH\n          DAVID MCKAY COMPANY _Publishers_\n          Philadelphia, MCMXX.\n\n          Copyright, 1920, by David McKay Company\n\n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\n                                                         FACING\n                                                          PAGE\n    She ran for some distance, turned several times, and\n      then began to be afraid                              14\n\n    She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose\n      such a flapping of wings                             22\n\n    \"Never mind, Princess Irene,\" he said. \"You mustn't\n      kiss me to-night. But you shan't break your word.\n      I will come another time\"                            42\n\n    In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped\n      in his great strong arms                             68\n\n    \"Come,\" and she still held out her arms                96\n\n    The goblins fell back a little when he began, and\n      made horrible grimaces all through the rhyme        118\n\n    Curdie went on after her, flashing his torch about    138\n\n    There sat his mother by the fire, and in her arms\n      lay the princess fast asleep                        184\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n    CHAPTER                                               PAGE\n        I. WHY THE PRINCESS HAS A STORY ABOUT HER           9\n       II. THE PRINCESS LOSES HERSELF                      13\n      III. THE PRINCESS AND--WE SHALL SEE WHO              16\n       IV. WHAT THE NURSE THOUGHT OF IT                    24\n        V. THE PRINCESS LETS WELL ALONE                    29\n       VI. THE LITTLE MINER                                32\n      VII. THE MINES                                       45\n     VIII. THE GOBLINS                                     50\n       IX. THE HALL OF THE GOBLIN PALACE                   59\n        X. THE PRINCESS'S KING-PAPA                        68\n       XI. THE OLD LADY'S BEDROOM                          73\n      XII. A SHORT CHAPTER ABOUT CURDIE                    82\n     XIII. THE COBS' CREATURES                             85\n      XIV. THAT NIGHT WEEK                                 90\n       XV. WOVEN AND THEN SPUN                             95\n      XVI. THE RING                                       106\n     XVII. SPRING-TIME                                    109\n     XVIII. CURDIE'S CLUE                                 112\n       XIX. GOBLIN COUNSELS                               122\n        XX. IRENE'S CLUE                                  128\n       XXI. THE ESCAPE                                    134\n      XXII. THE OLD LADY AND CURDIE                       147\n     XXIII. CURDIE AND HIS MOTHER                         155\n      XXIV. IRENE BEHAVES LIKE A PRINCESS                 165\n       XXV. CURDIE COMES TO GRIEF                         168\n      XXVI. THE GOBLIN-MINERS                             174\n     XXVII. THE GOBLINS IN THE KING'S HOUSE               177\n    XXVIII. CURDIE'S GUIDE                                184\n      XXIX. MASON-WORK                                    189\n       XXX. THE KING AND THE KISS                         192\n      XXXI. THE SUBTERRANEAN WATERS                       196\n     XXXII. THE LAST CHAPTER                              202\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nWHY THE PRINCESS HAS A STORY ABOUT HER\n\n\nTHERE was once a little princess who--\n\n\"_But, Mr. Author, why do you always write about princesses?_\"\n\n\"_Because every little girl is a princess._\"\n\n\"_You will make them vain if you tell them that._\"\n\n\"_Not if they understand what I mean._\"\n\n\"_Then what do you mean?_\"\n\n\"_What_ do you _mean by a princess?_\"\n\n\"_The daughter of a king._\"\n\n\"_Very well, then every little girl is a princess, and there would be no\nneed to say anything about it, except that she is always in danger of\nforgetting her rank, and behaving as if she had grown out of the mud. I\nhave seen little princesses behave like the children of thieves and\nlying beggars, and that is why they need to be told they are\nprincesses. And that is why, when I tell a story of this kind, I like to\ntell it about a princess. Then I can say better what I mean, because I\ncan then give her every beautiful thing I want her to have._\"\n\n\"_Please go on._\"\n\nThere was once a little princess whose father was king over a great\ncountry full of mountains and valleys. His palace was built upon one of\nthe mountains, and was very grand and beautiful. The princess, whose\nname was Irene, was born there, but she was sent soon after her birth,\nbecause her mother was not very strong, to be brought up by country\npeople in a large house, half castle, half farm-house, on the side of\nanother mountain, about halfway between its base and its peak.\n\nThe princess was a sweet little creature, and at the time my story\nbegins was about eight years old. I think, but she got older very fast.\nHer face was fair and pretty, with eyes like two bits of night-sky, each\nwith a star dissolved in the blue. Those eyes you would have thought\nmust have known they came from there, so often were they turned up in\nthat direction. The ceiling of her nursery was blue, with stars in it,\nas like the sky as they could make it. But I doubt if ever she saw the\nreal sky with the stars in it, for a reason which I had better mention\nat once.\n\nThese mountains were full of hollow places underneath; huge caverns, and\nwinding ways, some with water running through them, and some shining\nwith all colors of the rainbow when a light was taken in. There would\nnot have been much known about them, had there not been mines there,\ngreat deep pits, with long galleries and passages running off from them,\nwhich had been dug to get at the ore of which the mountains were full.\nIn the course of digging, the miners came upon many of these natural\ncaverns. A few of them had far-off openings out on the side of a\nmountain, or into a ravine.\n\nNow in these subterranean caverns lived a strange race of beings, called\nby some gnomes, by some kobolds, by some goblins. There was a legend\ncurrent in the country that at one time they lived above ground, and\nwere very like other people. But for some reason or other, concerning\nwhich there were different legendary theories, the king had laid what\nthey thought too severe taxes upon them, or had required observances of\nthem they did not like, or had begun to treat them with more severity in\nsome way or other, and impose stricter laws; and the consequence was\nthat they had all disappeared from the face of the country. According to\nthe legend, however, instead of going to some other country, they had\nall taken refuge in the subterranean caverns, whence they never came out\nbut at night, and then seldom showed themselves in any numbers, and\nnever to many people at once. It was only in the least frequented and\nmost difficult parts of the mountains that they were said to gather even\nat night in the open air. Those who had caught sight of any of them said\nthat they had greatly altered in the course of generations; and no\nwonder, seeing they lived away from the sun, in cold and wet and dark\nplaces. They were now, not ordinarily ugly, but either absolutely\nhideous, or ludicrously grotesque both in face and form. There was no\ninvention, they said, of the most lawless imagination expressed by pen\nor pencil, that could surpass the extravagance of their appearance. And\nas they grew mis-shapen in body, they had grown in knowledge and\ncleverness, and now were able to do things no mortal could see the\npossibility of. But as they grew in cunning, they grew in mischief, and\ntheir great delight was in every way they could think of to annoy the\npeople who lived in the open-air-story above them. They had enough of\naffection left for each other, to preserve them from being absolutely\ncruel for cruelty's sake to those that came in their way; but still they\nso heartily cherished the ancestral grudge against those who occupied\ntheir former possession, and especially against the descendants of the\nking who had caused their expulsion, that they sought every opportunity\nof tormenting them in ways that were as odd as their inventors; and\nalthough dwarfed and mis-shapen, they had strength equal to their\ncunning. In the process of time they had got a king, and a government of\ntheir own, whose chief business, beyond their own simple affairs, was to\ndevise trouble for their neighbors. It will now be pretty evident why\nthe little princess had never seen the sky at night. They were much too\nafraid of the goblins to let her out of the house then, even in company\nwith ever so many attendants; and they had good reason, as we shall see\nby-and-by.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE PRINCESS LOSES HERSELF\n\n\nI HAVE said the Princess Irene was about eight years old when my story\nbegins. And this is how it begins.\n\nOne very wet day, when the mountain was covered with mist which was\nconstantly gathering itself together into rain-drops, and pouring down\non the roofs of the great old house, whence it fell in a fringe of water\nfrom the eaves all round about it, the princess could not of course go\nout. She got very tired, so tired that even her toys could no longer\namuse her. You would wonder at that if I had time to describe to you one\nhalf of the toys she had. But then you wouldn't have the toys\nthemselves, and that makes all the difference: you can't get tired of a\nthing before you have it. It was a picture, though, worth seeing--the\nprincess sitting in the nursery with the sky-ceiling over her head, at a\ngreat table covered with her toys. If the artist would like to draw\nthis, I should advise him not to meddle with the toys. I am afraid of\nattempting to describe them, and I think he had better not try to draw\nthem. He had better not. He can do a thousand things I can't, but I\ndon't think he could draw those toys. No man could better make the\nprincess herself than he could, though--leaning with her back bowed into\nthe back of the chair, her head hanging down, and her hands in her lap,\nvery miserable as she would say herself, not even knowing what she would\nlike, except to go out and get very wet, catch a particularly nice\ncold, and have to go to bed and take gruel. The next moment after you\nsee her sitting there, her nurse goes out of the room.\n\n[Illustration: She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then\nbegan to be afraid.]\n\nEven that is a change, and the princess wakes up a little, and looks\nabout her. Then she tumbles off her chair, and runs out of the door, not\nthe same door the nurse went out of, but one which opened at the foot of\na curious old stair of worm-eaten oak, which looked as if never any one\nhad set foot upon it. She had once before been up six steps, and that\nwas sufficient reason, in such a day, for trying to find out what was at\nthe top of it.\n\nUp and up she ran--such a long way it seemed to her! until she came to\nthe top of the third flight. There she found the landing was the end of\na long passage. Into this she ran. It was full of doors on each side.\nThere were so many that she did not care to open any, but ran on to the\nend, where she turned into another passage, also full of doors. When she\nhad turned twice more, and still saw doors and only doors about her, she\nbegan to get frightened. It was so silent! And all those doors must hide\nrooms with nobody in them! That was dreadful. Also the rain made a great\ntrampling noise on the roof. She turned and started at full speed, her\nlittle footsteps echoing through the sounds of the rain--back for the\nstairs and her safe nursery. So she thought, but she had lost herself\nlong ago. It doesn't follow that she _was_ lost, because she had lost\nherself though.\n\nShe ran for some distance, turned several times, and then began to be\nafraid. Very soon she was sure that she had lost the way back. Rooms\neverywhere, and no stair! Her little heart beat as fast as her little\nfeet ran, and a lump of tears was growing in her throat. But she was too\neager and perhaps too frightened to cry for some time. At last her hope\nfailed her. Nothing but passages and doors everywhere! She threw herself\non the floor, and began to wail and cry.\n\nShe did not cry long, however, for she was as brave as could be expected\nof a princess of her age. After a good cry, she got up, and brushed the\ndust from her frock. Oh what old dust it was! Then she wiped her eyes\nwith her hands, for princesses don't always have their handkerchiefs in\ntheir pockets any more than some other little girls I know of. Next,\nlike a true princess, she resolved on going wisely to work to find her\nway back: she would walk through the passages, and look in every\ndirection for the stair. This she did, but without success. She went\nover the same ground again and again without knowing it, for the\npassages and doors were all alike. At last, in a corner, through a\nhalf-open door, she did see a stair. But alas! it went the wrong way:\ninstead of going down, it went up. Frightened as she was, however, she\ncould not help wishing to see where yet further the stair could lead. It\nwas very narrow, and so steep that she went up like a four-legged\ncreature on her hands and feet.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE PRINCESS AND--WE SHALL SEE WHO\n\n\nWHEN she came to the top, she found herself in a little square place,\nwith three doors, two opposite each other, and one opposite the top of\nthe stair. She stood for a moment, without an idea in her little head\nwhat to do next. But as she stood, she began to hear a curious humming\nsound. Could it be the rain? No. It was much more gentle, and even\nmonotonous than the sound of the rain, which now she scarcely heard. The\nlow sweet humming sound went on, sometimes stopping for a little while\nand then beginning again. It was more like the hum of a very happy bee\nthat had found a rich well of honey in some globular flower, than\nanything else I can think of at this moment. Where could it come from?\nShe laid her ear first to one of the doors to hearken if it was\nthere--then to another. When she laid her ear against the third door,\nthere could be no doubt where it came from: it must be from something in\nthat room. What could it be? She was rather afraid, but her curiosity\nwas stronger than her fear, and she opened the door very gently and\npeeped in. What do you think she saw? A very old lady who sat spinning.\n\n\"_Oh, Mr. Editor! I know the story you are going to tell: it's The\nSleeping Beauty; only you're spinning too, and making it longer._\"\n\n\"_No, indeed, it is not that story. Why should I tell one that every\nproperly educated child knows already? More old ladies than one have sat\nspinning in a garret. Besides, the old lady in that story was only\nspinning with a spindle, and this one was spinning with a spinning\nwheel, else how could the princess have heard the sweet noise through\nthe door? Do you know the difference? Did you ever see a spindle or a\nspinning wheel? I daresay you never did. Well, ask your mamma to explain\nto you the difference. Between ourselves, however, I shouldn't wonder if\nshe didn't know much better than you. Another thing is, that this is not\na fairy story; but a goblin story. And one thing more, this old lady\nspinning was not an old nurse--but--you shall see who. I think I have\nnow made it quite plain that this is not that lovely story of The\nSleeping Beauty. It is quite a new one, I assure you, and I will try to\ntell it as prettily as I can._\"\n\nPerhaps you will wonder how the princess could tell that the old lady\nwas an old lady, when I inform you that not only was she beautiful, but\nher skin was smooth and white. I will tell you more. Her hair was combed\nback from her forehead and face, and hung loose far down and all over\nher back. That is not much like an old lady--is it? Ah! but it was white\nalmost as snow. And although her face was so smooth, her eyes looked so\nwise that you could not have helped seeing she must be old. The\nprincess, though she could not have told you why, did think her very old\nindeed--quite fifty--she said to herself. But she was rather older than\nthat, as you shall hear.\n\nWhile the princess stared bewildered, with her head just inside the\ndoor, the old lady lifted hers, and said in a sweet, but old and rather\nshaky voice, which mingled very pleasantly with the continued hum of her\nwheel:\n\n\"Come in, my dear; come in. I am glad to see you.\"\n\nThat the princess was a real princess, you might see now quite plainly;\nfor she didn't hang on to the handle of the door, and stare without\nmoving, as I have known some do who ought to have been princesses, but\nwere only rather vulgar little girls. She did as she was told, stepped\ninside the door at once, and shut it gently behind her.\n\n\"Come to me, my dear,\" said the old lady.\n\nAnd again the princess did as she was told. She approached the old\nlady--rather slowly, I confess, but did not stop until she stood by her\nside, and looked up in her face with her blue eyes and the two melted\nstars in them.\n\n\"Why, what have you been doing with your eyes, child?\" asked the old\nlady.\n\n\"Crying,\" answered the princess.\n\n\"Why, child?\"\n\n\"Because I couldn't find my way down again.\"\n\n\"But you could find your way up.\"\n\n\"Not at first--not for a long time.\"\n\n\"But your face is streaked like the back of a zebra. Hadn't you a\nhandkerchief to wipe your eyes with?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Then why didn't you come to me to wipe them for you?\"\n\n\"Please I didn't know you were here. I will next time.\"\n\n\"There's a good child!\" said the old lady.\n\nThen she stopped her wheel, and rose, and, going out of the room,\nreturned with a little silver basin and a soft white towel, with which\nshe washed and wiped the bright little face. And the princess thought\nher hands were so smooth and nice!\n\nWhen she carried away the basin and towel, the little princess wondered\nto see how straight and tall she was, for, although she was so old, she\ndidn't stoop a bit. She was dressed in black velvet with thick white\nheavy-looking lace about it; and on the black dress her hair shone like\nsilver. There was hardly any more furniture in the room than there might\nhave been in that of the poorest old woman who made her bread by her\nspinning. There was no carpet on the floor--no table anywhere--nothing\nbut the spinning-wheel and the chair beside it. When she came back, she\nsat down again, and without a word began her spinning once more, while\nIrene, who had never seen a spinning-wheel, stood by her side and looked\non. When the old lady had succeeded in getting her thread fairly in\noperation again, she said to the princess, but without looking at her:\n\n\"Do you know my name, child?\"\n\n\"No, I don't know it,\" answered the princess.\n\n\"My name is Irene.\"\n\n\"That's _my_ name!\" cried the princess.\n\n\"I know that. I let you have mine. I haven't got your name. You've got\nmine.\"\n\n\"How can that be?\" asked the princess, bewildered. \"I've always had my\nname.\"\n\n\"Your papa, the king, asked me if I had any objection to your having it;\nand of course I hadn't. I let you have it with pleasure.\"\n\n\"It was very kind of you to give me your name--and such a pretty one,\"\nsaid the princess.\n\n\"Oh, not so _very_ kind!\" said the old lady. \"A name is one of those\nthings one can give away and keep all the same. I have a good many such\nthings. Wouldn't you like to know who I am, child?\"\n\n\"Yes, that I should--very much.\"\n\n\"I'm your great-great-grandmother,\" said the lady.\n\n\"What's that?\" asked the princess.\n\n\"I'm your father's mother's father's mother.\"\n\n\"Oh, dear! I can't understand that,\" said the princess.\n\n\"I daresay not. I didn't expect you would. But that's no reason why I\nshouldn't say it.\"\n\n\"Oh no!\" answered the princess.\n\n\"I will explain it all to you when you are older,\" the lady went on.\n\"But you will be able to understand this much now: I came here to take\ncare of you.\"\n\n\"Is it long since you came? Was it yesterday? Or was it to-day, because\nit was so wet that I couldn't get out?\"\n\n\"I've been here ever since you came yourself.\"\n\n\"What a long time!\" said the princess. \"I don't remember it at all.\"\n\n\"No. I suppose not.\"\n\n\"But I never saw you before.\"\n\n\"No. But you shall see me again.\"\n\n\"Do you live in this room always?\"\n\n\"I don't sleep in it. I sleep on the opposite side of the landing. I sit\nhere most of the day.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't like it. My nursery is much prettier. You must be a queen\ntoo, if you are my great big grandmother.\"\n\n\"Yes, I am a queen.\"\n\n\"Where is your crown then?\"\n\n\"In my bedroom.\"\n\n\"I _should_ like to see it.\"\n\n\"You shall some day--not to-day.\"\n\n\"I wonder why nursie never told me.\"\n\n\"Nursie doesn't know. She never saw me.\"\n\n\"But somebody knows that you are in the house?\"\n\n\"No; nobody.\"\n\n\"How do you get your dinner then?\"\n\n\"I keep poultry--of a sort.\"\n\n\"Where do you keep them?\"\n\n\"I will show you.\"\n\n\"And who makes the chicken broth for you?\"\n\n\"I never kill any of my chickens.\"\n\n\"Then I can't understand.\"\n\n\"What did you have for breakfast this morning?\"\n\n\"Oh! I had bread and milk, and an egg.--I daresay you eat their eggs.\"\n\n\"Yes, that's it. I eat their eggs.\"\n\n\"Is that what makes your hair so white?\"\n\n\"No, my dear. It's old age. I am very old.\"\n\n\"I thought so. Are you fifty?\"\n\n\"Yes--more than that.\"\n\n\"Are you a hundred?\"\n\n\"Yes--more than that. I am too old for you to guess. Come and see my\nchickens.\"\n\n[Illustration: She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose such a\nflapping of wings.]\n\nAgain she stopped her spinning. She rose, took the princess by the hand,\nled her out of the room, and opened the door opposite the stair. The\nprincess expected to see a lot of hens and chickens, but instead of\nthat, she saw the blue sky first, and then the roofs of the house, with\na multitude of the loveliest pigeons, mostly white, but of all colors,\nwalking about, making bows to each other, and talking a language she\ncould not understand. She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose\nsuch a flapping of wings, that she in her turn was startled.\n\n\"You've frightened my poultry,\" said the old lady, smiling.\n\n\"And they've frightened me,\" said the princess, smiling too. \"But what\nvery nice poultry! Are the eggs nice?\"\n\n\"Yes, very nice.\"\n\n\"What a small egg-spoon you must have! Wouldn't it be better to keep\nhens, and get bigger eggs?\"\n\n\"How should I feed them, though?\"\n\n\"I see,\" said the princess. \"The pigeons feed themselves. They've got\nwings.\"\n\n\"Just so. If they couldn't fly, I couldn't eat their eggs.\"\n\n\"But how do you get at the eggs? Where are their nests?\"\n\nThe lady took hold of a little loop of string in the wall at the side of\nthe door, and lifting a shutter showed a great many pigeon-holes with\nnests, some with young ones and some with eggs in them. The birds came\nin at the other side, and she took out the eggs on this side. She closed\nit again quickly, lest the young ones should be frightened.\n\n\"Oh what a nice way!\" cried the princess. \"Will you give me an egg to\neat? I'm rather hungry.\"\n\n\"I will some day, but now you must go back, or nursie will be miserable\nabout you. I daresay she's looking for you everywhere.\"\n\n\"Except here,\" answered the princess. \"Oh how surprised she _will_ be\nwhen I tell her about my great big grand-grandmother!\"\n\n\"Yes, that she will!\" said the old lady with a curious smile. \"Mind you\ntell her all about it exactly.\"\n\n\"That I will. Please will you take me back to her?\"\n\n\"I can't go all the way, but I will take you to the top of the stair,\nand then you must run down quite fast into your own room.\"\n\nThe little princess put her hand in the old lady's, who, looking this\nway and that, brought her to the top of the first stair, and thence to\nthe bottom of the second, and did not leave her till she saw her half\nway down the third. When she heard the cry of her nurse's pleasure at\nfinding her, she turned and walked up the stairs again, very fast indeed\nfor such a very great grandmother, and sat down to her spinning with\nanother strange smile on her sweet old face.\n\nAbout this spinning of hers I will tell you more next time.\n\nGuess what she was spinning.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nWHAT THE NURSE THOUGHT OF IT\n\n\n\"WHY, where can you have been, princess?\" asked the nurse, taking her in\nher arms. \"It's very unkind of you to hide away so long. I began to be\nafraid--\"\n\nHere she checked herself.\n\n\"What were you afraid of, nursie?\" asked the princess.\n\n\"Never mind,\" she answered. \"Perhaps I will tell you another day. Now\ntell me where you have been?\"\n\n\"I've been up a long way to see my very great, huge, old grandmother,\"\nsaid the princess.\n\n\"What do you mean by that?\" asked the nurse, who thought she was making\nfun.\n\n\"I mean that I've been a long way up and up to see my great grandmother.\nAh, nursie, you don't know what a beautiful mother of grandmothers I've\ngot upstairs. She is _such_ an old lady! with such lovely white\nhair!--as white as my silver cup. Now, when I think of it, I think her\nhair must be silver.\"\n\n\"What nonsense you are talking, princess!\" said the nurse.\n\n\"I'm not talking nonsense,\" returned Irene, rather offended. \"I will\ntell you all about her. She's much taller than you, and much prettier.\"\n\n\"Oh, I daresay!\" remarked the nurse.\n\n\"And she lives upon pigeon's eggs.\"\n\n\"Most likely,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"And she sits in an empty room, spin-spinning all day long.\"\n\n\"Not a doubt of it,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"And she keeps her crown in her bedroom.\"\n\n\"Of course--quite the proper place to keep her crown in. She wears it in\nbed, I'll be bound.\"\n\n\"She didn't say that. And I don't think she does. That wouldn't be\ncomfortable--would it? I don't think my papa wears his crown for a\nnight-cap. Does he, nursie?\"\n\n\"I never asked him. I daresay he does.\"\n\n\"And she's been there ever since I came here--ever so many years.\"\n\n\"Anybody could have told you that,\" said the nurse, who did not believe\na word Irene was saying.\n\n\"Why didn't you tell me then?\"\n\n\"There was no necessity. You could make it all up for yourself.\"\n\n\"You don't believe me then!\" exclaimed the princess, astonished and\nangry, as well she might be.\n\n\"Did you expect me to believe you, princess?\" asked the nurse coldly. \"I\nknow princesses are in the habit of telling make-believes, but you are\nthe first I ever heard of who expected to have them believed,\" she\nadded, seeing that the child was strangely in earnest.\n\nThe princess burst into tears.\n\n\"Well, I must say,\" remarked the nurse, now thoroughly vexed with her\nfor crying, \"it is not at all becoming in a princess to tell stories\n_and_ expect to be believed just because she is a princess.\"\n\n\"But it's quite true, I tell you, nursie.\"\n\n\"You've dreamt it, then, child.\"\n\n\"No, I didn't dream it. I went up-stairs, and I lost myself, and if I\nhadn't found the beautiful lady, I should never have found myself.\"\n\n\"Oh, I daresay!\"\n\n\"Well, you just come up with me, and see if I'm not telling the truth.\"\n\n\"Indeed I have other work to do. It's your dinner-time, and I won't have\nany more such nonsense.\"\n\nThe princess wiped her eyes, and her face grew so hot that they were\nsoon quite dry. She sat down to her dinner, but ate next to nothing. Not\nto be believed does not at all agree with princesses; for a real\nprincess cannot tell a lie. So all the afternoon she did not speak a\nword. Only when the nurse spoke to her, she answered her, for a real\nprincess is never rude--even when she does well to be offended.\n\nOf course the nurse was not comfortable in her mind--not that she\nsuspected the least truth in Irene's story, but that she loved her\ndearly, and was vexed with herself for having been cross to her. She\nthought her crossness was the cause of the princess' unhappiness, and\nhad no idea that she was really and deeply hurt at not being believed.\nBut, as it became more and more plain during the evening in every motion\nand look, that, although she tried to amuse herself with her toys, her\nheart was too vexed and troubled to enjoy them, her nurse's discomfort\ngrew and grew. When bedtime came, she undressed and laid her down, but\nthe child, instead of holding up her little mouth to be kissed, turned\naway from her and lay still. Then nursie's heart gave way altogether,\nand she began to cry. At the sound of her first sob, the princess\nturned again, and held her face to kiss her as usual. But the nurse had\nher handkerchief to her eyes, and did not see the movement.\n\n\"Nursie,\" said the princess, \"why won't you believe me?\"\n\n\"Because I can't believe you,\" said the nurse, getting angry again.\n\n\"Ah! then you can't help it,\" said Irene, \"and I will not be vexed with\nyou any more. I will give you a kiss and go to sleep.\"\n\n\"You little angel!\" cried the nurse, and caught her out of bed, and\nwalked about the room with her in her arms, kissing and hugging her.\n\n\"You _will_ let me take you to see my dear old great big grandmother,\nwon't you?\" said the princess, as she laid her down again.\n\n\"And _you_ won't say I'm ugly, any more--will you, princess?\"\n\n\"Nursie! I never said you were ugly. What can you mean?\"\n\n\"Well, if you didn't say it, you meant it.\"\n\n\"Indeed, I never did.\"\n\n\"You said I wasn't so pretty as that--\"\n\n\"As my beautiful grandmother--yes, I did say that; and I say it again,\nfor it's quite true.\"\n\n\"Then I _do_ think you _are_ unkind!\" said the nurse, and put her\nhandkerchief to her eyes again.\n\n\"Nursie, dear, everybody can't be as beautiful as every other body, you\nknow. You are _very_ nice-looking, but if you had been as beautiful as\nmy grandmother--\"\n\n\"Bother your grandmother!\" said the nurse.\n\n\"Nurse, that's very rude. You are not fit to be spoken to--till you can\nbehave better.\"\n\nThe princess turned away once more, and again the nurse was ashamed of\nherself.\n\n\"I'm sure I beg your pardon, princess,\" she said, though still in an\noffended tone. But the princess let the tone pass, and heeded only the\nwords.\n\n\"You won't say it again, I am sure,\" she answered, once more turning\ntoward her nurse. \"I was only going to say that if you had been twice as\nnice-looking as you are, some king or other would have married you, and\nthen what would have become of me?\"\n\n\"You are an angel!\" repeated the nurse, again embracing her.\n\n\"Now,\" insisted Irene, \"you _will_ come and see my grandmother--won't\nyou?\"\n\n\"I will go with you anywhere you like, my cherub,\" she answered; and in\ntwo minutes the weary little princess was fast asleep.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE PRINCESS LETS WELL ALONE\n\n\nWHEN she woke the next morning, the first thing she heard was the rain\nstill falling. Indeed, this day was so like the last, that it would have\nbeen difficult to tell where was the use of it. The first thing she\nthought of, however, was not the rain, but the lady in the tower; and\nthe first question that occupied her thoughts was whether she should not\nask the nurse to fulfill her promise this very morning, and go with her\nto find her grandmother as soon as she had had her breakfast. But she\ncame to the conclusion that perhaps the lady would not be pleased if she\ntook anyone to see her without first asking leave; especially as it was\npretty evident, seeing she lived on pigeons' eggs, and cooked them\nherself, that she did not want the household to know she was there. So\nthe princess resolved to take the first opportunity of running up alone\nand asking whether she might bring her nurse. She believed the fact that\nshe could not otherwise convince her she was telling the truth, would\nhave much weight with her grandmother.\n\nThe princess and her nurse were the best of friends all dressing time,\nand the princess in consequence ate an enormous little breakfast.\n\n\"I wonder, Lootie\"--that was her pet-name for her nurse--\"what pigeons'\neggs taste like?\" she said, as she was eating her egg--not quite a\ncommon one, for they always picked out the pinky ones for her.\n\n\"We'll get you a pigeon's egg, and you shall judge for yourself,\" said\nthe nurse.\n\n\"Oh, no, no!\" returned Irene, suddenly reflecting they might disturb the\nold lady in getting it, and that even if they did not, she would have\none less in consequence.\n\n\"What a strange creature you are,\" said the nurse--\"first to want a\nthing and then to refuse it!\"\n\nBut she did not say it crossly, and the princess never minded any\nremarks that were not unfriendly.\n\n\"Well, you see, Lootie, there are reasons,\" she returned, and said no\nmore, for she did not want to bring up the subject of their former\nstrife, lest her nurse should offer to go before she had had her\ngrandmother's permission to bring her. Of course she could refuse to\ntake her, but then she would believe her less than ever.\n\nNow the nurse, as she said herself afterward, could not be every moment\nin the room, and as never before yesterday had the princess given her\nthe smallest reason for anxiety, it had not yet come into her head to\nwatch her more closely. So she soon gave her a chance, and the very\nfirst that offered, Irene was off and up the stairs again.\n\nThis day's adventure, however, did not turn out like yesterday's,\nalthough it began like it; and indeed to-day is very seldom like\nyesterday, if people would note the differences--even when it rains. The\nprincess ran through passage after passage, and could not find the stair\nof the tower. My own suspicion is that she had not gone up high enough,\nand was searching on the second instead of the third floor. When she\nturned to go back, she failed equally in her search after the stair. She\nwas lost once more.\n\nSomething made it even worse to bear this time, and it was no wonder\nthat she cried again. Suddenly it occurred to her that it was after\nhaving cried before that she had found her grandmother's stair. She got\nup at once, wiped her eyes, and started upon a fresh quest. This time,\nalthough she did not find what she hoped, she found what was next best:\nshe did not come on a stair that went up, but she came upon one that\nwent down. It was evidently not the stair she had come up, yet it was a\ngood deal better than none; so down she went, and was singing merrily\nbefore she reached the bottom. There, to her surprise, she found herself\nin the kitchen. Although she was not allowed to go there alone, her\nnurse had often taken her, and she was a great favorite with the\nservants. So there was a general rush at her the moment she appeared,\nfor every one wanted to have her; and the report of where she was soon\nreached the nurse's ears. She came at once to fetch her; but she never\nsuspected how she had got there, and the princess kept her own counsel.\n\nHer failure to find the old lady not only disappointed her, but made her\nvery thoughtful. Sometimes she came almost to the nurse's opinion that\nshe had dreamed all about her; but that fancy never lasted very long.\nShe wondered much whether she should ever see her again, and thought it\nvery sad not to have been able to find her when she particularly wanted\nher. She resolved to say nothing more to her nurse on the subject,\nseeing it was so little in her power to prove her words.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE LITTLE MINER\n\n\nTHE next day the great cloud still hung over the mountain, and the rain\npoured like water from a full sponge. The princess was very fond of\nbeing out of doors, and she nearly cried when she saw that the weather\nwas no better. But the mist was not of such a dark dingy gray; there was\nlight in it; and as the hours went on, it grew brighter and brighter,\nuntil it was almost too brilliant to look at; and late in the afternoon,\nthe sun broke out so gloriously that Irene clapped her hands, crying,\n\n\"See, see, Lootie! The sun has had his face washed. Look how bright he\nis! Do get my hat, and let us go out for a walk. Oh dear! oh dear! how\nhappy I am!\"\n\nLootie was very glad to please the princess. She got her hat and cloak,\nand they set out together for a walk up the mountain; for the road was\nso hard and steep that the water could not rest upon it, and it was\nalways dry enough for walking a few minutes after the rain ceased. The\nclouds were rolling away in broken pieces, like great, overwoolly sheep,\nwhose wool the sun had bleached till it was almost too white for the\neyes to bear. Between them the sky shone with a deeper and purer blue,\nbecause of the rain. The trees on the road-side were hung all over with\ndrops, which sparkled in the sun like jewels. The only things that were\nno brighter for the rain, were the brooks that ran down the mountain;\nthey had changed from the clearness of crystal to a muddy brown; but\nwhat they lost in color they gained in sound--or at least in noise, for\na brook when it is swollen is not so musical as before. But Irene was in\nraptures with the great brown streams tumbling down everywhere; and\nLootie shared in her delight, for she too had been confined to the house\nfor three days. At length she observed that the sun was getting low, and\nsaid it was time to be going back. She made the remark again and again,\nbut, every time, the princess begged her to go on just a little farther\nand a little farther; reminding her that it was much easier to go down\nhill, and saying that when they did turn, they would be at home in a\nmoment. So on and on they did go, now to look at a group of ferns over\nwhose tops a stream was pouring in a watery arch, now to pick a shining\nstone from a rock by the wayside, now to watch the flight of some bird.\nSuddenly the shadow of a great mountain peak came up from behind, and\nshot in front of them. When the nurse saw it, she started and shook, and\ntremulously grasping the hand of the princess turned and began to run\ndown the hill.\n\n\"What's all the haste, nursie?\" asked Irene, running alongside of her.\n\n\"We must not be out a moment longer.\"\n\n\"But we can't help being out a good many moments longer.\"\n\nIt was too true. The nurse almost cried. They were much too far from\nhome. It was against express orders to be out with the princess one\nmoment after the sun was down; and they were nearly a mile up the\nmountain! If his Majesty, Irene's papa, were to hear of it, Lootie\nwould certainly be dismissed; and to leave the princess would break her\nheart. It was no wonder she ran. But Irene was not in the least\nfrightened, not knowing anything to be frightened at. She kept on\nchattering as well as she could, but it was not easy.\n\n\"Lootie! Lootie! why do you run so fast? It shakes my teeth when I\ntalk.\"\n\n\"Then don't talk,\" said Lootie.\n\nBut the princess went on talking. She was always saying, \"Look, look,\nLootie,\" but Lootie paid no more heed to anything she said, only ran on.\n\n\"Look, look, Lootie! Don't you see that funny man peeping over the\nrock?\"\n\nLootie only ran the faster. They had to pass the rock and when they came\nnearer, the princess clearly saw that it was only a large fragment of\nthe rock itself that she had mistaken for a man.\n\n\"Look, look, Lootie! There's _such_ a curious creature at the foot of\nthat old tree. Look at it, Lootie! It's making faces at us, I do think.\"\n\nLootie gave a stifled cry, and ran faster still--so fast, that Irene's\nlittle legs could not keep up with her, and she fell with a clash. It\nwas a hard down-hill road, and she had been running very fast--so it was\nno wonder she began to cry. This put the nurse nearly beside herself;\nbut all she could do was to run on, the moment she got the princess on\nher feet again.\n\n\"Who's that laughing at me?\" said the princess, trying to keep in her\nsobs, and running too fast for her grazed knees.\n\n\"Nobody, child,\" said the nurse, almost angrily.\n\nBut that instant there came a burst of coarse tittering from somewhere\nnear, and a hoarse indistinct voice that seemed to say, \"Lies! lies!\nlies!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" cried the nurse with a sigh that was almost a scream, and ran on\nfaster than ever.\n\n\"Nursie! Lootie! I can't run any more. Do let us walk a bit.\"\n\n\"What _am_ I to do?\" said the nurse. \"Here, I will carry you.\"\n\nShe caught her up; but found her much too heavy to run with, and had to\nset her down again. Then she looked wildly about her, gave a great cry,\nand said--\n\n\"We've taken the wrong turning somewhere, and I don't know where we are.\nWe are lost, lost!\"\n\nThe terror she was in had quite bewildered her. It was true enough they\nhad lost the way. They had been running down into a little valley in\nwhich there was no house to be seen.\n\nNow Irene did not know what good reason there was for her nurse's\nterror, for the servants had all strict orders never to mention the\ngoblins to her, but it was very discomposing to see her nurse in such a\nfright. Before, however, she had time to grow thoroughly alarmed like\nher, she heard the sound of whistling, and that revived her. Presently\nshe saw a boy coming up the road from the valley to meet them. He was\nthe whistler; but before they met, his whistling changed to singing. And\nthis is something like what he sang:\n\n          \"Ring! dod! bang!\n           Go the hammers' clang!\n           Hit and turn and bore!\n           Whizz and puff and roar!\n           Thus we rive the rocks.\n           Force the goblin locks.\n           See the shining ore!\n           One, two, three--\n           Bright as gold can be!\n           Four, five, six--\n           Shovels, mattocks, picks!\n           Seven, eight, nine--\n           Light your lamp at mine.\n           Ten, eleven, twelve--\n           Loosely hold the helve.\n           We're the merry miner-boys,\n           Make the goblins hold their noise.\"\n\n\"I wish you would hold _your_ noise,\" said the nurse rudely, for the\nvery word goblin at such a time and in such a place made her tremble. It\nwould bring the goblins upon them to a certainty, she thought, to defy\nthem in that way. But whether the boy heard her or not, he did not stop\nhis singing.\n\n          \"Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen--\n           This is worth the siftin';\n           Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen--\n           There's the match, and lay't in.\n           Nineteen, twenty--\n           Goblins in a plenty.\"\n\n\"Do be quiet,\" cried the nurse, in a whispered shriek. But the boy, who\nwas now close at hand, still went on.\n\n          \"Hush! scush! scurry!\n           There you go in a hurry!\n           Gobble! gobble! gobblin'!\n           There you go a wobblin';\n           Hobble, hobble, hobblin'!\n           Cobble! cobble! cobblin'!\n           Hob-bob-goblin--Huuuuuh!\"\n\n\"There!\" said the boy, as he stood still opposite them. \"There! that'll\ndo for them. They can't bear singing, and they can't stand that song.\nThey can't sing themselves, for they have no more voice than a crow; and\nthey don't like other people to sing.\"\n\nThe boy was dressed in a miner's dress, with a curious cap on his head.\nHe was a very nice-looking boy, with eyes as dark as the mines in which\nhe worked, and as sparkling as the crystals in their rocks. He was about\ntwelve years old. His face was almost too pale for beauty, which came of\nhis being so little in the open air and the sunlight--for even\nvegetables grown in the dark are white; but he looked happy, merry\nindeed--perhaps at the thought of having routed the goblins; and his\nbearing as he stood before them had nothing clownish or rude about it.\n\n\"I saw them,\" he went on, \"as I came up; and I'm very glad I did. I knew\nthey were after somebody, but I couldn't see who it was. They won't\ntouch you so long as I'm with you.\"\n\n\"Why, who are you?\" asked the nurse, offended at the freedom with which\nhe spoke to them.\n\n\"I'm Peter's son.\"\n\n\"Who's Peter?\"\n\n\"Peter the miner.\"\n\n\"I don't know him.\"\n\n\"I'm his son, though.\"\n\n\"And why should the goblins mind _you_, pray?\"\n\n\"Because I don't mind them. I'm used to them.\"\n\n\"What difference does that make?\"\n\n\"If you're not afraid of them, they're afraid of you. I'm not afraid of\nthem. That's all. But it's all that's wanted--up here, that is. It's a\ndifferent thing down there. They won't always mind that song even, down\nthere. And if anyone sings it, they stand grinning at him awfully; and\nif he gets frightened, and misses a word, or says a wrong one, they--oh!\ndon't they give it him!\"\n\n\"What do they do to him?\" asked Irene, with a trembling voice.\n\n\"Don't go frightening the princess,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"The princess!\" repeated the little miner, taking off his curious cap.\n\"I beg your pardon; but you oughtn't to be out so late. Everybody knows\nthat's against the law.\"\n\n\"Yes, indeed it is!\" said the nurse, beginning to cry again. \"And I\nshall have to suffer for it.\"\n\n\"What does that matter?\" said the boy. \"It must be your fault. It is the\nprincess who will suffer for it. I hope they didn't hear you call her\nthe princess. If they did, they're sure to know her again: they're\nawfully sharp.\"\n\n\"Lootie! Lootie!\" cried the princess. \"Take me home.\"\n\n\"Don't go on like that,\" said the nurse to the boy, almost fiercely.\n\"How could I help it? I lost my way.\"\n\n\"You shouldn't have been out so late. You wouldn't have lost your way if\nyou hadn't been frightened,\" said the boy. \"Come along. I'll soon set\nyou right again. Shall I carry your little Highness?\"\n\n\"Impertinence!\" murmured the nurse, but she did not say it aloud, for\nshe thought if she made him angry, he might take his revenge by telling\nsome one belonging to the house, and then it would be sure to come to\nthe king's ears.\n\n\"No, thank you,\" said Irene. \"I can walk very well, though I can't run\nso fast as nursie. If you will give me one hand, Lootie will give me\nanother, and then I shall get on famously.\"\n\nThey soon had her between them, holding a hand of each.\n\n\"Now let's run,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"No, no,\" said the little miner. \"That's the worst thing you can do. If\nyou hadn't run before, you would not have lost your way. And if you run\nnow, they will be after you in a moment.\"\n\n\"I don't want to run,\" said Irene.\n\n\"You don't think of _me_,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"Yes, I do, Lootie. The boy says they won't touch us if we don't run.\"\n\n\"Yes; but if they know at the house that I've kept you out so late, I\nshall be turned away, and that would break my heart.\"\n\n\"Turned away, Lootie. Who would turn you away?\"\n\n\"Your papa, child.\"\n\n\"But I'll tell him it was all my fault. And you know it was, Lootie.\"\n\n\"He won't mind that. I'm sure he won't.\"\n\n\"Then I'll cry, and go down on my knees to him, and beg him not to take\naway my own dear Lootie.\"\n\nThe nurse was comforted at hearing this, and said no more. They went on,\nwalking pretty fast, but taking care not to run a step.\n\n\"I want to talk to you,\" said Irene to the little miner; \"but it's so\nawkward! I don't know your name.\"\n\n\"My name's Curdie, little princess.\"\n\n\"What a funny name! Curdie! What more?\"\n\n\"Curdie Peterson. What's your name, please?\"\n\n\"Irene.\"\n\n\"What more?\"\n\n\"I don't know what more.--What more is my name, Lootie?\"\n\n\"Princesses haven't got more than one name. They don't want it.\"\n\n\"Oh then, Curdie, you must call me just Irene, and no more.\"\n\n\"No, indeed,\" said the nurse indignantly. \"He shall do no such thing.\"\n\n\"What shall he call me, then, Lootie?\"\n\n\"Your royal Highness.\"\n\n\"My royal Highness! What's that? No, no, Lootie, I will not be called\nnames. I don't like them. You said to me once yourself that it's only\nrude children that call names; and I'm sure Curdie wouldn't be\nrude.--Curdie, my name's Irene.\"\n\n\"Well, Irene,\" said Curdie, with a glance at the nurse which showed he\nenjoyed teasing her, \"it's very kind of you to let me call you anything.\nI like your name very much.\"\n\nHe expected the nurse to interfere again; but he soon saw that she was\ntoo frightened to speak. She was staring at something a few yards before\nthem, in the middle of the path, where it narrowed between rocks so that\nonly one could pass at a time.\n\n\"It's very much kinder of you to go out of your way to take us home,\"\nsaid Irene.\n\n\"I'm not going out of my way yet,\" said Curdie. \"It's on the other side\nthose rocks the path turns off to my father's.\"\n\n\"You wouldn't think of leaving us till we're safe home, I'm sure,\"\ngasped the nurse.\n\n\"Of course not,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"You dear, good, kind Curdie! I'll give you a kiss when we get home,\"\nsaid the princess.\n\nThe nurse gave her a great pull by the hand she held. But at that\ninstant the something in the middle of the way, which had looked like a\ngreat lump of earth brought down by the rain, began to move. One after\nanother it shot out four long things, like two arms and two legs, but it\nwas now too dark to tell what they were. The nurse began to tremble from\nhead to foot. Irene clasped Curdie's hand yet faster, and Curdie began\nto sing again.\n\n          \"One, two--\n           Hit and hew!\n           Three, four--\n           Blast and bore!\n           Five, six--\n           There's a fix!\n           Seven, eight--\n           Hold it straight.\n           Nine, ten--\n           Hit again!\n           Hurry! scurry!\n           Bother! smother!\n           There's a toad\n           In the road!\n           Smash it!\n           Squash it!\n           Fry it!\n           Dry it!\n           You're another!\n           Up and off!\n           There's enough!--Huuuuuh!\"\n\nAs he uttered the last words, Curdie let go his hold of his companion,\nand rushed at the thing in the road, as if he would trample it under\nhis feet. It gave a great spring, and ran straight up one of the rocks\nlike a huge spider. Curdie turned back laughing, and took Irene's hand\nagain. She grasped his very tight, but said nothing till they had passed\nthe rocks. A few yards more and she found herself on a part of the road\nshe knew, and was able to speak again.\n\n[Illustration: \"Never mind, Princess Irene,\" he said. \"You mustn't kiss\nme to-night. But you sha'n't break your word. I will come another\ntime.\"]\n\n\"Do you know, Curdie, I don't quite like your song; it sounds to me\nrather rude,\" she said.\n\n\"Well, perhaps it is,\" answered Curdie. \"I never thought of that; it's a\nway we have. We do it because they don't like it.\"\n\n\"Who don't like it?\"\n\n\"The cobs, as we call them.\"\n\n\"Don't!\" said the nurse.\n\n\"Why not?\" said Curdie.\n\n\"I beg you won't. Please don't.\"\n\n\"Oh, if you ask me that way, of course I won't; though I don't a bit\nknow why. Look! there are the lights of your great house down below.\nYou'll be at home in five minutes now.\"\n\nNothing more happened. They reached home in safety. Nobody had missed\nthem, or even known they had gone out; and they arrived at the door\nbelonging to their part of the house without anyone seeing them. The\nnurse was rushing in with a hurried and not over-gracious good-night to\nCurdie; but the princess pulled her hand from hers, and was just\nthrowing her arms around Curdie's neck, when she caught her again and\ndragged her away.\n\n\"Lootie, Lootie, I promised Curdie a kiss,\" cried Irene.\n\n\"A princess mustn't give kisses. It's not at all proper,\" said\nLootie.\n\n\"But I promised,\" said the princess.\n\n\"There's no occasion; he's only a miner-boy.\"\n\n\"He is a good boy, and a brave boy, and he has been very kind to us.\nLootie! Lootie! I promised.\"\n\n\"Then you shouldn't have promised.\"\n\n\"Lootie, I promised him a kiss.\"\n\n\"Your royal Highness,\" said Lootie, suddenly growing very respectful,\n\"must come in directly.\"\n\n\"Nurse, a princess must _not_ break her word,\" said Irene, drawing\nherself up and standing stockstill.\n\nLootie did not know which the king might count the worst--to let the\nprincess be out after sunset, or to let her kiss a miner-boy. She did\nnot know that, being a gentleman, as many kings have been, he would have\ncounted neither of them the worse. However much he might have disliked\nhis daughter to kiss the miner-boy, he would not have had her break her\nword for all the goblins in creation. But, as I say, the nurse was not\nlady enough to understand this, and so she was in a great difficulty,\nfor, if she insisted, some one might hear the princess cry and run to\nsee, and then all would come out. But here Curdie came again to the\nrescue.\n\n\"Never mind, Princess Irene,\" he said. \"You mustn't kiss me to-night.\nBut you sha'n't break your word. I will come another time. You may be\nsure I will.\"\n\n\"Oh, thank you, Curdie!\" said the princess, and stopped crying.\n\n\"Good night, Irene; good night, Lootie,\" said Curdie, and turned and was\nout of sight in a moment.\n\n\"I should like to see him!\" muttered the nurse, as she carried the\nprincess to the nursery.\n\n\"You _will_ see him,\" said Irene. \"You may be sure Curdie will keep his\nword. He's _sure_ to come again.\"\n\n\"I should like to see him!\" repeated the nurse, and said no more. She\ndid not want to open a new cause of strife with the princess by saying\nmore plainly what she meant. Glad enough that she had succeeded both in\ngetting home unseen, and in keeping the princess from kissing the\nminer's boy, she resolved to watch her far better in future. Her\ncarelessness had already doubled the danger she was in. Formerly the\ngoblins were her only fear; now she had to protect her charge from\nCurdie as well.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE MINES\n\n\nCURDIE went home whistling. He resolved to say nothing about the\nprincess for fear of getting the nurse into trouble, for while he\nenjoyed teasing her because of her absurdity, he was careful not to do\nher any harm. He saw no more of the goblins, and was soon fast asleep in\nhis bed.\n\nHe woke in the middle of the night, and thought he heard curious noises\noutside. He sat up and listened; then got up, and, opening the door very\nquietly, went out. When he peeped round the corner, he saw, under his\nown window, a group of stumpy creatures, whom he at once recognized by\ntheir shape. Hardly, however, had he begun his \"One, two, three!\" when\nthey broke asunder, scurried away, and were out of sight. He returned\nlaughing, got into bed again, and was fast asleep in a moment.\n\nReflecting a little over the matter in the morning, he came to the\nconclusion that, as nothing of the kind had ever happened before, they\nmust be annoyed with him for interfering to protect the princess. By the\ntime he was dressed, however, he was thinking of something quite\ndifferent, for he did not value the enmity of the goblins in the least.\n\nAs soon as they had had breakfast, he set off with his father for the\nmine.\n\nThey entered the hill by a natural opening under a huge rock, where a\nlittle stream rushed out. They followed its course for a few yards,\nwhen the passage took a turn, and sloped steeply into the heart of the\nhill. With many angles and windings and branchings off, and sometimes\nwith steps where it came upon a natural gulf, it led them deep into the\nhill before they arrived at the place where they were at present digging\nout the precious ore. This was of various kinds, for the mountain was\nvery rich with the better sorts of metals. With flint and steel, and\ntinder box, they lighted their lamps, then fixed them on their heads,\nand were soon hard at work with their pickaxes and shovels and hammers.\nFather and son were at work near each other, but not in the same\n_gang_--the passages out of which the ore was dug, they called\n_gangs_--for when the _lode_, or vein of ore, was small, one miner would\nhave to dig away alone in a passage no bigger than gave him just room to\nwork--sometimes in uncomfortable cramped positions. If they stopped for\na moment they could hear everywhere around them, some nearer, some\nfarther off, the sounds of their companions burrowing away in all\ndirections in the inside of the great mountain--some boring holes in the\nrock in order to blow it up with gunpowder, others shoveling the broken\nore into baskets to be carried to the mouth of the mine, others hitting\naway with their pickaxes. Sometimes, if the miner was in a very lonely\npart, he would hear only a tap-tapping, no louder than that of a\nwoodpecker, for the sound would come from a great distance off through\nthe solid mountain rock.\n\nThe work was hard at best, for it is very warm underground; but it was\nnot particularly unpleasant, and some of the miners, when they wanted to\nearn a little more money for a particular purpose, would stop behind\nthe rest, and work all night. But you could not tell night from day down\nthere, except from feeling tired and sleepy; for no light of the sun\never came into those gloomy regions. Some who had thus remained behind\nduring the night, although certain there were none of their companions\nat work, would declare the next morning that they heard, every time they\nhalted for a moment to take breath, a tap-tapping all about them, as if\nthe mountain were then more full of miners than ever it was during the\nday; and some in consequence would never stay over night, for all knew\nthose were the sounds of the goblins. They worked only at night, for the\nminers' night was the goblins' day. Indeed, the greater number of the\nminers were afraid of the goblins: for there were strange stories well\nknown amongst them of the treatment some had received whom the goblins\nhad surprised at their work during the night. The more courageous of\nthem, however, amongst them Peter Peterson and Curdie, who in this took\nafter his father, had stayed in the mine all night again and again, and\nalthough they had several times encountered a few stray goblins, had\nnever yet failed in driving them away. As I have indicated already, the\nchief defence against them was verse, for they hated verse of every\nkind, and some kinds they could not endure at all. I suspect they could\nnot make any themselves, and that was why they disliked it so much. At\nall events, those who were most afraid of them were those who could\nneither make verses themselves, nor remember the verses that other\npeople made for them; while those who were never afraid were those who\ncould make verses for themselves; for although there were certain old\nrhymes which were very effectual, yet it was well known that a new\nrhyme, if of the right sort, was even more distasteful to them, and\ntherefore more effectual in putting them to flight.\n\nPerhaps my readers may be wondering what the goblins could be about,\nworking all night long, seeing they never carried up the ore and sold\nit; but when I have informed them concerning what Curdie learned the\nvery next night, they will be able to understand.\n\nFor Curdie had determined, if his father would permit him, to remain\nthere alone this night--and that for two reasons: first, he wanted to\nget extra wages in order that he might buy a very warm red petticoat for\nhis mother, who had begun to complain of the cold of the mountain air\nsooner than usual this autumn; and second, he had just a faint\nglimmering of hope of finding out what the goblins were about under his\nwindow the night before.\n\nWhen he told his father, he made no objection, for he had great\nconfidence in his boy's courage and resources.\n\n\"I'm sorry I can't stay with you,\" said Peter; \"but I want to go and pay\nthe parson a visit this evening, and besides I've had a bit of a\nheadache all day.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry for that, father,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"Oh! it's not much. You'll be sure to take care of yourself, won't you?\"\n\n\"Yes, father; I will. I'll keep a sharp lookout, I promise you.\"\n\nCurdie was the only one who remained in the mine. About six o'clock the\nrest went away, every one bidding him good night, and telling him to\ntake care of himself; for he was a great favorite with them all.\n\n\"Don't forget your rhymes,\" said one.\n\n\"No, no,\" answered Curdie.\n\n\"It's no matter if he does,\" said another, \"for he'll only have to make\na new one.\"\n\n\"Yes, but he mightn't be able to make it fast enough,\" said another;\n\"and while it was cooking in his head, they might take a mean advantage\nand set upon him.\"\n\n\"I'll do my best,\" said Curdie. \"I'm not afraid.\"\n\n\"We all know that,\" they returned, and left him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE GOBLINS\n\n\nFOR some time Curdie worked away briskly, throwing all the ore he had\ndisengaged on one side behind him, to be ready for carrying out in the\nmorning. He heard a good deal of goblin-tapping, but it all sounded far\naway in the hill, and he paid it little heed. Toward midnight he began\nto feel rather hungry; so he dropped his pickaxe, got a lump of bread\nwhich in the morning he had laid in a damp hole in the rock, sat down on\na heap of ore and ate his supper. Then he leaned back for five minutes'\nrest before beginning his work again, and laid his head against the\nrock. He had not kept the position for one minute before he heard\nsomething which made him sharpen his ears. It sounded like a voice\ninside the rock. After a while he heard it again. It was a\ngoblin-voice--there could be no doubt about that--and this time he could\nmake out the words.\n\n\"Hadn't we better be moving?\" it said.\n\nA rougher and deeper voice replied:\n\n\"There's no hurry. That wretched little mole won't be through to-night,\nif he work ever so hard. He's by no means at the thinnest place.\"\n\n\"But you still think the lode does come through into our house?\" said\nthe first voice.\n\n\"Yes, but a good bit farther on than he has got to yet. If he had struck\na stroke more to the side just here,\" said the goblin, tapping the very\nstone, as it seemed to Curdie, against which his head lay, \"he would\nhave been through; but he's a couple of yards past it now, and if he\nfollow the lode it will be a week before it leads him in. You see it\nback there--a long way. Still, perhaps, in case of accident, it would be\nas well to be getting out of this. Helfer, you'll take the great chest.\nThat's your business, you know.\"\n\n\"Yes, dad,\" said a third voice. \"But you must help me to get it on my\nback. It's awfully heavy, you know.\"\n\n\"Well, it isn't just a bag of smoke, I admit. But you're as strong as a\nmountain, Helfer.\"\n\n\"You say so, dad. I think myself I'm all right. But I could carry ten\ntimes as much if it wasn't for my feet.\"\n\n\"That is your weak point, I confess, my boy.\"\n\n\"Ain't it yours, too, father?\"\n\n\"Well, to be honest, it is a goblin-weakness. Why they come so soft, I\ndeclare I haven't an idea.\"\n\n\"Specially when your head's so hard, you know, father.\"\n\n\"Yes, my boy. The goblin's glory is his head. To think how the fellows\nup above there have to put on helmets and things when they go fighting.\nHa! ha!\"\n\n\"But why don't we wear shoes like them, father? I should like\nit--specially when I've got a chest like that on my head.\"\n\n\"Well, you see, it's not the fashion. The king never wears shoes.\"\n\n\"The queen does.\"\n\n\"Yes; but that's for distinction. The first queen, you see--I mean the\nking's first wife--wore shoes of course, because she came from upstairs;\nand so, when she died, the next queen would not be inferior to her as\nshe called it, and would wear shoes too. It was all pride. She is the\nhardest in forbidding them to the rest of the women.\"\n\n\"I'm sure I wouldn't wear them--no, not for--that I wouldn't!\" said the\nfirst voice, which was evidently that of the mother of the family. \"I\ncan't think why either of them should.\"\n\n\"Didn't I tell you the first was from upstairs?\" said the other. \"That\nwas the only silly thing I ever knew his Majesty guilty of. Why should\nhe marry an outlandish woman like that--one of our natural enemies too?\"\n\n\"I suppose he fell in love with her.\"\n\n\"Pooh! pooh! He's just as happy now with one of his own people.\"\n\n\"Did she die _very_ soon? They didn't tease her to death, did they?\"\n\n\"Oh dear no! The king worshipped her very footmarks.\"\n\n\"What made her die, then? Didn't the air agree with her?\"\n\n\"She died when the young prince was born.\"\n\n\"How silly of her! _We_ never do that. It must have been because she\nwore shoes.\"\n\n\"I don't know that.\"\n\n\"Why do they wear shoes up there?\"\n\n\"Ah! now that's a sensible question, and I will answer it. But in order\nto do so, I must first tell you a secret. I once saw the queen's feet.\"\n\n\"Without her shoes?\"\n\n\"Yes--without her shoes.\"\n\n\"No! Did you? How was it?\"\n\n\"Never you mind how it was. _She_ didn't know I saw them. And what do\nyou think!--they had _toes_!\"\n\n\"Toes! What's that?\"\n\n\"You may well ask! I should never have known if I had not seen the\nqueen's feet. Just imagine! the ends of her feet were split up into five\nor six thin pieces!\"\n\n\"Oh, horrid! How _could_ the king have fallen in love with her?\"\n\n\"You forget that she wore shoes. That is just why she wore them. That is\nwhy all the men, and women too, upstairs wear shoes. They can't bear the\nsight of their own feet without them.\"\n\n\"Ah! now I understand. If ever you wish for shoes again, Helfer, I'll\nhit your feet--I will.\"\n\n\"No, no, mother; pray don't.\"\n\n\"Then don't you.\"\n\n\"But with such a big box on my head--\"\n\nA horrid scream followed, which Curdie interpreted as in reply to a blow\nfrom his mother upon the feet of her eldest goblin.\n\n\"Well, I never knew so much before!\" remarked a fourth voice.\n\n\"Your knowledge is not universal quite yet,\" said the father. \"You were\nonly fifty last month. Mind you see to the bed and bedding. As soon as\nwe've finished our supper, we'll be up and going. Ha! ha! ha!\"\n\n\"What are you laughing at, husband?\"\n\n\"I'm laughing to think what a mess the miners will find themselves\nin--somewhere before this day ten years.\"\n\n\"Why, what do you mean?\"\n\n\"Oh, nothing.\"\n\n\"Oh yes, you do mean something. You always do mean something.\"\n\n\"It's more than you do, then, wife.\"\n\n\"That may be; but it's not more than I find out, you know.\"\n\n\"Ha! ha! You're a sharp one. What a mother you've got, Helfer!\"\n\n\"Yes, father.\"\n\n\"Well, I suppose I must tell you. They're all at the palace consulting\nabout it to-night; and as soon as we've got away from this thin place,\nI'm going there to hear what night they fix upon. I should like to see\nthat young ruffian there on the other side, struggling in the agonies\nof--\"\n\nHe dropped his voice so low that Curdie could hear only a growl. The\ngrowl went on in a low bass for a good while, as inarticulate as if the\ngoblin's tongue had been a sausage; and it was not until his wife spoke\nagain that it rose to its former pitch.\n\n\"But what shall we do when you are at the palace?\" she asked.\n\n\"I will see you safe in the new house I've been digging for you for the\nlast two months. Podge, you mind the table and chairs. I commit them to\nyour care. The table has seven legs--each chair three. I shall require\nthem all at your hands.\"\n\nAfter this arose a confused conversation about the various household\ngoods and their transport; and Curdie heard nothing more that was of any\nimportance.\n\nHe now knew at least one of the reasons for the constant sound of the\ngoblin hammers and pickaxes at night. They were making new houses for\nthemselves, to which they might retreat when the miners should threaten\nto break into their dwellings. But he had learned two things of far\ngreater importance. The first was, that some grievous calamity was\npreparing, and almost ready to fall upon the heads of the miners; the\nsecond was--the one weak point of a goblin's body: he had not known that\ntheir feet were so tender as he had now reason to suspect. He had heard\nit said that they had no toes: he had never had opportunity of\ninspecting them closely enough in the dusk in which they always\nappeared, to satisfy himself whether it was a correct report. Indeed, he\nhad not been able even to satisfy himself as to whether they had no\nfingers, although that also was commonly said to be the fact. One of the\nminers, indeed, who had had more schooling than the rest, was wont to\nargue that such must have been the primordial condition of humanity, and\nthat education and handicraft had developed both toes and fingers--with\nwhich proposition Curdie had once heard his father sarcastically agree,\nalleging in support of it the probability that babies' gloves were a\ntraditional remnant of the old state of things; while the stockings of\nall ages, no regard being paid in them to the toes, pointed in the same\ndirection. But what was of importance was the fact concerning the\nsoftness of the goblin-feet, which he foresaw might be useful to all\nminers. What he had to do in the mean time, however, was to discover, if\npossible, the special evil design the goblins had now in their heads.\n\nAlthough he knew all the gangs and all the natural galleries with which\nthey communicated in the mined part of the mountain, he had not the\nleast idea where the palace of the king of the gnomes was; otherwise he\nwould have set out at once on the enterprise of discovering what the\nsaid design was. He judged, and rightly, that it must lie in a farther\npart of the mountain, between which and the mine there was as yet no\ncommunication. There must be one nearly completed, however; for it could\nbe but a thin partition which now separated them. If only he could get\nthrough in time to follow the goblins as they retreated! A few blows\nwould doubtless be sufficient--just where his ear now lay; but if he\nattempted to strike there with his pickaxe, he would only hasten the\ndeparture of the family, put them on their guard, and perhaps lose their\ninvoluntary guidance. He therefore began to feel the wall with his\nhands, and soon found that some of the stones were loose enough to be\ndrawn out with little noise.\n\nLaying hold of a large one with both his hands, he drew it gently out,\nand let it down softly.\n\n\"What was that noise?\" said the goblin father.\n\nCurdie blew out his light, lest it should shine through.\n\n\"It must be that one miner that stayed behind the rest,\" said the\nmother.\n\n\"No; he's been gone a good while. I haven't heard a blow for an hour.\nBesides, it wasn't like that.\"\n\n\"Then I suppose it must have been a stone carried down the brook\ninside.\"\n\n\"Perhaps. It will have more room by and by.\"\n\nCurdie kept quite still. After a little while, hearing nothing but the\nsounds of their preparations for departure, mingled with an occasional\nword of direction, and anxious to know whether the removal of the stone\nhad made an opening into the goblins' house, he put in his hand to feel.\nIt went in a good way, and then came in contact with something soft. He\nhad but a moment to feel it over, it was so quickly withdrawn: it was\none of the toeless goblin-feet. The owner of it gave a cry of fright.\n\n\"What's the matter, Helfer?\" asked his mother.\n\n\"A beast came out of the wall, and licked my foot.\"\n\n\"Nonsense! There are no wild beasts in our country,\" said his father.\n\n\"But it was, father. I felt it.\"\n\n\"Nonsense, I say. Will you malign your native realms and reduce them to\na level with the country up-stairs? That is swarming with wild beasts of\nevery description.\"\n\n\"But I did feel it, father.\"\n\n\"I tell you to hold your tongue. You are no patriot.\"\n\nCurdie suppressed his laughter, and lay still as a mouse--but no\nstiller, for every moment he kept nibbling away with his fingers at the\nedges of the hole. He was slowly making it bigger, for here the rock had\nbeen very much shattered with the blasting.\n\nThere seemed to be a good many in the family, to judge from the mass of\nconfused talk which now and then came through the hole; but when all\nwere speaking together, and just as if they had bottle-brushes--each at\nleast one--in their throats, it was not easy to make out much that was\nsaid. At length he heard once more what the father-goblin was saying.\n\n\"Now then,\" he said, \"get your bundles on your backs. Here, Helfer, I'll\nhelp you up with your chest.\"\n\n\"I wish it _was_ my chest, father.\"\n\n\"Your turn will come in good time enough! Make haste. I _must_ go to the\nmeeting at the palace to-night. When that's over, we can come back and\nclear out the last of the things before our enemies return in the\nmorning. Now light your torches, and come along. What a distinction it\nis to provide our own light, instead of being dependent on a thing hung\nup in the air--a most disagreeable contrivance--intended no doubt to\nblind us when we venture out under its baleful influence! Quite glaring\nand vulgar, I call it, though no doubt useful to poor creatures who\nhaven't the wit to make light for themselves!\"\n\nCurdie could hardly keep himself from calling through to know whether\nthey made the fire to light their torches by. But a moment's reflection\nshowed him that they would have said they did, inasmuch as they struck\ntwo stones together, and the fire came.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE HALL OF THE GOBLIN PALACE\n\n\nA SOUND of many soft feet followed, but soon ceased. Then Curdie flew at\nthe hole like a tiger, and tore and pulled. The sides gave way, and it\nwas soon large enough for him to crawl through. He would not betray\nhimself by rekindling his lamp, but the torches of the retreating\ncompany, departing in a straight line up a long avenue from the door of\ntheir cave, threw back light enough to afford him a glance round the\ndeserted home of the goblins. To his surprise, he could discover nothing\nto distinguish it from an ordinary cave in the rock, upon many of which\nhe had come with the rest of the miners in the progress of their\nexcavations. The goblins had talked of coming back for the rest of their\nhousehold gear: he saw nothing that would have made him suspect a family\nhad taken shelter there for a single night. The floor was rough and\nstony; the walls full of projecting corners; the roof in one place\ntwenty feet high, in another endangering his forehead; while on one side\na stream, no thicker than a needle, it is true, but still sufficient to\nspread a wide dampness over the wall, flowed down the face of the rock.\nBut the troop in front of him was toiling under heavy burdens. He could\ndistinguish Helfer now and then, in the flickering light and shade, with\nhis heavy chest on his bending shoulders; while the second brother was\nalmost buried in what looked like a great feather-bed. \"Where do they\nget the feathers?\" thought Curdie; but in a moment the troop disappeared\nat a turn of the way, and it was now both safe and necessary for Curdie\nto follow them, lest they should be round the next turning before he saw\nthem again, for so he might lose them altogether. He darted after them\nlike a grayhound. When he reached the corner and looked cautiously\nround, he saw them again at some distance down another long passage.\nNone of the galleries he saw that night bore signs of the work of\nman--or of goblin either. Stalactites far older than the mines hung from\ntheir roofs; and their floors were rough with boulders and large round\nstones, showing that there water must have once run. He waited again at\nthis corner till they had disappeared round the next, and so followed\nthem a long way through one passage after another. The passages grew\nmore and more lofty, and were more and more covered in the roof with\nshining stalactites.\n\nIt was a strange enough procession which he followed. But the strangest\npart of it was the household animals which crowded amongst the feet of\nthe goblins. It was true they had no wild animals down there--at least\nthey did not know of any; but they had a wonderful number of tame ones.\nI must, however, reserve any contributions toward the natural history of\nthese for a later position in my story.\n\nAt length, turning a corner too abruptly, he had almost rushed into the\nmiddle of the goblin family; for there they had already set down all\ntheir burdens on the floor of a cave considerably larger than that which\nthey had left. They were as yet too breathless to speak, else he would\nhave had warning of their arrest. He started back, however, before any\none saw him, and retreating a good way, stood watching till the father\nshould come out to go to the palace. Before very long, both he and his\nson Helfer appeared and kept on in the same direction as before, while\nCurdie followed them again with renewed precaution. For a long time he\nheard no sound except something like the rush of a river inside the\nrock; but at length what seemed the far-off noise of a great shouting\nreached his ears, which however presently ceased. After advancing a good\nway farther, he thought he heard a single voice. It sounded clearer and\nclearer as he went on, until at last he could almost distinguish the\nwords. In a moment or two, keeping after the goblins round another\ncorner, he once more started back--this time in amazement.\n\nHe was at the entrance of a magnificent cavern, of an oval shape, once\nprobably a huge natural reservoir of water, now the great palace hall of\nthe goblins. It rose to a tremendous height, but the roof was composed\nof such shining materials, and the multitude of torches carried by the\ngoblins who crowded the floor lighted up the place so brilliantly, that\nCurdie could see to the top quite well. But he had no idea how immense\nthe place was, until his eyes had got accustomed to it, which was not\nfor a good many minutes. The rough projections on the walls, and the\nshadows thrown upward from them by the torches, made the sides of the\nchamber look as if they were crowded with statues upon brackets and\npedestals, reaching in irregular tiers from floor to roof. The walls\nthemselves were, in many parts, of gloriously shining substances, some\nof them gorgeously colored besides, which powerfully contrasted with\nthe shadows. Curdie could not help wondering whether his rhymes would be\nof any use against such a multitude of goblins as filled the floor of\nthe hall, and indeed felt considerably tempted to begin his shout of\n_One, two, three!_ but as there was no reason for routing them, and much\nfor endeavoring to discover their designs, he kept himself perfectly\nquiet, and peeping round the edge of the doorway, listened with both his\nsharp ears.\n\nAt the other end of the hall, high above the heads of the multitude, was\na terrace-like ledge of considerable height, caused by the receding of\nthe upper part of the cavern wall. Upon this sat the king and his court,\nthe king on a throne hollowed out of a huge block of green copper ore,\nand his court upon lower seats around it. The king had been making them\na speech, and the applause which followed it was what Curdie had heard.\nOne of the court was now addressing the multitude. What he heard him say\nwas to the following effect:\n\n\"Hence it appears that two plans have been for some time together\nworking in the strong head of his Majesty for the deliverance of his\npeople. Regardless of the fact that we were the first possessors of the\nregions they now inhabit, regardless equally of the fact that we\nabandoned that region from the loftiest motives; regardless also of the\nself-evident fact that we excel them as far in mental ability as they\nexcel us in stature, they look upon us as a degraded race, and make a\nmockery of all our finer feelings. But the time has almost arrived\nwhen--thanks to his Majesty's inventive genius--it will be in our power\nto take a thorough revenge upon them once for all, in respect of their\nunfriendly behavior.\"\n\n\"May it please your Majesty--\" cried a voice close by the door, which\nCurdie recognized as that of the goblin he had followed.\n\n\"Who is he that interrupts the Chancellor?\" cried another from near the\nthrone.\n\n\"Glump,\" answered several voices.\n\n\"He is our trusty subject,\" said the king himself, in a slow and stately\nvoice: \"let him come forward and speak.\"\n\nA lane was parted through the crowd, and Glump having ascended the\nplatform and bowed to the king, spoke as follows:\n\n\"Sire, I would have held my peace, had I not known that I only knew how\nnear was the moment to which the Chancellor had just referred. In all\nprobability, before another day is past, the enemy will have broken\nthrough into my house--the partition between being even now not more\nthan a foot in thickness.\"\n\n\"Not quite so much,\" thought Curdie to himself.\n\n\"This very evening I have had to remove my household effects; therefore\nthe sooner we are ready to carry out the plan, for the execution of\nwhich his Majesty has been making such magnificent preparations, the\nbetter. I may just add, that within the last few days I have perceived a\nsmall outbreak in my dining-room, which combined with observations upon\nthe course of the river escaping where the evil men enter, has convinced\nme that close to the spot must lie a deep gulf in its channel. This\ndiscovery will, I trust, add considerably to the otherwise immense\nforces at his Majesty's disposal.\"\n\nHe ceased, and the king graciously acknowledged his speech with a bend\nof his head; whereupon Glump, after a bow to his Majesty, slid down\namongst the rest of the undistinguished multitude. Then the Chancellor\nrose and resumed.\n\n\"The information which the worthy Glump has given us,\" he said, \"might\nhave been of considerable import at the present moment, but for that\nother design already referred to, which naturally takes precedence. His\nMajesty, unwilling to proceed to extremities, and well aware that such\nmeasures sooner or later result in violent reactions, has excogitated a\nmore fundamental and comprehensive measure, of which I need say no more.\nShould his Majesty be successful--as who dares to doubt?--then a peace,\nall to the advantage of the goblin kingdom, will be established for a\ngeneration at least, rendered absolutely secure by the pledge which his\nroyal Highness the prince will have and hold for the good behavior of\nhis relatives. Should his Majesty fail--which who shall dare even to\nimagine in his most secret thoughts?--then will be the time for carrying\nout with rigor the design to which Glump referred, and for which our\npreparations are even now all but completed. The failure of the former\nwill render the latter imperative.\"\n\nCurdie perceiving that the assembly was drawing to a close, and that\nthere was little chance of either plan being more fully discovered, now\nthought it prudent to make his escape before the goblins began to\ndisperse, and slipped quietly away.\n\nThere was not much danger of meeting any goblins, for all the men at\nleast were left behind him in the palace; but there was considerable\ndanger of his taking a wrong turning, for he had now no light, and had\ntherefore to depend upon his memory and his hands. After he had left\nbehind him the glow that issued from the door of Glump's new abode, he\nwas utterly without guide, so far as his eyes were concerned.\n\nHe was most anxious to get back through the hole before the goblins\nshould return to fetch the remains of their furniture. It was not that\nhe was in the least afraid of them, but, as it was of the utmost\nimportance that he should thoroughly discover what the plans they were\ncherishing were, he must not occasion the slightest suspicion that they\nwere watched by a miner.\n\nHe hurried on, feeling his way along the walls of rock. Had he not been\nvery courageous, he must have been very anxious, for he could not but\nknow that if he lost his way it would be the most difficult thing in the\nworld to find it again. Morning would bring no light into these regions;\nand toward him least of all, who was known as a special rhymster and\npersecutor, could goblins be expected to exercise courtesy? Well might\nhe wish that he had brought his lamp and tinder-box with him, of which\nhe had not thought when he crept so eagerly after the goblins! He wished\nit all the more when, after a while, he found his way blocked up, and\ncould get no farther. It was of no use to turn back, for he had not the\nleast idea where he had begun to go wrong. Mechanically, however, he\nkept feeling about the walls that hemmed him in. His hand came upon a\nplace where a tiny stream of water was running down the face of the\nrock. \"What a stupid I am!\" he said to himself. \"I am actually at the\nend of my journey!--and there are the goblins coming back to fetch their\nthings!\" he added, as the red glimmer of their torches appeared at the\nend of the long avenue that led up to the cave. In a moment he had\nthrown himself on the floor, and wriggled backward through the hole. The\nfloor on the other side was several feet lower, which made it easier to\nget back. It was all he could do to lift the largest stone he had taken\nout of the hole, but he did manage to shove it in again. He sat down on\nthe ore-heap and thought.\n\nHe was pretty sure that the latter plan of the goblins was to inundate\nthe mine by breaking outlets for the water accumulated in the natural\nreservoirs of the mountain, as well as running through portions of it.\nWhile the part hollowed by the miners remained shut off from that\ninhabited by the goblins, they had had no opportunity of injuring them\nthus; but now that a passage was broken through, and the goblins' part\nproved the higher in the mountain, it was clear to Curdie that the mine\ncould be destroyed in an hour. Water was always the chief danger to\nwhich the miners were exposed. They met with a little choke-damp\nsometimes, but never with the explosive fire-damp so common in coal\nmines. Hence they were careful as soon as they saw any appearance of\nwater.\n\nAs the result of his reflections while the goblins were busy in their\nold home, it seemed to Curdie that it would be best to build up the\nwhole of this gang, filling it with stone, and clay or lime, so that\nthere should be no smallest channel for the water to get into. There was\nnot, however, any immediate danger, for the execution of the goblins'\nplan was contingent upon the failure of that unknown design which was to\ntake precedence of it; and he was most anxious to keep the door of\ncommunication open, that he might if possible discover what that former\nplan was. At the same time they could not then resume their intermitted\nlabors for the inundation without his finding it out; when by putting\nall hands to the work, the one existing outlet might in a single night\nbe rendered impenetrable to any weight of water; for by filling the gang\nentirely up, their embankment would be buttressed by the sides of the\nmountain itself.\n\nAs soon as he found that the goblins had again retired, he lighted his\nlamp, and proceeded to fill the hole he had made with such stones as he\ncould withdraw when he pleased. He then thought it better, as he might\nhave occasion to be up a good many nights after this, to go home and\nhave some sleep.\n\nHow pleasant the night-air felt upon the outside of the mountain after\nwhat he had gone through in the inside of it! He hurried up the hill,\nwithout meeting a single goblin on the way, and called and tapped at the\nwindow until he woke his father, who soon rose and let him in. He told\nhim the whole story, and, just as he had expected, his father thought it\nbest to work that lode no farther, but at the same time to pretend\noccasionally to be at work there still, in order that the goblins might\nhave no suspicions. Both father and son then went to bed, and slept\nsoundly until the morning.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE PRINCESS'S KING-PAPA\n\n\nTHE weather continued fine for weeks, and the little princess went out\nevery day. So long a period of fine weather had indeed never been known\nupon that mountain. The only uncomfortable thing was that her nurse was\nso nervous and particular about being in before the sun was down, that\noften she would take to her heels when nothing worse than a fleecy cloud\ncrossing the sun threw a shadow on the hillside; and many an evening\nthey were home a full hour before the sunlight had left the weathercock\non the stables. If it had not been for such behavior, Irene would by\nthis time have almost forgotten the goblins. She never forgot Curdie,\nbut him she remembered for his own sake, and indeed would have\nremembered him if only because a princess never forgets her debts until\nthey are paid.\n\n[Illustration: In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped in his\ngreat strong arms.]\n\nOne splendid sunshiny day, about an hour after noon, Irene, who was\nplaying on a lawn in the garden, heard the distant blast of a bugle. She\njumped up with a cry of joy, for she knew by that particular blast that\nher father was on his way to see her. This part of the garden lay on the\nslope of the hill, and allowed a full view of the country below. So she\nshaded her eyes with her hand, and looked far away to catch the first\nglimpse of shining armor. In a few moments a little troop came\nglittering round the shoulder of a hill. Spears and helmets were\nsparkling and gleaming, banners were flying, horses prancing, and\nagain came the bugle-blast, which was to her like the voice of her\nfather calling across the distance, \"Irene, I'm coming.\" On and on they\ncame, until she could clearly distinguish the king. He rode a white\nhorse, and was taller than any of the men with him. He wore a narrow\ncircle of gold set with jewels around his helmet, and as he came still\nnearer, Irene could discern the flashing of the stones in the sun. It\nwas a long time since he had been to see her, and her little heart beat\nfaster and faster as the shining troop approached, for she loved her\nking-papa very dearly, and was nowhere so happy as in his arms. When\nthey reached a certain point, after which she could see them no more\nfrom the garden, she ran to the gate, and there stood till up they came\nclanging and stamping, with one more bright bugle-blast which said,\n\"Irene, I am come.\"\n\nBy this time the people of the house were all gathered at the gate, but\nIrene stood alone in front of them. When the horseman pulled up, she ran\nto the side of the white horse, and held up her arms. The king stooped,\nand took her hands. In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped in\nhis great strong arms. I wish I could describe the king, so that you\ncould see him in your mind. He had gentle blue eyes, but a nose that\nmade him look like an eagle. A long dark beard, streaked with silvery\nlines, flowed from his mouth almost to his waist, and as Irene sat on\nthe saddle and hid her glad face upon his bosom, it mingled with the\ngolden hair which her mother had given her, and the two together were\nlike a cloud with streaks of the sun woven through it. After he had held\nher to his heart for a minute, he spoke to his white horse, and the\ngreat beautiful creature, which had been prancing so proudly a little\nwhile before, walked as gently as a lady--for he knew he had a little\nlady on his back--through the gate and up to the door of the house. Then\nthe king set her on the ground, and, dismounting, took her hand and\nwalked with her into the great hall, which was hardly ever entered\nexcept when he came to see his little princess. There he sat down with\ntwo of his councillors who had accompanied him, to have some\nrefreshment, and Irene bestowed herself on his right hand, and drank her\nmilk out of a wooden bowl curiously carved.\n\nAfter the king had eaten and drunk, he turned to the princess and said,\nstroking her hair--\n\n\"Now, my child, what shall we do next?\"\n\nThis was the question he almost always put to her first after their meal\ntogether; and Irene had been waiting for it with some impatience, for\nnow, she thought, she should be able to settle a question which\nconstantly perplexed her.\n\n\"I should like you to take me to see my great old grandmother.\"\n\nThe king looked grave, and said--\n\n\"What does my little daughter mean?\"\n\n\"I mean the Queen Irene that lives up in the tower--the very old lady,\nyou know, with the long hair of silver.\"\n\nThe king only gazed at his little princess with a look which she could\nnot understand.\n\n\"She's got her crown in her bedroom,\" she went on; \"but I've not been in\nthere yet. You know she's here, don't you?\"\n\n\"No,\" said the king very quietly.\n\n\"Then it must be all a dream,\" said Irene. \"I half thought it was; but\nI couldn't be sure. Now I _am_ sure of it. Besides, I couldn't find her\nthe next time I went up.\"\n\nAt that moment a snow-white pigeon flew in at an open window and, with a\nflutter, settled upon Irene's head. She broke into a merry laugh,\ncowered a little and put up her hands to her head, saying--\n\n\"Dear dovey, don't peck me. You'll pull out my hair with your long\nclaws, if you don't have a care.\"\n\nThe king stretched out his hand to take the pigeon, but it spread its\nwings and flew again through the open window, when its whiteness made\none flash in the sun and vanished. The king laid his hand on the\nprincess's head, held it back a little, gazed in her face, smiled half a\nsmile and sighed half a sigh.\n\n\"Come, my child; we'll have a walk in the garden together,\" he said.\n\n\"You won't come up and see my huge, great, beautiful grandmother, then,\nking-papa?\" said the princess.\n\n\"Not this time,\" said the king very gently. \"She has not invited me, you\nknow, and great old ladies like her do not choose to be visited without\nleave asked and given.\"\n\nThe garden was a very lovely place. Being upon a mountain side, there\nwere parts in it where the rocks came through in great masses, and all\nimmediately about them remained quite wild. Tufts of heather grew upon\nthem, and other hardy mountain plants and flowers, while near them would\nbe lovely roses and lilies, and all pleasant garden flowers. This\nmingling of the wild mountain with the civilized garden was very quaint,\nand it was impossible for any number of gardeners to make such a garden\nlook formal and stiff.\n\nAgainst one of these rocks was a garden-seat, shadowed, from the\nafternoon sun by the overhanging of the rock itself. There was a little\nwinding path up to the top of the rock, and on the top another seat; but\nthey sat on the seat at its foot, because the sun was hot; and there\nthey talked together of many things. At length the king said:\n\n\"You were out late one evening, Irene.\"\n\n\"Yes, papa. It was my fault; and Lootie was very sorry.\"\n\n\"I must talk to Lootie about it,\" said the king.\n\n\"Don't speak loud to her, please, papa,\" said Irene. \"She's been so\nafraid of being late ever since! Indeed she has not been naughty. It was\nonly a mistake for once.\"\n\n\"Once might be too often,\" murmured the king to himself, as he stroked\nhis child's head.\n\nI cannot tell you how he had come to know. I am sure Curdie had not told\nhim. Some one about the palace must have seen them, after all. He sat\nfor a good while thinking. There was no sound to be heard except that of\na little stream which ran merrily out of an opening in the rock by where\nthey sat, and sped away down the hill through the garden. Then he rose,\nand leaving Irene where she was, went into the house and sent for\nLootie, with whom he had a talk that made her cry.\n\nWhen in the evening he rode away upon his great white horse, he left six\nof his attendants behind him, with orders that three of them should\nwatch outside the house every night, walking round and round it from\nsunset to sunrise. It was clear he was not quite comfortable about the\nprincess.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nTHE OLD LADY'S BEDROOM\n\n\nNOTHING more happened worth telling for some time. The autumn came and\nwent by. There were no more flowers in the garden. The winds blew\nstrong, and howled among the rocks. The rain fell, and drenched the few\nyellow and red leaves that could not get off the bare branches. Again\nand again there would be a glorious morning followed by a pouring\nafternoon, and sometimes, for a week together, there would be rain,\nnothing but rain, all day, and then the most lovely cloudless night,\nwith the sky all out in full-blown stars--not one missing. But the\nprincess could not see much of them, for she went to bed early. The\nwinter drew on, and she found things growing dreary. When it was too\nstormy to go out, and she had got tired of her toys, Lootie would take\nher about the house, sometimes to the housekeeper's room, where the\nhousekeeper, who was a good, kind old woman, made much of her--sometimes\nto the servants' hall or the kitchen, where she was not princess merely,\nbut absolute queen, and ran a great risk of being spoiled. Sometimes she\nwould run of herself to the room where the men-at-arms whom the king had\nleft, sat, and they showed her their arms and accoutrements, and did\nwhat they could to amuse her. Still at times she found it very dreary,\nand often and often wished that her huge great grandmother had not been\na dream.\n\nOne morning the nurse left her with the housekeeper for a while. To\namuse her, she turned out the contents of an old cabinet upon the table.\nThe little princess found her treasures, queer ancient ornaments and\nmany things the uses of which she could not imagine, far more\ninteresting than her own toys, and sat playing with them for two hours\nor more. But at length, in handling a curious old-fashioned brooch, she\nran the pin of it into her thumb, and gave a little scream with the\nsharpness of the pain, but would have thought little more of it, had not\nthe pain increased and her thumb begun to swell. This alarmed the\nhousekeeper greatly. The nurse was fetched; the doctor was sent for; her\nhand was poulticed, and long before her usual time she was put to bed.\nThe pain still continued, and although she fell asleep and dreamed a\ngood many dreams, there was the pain always in every dream. At last it\nwoke her up.\n\nThe moon was shining brightly into the room. The poultice had fallen off\nher hand, and it was burning hot. She fancied if she could hold it into\nthe moonlight, that would cool it. So she got out of bed, without waking\nthe nurse who lay at the other end of the room, and went to the window.\nWhen she looked out, she saw one of the men-at-arms walking in the\ngarden, with the moonlight glancing on his armor. She was just going to\ntap on the window and call him, for she wanted to tell him all about it,\nwhen she bethought herself that that might wake Lootie, and she would\nput her into bed again. So she resolved to go to the window of another\nroom, and call him from there. It was so much nicer to have somebody to\ntalk to than to lie awake in bed with the burning pain in her hand. She\nopened the door very gently and went through the nursery, which did not\nlook into the garden, to go to the other window. But when she came to\nthe foot of the old staircase, there was the moon shining down from some\nwindow high up, and making the worm-eaten oak look very strange and\ndelicate and lovely. In a moment she was putting her little feet one\nafter the other in the silvery path up the stair, looking behind as she\nwent, to see the shadow they made in the middle of the silver. Some\nlittle girls would have been afraid to find themselves thus alone in the\nmiddle of the night, but Irene was a princess.\n\nAs she went slowly up the stairs, not quite sure that she was not\ndreaming, suddenly a great longing woke up in her heart to try once more\nwhether she could not find the old, old lady with the silvery hair.\n\n\"If she is a dream,\" she said to herself, \"then I am the likelier to\nfind her, if I am dreaming.\"\n\nSo up and up she went, stair after stair, until she came to the many\nrooms--all just as she had seen them before. Through passage after\npassage she softly sped, comforting herself that if she should lose her\nway it would not matter much, because when she woke she would find\nherself in her own bed, with Lootie not far off. But as if she had known\nevery step of the way, she walked straight to the door at the foot of\nthe narrow stair that led to the tower.\n\n\"What if I should realliality-really find my beautiful old grandmother\nup there!\" she said to herself, as she crept up the steep steps.\n\nWhen she reached the top, she stood a moment listening in the dark, for\nthere was no moon there. Yes! it was! it was the hum of the\nspinning-wheel! What a diligent grandmother to work both day and night!\n\nShe tapped gently at the door.\n\n\"Come in, Irene,\" said the sweet voice.\n\nThe princess opened the door, and entered. There was the moonlight\nstreaming in at the window, and in the middle of the moonlight sat the\nold lady in her black dress with the white lace, and her silvery hair\nmingling with the moonlight, so that you could not have distinguished\none from the other.\n\n\"Come in, Irene,\" she said again. \"Can you tell me what I am spinning?\"\n\n\"She speaks,\" thought Irene, \"just as if she had seen me five minutes\nago, or yesterday at the farthest.--No,\" she answered; \"I don't know\nwhat you are spinning. Please, I thought you were a dream. Why couldn't\nI find you before, great-great-grandmother?\"\n\n\"That you are hardly old enough to understand. But you would have found\nme sooner if you hadn't come to think I was a dream. I will give you one\nreason, though, why you couldn't find me. I didn't want you to find me.\"\n\n\"Why, please?\"\n\n\"Because I did not want Lootie to know I was here.\"\n\n\"But you told me to tell Lootie.\"\n\n\"Yes. But I knew Lootie would not believe you. If she were to see me\nsitting spinning here, she wouldn't believe me either.\"\n\n\"Why.\"\n\n\"Because she couldn't. She would rub her eyes, and go away and say she\nfelt queer, and forget half of it and more, and then say it had been all\na dream.\"\n\n\"Just like me,\" said Irene, feeling very much ashamed of herself.\n\n\"Yes, a good deal like you, but not just like you; for you've come\nagain; and Lootie wouldn't have come again. She would have said, No,\nno--she had had enough of such nonsense.\"\n\n\"Is it naughty of Lootie then?\"\n\n\"It would be naughty of you. I've never done anything for Lootie.\"\n\n\"And you did wash my face and hands for me,\" said Irene, beginning to\ncry.\n\nThe old lady smiled a sweet smile and said--\n\n\"I'm not vexed with you, my child--nor with Lootie either. But I don't\nwant you to say anything more to Lootie about me. If she should ask you,\nyou must just be silent. But I do not think she will ask you.\"\n\nAll the time they talked, the old lady kept on spinning.\n\n\"You haven't told me yet what I am spinning,\" she said.\n\n\"Because I don't know. It's very pretty stuff.\"\n\nIt was indeed very pretty stuff. There was a good bunch of it on the\ndistaff attached to the spinning-wheel, and in the moonlight it shone\nlike--what shall I say it was like? It was not white enough for\nsilver--yes, it was like silver, but shone gray rather than white, and\nglittered only a little. And the thread the old lady drew out from it\nwas so fine that Irene could hardly see it.\n\n\"I am spinning this for you, my child.\"\n\n\"For me! What am I to do with it, please?\"\n\n\"I will tell you by and by. But first I will tell you what it is. It is\nspider-webs--of a particular kind. My pigeons bring it me from over the\ngreat sea. There is only one forest where the spiders live who make this\nparticular kind--the finest and strongest of any. I have nearly finished\nmy present job. What is on the rock now will be quite sufficient. I have\na week's work there yet, though,\" she added, looking at the bunch.\n\n\"Do you work all day and night too, great-great-great-great\ngrandmother?\" said the princess, thinking to be very polite with so many\n_greats_.\n\n\"I am not quite so great as all that,\" she answered, smiling almost\nmerrily. \"If you call me grandmother, that will do.--No. I don't work\nevery night--only moonlit nights, and then no longer than the moon\nshines upon my wheel. I sha'n't work much longer to-night.\"\n\n\"And what will you do next, grandmother?\"\n\n\"Go to bed. Would you like to see my bedroom?\"\n\n\"Yes, that I should.\"\n\n\"Then I think I won't work any longer to-night. I shall be in good\ntime.\"\n\nThe old lady rose, and left her wheel standing just as it was. You see\nthere was no good in putting it away, for where there was not any\nfurniture, there was no danger of being untidy.\n\nThen she took Irene by the hand, but it was her bad hand, and Irene gave\na little cry of pain.\n\n\"My child!\" said, her grandmother, \"what is the matter?\"\n\nIrene held her hand into the moonlight, that the old lady might see it,\nand told her all about it, at which she looked grave. But she only\nsaid--\"Give me your other hand\"; and, having led her out upon the little\ndark landing, opened the door on the opposite side of it. What was\nIrene's surprise to see the loveliest room she had ever seen in her\nlife! It was large and lofty, and dome-shaped. From the centre hung a\nlamp as round as a ball, shining as if with the brightest moonlight,\nwhich made everything visible in the room, though not so clearly that\nthe princess could tell what many of the things were. A large oval bed\nstood in the middle, with a coverlid of rose-color, and velvet curtains\nall round it of a lovely pale blue. The walls were also blue--spangled\nall over with what looked like stars of silver.\n\nThe old lady left her, and going to a strange-looking cabinet, opened it\nand took out a curious silver casket. Then she sat down on a low chair,\nand calling Irene, made her kneel before her, while she looked at her\nhand. Having examined it, she opened the casket, and took from it a\nlittle ointment. The sweetest odor filled the room--like that of roses\nand lilies--as she rubbed the ointment gently all over the hot swollen\nhand. Her touch was so pleasant and cool, that it seemed to drive away\nthe pain and heat wherever it came.\n\n\"Oh, grandmother! it is _so_ nice!\" said Irene. \"Thank you; thank you.\"\n\nThen the old lady went to a chest of drawers, and took out a large\nhandkerchief of gossamer-like cambric, which she tied around her hand.\n\n\"I don't think that I can let you go away to-night,\" she said. \"Do you\nthink you would like to sleep with me?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, yes, dear grandmother!\" said Irene, and would have clapped her\nhands, forgetting that she could not.\n\n\"You won't be afraid then to go to bed with such an old woman?\"\n\n\"No. You are so beautiful, grandmother.\"\n\n\"But I am _very_ old.\"\n\n\"And I suppose I am very young. You won't mind sleeping with such a\n_very_ young woman, grandmother?\"\n\n\"You sweet little pertness!\" said the old lady, and drew her toward her,\nand kissed her on the forehead and the cheek and the mouth.\n\nThen she got a large silver basin, and having poured some water into it,\nmade Irene sit on the chair, and washed her feet. This done, she was\nready for bed. And oh, what a delicious bed it was into which her\ngrandmother laid her! She hardly could have told she was lying upon\nanything: she felt nothing but the softness. The old lady having\nundressed herself, lay down beside her.\n\n\"Why don't you put out your moon?\" asked the princess.\n\n\"That never goes out, night or day,\" she answered. \"In the darkest\nnight, if any of my pigeons are out on a message, they always see my\nmoon, and know where to fly to.\"\n\n\"But if somebody besides the pigeons were to see it--somebody about the\nhouse, I mean--they would come to look what it was, and find you.\"\n\n\"The better for them then,\" said the old lady. \"But it does not happen\nabove five times in a hundred years that any one does see it. The\ngreater part of those who do, take it for a meteor, wink their eyes, and\nforget it again. Besides, nobody could find the room except I pleased.\nBesides again--I will tell you a secret--if that light were to go out,\nyou would fancy yourself lying in a bare garret, on a heap of old straw,\nand would not see one of the pleasant things round about you all the\ntime.\"\n\n\"I hope it will never go out,\" said the princess.\n\n\"I hope not. But it is time we both went to sleep. Shall I take you in\nmy arms?\"\n\nThe little princess nestled close up to the old lady, who took her in\nboth her arms, and held her close to her bosom.\n\n\"Oh dear! this is so nice!\" said the princess. \"I didn't know anything\nin the whole world could be so comfortable. I should like to lie here\nfor ever.\"\n\n\"You may if you will,\" said the old lady. \"But I must put you to one\ntrial--not a very hard one, I hope.--This night week you must come back\nto me. If you don't, I do not know when you may find me again, and you\nwill soon want me very much.\"\n\n\"Oh! please, don't let me forget.\"\n\n\"You shall not forget. The only question is whether you will believe I\nam anywhere--whether you will believe I am anything but a dream. You may\nbe sure I will do all I can to help you to come. But it will rest with\nyourself after all. On the night of next Friday, you must come to me.\nMind now.\"\n\n\"I will try,\" said the princess.\n\n\"Then good night,\" said the old lady, and kissed the forehead which lay\nin her bosom.\n\nIn a moment more the little princess was dreaming in the midst of the\nloveliest dreams--of summer seas and moonlight and mossy springs and\ngreat murmuring trees, and beds of wild flowers with such odors as she\nhad never smelled before. But after all, no dream could be more lovely\nthan what she had left behind when she fell asleep.\n\nIn the morning she found herself in her own bed. There was no\nhandkerchief or anything else on her hand, only a sweet odor lingering\nabout it. The swelling had all gone down; the prick of the brooch had\nvanished:--in fact her hand was perfectly well.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nA SHORT CHAPTER ABOUT CURDIE\n\n\nCURDIE spent many nights in the mine. His father and he had taken Mrs.\nPeterson into the secret, for they knew mother could hold her tongue,\nwhich was more than could be said of all the miners' wives. But Curdie\ndid not tell her that every night he spent in the mine, part of it went\nin earning a new red petticoat for her.\n\nMrs. Peterson was such a nice good mother! All mothers are more or less,\nbut Mrs. Peterson was nice and good all _more_ and no _less_. She made a\nlittle heaven in that poor cottage on the hillside--for her husband and\nson to go home to out of the dreary earth in which they worked. I doubt\nif the princess was very much happier even in the arms of her huge\ngreat-grandmother than Peter and Curdie were in the arms of Mrs.\nPeterson. True, her hands were hard, and chapped, and large, but it was\nwith work for them; and therefore in the sight of the angels, her hands\nwere so much the more beautiful. And if Curdie worked hard to get her a\npetticoat, she worked hard every day to get him comforts which he would\nhave missed much more than she would a new petticoat even in winter. Not\nthat she and Curdie ever thought of how much they worked for each other:\nthat would have spoiled everything.\n\nWhen left alone in the mine, Curdie always worked on for an hour or two\nfirst, following the lode which, according to Glump, would lead at last\ninto the deserted habitation. After that, he would set out on a\nreconnoitering expedition. In order to manage this, or rather the return\nfrom it, better than the first time, he had bought a huge ball of fine\nstring, having learned the trick from Hop-o'-my-Thumb, whose history his\nmother had often told him. Not that Hop-o'-my-Thumb had ever used a ball\nof string--I should be sorry to be supposed so far out in my\nclassics--but the principle was the same as that of the pebbles. The end\nof this string he fastened to his pickaxe, which figured no bad anchor,\nand then, with the ball in his hand, unrolling as he went, set out in\nthe dark through the natural gangs of the goblins' territory. The first\nnight or two he came upon nothing worth remembering; saw only a little\nof the home-life of the _cobs_ in the various caves they called houses;\nfailed in coming upon anything to cast light upon the foregoing design\nwhich kept the inundation for the present in the background. But at\nlength, I think on the third or fourth night, he found, partly guided by\nthe noise of their implements, a company of evidently the best sappers\nand miners amongst them, hard at work. What were they about? It could\nnot well be the inundation, seeing that had in the meantime been\npostponed to something else. Then what was it? He lurked and watched,\nevery now and then in the greatest risk of being detected, but without\nsuccess. He had again and again to retreat in haste, a proceeding\nrendered the more difficult that he had to gather up his string as he\nreturned upon its course. It was not that he was afraid of the goblins,\nbut that he was afraid of their finding out that they were watched,\nwhich might have prevented the discovery at which he aimed. Sometimes\nhis haste had to be such that, when he reached home toward morning, his\nstring for lack of time to wind it up as he \"dodged the cobs,\" would be\nin what seemed the most hopeless entanglement; but after a good sleep\nthough a short one, he always found his mother had got it right again.\nThere it was, wound in a most respectable ball, ready for use the moment\nhe should want it!\n\n\"I can't think how you do it, mother,\" he would say.\n\n\"I follow the thread,\" she would answer--\"just as you do in the mine.\"\n\nShe never had more to say about it; but the less clever she was with her\nwords, the more clever she was with her hands; and the less his mother\nsaid, the more, Curdie believed, she had to say.\n\nBut still he had made no discovery as to what the goblin miners were\nabout.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nTHE COBS' CREATURES\n\n\nABOUT this time, the gentlemen whom the king had left behind him to\nwatch over the princess, had each occasion to doubt the testimony of his\nown eyes, for more than strange were the objects to which they would\nbear witness. They were of one sort--creatures--but so grotesque and\nmisshapen as to be more like a child's drawings upon his slate than\nanything natural. They saw them only at night, while on guard about the\nhouse. The testimony of the man who first reported having seen one of\nthem was that, as he was walking slowly round the house, while yet in\nthe shadow, he caught sight of a creature standing on its hind legs in\nthe moonlight, with its fore feet upon a window-ledge, staring in at the\nwindow. Its body might have been that of a dog or wolf--he thought, but\nhe declared on his honor that its head was twice the size it ought to\nhave been for the size of its body, and as round as a ball, while the\nface, which it turned upon him as it fled, was more like one carved by a\nboy upon the turnip inside which he is going to put a candle, than\nanything else he could think of. It rushed into the garden. He sent an\narrow after it, and thought he must have struck it; for it gave an\nunearthly howl, and he could not find his arrow any more than the beast,\nalthough he searched all about the place where it vanished. They laughed\nat him until he was driven to hold his tongue; and said he must have\ntaken too long a pull at the ale-jug. But before two nights were over,\nhe had one to side with him; for he too had seen something strange, only\nquite different from that reported by the other. The description the\nsecond man gave of the creature he had seen was yet more grotesque and\nunlikely. They were both laughed at by the rest; but night after night\nanother came over to their side, until at last there was only one left\nto laugh at all his companions. Two nights more passed, and he saw\nnothing; but on the third, he came rushing from the garden to the other\ntwo before the house, in such an agitation that they declared--for it\nwas their turn now--that the band of his helmet was cracking under his\nchin with the rising of his hair inside it. Running with him into that\npart of the garden which I have already described, they saw a score of\ncreatures, to not one of which they could give a name, and not one of\nwhich was like another, hideous and ludicrous at once, gamboling on the\nlawn in the moonlight. The supernatural or rather subnatural ugliness of\ntheir faces, the length of legs and necks in some, and the apparent\nabsence of both or either in others, made the spectators, although in\none consent as to what they saw, yet doubtful, as I have said, of the\nevidence of their own eyes--and ears as well; for the noises they made,\nalthough not loud, were as uncouth and varied as their forms, and could\nbe described neither as grunts nor squeaks nor roars nor howls nor barks\nnor yells nor screams nor croaks nor hisses nor mews nor shrieks, but\nonly as something like all of them mingled in one horrible dissonance.\nKeeping in the shade, the watchers had a few moments to recover\nthemselves before the hideous assembly suspected their presence; but all\nat once, as if by common consent, they scampered off in the direction\nof a great rock, and vanished before the men had come to sufficiently to\nthink of following them.\n\nMy readers will suspect what these were; but I will now give them full\ninformation concerning them. They were of course household animals\nbelonging to the goblins, whose ancestors had taken their ancestors many\ncenturies before from the upper regions of light into the lower regions\nof darkness. The original stocks of these horrible creatures were very\nmuch the same as the animals now seen about farms and homes in the\ncountry, with the exception of a few of them, which had been wild\ncreatures, such as foxes, and indeed wolves and small bears, which the\ngoblins, from their proclivity toward the animal creation, had caught\nwhen cubs and tamed. But in the course of time, all had undergone even\ngreater changes than had passed upon their owners. They had\naltered--that is, their descendants had altered--into such creatures as\nI have not attempted to describe except in the vaguest manner--the\nvarious parts of their bodies assuming, in an apparently arbitrary and\nself-willed manner, the most abnormal developments. Indeed, so little\ndid any distinct type predominate in some of the bewildering results,\nthat you could only have guessed at any known animal as the original,\nand even then, what likeness remained would be more one of general\nexpression than of definable conformation. But what increased the\ngruesomeness tenfold, was that, from constant domestic, or indeed rather\nfamily association with the goblins, their countenances had grown in\ngrotesque resemblance to the human. No one understands animals who does\nnot see that every one of them, even amongst the fishes, it may be with\na dimness and vagueness infinitely remote, yet shadows the human: in the\ncase of these the human resemblance had greatly increased: while their\nowners had sunk toward them, they hod risen toward their owners. But the\nconditions of subterranean life being equally unnatural for both, while\nthe goblins were worse, the creatures had not improved by the\napproximation, and its result would have appeared far more ludicrous\nthan consoling to the warmest lover of animal nature. I shall now\nexplain how it was that just then these animals began to show themselves\nabout the king's country house.\n\nThe goblins, as Curdie had discovered, were mining on--at work both day\nand night, in divisions, urging the scheme after which he lay in wait.\nIn the course of their tunneling, they had broken into the channel of a\nsmall stream, but the break being in the top of it, no water had escaped\nto interfere with their work. Some of the creatures, hovering as they\noften did about their masters, had found the hole, and had, with the\ncuriosity which had grown to a passion from the restraints of their\nunnatural circumstances, proceeded to explore the channel. The stream\nwas the same which ran out by the seat on which Irene and her king-papa\nhad sat as I have told, and the goblin-creatures found it jolly fun to\nget out for a romp on a smooth lawn such as they had never seen in all\ntheir poor miserable lives. But although they had partaken enough of the\nnature of their owners to delight in annoying and alarming any of the\npeople whom they met on the mountain, they were of course incapable of\ndesigns of their own, or of intentionally furthering those of their\nmasters.\n\nFor several nights after the men-at-arms were at length of one mind as\nto the facts of the visits of some horrible creatures, whether bodily or\nspectral they could not yet say, they watched with special attention\nthat part of the garden where they had last seen them. Perhaps indeed\nthey gave in consequence too little attention to the house. But the\ncreatures were too cunning to be easily caught; nor were the watchers\nquick-eyed enough to descry the head, or the keen eyes in it, which,\nfrom the opening whence the stream issued, would watch them in turn,\nready, the moment they left the lawn to report the place clear.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nTHAT NIGHT WEEK\n\n\nDURING the whole of the week, Irene had been thinking every other moment\nof her promise to the old lady, although even now she could not feel\nquite sure that she had not been dreaming. Could it really be that an\nold lady lived up in the top of the house with pigeons and a\nspinning-wheel, and a lamp that never went out? She was, however, none\nthe less determined, on the coming Friday, to ascend the three stairs,\nwalk through the passages with the many doors, and try to find the tower\nin which she had either seen or dreamed her grandmother.\n\nHer nurse could not help wondering what had come to the child--she would\nsit so thoughtfully silent, and even in the midst of a game with her,\nwould so suddenly fall into a dreamy mood. But Irene took care to betray\nnothing, whatever efforts Lootie might make to get at her thoughts. And\nLootie had to say to herself, \"What an odd child she is!\" and give it\nup.\n\nAt length the long looked-for Friday arrived, and lest Lootie should be\nmoved to watch her, Irene endeavored to keep herself as quiet as\npossible. In the afternoon she asked for her doll's house, and went on\narranging and rearranging the various rooms and their inhabitants for a\nwhole hour. Then she gave a sigh and threw herself back in her chair.\nOne of the dolls would not sit, and another would not stand, and they\nwere all very tiresome. Indeed there was one that would not even lie\ndown, which was too bad. But it was now getting dark, and the darker it\ngot the more exited Irene became, and the more she felt it necessary to\nbe composed.\n\n\"I see you want your tea, princess,\" said the nurse: \"I will go and get\nit. The room feels close: I will open the window a little. The evening\nis mild: it won't hurt you.\"\n\n\"There's no fear of that, Lootie,\" said Irene, wishing she had put off\ngoing for the tea till it was darker, when she might have made her\nattempt with every advantage.\n\nI fancy Lootie was longer in returning than she had intended; for when\nIrene, who had been lost in thought, looked up, she saw it was nearly\ndark, and at the same moment caught sight of a pair of eyes, bright with\na green light, glowering at her through the open window. The next\ninstant something leaped into the room. It was like a cat, with legs as\nlong as a horse's, Irene said, but its body no bigger and its legs no\nthicker than those of a cat. She was too frightened to cry out, but not\ntoo frightened to jump from her chair and run from the room.\n\nIt is plain enough to every one of my readers what she ought to have\ndone--and indeed Irene thought of it herself; but when she came to the\nfoot of the old stair, just outside the nursery door, she imagined the\ncreature running up those long ascents after her, and pursuing her\nthrough the dark passages--_which, after all, might lead to no tower!_\nThat thought was too much. Her heart failed her, and turning from the\nstair, she rushed along to the hall, whence, finding the front-door\nopen, she darted into the court, pursued--at least she thought so--by\nthe creature. No one happening to see her, on she ran, unable to think\nfor fear, and ready to run anywhere to elude the awful creature with\nthe stilt-legs. Not daring to look behind her, she rushed straight out\nof the gate, and up the mountain. It was foolish indeed--thus to run\nfarther and farther from all who could help her, as if she had been\nseeking a fit spot for the goblin-creature to eat her in at his leisure;\nbut that is the way fear serves us: it always takes the side of the\nthing that we are afraid of.\n\nThe princess was soon out of breath with running up hill; but she ran\non, for she fancied the horrible creature just behind her, forgetting\nthat, had it been after her, such legs as those must have overtaken her\nlong ago. At last she could run no longer, and fell, unable even to\nscream, by the roadside, where she lay for sometime, half dead with\nterror. But finding nothing lay hold of her, and her breath beginning to\ncome back, she ventured at length to get half up, and peer anxiously\nabout her. It was now so dark that she could see nothing. Not a single\nstar was out. She could not even tell in what direction the house lay,\nand between her and home she fancied the dreadful creature lying ready\nto pounce upon her. She saw now that she ought to have run up the stairs\nat once. It was well she did not scream; for, although very few of the\ngoblins had come out for weeks, a stray idler or two might have heard\nher. She sat down upon a stone, and nobody but one who had done\nsomething wrong could have been more miserable. She had quite forgotten\nher promise to visit her grandmother. A rain-drop fell on her face. She\nlooked up, and for a moment her terror was lost in astonishment. At\nfirst she thought the rising moon had left her place, and drawn nigh to\nsee what could be the matter with the little girl, sitting alone,\nwithout hat or cloak, on the dark bare mountain; but she soon saw she\nwas mistaken, for there was no light on the ground at her feet, and no\nshadow anywhere. But a great silvery globe was hanging in the air; and\nas she gazed at the lovely thing, her courage revived. If she were but\nindoors again she would fear nothing, not even the terrible creature\nwith the long legs! But how was she to find her way back? What could\nthat light be? Could it be--? No, it couldn't. But what if it should\nbe--yes--it must be--her great-great-grandmother's lamp, which guided\nher pigeons home through the darkest night! She jumped up: she had but\nto keep that light in view, and she must find the house.\n\nHer heart grew strong. Speedily, yet softly, she walked down the hill,\nhoping to pass the watching creature unseen. Dark as it was, there was\nlittle danger now of choosing the wrong road. And--which was most\nstrange--the light that filled her eyes from the lamp, instead of\nblinding them for a moment to the object upon which they next fell,\nenabled her for a moment to see it, despite the darkness. By looking at\nthe lamp and then dropping her eyes, she could see the road for a yard\nor two in front of her, and this saved her from several falls, for the\nroad was very rough. But all at once, to her dismay, it vanished, and\nthe terror of the beast, which had left her the moment she began to\nreturn, again laid hold of her heart. The same instant, however, she\ncaught the light of the windows, and knew exactly where she was. It was\ntoo dark to run, but she made what haste she could, and reached the gate\nin safety. She found the house door still open, ran through the hall,\nand, without even looking into the nursery, bounded straight up the\nstair, and the next, and the next; then turning to the right, ran\nthrough the long avenue of silent rooms, and found her way at once to\nthe door at the foot of the tower stair.\n\nWhen first the nurse missed her, she fancied she was playing her a\ntrick, and for some time took no trouble about her; but at last, getting\nfrightened, she had begun to search; and when the princess entered, the\nwhole household was hither and thither, over the house, hunting for her.\nA few seconds after she reached the stair of the tower, they had even\nbegun to search the neglected rooms, in which they would never have\nthought of looking had they not already searched every other place they\ncould think of in vain. But by this time she was knocking at the old\nlady's door.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nWOVEN AND THEN SPUN\n\n\n\"COME in, Irene,\" said the silvery voice of her grandmother.\n\nThe princess opened the door, and peeped in. But the room was quite\ndark, and there was no sound of the spinning-wheel. She grew frightened\nonce more, thinking that, although the room was there, the old lady\nmight be a dream after all. Every little girl knows how dreadful it is\nto find a room empty where she thought somebody was; but Irene had to\nfancy for a moment that the person she came to find was nowhere at all.\nShe remembered however that at night she spun only in the moonlight, and\nconcluded that must be why there was no sweet, bee-like humming: the old\nlady might be somewhere in the darkness. Before she had time to think\nanother thought, she heard her voice again, saying as before--\n\n\"Come in, Irene.\"\n\nFrom the sound, she understood at once that she was not in the room\nbeside her. Perhaps she was in her bedroom. She turned across the\npassage, feeling her way to the other door. When her hand fell on the\nlock, again the old lady spoke--\n\n\"Shut the other door behind you, Irene. I always close the door of my\nworkroom when I go to my chamber.\"\n\nIrene wondered to hear her voice so plainly through the door; having\nshut the other, she opened it and went in. Oh, what a lovely haven to\nreach from the darkness and fear through which she had come! The soft\nlight made her feel as if she were going into the heart of the milkiest\npearl; while the blue walls and their silver stars for a moment\nperplexed her with the fancy that they were in reality the sky which she\nhad left outside a minute ago covered with rainclouds.\n\n[Illustration: \"Come,\" and she still held out her arms.]\n\n\"I've lighted a fire for you, Irene: you're cold and wet,\" said her\ngrandmother.\n\nThen Irene looked again, and saw that what she had taken for a huge\nbouquet of red roses on a low stand against the wall, was in fact a fire\nwhich burned in the shapes of the loveliest and reddest roses, glowing\ngorgeously between the heads and wings of two cherubs of shining silver.\nAnd when she came nearer, she found that the smell of roses with which\nthe room was filled, came from the fire-roses on the hearth. Her\ngrandmother was dressed in the loveliest pale-blue velvet, over which\nher hair, no longer white, but of a rich gold color, streamed like a\ncataract, here falling in dull gathered heaps, there rushing away in\nsmooth shining falls. And even as she looked, the hair seemed pouring\ndown from her head, and vanishing in a golden mist ere it reached the\nfloor. It flowed from under the edge of a circle of shining silver, set\nwith alternated pearls and opals. On her dress was no ornament whatever,\nneither was there a ring on her hand, or a necklace or carcanet about\nher neck. But her slippers glimmered with the light of the Milky-way,\nfor they were covered with seed-pearls and opals in one mass. Her face\nwas that of a woman of three-and-twenty.\n\nThe princess was so bewildered with astonishment and admiration that she\ncould hardly thank her, and drew nigh with timidity, feeling dirty and\nuncomfortable. The lady was seated on a low chair by the side of the\nfire, with hands outstretched to take her, but the princess hung back\nwith a troubled smile.\n\n\"Why, what's the matter?\" asked her grandmother. \"You haven't been doing\nanything wrong--I know that by your face, though it _is_ rather\nmiserable. What's the matter, my dear?\"\n\nAnd still she held out her arms.\n\n\"Dear grandmother,\" said Irene, \"I'm not so sure that I haven't done\nsomething wrong. I ought to have run up to you at once when the\nlong-legged cat came in at the window, instead of running out on the\nmountain, and making myself such a fright.\"\n\n\"You were taken by surprise, my child, and are not so likely to do it\nagain. It is when people do wrong things willfully that they are the\nmore likely to do them again. Come.\"\n\nAnd still she held out her arms.\n\n\"But, grandmother, you're so beautiful and grand with your crown on! and\nI am so dirty with mud and rain!--I should quite spoil your beautiful\nblue dress.\"\n\nWith a merry little laugh, the lady sprang from her chair, more lightly\nfar than Irene herself could, caught the child to her bosom, and kissing\nthe tear-stained face over and over, sat down with her in her lap.\n\n\"Oh, grandmother! you'll make yourself such a mess!\" cried Irene,\nclinging to her.\n\n\"You darling! do you think I care more for my dress than for my little\ngirl? Beside--look here!\"\n\nAs she spoke she set her down, and Irene saw to her dismay that the\nlovely dress was covered with the mud of her fall on the mountain road.\nBut the lady stooped to the fire, and taking from it, by the stalk in\nher fingers, one of the burning roses, passed it once and again and a\nthird time over the front of her dress; and when Irene looked, not a\nsingle stain was to be discovered.\n\n\"There!\" said her grandmother, \"you won't mind coming to me now?\"\n\nBut Irene again hung back, eyeing the flaming rose which the lady held\nin her hand.\n\n\"You're not afraid of the rose--are you?\" she said, and she was about to\nthrow it on the hearth again.\n\n\"Oh! don't, please!\" cried Irene. \"Won't you hold it to my frock and my\nhands and my face? And I'm afraid my feet and my knees want it too!\"\n\n\"No,\" answered her grandmother, smiling a little sadly, as she threw the\nrose from her; \"it is too hot for you yet. It would set your frock in a\nflame. Besides, I don't want to make you clean to-night. I want your\nnurse and the rest of the people to see you as you are, for you will\nhave to tell them how you ran away for fear of the long-legged cat. I\nshould like to wash you, but they would not believe you then. Do you see\nthat bath behind you?\"\n\nThe princess looked, and saw a large oval tub of silver, shining\nbrilliantly in the light of the wonderful lamp.\n\n\"Go and look into it,\" said the lady.\n\nIrene went, and came back very silently, with her eyes shining.\n\n\"What did you see?\" asked her grandmother.\n\n\"The sky and the moon and the stars,\" she answered. \"It looked as if\nthere was no bottom to it.\"\n\nThe lady smiled a pleased, satisfied smile, and was silent also for a\nfew moments. Then she said--\n\n\"Any time you want a bath, come to me. I know you have a bath every\nmorning, but sometimes you want one at night too.\"\n\n\"Thank you, grandmother; I will--I will indeed,\" answered Irene, and was\nagain silent for some moments thinking. Then she said, \"How was it,\ngrandmother, that I saw your beautiful lamp--not the light of it\nonly--but the great round silver lamp itself, hanging alone in the great\nopen air high up? It was your lamp I saw--wasn't it?\"\n\n\"Yes, my child; it was my lamp.\"\n\n\"Then how was it? I don't see a window all round.\"\n\n\"When I please, I can make the lamp shine through the walls--shine so\nstrong that it melts them away from before the sight, and shows itself\nas you saw it. But, as I told you, it is not everybody can see it.\"\n\n\"How is it that I can then? I'm sure I don't know.\"\n\n\"It is a gift born with you. And one day I hope everybody will have it.\"\n\n\"But how do you make it shine through the walls?\"\n\n\"Ah! that you would not understand if I were to try ever so much to make\nyou--not yet--not yet. But,\" added the lady rising, \"you must sit in my\nchair while I get you the present I have been preparing for you. I told\nyou my spinning was for you. It is finished now, and I am going to fetch\nit. I have been keeping it warm under one of my brooding pigeons.\"\n\nIrene sat down in the low chair, and her grandmother left her, shutting\nthe door behind her. The child sat gazing, now at the rose-fire, now at\nthe starry walls, now at the silvery light; and a great quietness came\nover her heart. If all the long-legged cats in the world had come\nrushing helter-skelter at her then, she would not have been afraid of\nthem for a single moment. How this was, however, she could not\ntell;--she only knew there was no fear in her, and everything was so\nright and safe that it could not get in.\n\nShe had been gazing at the lovely lamp for some minutes fixedly: turning\nher eyes, she found the wall had vanished, for she was looking out on\nthe dark cloudy night. But though she heard the wind blowing, none of it\nblew upon her. In a moment more, the clouds themselves parted, or rather\nvanished like the wall, and she looked straight into the starry herds,\nflashing gloriously in the dark blue. It was but for a moment. The\nclouds gathered again and shut out the stars; the wall gathered again\nand shut out the clouds; and there stood the lady beside her with the\nloveliest smile on her face, and a shimmering ball in her hand, about\nthe size of a pigeon's egg.\n\n\"There, Irene; there is my work for you!\" she said, holding out the ball\nto the princess.\n\nShe took it in her hand, and looked at it all over. It sparkled a\nlittle, and shone here and shone there, but not much. It was of a sort\nof gray whiteness, something like spun glass.\n\n\"Is this _all_ your spinning, grandmother?\" she asked.\n\n\"All since you came to the house. There is more there than you think.\"\n\n\"How pretty it is! What am I to do with it?\"\n\n\"That I will now explain to you,\" answered the lady, turning from her,\nand going to her cabinet.\n\nShe came back with a small ring in her hand. Then she took the ball from\nIrene's, and did something with the two--Irene could not tell what.\n\n\"Give me your hand,\" she said.\n\nIrene held up her right hand.\n\n\"Yes, that is the hand I want,\" said the lady, and put the ring on the\nforefinger of it.\n\n\"What a beautiful ring!\" said Irene. \"What is the stone called?\"\n\n\"It is a fire-opal.\"\n\n\"Please, am I to keep it?\"\n\n\"Always.\"\n\n\"Oh, thank you, grandmother! It's prettier than anything I ever saw,\nexcept those--of all colors--in your--Please, is that your crown?\"\n\n\"Yes, it is my crown. The stone in your ring is of the same sort--only\nnot so good. It has only red, but mine have all colors, you see.\"\n\n\"Yes, grandmother. I will take such care of it!--But--\" she added,\nhesitating.\n\n\"But what?\" asked her grandmother.\n\n\"What am I to say when Lootie asks me where I got it?\"\n\n\"_You_ will ask _her_ where you got it,\" answered the lady smiling.\n\n\"I don't see how I can do that.\"\n\n\"You will though.\"\n\n\"Of course I will if you say so. But you know I can't pretend not to\nknow.\"\n\n\"Of course not. But don't trouble yourself about it. You will see when\nthe time comes.\"\n\nSo saying, the lady turned, and threw the little ball into the\nrose-fire.\n\n\"Oh, grandmother!\" exclaimed Irene; \"I thought you had spun it for me.\"\n\n\"So I did, my child. And you've got it.\"\n\n\"No; it's burnt in the fire.\"\n\nThe lady put her hand in the fire, brought out the ball, glimmering as\nbefore, and held it toward her. Irene stretched out her hand to take it,\nbut the lady turned, and going to her cabinet, opened a drawer, and laid\nthe ball in it.\n\n\"Have I done anything to vex you, grandmother?\" said Irene pitifully.\n\n\"No, my darling. But you must understand that no one ever gives anything\nto another properly and really without keeping it. That ball is yours.\"\n\n\"Oh! I'm not to take it with me! You are going to keep it for me!\"\n\n\"You are to take it with you. I've fastened the end of it to the ring on\nyour finger.\"\n\nIrene looked at the ring.\n\n\"I can't see it there, grandmother,\" she said.\n\n\"Feel--a little way from the ring--toward the cabinet,\" said the lady.\n\n\"Oh! I do feel it!\" exclaimed the princess. \"But I can't see it,\" she\nadded, looking close to her outstretched hand.\n\n\"No. The thread is too fine for you to see it. You can only feel it. Now\nyou can fancy how much spinning that took, although it does seem such a\nlittle ball.\"\n\n\"But what use can I make of it, if it lies in your cabinet?\"\n\n\"That is what I will explain to you. It would be of no use to you--it\nwouldn't be yours at all if it did not lie in my cabinet. Now listen. If\never you find yourself in any danger--such, for example, as you were in\nthis evening--you must take off your ring, and put it under the pillow\nof your bed. Then you must lay your forefinger, the same that wore the\nring, upon the thread, and follow the thread wherever it leads you.\"\n\n\"Oh, how delightful! It will lead me to you, grandmother, I know!\"\n\n\"Yes. But, remember, it may seem to you a very roundabout way indeed,\nand you must not double the thread. Of one thing you may be sure, that\nwhile you hold it, I hold it too.\"\n\n\"It is very wonderful!\" said Irene thoughtfully. Then suddenly becoming\naware, she jumped up, crying--\"Oh, grandmother! here I have been sitting\nall this time in your chair, and you standing! I _beg_ your pardon.\"\n\nThe lady laid her hand on her shoulder and said:\n\n\"Sit down again, Irene. Nothing pleases me better than to see any one\nsit in my chair. I am only too glad to stand so long as any one will sit\nin it.\"\n\n\"How kind of you!\" said the princess, and sat down again.\n\n\"It makes me happy,\" said the lady.\n\n\"But,\" said Irene, still puzzled, \"won't the thread get in somebody's\nway and be broken, if the one end is fast to my ring and the other laid\nin your cabinet?\"\n\n\"You will find all that arranges itself. I am afraid it is time for you\nto go.\"\n\n\"Mightn't I stay and sleep with you to-night, grandmother?\"\n\n\"No, not to-night. If I had meant you to stay to-night, I should have\ngiven you a bath; but you know everybody in the house is miserable about\nyou, and it would be cruel to keep them so all night. You must go down\nstairs.\"\n\n\"I'm so glad, grandmother, you didn't say--_go home_--for this is my\nhome. Mayn't I call this my home?\"\n\n\"You may, my child. And I trust you will always think it your home. Now\ncome. I must take you back without any one seeing you.\"\n\n\"Please, I want to ask you one question more,\" said Irene. \"Is it\nbecause you have your crown on that you look so young?\"\n\n\"No, child,\" answered her grandmother; \"it is because I felt so young\nthis evening, that I put my crown on. And it occurred to me that you\nwould like to see your old grandmother in her best.\"\n\n\"Why do you call yourself old? You're not old, grandmother.\"\n\n\"I am very old indeed. It is so silly of people--I don't mean you, for\nyou are such a tiny, and couldn't know better--but it is so silly of\npeople to fancy that old age means crookedness and witheredness and\nfeebleness and sticks and spectacles and rheumatism and forgetfulness!\nIt is so silly! Old age has nothing whatever to do with all that. The\nright old age means strength and beauty and mirth and courage and clear\neyes and strong painless limbs. I am older than you are able to think,\nand--\"\n\n\"And look at you, grandmother!\" cried Irene, jumping up, and flinging\nher arms about her neck. \"I won't be so silly again, I promise you. At\nleast--I'm rather afraid to promise--but if I am, I promise to be sorry\nfor it--I do. I wish I were as old as you, grandmother. I don't think\nyou are ever afraid of anything.\"\n\n\"Not for long, at least, my child. Perhaps by the time I am two thousand\nyears of age, I shall, indeed, never be afraid of anything. But I must\nconfess that I have sometimes been afraid about my children--sometimes\nabout you, Irene.\"\n\n\"Oh, I'm so sorry, grandmother!--To-night, I suppose, you mean.\"\n\n\"Yes--a little to-night; but a good deal when you had all but made up\nyour mind that I was a dream, and no real great-great-grandmother. You\nmust not suppose that I am blaming you for that, I daresay it was out of\nyour power to help it.\"\n\n\"I don't know, grandmother,\" said the princess, beginning to cry. \"I\ncan't always do myself as I should like. And I don't always try. I'm\nvery sorry anyhow.\"\n\nThe lady stooped, lifted her in her arms, and sat down with her in her\nchair, holding her close to her bosom. In a few minutes the princess had\nsobbed herself to sleep. How long she slept, I do not know. When she\ncame to herself she was sitting in her own high chair at the nursery\ntable, with her doll's-house before her.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nTHE RING\n\n\nTHE same moment her nurse came into the room, sobbing. When she saw her\nsitting there, she started back with a loud cry of amazement and joy.\nThen running to her, she caught her up in her arms and covered her dear\nlittle face with kisses.\n\n\"My precious darling princess! where have you been? What has happened to\nyou? We've all been crying our eyes out, and searching the house from\ntop to bottom for you.\"\n\n\"Not quite from the top,\" thought Irene to herself; and she might have\nadded--\"not quite to the bottom,\" perhaps, if she had known all. But the\none she would not, and the other she could not say.\n\n\"Oh, Lootie! I've had such a dreadful adventure!\" she replied, and told\nher all about the cat with the long legs, and how she ran out upon the\nmountain, and came back again. But she said nothing of her grandmother\nor her lamp.\n\n\"And there we've been searching for you all over the house for more than\nan hour and a half!\" exclaimed the nurse. \"But that's no matter, now\nwe've got you! Only, princess, I must say,\" she added, her mood\nchanging, \"what you ought to have done was to call for your own Lootie\nto come and help you, instead of running out of the house, and up the\nmountain, in that wild--I must say, foolish fashion.\"\n\n\"Well, Lootie,\" said Irene quietly, \"perhaps if you had a big cat, all\nlegs, running at you, you mightn't exactly know which was the wisest\nthing to do at the moment.\"\n\n\"I wouldn't run up the mountain, anyhow,\" returned Lootie.\n\n\"Not if you had time to think about it. But when those creatures came at\nyou that night on the mountain, you were so frightened yourself that you\nlost your way home.\"\n\nThis put a stop to Lootie's reproaches. She had been on the point of\nsaying that the long-legged cat must have been a twilight fancy of the\nprincess's, but the memory of the horrors of that night, and of the\ntalking-to which the king had given her in consequence, prevented her\nfrom saying that which after all she did not half believe--having a\nstrong suspicion that the cat was a goblin; for the fact was that she\nknew nothing of the difference between the goblins and their creatures:\nshe counted them all just goblins.\n\nWithout another word she went and got some fresh tea and bread and\nbutter for the princess. Before she returned, the whole household,\nheaded by the housekeeper, burst into the nursery to exult over their\ndarling. The gentlemen-at-arms followed, and were ready enough to\nbelieve all she told them about the long-legged cat. Indeed, though wise\nenough to say nothing about it, they remembered with no little horror,\njust such a creature amongst those they had surprised at their gambols\nupon the princess's lawn. In their own hearts they blamed themselves for\nnot having kept better watch. And their captain gave order that from\nthis night the front door and all the windows on the ground floor should\nbe locked immediately the sun set, and opened after upon no pretence\nwhatever. The men-at-arms redoubled their vigilance, and for some time\nthere was no further cause of alarm.\n\nWhen the princess woke the next morning, her nurse was bending over her.\n\n\"How your ring does glow this morning, princess!--just like a fiery\nrose!\" she said.\n\n\"Does it, Lootie?\" returned Irene. \"Who gave me the ring, Lootie? I know\nI've had it a long time, but where did I get it? I don't remember.\"\n\n\"I think it must have been your mother gave it you, princess; but\nreally, for as long as you have worn it, I don't remember that ever I\nheard,\" answered her nurse.\n\n\"I will ask my king-papa the next time he comes,\" said Irene.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\nSPRING-TIME\n\n\nTHE spring, so dear to all creatures, young and old, came at last, and\nbefore the first few days of it had gone, the king rode through its\nbudding valleys to see his little daughter. He had been in a distant\npart of his dominions all the winter, for he was not in the habit of\nstopping in one great city, or of visiting only his favorite country\nhouses, but he moved from place to place, that all his people might know\nhim. Wherever he journeyed, he kept a constant lookout for the ablest\nand best men to put into office, and wherever he found himself mistaken,\nand those he had appointed incapable or unjust, he removed them at once.\nHence you see it was his care of the people that kept him from seeing\nhis princess so often as he would have liked. You may wonder why he did\nnot take her about with him; but there were several reasons against his\ndoing so, and I suspect her great-great-grandmother had had a principal\nhand in preventing it. Once more Irene heard the bugle-blast, and once\nmore she was at the gate to meet her father as he rode up on his great\nwhite horse.\n\nAfter they had been alone for a little while, she thought of what she\nhad resolved to ask him.\n\n\"Please, king-papa,\" she said, \"will you tell me where I got this pretty\nring? I can't remember.\"\n\nThe king looked at it. A strange, beautiful smile spread like sunshine\nover his face, and an answering smile, but at the same time a\nquestioning one, spread like moonlight over Irene's.\n\n\"It was your queen-mamma's once,\" he said.\n\n\"And why isn't it hers now?\" asked Irene.\n\n\"She does not want it now,\" said the king, looking grave.\n\n\"Why doesn't she want it now?\"\n\n\"Because she's gone where all those rings are made.\"\n\n\"And when shall I see her?\" asked the princess.\n\n\"Not for some time yet,\" answered the king, and the tears came in his\neyes.\n\nIrene did not remember her mother, and did not know why her father\nlooked so, and why the tears came in his eyes; but she put her arms\nround his neck and kissed him, and asked no more questions.\n\nThe king was much disturbed on hearing the report of the\ngentlemen-at-arms concerning the creatures they had seen; and I presume\nwould have taken Irene with him that very day, but for what the presence\nof the ring on her finger assured him of. About an hour before he left,\nIrene saw him go up the old stair; and he did not come down again till\nthey were just ready to start; and she thought with herself that he had\nbeen up to see the old lady. When he went away, he left the other six\ngentlemen behind him, that there might be six of them always on guard.\n\nAnd now, in the lovely spring-weather, Irene was out on the mountain the\ngreater part of the day. In the warmer hollows there were lovely\nprimroses, and not so many that she ever got tired of them. As often as\nshe saw a new one opening an eye of light in the blind earth, she would\nclap her hands with gladness, and, unlike some children I know, instead\nof pulling it, would touch it as tenderly as if it had been a new baby,\nand, having made its acquaintance, would leave it as happy as she found\nit. She treated the plants on which they grew like birds' nests; every\nfresh flower was like a new little bird to her. She would pay a visit to\nall the flower-nests she knew, remembering each by itself. She would go\ndown on her hands and knees beside one and say \"Good morning! Are you\nall smelling very sweet this morning? Good-bye!\" And then she would go\nto another nest, and say the same. It was a favorite amusement with her.\nThere were many flowers up and down, and she loved them all, but the\nprimroses were her favorites.\n\n\"They're not too shy, and they're not a bit forward,\" she would say to\nLootie.\n\nThere were goats too about, over the mountain, and when the little kids\ncame, she was as pleased with them as with the flowers. The goats\nbelonged to the miners mostly--a few of them to Curdie's mother; but\nthere were a good many wild ones that seemed to belong to nobody. These\nthe goblins counted theirs, and it was upon them partly that they lived.\nThey set snares and dug pits for them; and did not scruple to take what\ntame ones happened to be caught; but they did not try to steal them in\nany other manner, because they were afraid of the dogs the hill-people\nkept to watch them, for the knowing dogs always tried to bite their\nfeet. But the goblins had a kind of sheep of their own--very queer\ncreatures, which they drove out to feed at night, and the other\ngoblin-creatures were wise enough to keep good watch over them, for they\nknew they should have their bones by and by.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nCURDIE'S CLUE\n\n\nCURDIE was as watchful as ever, but was almost getting tired of his\nill-success. Every other night or so he followed the goblins about, as\nthey went on digging and boring, and getting as near them as he could,\nwatched them from behind stones and rocks; but as yet he seemed no\nnearer finding out what they had in view. As at first, he always kept\nhold of the end of his string, while his pickaxe left just outside the\nhole by which he entered the goblins' country from the mine, continued\nto serve as an anchor and hold fast the other end. The goblins hearing\nno more noise in that quarter, had ceased to apprehend an immediate\ninvasion, and kept no watch.\n\nOne night, after dodging about and listening till he was nearly falling\nasleep with weariness, he began to roll up his ball, for he had resolved\nto go home to bed. It was not long, however, before he began to feel\nbewildered. One after another he passed goblin-houses, caves that is,\noccupied by goblin families, and at length was sure they were many more\nthan he had passed as he came. He had to use great caution to pass\nunseen--they lay so close together. Could his string have led him wrong?\nHe still followed winding it, and still it led him into more thickly\npopulated quarters, until he became quite uneasy, and indeed\napprehensive; for although he was not afraid of the _cobs_, he was\nafraid of not finding his way out. But what could he do? It was of no\nuse to sit down and wait for the morning--the morning made no difference\nhere. It was all dark, and always dark; and if his string failed him he\nwas helpless. He might even arrive within a yard of the mine, and never\nknow it. Seeing he could do nothing better, he would at least find where\nthe end of the string was, and if possible how it had come to play him\nsuch a trick. He knew by the size of the ball that he was getting pretty\nnear the last of it, when he began to feel a tugging and pulling at it.\nWhat could it mean? Turning a sharp corner, he thought he heard strange\nsounds. These grew, as he went on, to a scuffling and growling and\nsqueaking; and the noise increased, until, turning a second sharp\ncorner, he found himself in the midst of it, and the same moment tumbled\nover a wallowing mass, which he knew must be a knot of the cobs'\ncreatures. Before he could recover his feet, he had caught some great\nscratches on his face, and several severe bites on his legs and arms.\nBut as he scrambled to get up, his hand fell upon his pickaxe, and\nbefore the horrid beasts could do him any serious harm, he was laying\nabout with it right and left in the dark. The hideous cries which\nfollowed gave him the satisfaction of knowing that he had punished some\nof them pretty smartly for their rudeness, and by their scampering and\ntheir retreating howls, he perceived that he had routed them. He stood a\nlittle, weighing his battle-axe in his hand as if it had been the most\nprecious lump of metal--but indeed no lump of gold itself could have\nbeen so precious at that time as that common tool--then untied the end\nof the string from it, put the ball in his pocket, and still stood\nthinking. It was clear that the cobs' creatures had found his axe, had\nbetween them carried it off, and had so led him he knew not where. But\nfor all his thinking he could not tell what he ought to do, until\nsuddenly he became aware of a glimmer of light in the distance. Without\na moment's hesitation he set out for it, as fast as the unknown and\nrugged way would permit. Yet again turning a corner, led by the dim\nlight, he spied something quite new in his experience of the underground\nregions--a small irregular shape of something shining. Going up to it,\nhe found it was a piece of mica, or Muscovy glass, called sheep-silver\nin Scotland, and the light flickering as if from a fire behind it. After\ntrying in vain for some time to discover an entrance to the place where\nit was burning, he came at length to a small chamber in which an opening\nhigh in the wall revealed a glow beyond. To this opening he managed to\nscramble up, and then he saw a strange sight.\n\nBelow sat a little group of goblins around a fire, the smoke of which\nvanished in the darkness far aloft. The sides of the cave were full of\nshining minerals like those of the palace-hall; and the company was\nevidently of a superior order, for every one wore stones about head, or\narms, or waist, shining, dull, gorgeous colors in the light of the fire.\nNor had Curdie looked long before he recognized the king himself, and\nfound that he had made his way into the inner apartment of the royal\nfamily. He had never had such a good chance of hearing something! He\ncrept through the hole as softly as he could, scrambled a good way down\nthe wall toward them without attracting attention, and then sat down and\nlistened. The king, evidently the queen, and probably the crown-prince\nand the prime minister were talking together. He was sure of the queen\nby her shoes, for as she warmed her feet at the fire, he saw them quite\nplainly.\n\n\"That _will_ be fun!\" said the one he took for the crown-prince.\n\nIt was the first whole sentence he heard.\n\n\"I don't see why you should think it such a grand affair!\" said his\nstepmother, tossing her head backward.\n\n\"You must remember, my spouse,\" interposed his Majesty, as if making\nexcuse for his son, \"he has got the same blood in him. His mother--\"\n\n\"Don't talk to me of his mother! You positively encourage his unnatural\nfancies. Whatever belongs to _that_ mother, ought to be cut out of him.\"\n\n\"You forget yourself, my dear!\" said the king.\n\n\"I don't,\" said the queen, \"nor you either. If you expect _me_ to\napprove of such coarse tastes, you will find yourself mistaken. _I_\ndon't wear shoes for nothing.\"\n\n\"You must acknowledge, however,\" the king said, with a little groan,\n\"that this at least is no whim of Harelip's, but a matter of\nstate-policy. You are well aware that his gratification comes purely\nfrom the pleasure of sacrificing himself to the public good. Does it\nnot, Harelip?\"\n\n\"Yes, father; of course it does. Only it _will_ be nice to make her cry.\nI'll have the skin taken off between her toes, and tie them up till they\ngrow together. Then her feet will be like other people's, and there will\nbe no occasion for her to wear shoes.\"\n\n\"Do you mean to insinuate _I've_ got toes, you unnatural wretch?\" cried\nthe queen; and she moved angrily toward Harelip. The councilor, however,\nwho was betwixt them, leaned forward so as to prevent her touching him,\nbut only as if to address the prince.\n\n\"Your royal Highness,\" he said, \"possibly requires to be reminded that\nyou have got three toes yourself--one on one foot, two on the other.\"\n\n\"Ha! ha! ha!\" shouted the queen triumphantly.\n\nThe councilor, encouraged by this mark of favor, went on.\n\n\"It seems to me, your royal Highness, it would greatly endear you to\nyour future people, proving to them that you are not the less one of\nthemselves that you had the misfortune to be born of a sun-mother, if\nyou were to command upon yourself the comparatively slight operation\nwhich, in a more extended form, you so wisely meditate with regard to\nyour future princess.\"\n\n\"Ha! ha! ha!\" laughed the queen, louder than before, and the king and\nthe minister joined in the laugh. It was anything but a laughing matter\nto Harelip. He growled, and for a few moments the others continued to\nexpress their enjoyment of his discomfiture.\n\nThe queen was the only one Curdie could see with any distinctness. She\nsat sideways to him, and the light of the fire shone full upon her face.\nHe could not consider her handsome. Her nose was certainly broader at\nthe end than its extreme length, and her eyes, instead of being\nhorizontal, were set up like two perpendicular eggs, one on the broad,\nthe other on the small, end. Her mouth was no bigger than a small\nbuttonhole until she laughed, when it stretched from ear to ear--only\nto be sure her ears were very nearly in the middle of her cheeks.\n\nAnxious to hear everything they might say, Curdie ventured to slide down\na smooth part of the rock just under him, to a projection below, upon\nwhich he thought to rest. But whether he was not careful enough, or the\nprojection gave way, down he came with a rush on the floor of the\ncavern, bringing with him a great rumbling shower of stones.\n\nThe goblins jumped from their seats in more anger than consternation,\nfor they had never yet seen anything to be afraid of in the palace. But\nwhen they saw Curdie with his pick in his hand, their rage was mingled\nwith fear, for they took him for the first of an invasion of miners. The\nking notwithstanding drew himself up to his full height of four feet,\nspread himself to his full breadth of three and a half, for he was the\nhandsomest and squarest of all the goblins, and strutting up to Curdie,\nplanted himself with outspread feet before him, and said with dignity--\n\n\"Pray what right have you in my palace?\"\n\n\"The right of necessity, your majesty,\" answered Curdie. \"I lost my way,\nand did not know where I was wandering to.\"\n\n\"How did you get in?\"\n\n\"By a hole in the mountain.\"\n\n\"But you are a miner! Look at your pickaxe!\"\n\nCurdie did look at it, answering,\n\n\"I came upon it, lying on the ground, a little way from here. I tumbled\nover some wild beasts who were playing with it. Look, your majesty.\" And\nCurdie showed him how he was scratched and bitten.\n\n[Illustration: The goblins fell back a little when he began, and made\nhorrible grimaces all through the rhyme.]\n\nThe king was pleased to find him behave more politely than he had\nexpected from what his people had told him concerning the miners, for he\nattributed it to the power of his own presence; but he did not therefore\nfeel friendly to the intruder.\n\n\"You will oblige me by walking out of my dominions at once,\" he said,\nwell knowing what a mockery lay in the words.\n\n\"With pleasure, if your majesty will give me a guide,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"I will give you a thousand,\" said the king, with a scoffing air of\nmagnificent liberality.\n\n\"One will be quite sufficient,\" said Curdie.\n\nBut the king uttered a strange shout, half halloo, half roar, and in\nrushed goblins till the cave was swarming. He said something to the\nfirst of them which Curdie could not hear, and it was passed from one to\nanother till in a moment the farthest in the crowd had evidently heard\nand understood it. They began to gather about him in a way he did not\nrelish, and he retreated toward the wall. They pressed upon him.\n\n\"Stand back,\" said Curdie, grasping his pickaxe tighter by his knee.\n\nThey only grinned and pressed closer. Curdie bethought himself, and\nbegan to rhyme.\n\n          \"Ten, twenty, thirty--\n           You're all so very dirty!\n           Twenty, thirty, forty--\n           You're all so thick and snorty!\n\n          \"Thirty, forty, fifty--\n           You're all so puff-and-snifty!\n           Forty, fifty, sixty--\n           Beast and man so mixty!\n\n          \"Fifty, sixty, seventy--\n           Mixty, maxty, leaventy--\n           Sixty, seventy, eighty--\n           All your cheeks so slaty.\n\n          \"Seventy, eighty, ninety,\n           All your hands so flinty!\n           Eighty, ninety, hundred,\n           Altogether dundred!\"\n\nThe goblins fell back a little when he began, and made horrible grimaces\nall through the rhyme, as if eating something so disagreeable that it\nset their teeth on edge and gave them the creeps; but whether it was\nthat the rhyming words were most of them no words at all, for a new\nrhyme being considered more efficacious, Curdie had made it on the spur\nof the moment, or whether it was that the presence of the king and queen\ngave them courage, I cannot tell; but the moment the rhyme was over,\nthey crowded on him again, and out shot a hundred long arms, with a\nmultitude of thick nailless fingers at the end of them, to lay hold upon\nhim. Then Curdie heaved up his axe. But being as gentle as courageous\nand not wishing to kill any of them, he turned the end which was square\nand blunt like a hammer, and with that came down a great blow on the\nhead of the goblin nearest him. Hard as the heads of all goblins are, he\nthought he must feel that. And so he did, no doubt; but he only gave a\nhorrible cry, and sprung at Curdie's throat. Curdie however drew back in\ntime, and just at that critical moment, remembered the vulnerable part\nof the goblin-body. He made a sudden rush at the king, and stamped with\nall his might on his Majesty's feet. The king gave a most unkingly howl,\nand almost fell into the fire. Curdie then rushed into the crowd,\nstamping right and left. The goblins drew back howling on every side as\nhe approached, but they were so crowded that few of those he attacked\ncould escape his tread; and the shrieking and roaring that filled the\ncave would have appalled Curdie, but for the good hope it gave him. They\nwere tumbling over each other in heaps in their eagerness to rush from\nthe cave, when a new assailant suddenly faced him:--the queen, with\nflaming eyes and expanded nostrils, her hair standing half up from her\nhead, rushed at him. She trusted in her shoes; they were of\ngranite--hollowed like French _sabots_. Curdie would have endured much\nrather than hurt a woman, even if she was a goblin; but here was an\naffair of life and death: forgetting her shoes, he made a great stamp on\none of her feet. But she instantly returned it with very different\neffect, causing him frightful pain and almost disabling him. His only\nchance with her would have been to attack the granite shoes with his\npickaxe, but before he could think of that, she had caught him up in her\narms, and was rushing with him across the cave. She dashed him into a\nhole in the wall, with a force that almost stunned him. But although he\ncould not move, he was not too far gone to hear her great cry, and the\nrush of multitudes of soft feet, followed by the sounds of something\nheaved up against the rock; after which came a multitudinous patter of\nstones falling near him. The last had not ceased when he grew very\nfaint, for his head had been badly cut, and at last insensible.\n\nWhen he came to himself, there was perfect silence about him, and utter\ndarkness, but for the merest glimmer in one tiny spot. He crawled to it,\nand found that they had heaved a slab against the mouth of the hole,\npast the edge of which a poor little gleam found its way from the fire.\nHe could not move it a hair's breadth, for they had piled a great heap\nof stones against it. He crawled back to where he had been lying, in the\nfaint hope of finding his pickaxe. But after a vain search, he was at\nlast compelled to acknowledge himself in an evil plight. He sat down and\ntried to think, but soon fell fast asleep.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nGOBLIN COUNSELS\n\n\nHE must have slept a long time, for when he awoke, he felt wonderfully\nrestored--indeed he felt almost well, and he was also very hungry. There\nwere voices in the outer cave.\n\nOnce more then, it was night; for the goblins slept during the day, and\nwent about their affairs during the night.\n\nIn the universal and constant darkness of their dwelling, they had no\nreason to prefer the one arrangement to the other; but from aversion to\nthe sun-people, they chose to be busy when there was least chance of\ntheir being met either by the miners below, when they were burrowing, or\nby the people of the mountain above, when they were feeding their sheep\nor catching their goats. And indeed it was only when the sun was away\nthat the outside of the mountain was sufficiently like their own dismal\nregions to be endurable to their mole-eyes, so thoroughly had they\nbecome disused to any light beyond that of their own fires and torches.\n\nCurdie listened, and soon found that they were talking of himself.\n\n\"How long will it take?\" asked Harelip.\n\n\"Not many days, I should think,\" answered the king. \"They are poor\nfeeble creatures, those sun-people, and want to be always eating. _We_\ncan go a week at a time without food, and be all the better for it; but\nI've been told _they_ eat two or three times every day! Can you believe\nit?--They must be quite hollow inside--not at all like us, nine-tenths\nof whose bulk is solid flesh and bone. Yes--I judge a week of starvation\nwill do for him.\"\n\n\"If I may be allowed a word,\" interposed the queen, \"--and I think I\nought to have some voice in the matter--\"\n\n\"The wretch is entirely at your disposal, my spouse,\" interrupted the\nking. \"He is your property. You caught him yourself. We should never\nhave done it.\"\n\nThe queen laughed. She seemed in far better humor than the night before.\n\n\"I was about to say,\" she resumed, \"that it does seem a pity to waste so\nmuch fresh meat.\"\n\n\"What are you thinking of, my love?\" said the king. \"The very notion of\nstarving him implies that we are not going to give him any meat, either\nsalt or fresh.\"\n\n\"I'm not such a stupid as that comes to,\" returned her Majesty. \"What I\nmean is, that by the time he is starved, there will hardly be a picking\nupon his bones.\"\n\nThe king gave a great laugh.\n\n\"Well, my spouse, you may have him when you like,\" he said. \"I don't\nfancy him for my part. I am pretty sure he is tough eating.\"\n\n\"That would be to honor instead of punish his insolence,\" returned the\nqueen. \"But why should our poor creatures be deprived of so much\nnourishment? Our little dogs and cats and pigs and small bears would\nenjoy him very much.\"\n\n\"You are the best of housekeepers, my lovely queen!\" said her husband.\n\"Let it be so by all means. Let us have our people in, and get him out\nand kill him at once. He deserves it. The mischief he might have brought\nupon us, now that he had penetrated so far as our most retired citadel,\nis incalculable. Or rather let us tie him hand and foot, and have the\npleasure of seeing him torn to pieces by full torchlight in the great\nhall.\"\n\n\"Better and better!\" cried the queen and prince together, both of them\nclapping their hands. And the prince made an ugly noise with his\nhare-lip, just as if he had intended to be one at the feast.\n\n\"But,\" added the queen, bethinking herself, \"he is so troublesome. For\nas poor creatures as they are, there is something about those sun-people\nthat is _very_ troublesome. I cannot imagine how it is that with such\nsuperior strength and skill and understanding as ours, we permit them to\nexist at all. Why do we not destroy them entirely, and use their cattle\nand grazing lands at our pleasure? Of course, we don't want to live in\ntheir horrid country! It is far too glaring for our quieter and more\nrefined tastes. But we might use it for a sort of outhouse, you know.\nEven our creatures' eyes might get used to it, and if they did grow\nblind, that would be of no consequence, provided they grew fat as well.\nBut we might even keep their great cows and other creatures, and then we\nshould have a few more luxuries, such as cream and cheese, which at\npresent we only taste occasionally, when our brave men have succeeded in\ncarrying some off from their farms.\"\n\n\"It is worth thinking of,\" said the king; \"and I don't know why you\nshould be the first to suggest it, except that you have a positive\ngenius for conquest. But still, as you say, there is something very\ntroublesome about them; and it would be better, as I understand you to\nsuggest, that we should starve him for a day or two first, so that he\nmay be a little less frisky when we take him out.\"\n\n          \"Once there was a goblin\n           Living in a hole;\n           Busy he was cobblin'\n           A shoe without a sole.\n\n          \"By came a birdie:\n           'Goblin, what do you do?'\n           'Cobble at a sturdie\n           Upper leather shoe.'\n\n          \"'What's the good o' that, sir?'\n           Said the little bird,\n           'Why it's very pat, sir--\n           Plain without a word.\n\n          \"'Where 'tis all a hill, sir,\n           Never can be holes:\n           Why should their shoes have soles, sir,\n           When they've got no souls?'\"\n\n\"What's that horrible noise?\" cried the queen, shuddering from pot-metal\nhead to granite shoes.\n\n\"I declare,\" said the king with solemn indignation, \"it's the\nsun-creature in the hole!\"\n\n\"Stop that disgusting noise!\" cried the crown-prince valiantly, getting\nup and standing in front of the heap of stones, with his face toward\nCurdie's prison.--\"Do now, or I'll break your head.\"\n\n\"Break away,\" shouted Curdie, and began singing again--\n\n          \"Once there was a goblin\n           Living in a hole,--\"\n\n\"I really cannot bear it,\" said the queen. \"If I could only get at his\nhorrid toes with my slippers again!\"\n\n\"I think we had better go to bed,\" said the king.\n\n\"It's not time to go to bed,\" said the queen.\n\n\"I would if I was you,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"Impertinent wretch!\" said the queen, with the utmost scorn in her\nvoice.\n\n\"An impossible _if_,\" said his Majesty with dignity.\n\n\"Quite,\" returned Curdie, and began singing again--\n\n          \"Go to bed,\n           Goblin, do.\n           Help the queen\n           Take off her shoe.\n\n          \"If you do,\n           It will disclose\n           A horrid set\n           Of sprouting toes.\"\n\n\"What a lie!\" roared the queen in a rage.\n\n\"By the way, that reminds me,\" said the king, \"that, for as long as we\nhave been married, I have never seen your feet, queen. I think you might\ntake off your shoes when you go to bed! They positively hurt me\nsometimes.\"\n\n\"I will do just as I like,\" retorted the queen sulkily.\n\n\"You ought to do as your hubby wishes you,\" said the king.\n\n\"I will not,\" said the queen.\n\n\"Then I insist upon it,\" said the king.\n\nApparently his Majesty approached the queen for the purpose of following\nthe advice given by Curdie, for the latter heard a scuffle, and then a\ngreat roar from the king.\n\n\"Will you be quiet then?\" said the queen wickedly.\n\n\"Yes, yes, queen. I only meant to coax you.\"\n\n\"Hands off!\" cried the queen triumphantly. \"I'm going to bed. You may\ncome when you like. But as long as I am queen, I will sleep in my shoes.\nIt is my royal privilege. Harelip, go to bed.\"\n\n\"I'm going,\" said Harelip sleepily.\n\n\"So am I,\" said the king.\n\n\"Come along then,\" said the queen; \"and mind you are good, or I'll--\"\n\n\"Oh, no, no, no!\" screamed the king, in the most supplicating of tones.\n\nCurdie heard only a muttered reply in the distance; and then the cave\nwas quite still.\n\nThey had left the fire burning, and the light came through brighter than\nbefore. Curdie thought it was time to try again if anything could be\ndone. But he found he could not get even a finger through the chink\nbetween the slab and the rock. He gave a great rush with his shoulder\nagainst the slab, but it yielded no more than if it had been part of the\nrock. All he could do was to sit down and think again.\n\nBy and by he came to the resolution to pretend to be dying, in the hope\nthey might take him out before his strength was too much exhausted to\nlet him have a chance. Then, for the creatures, if he could but find his\naxe again, he would have no fear of them; and if it were not for the\nqueen's horrid shoes, he would have no fear at all.\n\nMeantime, until they should come again at night, there was nothing for\nhim to do but forge new rhymes, now his only weapons. He had no\nintention of using them at present, of course; but it was well to have a\nstock, for he might live to want them, and the manufacture of them would\nhelp to while away the time.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nIRENE'S CLUE\n\n\nTHAT same morning, early, the princess woke in a terrible fright. There\nwas a hideous noise in her room--of creatures snarling and hissing and\nracketing about as if they were fighting. The moment she came to\nherself, she remembered something she had never thought of again--what\nher grandmother told her to do when she was frightened. She immediately\ntook off her ring and put it under her pillow. As she did so, she\nfancied she felt a finger and thumb take it gently from under her palm.\n\"It must be my grandmother!\" she said to herself, and the thought gave\nher such courage that she stopped to put on her dainty little slippers\nbefore running from the room. While doing this, she caught sight of a\nlong cloak of sky-blue, thrown over the back of a chair by her bedside.\nShe had never seen it before, but it was evidently waiting for her. She\nput it on, and then, feeling with the forefinger of her right hand, soon\nfound her grandmother's thread, which she proceeded at once to follow,\nexpecting it would lead her straight up the old stair. When she reached\nthe door, she found it went down and ran along the floor, so that she\nhad almost to crawl in order to keep a hold of it. Then, to her\nsurprise, and somewhat to her dismay, she found that instead of leading\nher toward the stair it turned in quite the opposite direction. It led\nher through certain narrow passages toward the kitchen, turning aside\nere she reached it, and guiding her to a door which communicated with a\nsmall back yard. Some of the maids were already up, and this door was\nstanding open. Across the yard the thread still ran along the ground,\nuntil it brought her to a door in the wall which opened upon the\nmountain side. When she had passed through, the thread rose to about\nhalf her height, and she could hold it with ease as she walked. It led\nher straight up the mountain.\n\nThe cause of her alarm was less frightful than she supposed. The cook's\ngreat black cat, pursued by the housekeeper's terrier, had bounced\nagainst her bedroom door, which had not been properly fastened, and the\ntwo had burst into her room together and commenced a battle royal. How\nthe nurse came to sleep through it, was a mystery, but I suspect the old\nlady had something to do with it.\n\nIt was a clear warm morning. The wind blew deliciously over the\nmountain-side. Here and there she saw a late primrose, but she did not\nstop to call on them. The sky was mottled with small clouds. The sun was\nnot yet up, but some of their fluffy edges had caught his light and hung\nout orange and gold-colored fringes upon the air. The dew lay in round\ndrops upon the leaves, and hung like tiny diamonds from the blades of\ngrass about her path.\n\n\"How lovely that bit of gossamer is!\" thought the princess, looking at a\nlong undulating line that shone at some distance from her up the hill.\nIt was not the time for gossamers though; and Irene soon discovered that\nit was her own thread she saw shining on before her in the light of the\nmorning. It was leading her she knew not whither; but she had never in\nher life been out before sunrise, and everything was so fresh and cool\nand lively and full of something coming, that she felt too happy to be\nafraid of anything.\n\nAfter leading her up a good distance, the thread turned to the left, and\ndown the path upon which she and Lootie had met Curdie. But she never\nthought of that, for now in the morning light, with its far outlook over\nthe country, no path could have been more open and airy and cheerful.\nShe could see the road almost to the horizon, along which she had so\noften watched her king-papa and his troop come shining, with the\nbugle-blast cleaving the air before them; and it was like a companion to\nher. Down and down the path went, then up, and then down, and then up\nagain, getting rugged and more rugged as it went; still along the path\nwent the silvery thread, and still along the thread went Irene's little\nrosy-tipped forefinger. By and by she came to a little stream that\njabbered and prattled down the hill, and up the side of the stream went\nboth path and thread. And still the path grew rougher and steeper, and\nthe mountain grew wilder, till Irene began to think she was going a very\nlong way from home; and when she turned to look back, she saw that the\nlevel country had vanished and the rough bare mountain had closed in\nabout her. But still on went the thread, and on went the princess.\nEverything around her was getting brighter and brighter as the sun came\nnearer; till at length his first rays all at once alighted on the top of\na rock before her, like some golden creature fresh from the sky. Then\nshe saw that the little stream ran out of a hole in that rock, that the\npath did not go past the rock, and that the thread was leading her\nstraight up to it. A shudder ran through her from head to foot when she\nfound that the thread was actually taking her into the hole out of which\nthe stream ran. It ran out babbling joyously, but she had to go in.\n\nShe did not hesitate. Right into the hole she went, which was high\nenough to let her walk without stooping. For a little way there was a\nbrown glimmer, but at the first turn it all but ceased, and before she\nhad gone many paces she was in total darkness. Then she began to be\nfrightened indeed. Every moment she kept feeling the thread backward,\nand as she went farther and farther into the darkness of the great\nhollow mountain, she kept thinking more and more about her grandmother,\nand all that she had said to her, and how kind she had been, and how\nbeautiful she was, and all about her lovely room, and the fire of roses,\nand the great lamp that sent its light through stone walls. And she\nbecame more and more sure that the thread could not have gone there of\nitself, and that her grandmother must have sent it. But it tried her\ndreadfully when the path went down very steep, and especially when she\ncame to places where she had to go down rough stairs, and even sometimes\na ladder. Through one narrow passage after another, over lumps of rock\nand sand and clay, the thread guided her, until she came to a small hole\nthrough which she had to creep. Finding no change on the other\nside--\"Shall I ever get back?\" she thought, over and over again,\nwondering at herself that she was not ten times more frightened, and\noften feeling as if she were only walking in the story of a dream.\nSometimes she heard the noise of water, a dull gurgling inside the rock.\nBy and by she heard the sounds of blows, which came nearer and nearer;\nbut again they grew duller and almost died away. In a hundred directions\nshe turned, obedient to the guiding thread.\n\nAt last she spied a dull red shine, and came up to the mica-window, and\nthence away and round about, and right into a cavern, where glowed the\nred embers of a fire. Here the thread began to rise. It rose as high as\nher head, and higher still. What _should_ she do if she lost her hold?\nShe was pulling it down! She might break it! She could see it far up,\nglowing as red as her fire-opal in the light of the embers.\n\nBut presently she came to a huge heap of stones, piled in a slope\nagainst the wall of the cavern. On these she climbed, and soon recovered\nthe level of the thread--only however to find, the next moment, that it\nvanished through the heap of stones, and left her standing on it, with\nher face to the solid rock. For one terrible moment, she felt as if her\ngrandmother had forsaken her. The thread which the spiders had spun far\nover the seas, which her grandmother had sat in the moonlight and spun\nagain for her, which she had tempered in the rose-fire, and tied to her\nopal ring, had left her--had gone where she could no longer follow\nit--had brought her into a horrible cavern, and there left her! She was\nforsaken indeed!\n\n\"When _shall_ I wake?\" she said to herself in an agony, but the same\nmoment knew that it was no dream. She threw herself upon the heap, and\nbegan to cry. It was well she did not know what creatures, one of them\nwith stone shoes on her feet, were lying in the next cave. But neither\ndid she know who was on the other side of the slab.\n\nAt length the thought struck her, that at least she could follow the\nthread backward, and thus get out of the mountain, and home. She rose at\nonce, and found the thread. But the instant she tried to feel it\nbackward, it vanished from her touch. Forward, it led her hand up to the\nheap of stones--backward, it seemed nowhere. Neither could she see it as\nbefore in the light of the fire. She burst into a wailing cry, and again\nthrew herself down on the stones.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nTHE ESCAPE\n\n\nAS the princess lay and sobbed, she kept feeling the thread\nmechanically, following it with her finger many times up the stones in\nwhich it disappeared. By and by she began, still mechanically, to poke\nher finger in after it between the stones as far as she could. All at\nonce it came into her head that she might remove some of the stones and\nsee where the thread went next. Almost laughing at herself for never\nhaving thought of this before, she jumped to her feet. Her fear\nvanished: once more she was certain her grandmother's thread could not\nhave brought her there just to leave her there; and she began to throw\naway the stones from the top as fast as she could, sometimes two or\nthree at a handful, sometimes taking both hands to lift one. After\nclearing them away a little, she found that the thread turned and went\nstraight downward. Hence, as the heap sloped a good deal, growing of\ncourse wider toward its base, she had to throw away a multitude of\nstones to follow the thread. But this was not all, for she soon found\nthat the thread, after going straight down for a little way, turned\nfirst sideways in one direction, then sideways in another, and then\nshot, at various angles, hither and thither inside the heap, so that she\nbegan to be afraid that to clear the thread, she must remove the whole\nhuge gathering. She was dismayed at the very idea, but, losing no time,\nset to work with a will; and with aching back, and bleeding fingers and\nhands, she worked on, sustained by the pleasure of seeing the heap\nslowly diminish, and begin to show itself on the opposite side of the\nfire. Another thing which helped to keep up her courage was, that as\noften as she uncovered a turn of the thread, instead of lying loose upon\nthe stones, it tightened up; this made her sure that her grandmother was\nat the end of it somewhere.\n\nShe had got about half way down when she started, and nearly fell with\nfright. Close to her ear as it seemed, a voice broke out singing--\n\n          \"Jabber, bother, smash!\n           You'll have it all in a crash.\n           Jabber, smash, bother!\n           You'll have the worst of the pother.\n           Smash, bother, jabber!--\"\n\nHere Curdie stopped, either because he could not find a rhyme to\n_jabber_, or because he remembered what he had forgotten when he woke up\nat the sound of Irene's labors, that his plan was to make the goblins\nthink he was getting weak. But he had uttered enough to let Irene know\nwho he was.\n\n\"It's Curdie!\" she cried joyfully.\n\n\"Hush, hush!\" came Curdie's voice again from somewhere. \"Speak softly.\"\n\n\"Why, you were singing loud!\" said Irene.\n\n\"Yes. But they know I am here, and they don't know you are. Who are\nyou?\"\n\n\"I'm Irene,\" answered the princess. \"I know who you are quite well.\nYou're Curdie.\"\n\n\"Why, how ever did you come here, Irene?\"\n\n\"My great-great-grandmother sent me; and I think I've found out why. You\ncan't get out, I suppose?\"\n\n\"No, I can't. What are you doing?\"\n\n\"Clearing away a huge heap of stones.\"\n\n\"There's a princess!\" exclaimed Curdie, in a tone of delight, but still\nspeaking in little more than a whisper. \"I can't think how you got here,\nthough.\"\n\n\"My grandmother sent me after her thread.\"\n\n\"I don't know what you mean,\" said Curdie; \"but so you're there, it\ndoesn't much matter.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes it does!\" returned Irene. \"I should never have been here but\nfor her.\"\n\n\"You can tell me all about it when we get out, then. There's no time to\nlose now,\" said Curdie.\n\nAnd Irene went to work, as fresh as when she began.\n\n\"There's such a lot of stones!\" she said. \"It will take me a long time\nto get them all away.\"\n\n\"How far on have you got?\" asked Curdie.\n\n\"I've got about the half way, but the other half is ever so much\nbigger.\"\n\n\"I don't think you will have to move the lower half. Do you see a slab\nlaid up against the wall?\"\n\nIrene looked and felt about with her hands, and soon perceived the\noutlines of the slab.\n\n\"Yes,\" she answered, \"I do.\"\n\n\"Then, I think,\" rejoined Curdie, \"when you have cleared the slab about\nhalf way down, or a little more, I shall be able to push it over.\"\n\n\"I must follow my thread,\" returned Irene, \"whatever I do.\"\n\n\"What _do_ you mean?\" exclaimed Curdie.\n\n\"You will see when you get out of here,\" answered the princess, and then\nshe went on harder than ever.\n\nBut she was soon satisfied that what Curdie wanted done, and what the\nthread wanted done, were one and the same thing. For she not only saw\nthat by following the turns of the thread she had been clearing the face\nof the slab, but that, a little more than half way down, the thread went\nthrough the chink between the slab and the wall into the place where\nCurdie was confined, so that she could not follow it any farther until\nthe slab was out of her way. As soon as she found this, she said in a\nright joyous whisper--\n\n\"Now, Curdie! I think if you were to give a great push, the slab would\ntumble over.\"\n\n\"Stand quite clear of it then,\" said Curdie, \"and let me know when you\nare ready.\"\n\nIrene got off the heap, and stood on one side of it.\n\n\"Now, Curdie!\" she cried.\n\nCurdie gave a great rush with his shoulder against it. Out tumbled the\nslab on the heap, and out crept Curdie over the top of it.\n\n\"You've saved my life, Irene!\" he whispered.\n\n\"Oh, Curdie! I'm so glad! Let's get out of this horrid place as fast as\nwe can.\"\n\n\"That's easier said than done,\" returned he.\n\n\"Oh, no! it's quite easy,\" said Irene. \"We have only to follow my\nthread. I am sure that it's going to take us out now.\"\n\nShe had already begun to follow it over the fallen slab into the hole,\nwhile Curdie was searching the floor of the cavern for his pickaxe.\n\n[Illustration: Curdie went on after her, flashing his torch about.]\n\n\"Here it is!\" he cried. \"No, it is not!\" he added, in a disappointed\ntone. \"What can it be then?--I declare it's a torch. That _is_ jolly!\nIt's better almost than my pickaxe. Much better if it weren't for those\nstone shoes!\" he went on, as he lighted the torch by blowing the last\nembers of the expiring fire.\n\nWhen he looked up, with the lighted torch casting a glare into the great\ndarkness of the huge cavern, he caught sight of Irene disappearing in\nthe hole out of which he had himself just come.\n\n\"Where are you going there?\" he cried. \"That's not the way out. That's\nwhere I couldn't get out.\"\n\n\"I know that,\" whispered Irene. \"But this is the way my thread goes, and\nI must follow it.\"\n\n\"What nonsense the child talks!\" said Curdie to himself. \"I must follow\nher, though, and see that she comes to no harm. She will soon find she\ncan't get out that way, and then she will come with me.\"\n\nSo he crept once more over the slab into the hole with his torch in his\nhand. But when he looked about in it, he could see her nowhere. And now\nhe discovered that although the hole was narrow, it was much larger than\nhe had supposed; for in one direction the roof came down very low, and\nthe hole went off in a narrow passage, of which he could not see the\nend. The princess must have crept in there. He got on his knees and one\nhand, holding the torch with the other, and crept after her. The hole\ntwisted about, in some parts so low that he could hardly get through,\nin others so high that he could not see the roof, but everywhere it was\nnarrow--far too narrow for a goblin to get through, and so I presume\nthey never thought that Curdie might. He was beginning to feel very\nuncomfortable lest he could not see the end. The princess when he heard\nher voice almost close to his ear, whispering--\n\n\"Aren't you coming, Curdie?\"\n\nAnd when he turned the next corner, there she stood waiting for him.\n\n\"I knew you couldn't go wrong in that narrow hole, but now you must keep\nby me, for here is a great wide place,\" she said.\n\n\"I can't understand it,\" said Curdie, half to himself, half to Irene.\n\n\"Never mind,\" she returned. \"Wait till we get out.\"\n\nCurdie, utterly astonished that she had already got so far, and by a\npath he had known nothing of, thought it better to let her do as she\npleased.\n\n\"At all events,\" he said again to himself, \"I know nothing about the\nway, miner as I am; and she seems to think she does know something about\nit, though how she should, passes my comprehension. So she's just as\nlikely to find her way as I am, and as she insists on taking the lead, I\nmust follow. We can't be much worse off than we are, anyhow.\"\n\nReasoning thus, he followed her a few steps, and came out in another\ngreat cavern, across which Irene walked in a straight line, as\nconfidently as if she knew every step of the way. Curdie went on after\nher, flashing his torch about, and trying to see something of what lay\naround them. Suddenly he started back a pace as the light fell upon\nsomething close by which Irene was passing. It was a platform of rock\nraised a few feet from the floor and covered with sheep skins, upon\nwhich lay two horrible figures asleep, at once recognized by Curdie as\nthe king and queen of the goblins. He lowered his torch instantly lest\nthe light should awake them. As he did so, it flashed upon his pickaxe,\nlying by the side of the queen, whose hand lay close by the handle of\nit.\n\n\"Stop one moment,\" he whispered. \"Hold my torch, and don't let the light\non their faces.\"\n\nIrene shuddered when she saw the frightful creatures whom she had passed\nwithout observing them, but she did as he requested, and turning her\nback, held the torch low in front of her. Curdie drew his pickaxe\ncarefully away, and as he did so, spied one of her feet, projecting from\nunder the skins. The great clumsy granite shoe, exposed thus to his\nhand, was a temptation not to be resisted. He laid hold of it, and with\ncautious efforts, drew it off. The moment he succeeded, he saw to his\nastonishment that what he had sung in ignorance, to annoy the queen, was\nactually true: she had six horrible toes. Overjoyed at his success, and\nseeing by the huge bump in the sheep skins where the other foot was, he\nproceeded to lift them gently, for, if he could only succeed in carrying\naway the other shoe as well, he would be no more afraid of the goblins\nthan of so many flies. But as he pulled at the second shoe, the queen\ngave a growl and sat up in bed. The same instant the king awoke also,\nand sat up beside her.\n\n\"Run, Irene!\" cried Curdie, for though he was not now in the least\nafraid for himself, he was for the princess.\n\nIrene looked once round, saw the fearful creatures awake, and like the\nwise princess she was, dashed the torch on the ground and extinguished\nit, crying out--\n\n\"Here, Curdie, take my hand.\"\n\nHe darted to her side, forgetting neither the queen's shoe nor his\npickaxe, and caught hold of her hand, as she sped fearlessly where her\nthread guided her. They heard the queen give a great bellow; but they\nhad a good start, for it would be some time before they could get\ntorches lighted to pursue them. Just as they thought they saw a gleam\nbehind them, the thread brought them to a very narrow opening, through\nwhich Irene crept easily, and Curdie with difficulty.\n\n\"Now,\" said Curdie; \"I think we shall be safe.\"\n\n\"Of course we shall,\" returned Irene.\n\n\"Why do you think so?\" asked Curdie.\n\n\"Because my grandmother is taking care of us.\"\n\n\"That's all nonsense,\" said Curdie. \"I don't know what you mean.\"\n\n\"Then if you don't know what I mean, what right have you to call it\nnonsense?\" asked the princess, a little offended.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Irene,\" said Curdie; \"I did not mean to vex you.\"\n\n\"Of course not,\" returned the princess. \"But why do _you_ think we shall\nbe safe?\"\n\n\"Because the king and queen are far too stout to get through that hole.\"\n\n\"There may be ways round,\" said the other.\n\n\"To be sure there might; we are not out of it yet,\" acknowledged\nCurdie.\n\n\"But what do you mean by the king and queen?\" asked the princess. \"I\nshould never call such creatures as those a king and a queen.\"\n\n\"Their own people do, though,\" answered Curdie.\n\nThe princess asked more questions, and Curdie, as they walked leisurely\nalong, gave her a full account, not only of the character and habits of\nthe goblins, so far as he knew them, but of his own adventures with\nthem, beginning from the very night after that in which he had met her\nand Lootie upon the mountain. When he had finished, he begged Irene to\ntell him how it was that she had come to his rescue. So Irene too had to\ntell a long story, which she did in rather a roundabout manner,\ninterrupted by many questions concerning things she had not explained.\nBut her tale, as he did not believe more than half of it, left\neverything as unaccountable to him as before, and he was nearly as much\nperplexed as to what he must think of the princess. He could not believe\nthat she was deliberately telling stories, and the only conclusion he\ncould come to was that Lootie had been playing the child tricks,\ninventing no end of lies to frighten her for her own purposes.\n\n\"But how ever did Lootie come to let you go into the mountain alone?\" he\nasked.\n\n\"Lootie knows nothing about it. I left her fast asleep--at least I think\nso. I hope my grandmother won't let her get into trouble, for it wasn't\nher fault at all, as my grandmother very well knows.\"\n\n\"But how did you find your way to me?\" persisted Curdie.\n\n\"I told you already,\" answered Irene;--\"by keeping my finger upon my\ngrandmother's thread, as I am doing now.\"\n\n\"You don't mean you've got the thread there?\"\n\n\"Of course I do. I have told you so ten times already. I have\nhardly--except when I was removing the stones--taken my finger off it.\nThere!\" she added, guiding Curdie's hand to the thread, \"you feel it\nyourself--don't you?\"\n\n\"I feel nothing at all,\" replied Curdie.\n\n\"Then what can be the matter with your finger? I feel it perfectly. To\nbe sure it is very thin, and in the sunlight looks just like the thread\nof a spider, though there are many of them twisted together to make\nit--but for all that I can't think why you shouldn't feel it as well as\nI do.\"\n\nCurdie was too polite to say he did not believe there was any thread\nthere at all. What he did say was--\n\n\"Well, I can make nothing of it.\"\n\n\"I can though, and you must be glad of that, for it will do for both of\nus.\"\n\n\"We're not out yet,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"We soon shall be,\" returned Irene confidently.\n\nAnd now the thread went downward, and led Irene's hand to a hole in the\nfloor of the cavern, whence came a sound of running water which they had\nbeen hearing for some time.\n\n\"It goes into the ground now, Curdie,\" she said, stopping.\n\nHe had been listening to another sound, which his practised ear had\ncaught long ago, and which also had been growing louder. It was the\nnoise the goblin miners made at their work, and they seemed to be at no\ngreat distance now. Irene heard it the moment she stopped.\n\n\"What is that noise?\" she asked. \"Do you know, Curdie?\"\n\n\"Yes. It is the goblins digging and burrowing,\" he answered.\n\n\"And don't you know for what purpose they do it?\"\n\n\"No; I haven't the least idea. Would you like to see them?\" he asked,\nwishing to have another try after their secret.\n\n\"If my thread took me there, I shouldn't much mind; but I don't want to\nsee them, and I can't leave my thread. It leads me down into the hole,\nand we had better go at once.\"\n\n\"Very well. Shall I go in first?\" said Curdie.\n\n\"No; better not. You can't feel the thread,\" she answered, stepping down\nthrough a narrow break in the floor of the cavern. \"Oh!\" she cried, \"I\nam in the water. It is running strong--but it is not deep, and there is\njust room to walk. Make haste, Curdie.\"\n\nHe tried, but the hole was too small for him to get in.\n\n\"Go on a little bit,\" he said, shouldering his pickaxe.\n\nIn a few moments he had cleared a large opening and followed her. They\nwent on, down and down with the running water, Curdie getting more and\nmore afraid it was leading them to some terrible gulf in the heart of\nthe mountain. In one or two places he had to break away the rock to make\nroom before even Irene could get through--at least without hurting\nherself. But at length they spied a glimmer of light, and in a minute\nmore, they were almost blinded by the full sunlight into which they\nemerged. It was some little time before the princess could see well\nenough to discover that they stood in her own garden, close by the seat\non which she and her king-papa had sat that afternoon. They had come out\nby the channel of the little stream. She danced and clapped her hands\nwith delight.\n\n\"Now, Curdie!\" she cried, \"won't you believe what I told you about my\ngrandmother and her thread?\"\n\nFor she had felt all the time that Curdie was not believing what she had\ntold him.\n\n\"There!--don't you see it shining on before us?\" she added.\n\n\"I don't see anything,\" persisted Curdie.\n\n\"Then you must believe without seeing,\" said the princess; \"for you\ncan't deny it has brought me out of the mountain.\"\n\n\"I can't deny we _are_ out of the mountain, and I should be very\nungrateful indeed to deny that _you_ had brought _me_ out of it.\"\n\n\"I couldn't have done it but for the thread,\" persisted Irene.\n\n\"That's the part I don't understand.\"\n\n\"Well, come along, and Lootie will get you something to eat. I am sure\nyou must want it very much.\"\n\n\"Indeed I do. But my father and mother will be so anxious about me, I\nmust make haste--first up the mountain to tell my mother, and then down\ninto the mine again to acquaint my father.\"\n\n\"Very well, Curdie; but you can't get out without coming this way, and I\nwill take you through the house, for that is nearest.\"\n\nThey met no one by the way, for indeed, as before, the people were here\nand there and everywhere searching for the princess. When they got in,\nIrene found that the thread, as she had half expected, went up the old\nstaircase, and a new thought struck her. She turned to Curdie and\nsaid--\n\n\"My grandmother wants me. Do come up with me, and see her. Then you will\nknow that I have been telling you the truth. Do come--to please me,\nCurdie. I can't bear you should think I say what is not true.\"\n\n\"I never doubted you believed what you said,\" returned Curdie. \"I only\nthought you had some fancy in your head that was not correct.\"\n\n\"But do come, dear Curdie.\"\n\nThe little miner could not withstand this appeal, and though he felt shy\nin what seemed to him such a huge grand house, he yielded, and followed\nher up the stair.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nTHE OLD LADY AND CURDIE\n\n\nUP the stair then they went, and the next and the next, and through the\nlong rows of empty rooms, and up the little tower stairs, Irene growing\nhappier and happier as she ascended. There was no answer when she\nknocked at length at the door of the workroom, nor could she hear any\nsound of the spinning-wheel, and once more her heart sank within\nher--but only for one moment, as she turned and knocked at the other\ndoor.\n\n\"Come in,\" answered the sweet voice of her grandmother, and Irene opened\nthe door and entered, followed by Curdie.\n\n\"You darling!\" cried the lady, who was seated by a fire of red roses\nmingled with white--\"I've been waiting for you, and indeed getting a\nlittle anxious about you, and beginning to think whether I had not\nbetter go and fetch you myself.\"\n\nAs she spoke she took the little princess in her arms and placed her\nupon her lap. She was dressed in white now, and looking if possible more\nlovely than ever.\n\n\"I've brought Curdie, grandmother. He wouldn't believe what I told him,\nand so I've brought him.\"\n\n\"Yes--I see him. He is a good boy, Curdie, and a brave boy. Aren't you\nglad you have got him out?\"\n\n\"Yes, grandmother. But it wasn't very good of him not to believe me when\nI was telling him the truth.\"\n\n\"People must believe what they can, and those who believe more must not\nbe hard upon those who believe less. I doubt if you would have believed\nit all yourself if you hadn't seen some of it.\"\n\n\"Ah! yes, grandmother, I daresay. I'm sure you are right. But he'll\nbelieve now.\"\n\n\"I don't know that,\" replied her grandmother.\n\n\"Won't you, Curdie?\" said Irene, looking round at him as she asked the\nquestion.\n\nHe was standing in the middle of the floor, staring, and looking\nstrangely bewildered. This she thought came of his astonishment at the\nbeauty of the lady.\n\n\"Make a bow to my grandmother, Curdie,\" she said.\n\n\"I don't see any grandmother,\" answered Curdie, rather gruffly.\n\n\"Don't see my grandmother when I'm sitting in her lap!\" exclaimed the\nprincess.\n\n\"No I don't,\" said Curdie, almost sulkily.\n\n\"Don't you see the lovely fire of roses--white ones amongst them this\ntime?\" asked Irene almost as bewildered as he.\n\n\"No I don't,\" answered Curdie, almost sulkily.\n\n\"Nor the blue bed? Nor the rose-colored counterpane? Nor the beautiful\nlight, like the moon, hanging from the roof?\"\n\n\"You're making game of me, your royal Highness; and after what we have\ncome through together this day, I don't think it is kind of you,\" said\nCurdie, feeling very much hurt.\n\n\"Then what _do_ you see?\" asked Irene, who perceived at once that for\nher not to believe him was at least as bad as for him not to believe\nher.\n\n\"I see a big, bare garret-room--like the one in mother's cottage, only\nbig enough to take the cottage itself in, and leave a good margin all\nround,\" answered Curdie.\n\n\"And what more do you see?\"\n\n\"I see a tub, and a heap of musty straw, and a withered apple and a ray\nof sunlight coming through a hole in the middle of the roof, and shining\non your head, and making all the place look a curious dusky brown. I\nthink you had better drop it, princess, and go down to the nursery, like\na good girl.\"\n\n\"But don't you hear my grandmother talking to me?\" asked Irene, almost\ncrying.\n\n\"No. I hear the cooing of a lot of pigeons. If you won't come down, I\nwill go without you. I think that will be better anyhow, for I'm sure\nnobody who met us would believe a word we said to them. They would think\nwe made it all up. I don't expect anybody but my own father and mother\nto believe me. They _know_ I wouldn't tell a story.\"\n\n\"And yet _you_ won't believe _me_, Curdie?\" expostulated the princess,\nnow fairly crying with vexation, and sorrow at the gulf between her and\nCurdie.\n\n\"No. I _can't_, and I can't help it,\" said Curdie, turning to leave the\nroom.\n\n\"What _shall_ I do, grandmother?\" sobbed the princess, turning her face\nround upon the lady's bosom, and shaking with suppressed sobs.\n\n\"You must give him time,\" said her grandmother; \"and you must be content\nnot to be believed for a while. It is very hard to bear; but I have had\nto bear it, and shall have to bear it many a time yet. I will take care\nof what Curdie thinks of you in the end. You must let him go now.\"\n\n\"You are not coming, are you?\" asked Curdie.\n\n\"No, Curdie; my grandmother says I must let you go. Turn to the right\nwhen you get to the bottom of all the stairs, and in that way you will\narrive safely at the hall where the great door is.\"\n\n\"Oh! I don't doubt I can find my way--without you, princess, or your old\ngrannie's thread either,\" said Curdie, quite rudely.\n\n\"Oh, Curdie! Curdie!\"\n\n\"I wish I had gone home at once. I'm very much obliged to you, Irene,\nfor getting me out of that hole, but I wish you hadn't made a fool of me\nafterward.\"\n\nHe said this as he opened the door, which he left open, and, without\nanother word, went down the stairs. Irene listened with dismay to his\ndeparting footsteps. Then turning again to the lady--\n\n\"What does it all mean, grandmother?\" she sobbed, and burst into fresh\ntears.\n\n\"It means, my love, that I did not mean to show myself. Curdie is not\nyet able to believe some things. Seeing is not believing--it is only\nseeing. You remember I told you that if Lootie were to see me, she would\nrub her eyes, forget the half she saw, and call the other half\nnonsense.\"\n\n\"Yes; but I should have thought Curdie--\"\n\n\"You are right. Curdie is much farther on than Lootie, and you will see\nwhat will come of it. But in the meantime, you must be content, I say,\nto be misunderstood for a while. We are all very anxious to be\nunderstood, and it is very hard not to be. But there is one thing much\nmore necessary.\"\n\n\"What is that, grandmother?\"\n\n\"To understand other people.\"\n\n\"Yes, grandmother. I must be fair--for if I'm not fair to other people,\nI'm not worth being understood myself I see. So as Curdie can't help it,\nI will not be vexed with him, but just wait.\"\n\n\"There's my own dear child,\" said her grandmother, and pressed her close\nto her bosom.\n\n\"Why weren't you in your workroom, when we came up, grandmother?\" asked\nIrene, after a few moments' silence.\n\n\"If I had been there, Curdie would have seen me well enough. But why\nshould I be there rather than in this beautiful room?\"\n\n\"I thought you would be spinning.\"\n\n\"I've nobody to spin for just at present. I never spin without knowing\nfor whom I am spinning.\"\n\n\"That reminds me--there is one thing that puzzles me,\" said the\nprincess: \"how are you to get the thread out of the mountain again?\nSurely you won't have to make another for me! That would be such a\ntrouble!\"\n\nThe lady set her down, and rose, and went to the fire. Putting in her\nhand, she drew it out again, and held up the shining ball between her\nfinger and thumb.\n\n\"I've got it now, you see,\" she said, coming back to the princess, \"all\nready for you when you want it.\"\n\nGoing to her cabinet, she laid it in the same drawer as before.\n\n\"And here is your ring,\" she added, taking it from the little finger of\nher left hand, and putting it on the forefinger of Irene's right hand.\n\n\"Oh, thank you, grandmother. I feel so safe now!\"\n\n\"You are very tired, my child,\" the lady went on. \"Your hands are hurt\nwith the stones, and I have counted nine bruises on you. Just look what\nyou are like.\"\n\nAnd she held up to her a little mirror which she had brought from the\ncabinet. The princess burst into a merry laugh at the sight. She was so\ndraggled with the stream, and dirty with creeping through narrow places,\nthat if she had seen the reflection without knowing it was a reflection,\nshe would have taken herself for some gypsy-child whose face was washed\nand hair combed about once in a month. The lady laughed too, and lifting\nher again upon her knee, took off her cloak and night-gown. Then she\ncarried her to the side of the room. Irene wondered what she was going\nto do with her, but asked no questions--only starting a little when she\nfound that she was going to lay her in the large silver bath; for as she\nlooked into it, again she saw no bottom, but the stars shining miles\naway as it seemed in a great blue gulf. Her hands closed involuntarily\non the beautiful arms that held her, and that was all.\n\nThe lady pressed her once more to her bosom, saying--\n\n\"Do not be afraid, my child.\"\n\n\"No, grandmother,\" answered the princess, with a little gasp; and the\nnext instant she sank in the clear cool water.\n\nWhen she opened her eyes, she saw nothing but a strange lovely blue over\nand beneath and all about her. The lady and the beautiful room had\nvanished from her sight, and she seemed utterly alone. But instead of\nbeing afraid, she felt more than happy--perfectly blissful. And from\nsomewhere came the voice of the lady, singing a strange sweet song, of\nwhich she could distinguish every word; but of the sense she had only a\nfeeling--no understanding. Nor could she remember a single line after it\nwas gone. It vanished, like the poetry in a dream, as fast as it came.\nIn after years, however, she would sometimes fancy that snatches of\nmelody suddenly rising in her brain, must be little phrases and\nfragments of the air of that song; and the very fancy would make her\nhappier, and abler to do her duty.\n\nHow long she lay in the water she did not know. It seemed a long\ntime--not from weariness, but from pleasure. But at last she felt the\nbeautiful hands lay hold of her, and through the gurgling waters she was\nlifted out into the lovely room. The lady carried her to the fire, and\nsat down with her in her lap, and dried her tenderly with the softest\ntowel. It was so different from Lootie's drying! When the lady had done,\nshe stooped to the fire, and drew from it her night-gown, as white as\nsnow.\n\n\"How delicious!\" exclaimed the princess. \"It smells of all the roses in\nthe world, I think.\"\n\nWhen she stood up on the floor, she felt as if she had been made over\nagain. Every bruise and all weariness were gone, and her hands were soft\nand whole as ever.\n\n\"Now I am going to put you to bed for a good sleep,\" said her\ngrandmother.\n\n\"But what will Lootie be thinking? And what am I to say to her when she\nasks me where I have been?\"\n\n\"Don't trouble yourself about it. You will find it all come right,\" said\nher grandmother, and laid her into the blue bed, under the rosy\ncounterpane.\n\n\"There is just one thing more,\" said Irene. \"I am a little anxious about\nCurdie. As I brought him into the house, I ought to have seen him safe\non his way home.\"\n\n\"I took care of all that,\" answered the lady. \"I told you to let him go,\nand therefore I was bound to look after him. Nobody saw him, and he is\nnow eating a good dinner in his mother's cottage, far up the mountain.\"\n\n\"Then I will go to sleep,\" said Irene, and in a few minutes, she was\nfast asleep.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nCURDIE AND HIS MOTHER\n\n\nCURDIE went up the mountain neither whistling nor singing, for he was\nvexed with Irene for taking him in, as he called it; and he was vexed\nwith himself for having spoken to her so angrily. His mother gave a cry\nof joy when she saw him, and at once set about getting him something to\neat, asking him questions all the time, which he did not answer so\ncheerfully as usual. When his meal was ready, she left him to eat it,\nand hurried to the mine to let his father know he was safe. When she\ncame back, she found him fast asleep upon her bed; nor did he wake until\nthe arrival home of his father in the evening.\n\n\"Now, Curdie,\" his mother said, as they sat at supper, \"tell us the\nwhole story from beginning to end, just as it all happened.\"\n\nCurdie obeyed, and told everything to the point where they came out upon\nthe lawn in the garden of the king's house.\n\n\"And what happened after that?\" asked his mother. \"You haven't told us\nall. You ought to be very happy at having got away from those demons,\nand instead of that, I never saw you so gloomy. There must be something\nmore. Besides, you do not speak of that lovely child as I should like to\nhear you. She saved your life at the risk of her own, and yet somehow\nyou don't seem to think much of it.\"\n\n\"She talked such nonsense!\" answered Curdie, \"and told me a pack of\nthings that weren't a bit true; and I can't get over it.\"\n\n\"What were they?\" asked his father. \"Your mother may be able to throw\nsome light upon them.\"\n\nThen Curdie made a clean breast of it, and told them everything.\n\nThey all sat silent for some time, pondering the strange tale. At last\nCurdie's mother spoke.\n\n\"You confess, my boy,\" she said, \"there is something about the whole\naffair you do not understand?\"\n\n\"Yes, of course, mother,\" he answered, \"I cannot understand how a child\nknowing nothing about the mountain, or even that I was shut up in it,\nshould come all that way alone, straight to where I was; and then, after\ngetting me out of the hole, lead me out of the mountain, too, where I\nshould not have known a step of the way if it had been as light as in\nthe open air.\"\n\n\"Then you have no right to say that what she told you was not true. She\ndid take you out, and she must have had something to guide her: why not\na thread as well as a rope, or anything else? There is something you\ncannot explain, and her explanation may be the right one.\"\n\n\"It's no explanation at all, mother; and I can't believe it.\"\n\n\"That may be only because you do not understand it. If you did, you\nwould probably find it was an explanation, and believe it thoroughly. I\ndon't blame you for not being able to believe it, but I do blame you for\nfancying such a child would try to deceive you. Why should she? Depend\nupon it, she told you all she knew. Until you had found a better way of\naccounting for it all, you might at least have been more sparing of your\njudgment.\"\n\n\"That is what something inside me has been saying all the time,\" said\nCurdie, hanging down his head. \"But what do you make of the grandmother?\nThat is what I can't get over. To take me up to an old garret, and try\nto persuade me against the sight of my own eyes that it was a beautiful\nroom, with blue walls and silver stars, and no end of things in it, when\nthere was nothing there but an old tub and a withered apple and a heap\nof straw and a sunbeam! It was too bad! She _might_ have had some old\nwoman there at least who could pass for her precious grandmother!\"\n\n\"Didn't she speak as if she saw those other things herself, Curdie?\"\n\n\"Yes. That's what bothers me. You would have thought she really meant\nand believed that she saw every one of the things she talked about. And\nnot one of them there! It was too bad, I say.\"\n\n\"Perhaps some people can see things other people can't see, Curdie,\"\nsaid his mother very gravely. \"I think I will tell you something I saw\nmyself once--only perhaps you won't believe me either!\"\n\n\"Oh, mother, mother!\" cried Curdie, bursting into tears; \"I don't\ndeserve that, surely!\"\n\n\"But what I am going to tell you is very strange,\" persisted his mother;\n\"and if having heard it, you were to say I must have been dreaming, I\ndon't know that I should have any right to be vexed with you, though I\nknow at least that I was not asleep.\"\n\n\"Do tell me, mother. Perhaps it will help me to think better of the\nprincess.\"\n\n\"That's why I am tempted to tell you,\" replied his mother. \"But first, I\nmay as well mention, that according to old whispers, there is something\nmore than common about the king's family; and the queen was of the same\nblood, for they were cousins of some degree. There were strange stories\ntold concerning them--all good stories--but strange, very strange. What\nthey were I cannot tell, for I only remember the faces of my grandmother\nand my mother as they talked together about them. There was wonder and\nawe--not fear, in their eyes, and they whispered, and never spoke aloud.\nBut what I saw myself, was this: Your father was going to work in the\nmine, one night, and I had been down with his supper. It was soon after\nwe were married, and not very long before you were born. He came with me\nto the mouth of the mine, and left me to go home alone, for I knew the\nway almost as well as the floor of our own cottage. It was pretty dark,\nand in some parts of the road where the rocks overhung, nearly quite\ndark. But I got along perfectly well, never thinking of being afraid,\nuntil I reached a spot you know well enough, Curdie, where the path has\nto make a sharp turn out of the way of a great rock on the left-hand\nside. When I got there, I was suddenly surrounded by about half-a-dozen\nof the cobs, the first I had ever seen, although I had heard tell of\nthem often enough. One of them blocked up the path, and they all began\ntormenting and teasing me in a way it makes me shudder to think of even\nnow.\"\n\n\"If I had only been with you!\" cried father and son in a breath.\n\nThe mother gave a funny little smile, and went on.\n\n\"They had some of their horrible creatures with them too, and I must\nconfess I was dreadfully frightened. They had torn my clothes very much,\nand I was afraid they were going to tear myself to pieces, when suddenly\na great white soft light shone upon me. I looked up. A broad ray, like a\nshining road, came down from a large globe of silvery light, not very\nhigh up, indeed not quite so high as the horizon--so it could not have\nbeen a new star or another moon or anything of that sort. The cobs\ndropped persecuting me, and looked dazed, and I thought they were going\nto run away, but presently they began again. The same moment, however,\ndown the path from the globe of light came a bird, shining like silver\nin the sun. It gave a few rapid flaps first, and then, with its wings\nstraight out, shot sliding down the slope of the light. It looked to me\njust like a white pigeon. But whatever it was, when the cobs caught\nsight of it coming straight down upon them, they took to their heels and\nscampered away across the mountain, leaving me safe, only much\nfrightened. As soon as it had sent them off, the bird went gliding again\nup the light, and just at the moment it reached the globe, the light\ndisappeared, just the same as if a shutter had been closed over a\nwindow, and I saw it no more. But I had no more trouble with the cobs\nthat night, or at any time afterward.\"\n\n\"How strange!\" exclaimed Curdie.\n\n\"Yes, it is strange; but I can't help believing it, whether you do or\nnot,\" said his mother.\n\n\"It's exactly as your mother told it to me the very next morning,\" said\nhis father.\n\n\"You don't think I'm doubting my own mother!\" cried Curdie.\n\n\"There are other people in the world quite as well worth believing as\nyour own mother,\" said his mother. \"I don't know that she's so much the\nfitter to be believed that she happens to be _your_ mother, Mr. Curdie.\nThere are mothers far more likely to tell lies than that little girl I\nsaw talking to the primroses a few weeks ago. If she were to lie I\nshould begin to doubt my own word.\"\n\n\"But princesses _have_ told lies as well as other people,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"Yes, but not princesses like that child. She's a good girl, I am\ncertain, and that's more than being a princess. Depend upon it you will\nhave to be sorry for behaving so to her, Curdie. You ought at least to\nhave held your tongue.\"\n\n\"I am sorry now,\" answered Curdie.\n\n\"You ought to go and tell her so, then.\"\n\n\"I don't see how I could manage that. They wouldn't let a miner boy like\nme have a word with her alone; and I couldn't tell her before that nurse\nof hers. She'd be asking ever so many questions, and I don't know how\nmany of them the little princess would like me to answer. She told me\nthat Lootie didn't know anything about her coming to get me out of the\nmountain. I am certain she would have prevented her somehow if she had\nknown it. But I may have a chance before long, and meantime I must try\nto do something for her. I think, father, I have got on the track at\nlast.\"\n\n\"Have you, indeed, my boy?\" said Peter. \"I am sure you deserve some\nsuccess; you have worked very hard for it. What have you found out?\"\n\n\"It's difficult you know, father, inside the mountain, especially in the\ndark, and not knowing what turns you have taken, to tell the lie of\nthings outside.\"\n\n\"Impossible, my boy, without a chart, or at least a compass,\" returned\nhis father.\n\n\"Well, I think I have nearly discovered in what direction the cobs are\nmining. If I am right, I know something else that I can put to it, and\nthen one and one will make three.\"\n\n\"They very often do, Curdie, as we miners ought to be well aware. Now\ntell us, my boy, what the two things are, and see whether we guess at\nthe same third as you.\"\n\n\"I don't see what that has to do with the princess,\" interposed his\nmother.\n\n\"I will soon let you see that, mother. Perhaps you may think me foolish,\nbut until I am sure there is nothing in my present fancy, I am more\ndetermined than ever to go on with my observations. Just as we came to\nthe channel by which we got out, I heard the miners at work somewhere\nnear--I think down below us. Now since I began to watch them, they have\nmined a good half mile, in a straight line; and so far as I am aware,\nthey are working in no other part of the mountain. But I never could\ntell in what direction they were going. When we came out in the king's\ngarden, however, I thought at once whether it was possible they were\nworking toward the king's house; and what I want to do to-night is to\nmake sure whether they are or not. I will take a light with me--\"\n\n\"Oh, Curdie,\" cried his mother, \"then they will see you.\"\n\n\"I'm no more afraid of them now than I was before,\" rejoined\nCurdie,--\"now that I've got this precious shoe. They can't make another\nsuch in a hurry, and one bare foot will do for my purpose. Woman as she\nmay be, I won't spare her next time. But I shall be careful with my\nlight, for I don't want them to see me. I won't stick it in my hat.\"\n\n\"Go on, then, and tell us what you mean to do.\"\n\n\"I mean to take a bit of paper with me and a pencil, and go in at the\nmouth of the stream by which we came out. I shall mark on the paper as\nnear as I can the angle of every turning I take until I find the cobs at\nwork, and so get a good idea in what direction they are going. If it\nshould prove to be nearly parallel with the stream, I shall know it is\ntoward the king's house they are working.\"\n\n\"And what if you should. How much wiser will you be then?\"\n\n\"Wait a minute, mother, dear. I told you that when I came upon the royal\nfamily in the cave, they were talking of their prince--Harelip, they\ncalled him--marrying a sun-woman--that means one of us--one with toes to\nher feet. Now in the speech one of them made that night at their great\ngathering, of which I heard only a part, he said that peace would be\nsecured for a generation at least by the pledge the prince would hold\nfor the good behavior of _her_ relatives: that's what he said, and he\nmust have meant the sun-woman the prince was to marry. I am quite sure\nthe king is much too proud to wish his son to marry any but a princess,\nand much too knowing to fancy that his having a peasant woman for a wife\nwould be of any material advantage to them.\"\n\n\"I see what you are driving at now,\" said his mother.\n\n\"But,\" said his father, \"the king would dig the mountain to the plain\nbefore he would have his princess the wife of a cob, if he were ten\ntimes a prince.\"\n\n\"Yes; but they think so much of themselves!\" said his mother. \"Small\ncreatures always do. The bantam is the proudest cock in my little yard.\"\n\n\"And I fancy,\" said Curdie, \"if they once get her, they would tell the\nking they would kill her except, he consented to the marriage.\"\n\n\"They might say so,\" said his father, \"but they wouldn't kill her; they\nwould keep her alive for the sake of the hold it gave them over our\nking. Whatever he did to them, they would threaten to do the same to the\nprincess.\"\n\n\"And they are bad enough to torment her just for their own amusement--I\nknow that,\" said his mother.\n\n\"Anyhow, I will keep a watch on them, and see what they are up to,\" said\nCurdie. \"It's too horrible to think of. I daren't let myself do it. But\nthey sha'n't have her--at least if I can help it. So, mother dear--my\nclue is all right--will you get me a bit of paper and a pencil and a\nlump of pease-pudding, and I will set out at once. I saw a place where I\ncan climb over the wall of the garden quite easily.\"\n\n\"You must mind and keep out of the way of the men on the watch,\" said\nhis mother.\n\n\"That I will. I don't want them to know anything about it. They would\nspoil it all. The cobs would only try some other plan--they are such\nobstinate creatures! I shall take good care, mother. They won't kill and\neat me either, if they should come upon me. So you needn't mind them.\"\n\nHis mother got him what he asked for, and Curdie set out. Close beside\nthe door by which the princess left the garden for the mountain, stood a\ngreat rock, and by climbing it Curdie got over the wall. He tied his\nclue to a stone just inside the channel of the stream, and took his\npickaxe with him. He had not gone far before he encountered a horrid\ncreature coming toward the mouth. The spot was too narrow for two of\nalmost any size or shape, and besides Curdie had no wish to let the\ncreature pass. Not being able to use his pickaxe, however, he had a\nsevere struggle with him, and it was only after receiving many bites,\nsome of them bad, that he succeeded in killing him with his pocket\nknife. Having dragged him out, he made haste to get in again before\nanother should stop up the way.\n\nI need not follow him farther in this night's adventures. He returned to\nhis breakfast, satisfied that the goblins were mining in the direction\nof the palace--on so low a level that their intention must, he thought,\nbe to burrow under the walls of the king's house, and rise up inside\nit--in order, he fully believed, to lay hands on the little princess,\nand carry her off for a wife to their horrid Harelip.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nIRENE BEHAVES LIKE A PRINCESS\n\n\nWHEN the princess awoke from the sweetest of sleeps, she found her nurse\nbending above her, the housekeeper looking over the nurse's shoulder,\nand the laundry-maid looking over the housekeeper's. The room was full\nof women-servants; and the gentlemen-at-arms, with a long column of\nmen-servants behind them, were peeping, or trying to peep in at the door\nof the nursery.\n\n\"Are those horrid creatures gone?\" asked the princess, remembering first\nwhat had terrified her in the morning.\n\n\"You naughty little princess!\" cried Lootie.\n\nHer face was very pale, with red streaks in it, and she looked as if she\nwere going to shake her; but Irene said nothing--only waited to hear\nwhat should come next.\n\n\"How _could_ you get under the clothes like that, and make us all fancy\nyou were lost! And keep it up all day too! You _are_ the most obstinate\nchild! It's anything but fun to us, I can tell you!\"\n\nIt was the only way the nurse could account for her disappearance.\n\n\"I didn't do that, Lootie,\" said Irene, very quietly.\n\n\"Don't tell stories!\" cried her nurse quite rudely.\n\n\"I shall tell you nothing at all,\" said Irene.\n\n\"That's just as bad,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"Just as bad to say nothing at all as to tell stories!\" exclaimed the\nprincess. \"I will ask my papa about that. He won't say so. And I don't\nthink he will like you to say so.\"\n\n\"Tell me directly what you mean by it!\" screamed the nurse, half wild\nwith anger at the princess, and fright at the possible consequences to\nherself.\n\n\"When I tell you the truth, Lootie,\" said the princess, who somehow did\nnot feel at all angry, \"you say to me _Don't tell stories_: it would\nappear that I must tell stories before you will believe me.\"\n\n\"You are very rude, my dear princess,\" said the nurse.\n\n\"You are so rude, Lootie, that I will not speak to you again till you\nare sorry. Why should I, when I know you will not believe me?\" returned\nthe princess.\n\nFor she did know perfectly well that if she were to tell Lootie what she\nhad been about, the more she went on to tell her, the less would she\nbelieve her.\n\n\"You are the most provoking child!\" cried her nurse. \"You deserve to be\nwell punished for your wicked behavior.\"\n\n\"Please, Mrs. Housekeeper,\" said the princess, \"will you take me to your\nroom and keep me till my king-papa comes? I will ask him to come as soon\nas he can.\"\n\nEvery one stared at these words. Up to this moment, they had all\nregarded her as little more than a baby.\n\nBut the housekeeper was afraid of the nurse, and sought to patch matters\nup, saying--\n\n\"I am sure, princess, nursey did not mean to be rude to you.\"\n\n\"I do not think my papa would wish me to have a nurse who spoke to me as\nLootie does. If she thinks I tell lies, she had better either say so to\nmy papa, or go away. Sir Walter, will you take charge of me?\"\n\n\"With the greatest of pleasure, princess,\" answered the captain of the\ngentlemen-at-arms, walking with his great stride into the room. The\ncrowd of servants made eager way for him, and he bowed low before the\nlittle princess's bed. \"I shall send my servant at once, on the fastest\nhorse in the stable, to tell your king-papa that your royal Highness\ndesires his presence. When you have chosen one of these under-servants\nto wait upon you, I shall order the room to be cleared.\"\n\n\"Thank you very much, Sir Walter,\" said the princess, and her eye\nglanced toward a rosy-cheeked girl who had lately come to the house as a\nscullery-maid.\n\nBut when Lootie saw the eyes of her dear princess going in search of\nanother instead of her, she fell upon her knees by the bedside, and\nburst into a great cry of distress.\n\n\"I think, Sir Walter,\" said the princess, \"I will keep Lootie. But I put\nmyself under your care; and you need not trouble my king-papa until I\nspeak to you again. Will you all please to go away? I am quite safe and\nwell, and I did not hide myself for the sake either of amusing myself,\nor of troubling my people. Lootie, will you please to dress me?\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nCURDIE COMES TO GRIEF\n\n\nEVERYTHING was for some time quiet above ground. The king was still away\nin a distant part of his dominions. The men-at-arms kept watching about\nthe house. They had been considerably astonished by finding at the foot\nof the rock in the garden, the hideous body of the goblin-creature\nkilled by Curdie; but they came to the conclusion that it had been slain\nin the mines, and had crept out there to die; and except an occasional\nglimpse of a live one they saw nothing to cause alarm. Curdie kept\nwatching in the mountain, and the goblins kept burrowing deeper into the\nearth. As long as they went deeper, there was, Curdie judged, no\nimmediate danger.\n\nTo Irene, the summer was as full of pleasure as ever, and for a long\ntime, although she often thought of her grandmother during the day, and\noften dreamed about her at night, she did not see her. The kids and the\nflowers were as much her delight as ever, and she made as much\nfriendship with the miners' children she met on the mountain as Lootie\nwould permit; but Lootie had very foolish notions concerning the dignity\nof a princess, not understanding that the truest princess is just the\none who loves all her brothers and sisters best, and who is most able to\ndo them good by being humble toward them. At the same time she was\nconsiderably altered for the better in her behavior to the princess.\nShe could not help seeing that she was no longer a mere child, but wiser\nthan her age would account for. She kept foolishly whispering to the\nservants, however--sometimes that the princess was not right in her\nmind, sometimes that she was too good to live, and other nonsense of the\nsame sort.\n\nAll this time, Curdie had to be sorry, without a chance of confessing,\nthat he had behaved so unkindly to the princess. This perhaps made him\nthe more diligent in his endeavors to serve her. His mother and he often\ntalked on the subject, and she comforted him, and told him she was sure\nhe would some day have the opportunity he so much desired.\n\nHere I should like to remark, for the sake of princes and princesses in\ngeneral, that it is a low and contemptible thing to refuse to confess a\nfault, or even an error. If a true princess has done wrong, she is\nalways uneasy until she has had an opportunity of throwing the wrongness\naway from her by saying, \"I did it; and I wish I had not; and I am sorry\nfor having done it.\" So you see there is some ground for supposing that\nCurdie was not a miner only, but a prince as well. Many such instances\nhave been known in the world's history.\n\nAt length, however, he began to see signs of a change in the proceedings\nof the goblin excavators: they were going no deeper, but had commenced\nrunning on a level; and he watched them, therefore, more closely than\never. All at once, one night, coming to a slope of very hard rock, they\nbegan to ascend along the inclined plane of its surface. Having reached\nits top, they went again on a level for a night or two, after which they\nbegan to ascend once more, and kept on at a pretty steep angle. At\nlength Curdie judged it time to transfer his observation to another\nquarter, and the next night, he did not go to the mine at all; but,\nleaving his pickaxe and clue at home, and taking only his usual lumps of\nbread and pease-pudding, went down the mountain to the king's house. He\nclimbed over the wall, and remained in the garden the whole night,\ncreeping on hands and knees from one spot to the other, and lying at\nfull length with his ear to the ground, listening. But he heard nothing\nexcept the tread of the men-at-arms as they marched about, whose\nobservation, as the night was cloudy and there was no moon, he had\nlittle difficulty in avoiding. For several following nights, he\ncontinued to haunt the garden and listen, but with no success.\n\nAt length, early one evening, whether it was that he had got careless of\nhis own safety, or that the growing moon had become strong enough to\nexpose him, his watching came to a sudden end. He was creeping from\nbehind the rock where the stream ran out, for he had been listening all\nround it in the hope it might convey to his ear some indication of the\nwhereabouts of the goblin miners, when just as he came into the\nmoonlight on the lawn, a whizz in his ear and a blow upon his leg\nstartled him. He instantly squatted in the hope of eluding further\nnotice. But when he heard the sound of running feet, he jumped up to\ntake the chance of escape by flight. He fell, however, with a keen shoot\nof pain, for the bolt of a cross-bow had wounded his leg, and the blood\nwas now streaming from it. He was instantly laid hold of by two or three\nof the men-at-arms. It was useless to struggle, and he submitted in\nsilence.\n\n\"It's a boy!\" cried several of them together, in a tone of amazement. \"I\nthought it was one of those demons.\"\n\n\"What are you about here?\"\n\n\"Going to have a little rough usage apparently,\" said Curdie laughing,\nas the men shook him.\n\n\"Impertinence will do you no good. You have no business here in the\nking's grounds, and if you don't give a true account of yourself, you\nshall fare as a thief.\"\n\n\"Why, what else could he be?\" said one.\n\n\"He might have been after a lost kid, you know,\" suggested another.\n\n\"I see no good in trying to excuse him. He has no business here anyhow.\"\n\n\"Let me go away then, if you please,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"But we don't please--not except you give a good account of yourself.\"\n\n\"I don't feel quite sure whether I can trust you,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"We are the king's own men-at-arms,\" said the captain, courteously, for\nhe was taken with Curdie's appearance and courage.\n\n\"Well, I will tell you all about it--if you will promise to listen to me\nand not do anything rash.\"\n\n\"I call that cool!\" said one of the party laughing. \"He will tell us\nwhat mischief he was about, if we promise to do as pleases him.\"\n\n\"I was about no mischief,\" said Curdie.\n\nBut ere he could say more he turned faint, and fell senseless on the\ngrass. Then first they discovered that the bolt they had shot, taking\nhim for one of the goblin creatures, had wounded him.\n\nThey carried him into the house, and laid him down in the hall. The\nreport spread that they had caught a robber, and the servants crowded in\nto see the villain. Amongst the rest came the nurse. The moment she saw\nhim she exclaimed with indignation:\n\n\"I declare it's the same young rascal of a miner that was rude to me and\nthe princess on the mountain. He actually wanted to kiss the princess.\n_I_ took good care of that--the wretch! And _he_ was prowling about--was\nhe? Just like his impudence!\"\n\nThe princess being fast asleep, and Curdie in a faint, she could\nmisrepresent at her pleasure.\n\nWhen he heard this, the captain, although he had considerable doubt of\nits truth, resolved to keep Curdie a prisoner until they could search\ninto the affair. So, after they had brought him round a little, and\nattended to his wound, which was rather a bad one, they laid him, still\nexhausted from the loss of blood, upon a mattress in a disused room--one\nof those already so often mentioned--and locked the door, and left him.\nHe passed a troubled night, and in the morning they found him talking\nwildly. In the evening he came to himself, but felt very weak, and his\nleg was exceedingly painful. Wondering where he was, and seeing one of\nthe men-at-arms in the room, he began to question him, and soon recalled\nthe events of the preceding night. As he was himself unable to watch any\nmore, he told the soldier all he knew about the goblins, and begged him\nto tell his companions, and stir them up to watch with tenfold\nvigilance; but whether it was that he did not talk quite coherently, or\nthat the whole thing appeared incredible, certainly the man concluded\nthat Curdie was only raving still, and tried to coax him into holding\nhis tongue. This, of course, annoyed Curdie dreadfully, who now felt in\nhis turn what it was not to be believed, and the consequence was that\nhis fever returned, and by the time when, at his persistent entreaties,\nthe captain was called, there could be no doubt that he was raving. They\ndid for him what they could, and promised everything he wanted, but with\nno intention of fulfilment. At last he went to sleep, and when at length\nhis sleep grew profound and peaceful, they left him, locked the door\nagain, and withdrew, intending to revisit him early in the morning.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nTHE GOBLIN MINERS\n\n\nTHAT same night several of the servants were having a chat together\nbefore going to bed.\n\n\"What can that noise be?\" said one of the housemaids, who had been\nlistening for a moment or two.\n\n\"I've heard it the last two nights,\" said the cook. \"If there were any\nabout the place, I should have taken it for rats, but my Tom keeps them\nfar enough.\"\n\n\"I've heard though,\" said the scullery-maid, \"that rats move about in\ngreat companies sometimes. There may be an army of them invading us. I\nheard the noises yesterday and to-day too.\"\n\n\"It'll be grand fun then for my Tom and Mrs. Housekeeper's Bob,\" said\nthe cook. \"They'll be friends for once in their lives, and fight on the\nsame side. I'll engage Tom and Bob together will put to flight any\nnumber of rats.\"\n\n\"It seems to me,\" said the nurse, \"that the noises are much too loud for\nthat. I have heard them all day, and my princess has asked me several\ntimes what they could be. Sometimes they sound like distant thunder, and\nsometimes like the noises you hear in the mountain from those horrid\nminers underneath.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't wonder,\" said the cook, \"if it was the miners after all.\nThey may have come on some hole in the mountain through which the\nnoises reach to us. They are always boring and blasting and breaking,\nyou know.\"\n\nAs he spoke there came a great rolling rumble beneath them, and the\nhouse quivered. They all started up in affright, and rushing to the hall\nfound the gentlemen-at-arms in consternation also. They had sent to wake\ntheir captain, who said from their description that it must have been an\nearthquake, an occurrence which, although very rare in that country, had\ntaken place almost within the century; and then went to bed again,\nstrange to say, and fell fast asleep without once thinking of Curdie, or\nassociating the noises they had heard with what he had told them. He had\nnot believed Curdie. If he had, he would at once have thought of what he\nhad said, and would have taken precautions. As they heard nothing more,\nthey concluded that Sir Walter was right, and that the danger was over\nfor perhaps another hundred years. The fact, as discovered afterward,\nwas that the goblins had, in working up a second sloping face of stone,\narrived at a huge block which lay under the cellars of the house, within\nthe line of the foundations. It was so round that when they succeeded,\nafter hard work, in dislodging it without blasting, it rolled thundering\ndown the slope with a bounding, jarring roll, which shook the\nfoundations of the house. The goblins were themselves dismayed at the\nnoise, for they knew, by careful spying and measuring, that they must\nnow be very near, if not under, the king's house, and they feared giving\nan alarm. They, therefore, remained quiet for awhile, and when they\nbegan to work again, they no doubt thought themselves very fortunate in\ncoming upon a vein of sand which filled a winding fissure in the rock\non which the house was built. By scooping this away they soon came out\nin the king's wine-cellar.\n\nNo sooner did they and where they were, than they scurried back again,\nlike rats into their holes, and running at full speed to the goblin\npalace, announced their success to the king and queen with shouts of\ntriumph. In a moment the goblin royal family and the whole goblin people\nwere on their way in hot haste to the king's house, each eager to have a\nshare in the glory of carrying off that same night the Princess Irene.\n\nThe queen went stumping along in one shoe of stone and one of skin. This\ncould not have been pleasant, and my readers may wonder that, with such\nskillful workmen about her, she had not yet replaced the shoe carried\noff by Curdie. As the king however had more than one ground of objection\nto her stone shoes, he no doubt took advantage of the discovery of her\ntoes, and threatened to expose her deformity if she had another made. I\npresume he insisted on her being content with skin-shoes, and allowed\nher to wear the remaining granite one on the present occasion only\nbecause she was going out to war.\n\nThey soon arrived in the king's wine-cellar, and regardless of its huge\nvessels, of which they did not know the use, began as quietly as they\ncould to force the door that led upward.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nTHE GOBLINS IN THE KING'S HOUSE\n\n\nWHEN Curdie fell asleep he began at once to dream. He thought he was\nascending the mountain-side from the mouth of the mine, whistling and\nsinging \"_Ring, dod, bang!_\" when he came upon a woman and child who\nwere lost; and from that point he went on dreaming all that had happened\nsince he met the princess and Lootie; how he had watched the goblins,\nand been taken by them, how he had been rescued by the princess;\neverything indeed, until he was wounded, and imprisoned by the\nmen-at-arms. And now he thought he was lying wide awake where they had\nlaid him, when suddenly he heard a great thundering sound.\n\n\"The cobs are coming!\" he said. \"They didn't believe a word I told them!\nThe cobs'll be carrying off the princess from under their stupid noses!\nBut they sha'n't! that they sha'n't!\"\n\nHe jumped up, as he thought, and began to dress, but, to his dismay,\nfound that he was still lying in bed.\n\n\"Now then I will!\" he said. \"Here goes! I _am_ up now!\"\n\nBut yet again he found himself snug in bed. Twenty times he tried, and\ntwenty times he failed; for in fact he was not awake, only dreaming that\nhe was. At length in an agony of despair, fancying he heard the goblins\nall over the house, he gave a great cry. Then there came, as he thought,\na hand upon the lock of the door. It opened, and, looking up, he saw a\nlady with white hair, carrying a silver box in her hand, enter the\nroom. She came to his bed, he thought, stroked his head and face with\ncool, soft hands, took the dressing from his leg, rubbed it with\nsomething that smelled like roses, and then waved her hands over him\nthree times. At the last wave of her hands everything vanished, he felt\nhimself sinking into the profoundest slumber, and remembered nothing\nmore until he awoke in earnest.\n\nThe setting moon was throwing a feeble light through the casement, and\nthe house was full of uproar. There was soft heavy multitudinous\nstamping, a clashing and clanging of weapons, the voices of men and the\ncries of women, mixed with a hideous bellowing, which sounded\nvictorious. The cobs were in the house! He sprang from his bed, hurried\non some of his clothes, not forgetting his shoes, which were armed with\nnails; then spying an old hunting-knife, or short sword, hanging on the\nwall, he caught it, and rushed down the stairs, guided by the sounds of\nstrife, which grew louder and louder.\n\nWhen he reached the ground floor he found the whole place swarming. All\nthe goblins of the mountain seemed gathered there. He rushed amongst\nthem, shouting--\n\n          \"One, two,\n           Hit and hew!\n           Three, four,\n           Blast and bore!\"\n\nand with every rhyme he came down a great stamp upon a foot, cutting at\nthe same time at their faces--executing, indeed, a sword dance of the\nwildest description. Away scattered the goblins in every\ndirection,--into closets, upstairs, into chimneys, up on rafters, and\ndown to the cellars. Curdie went on stamping and slashing and singing,\nbut saw nothing of the people of the house until he came to the great\nhall, in which, the moment he entered it, arose a great goblin shout.\nThe last of the men-at-arms, the captain himself, was on the floor,\nburied beneath a wallowing crowd of goblins. For, while each knight was\nbusy defending himself as well as he could, by stabs in the thick bodies\nof the goblins, for he had soon found their heads all but invulnerable,\nthe queen had attacked his legs and feet with her horrible granite shoe,\nand he was soon down; but the captain had got his back to the wall and\nstood out longer. The goblins would have torn them all to pieces, but\nthe king had given orders to carry them away alive, and over each of\nthem, in twelve groups, was standing a knot of goblins, while as many as\ncould find room were sitting upon their prostrate bodies.\n\nCurdie burst in dancing and gyrating and stamping and singing like a\nsmall incarnate whirlwind,\n\n          \"Where 'tis all a hole, sir,\n             Never can be holes:\n           Why should their shoes have soles, sir,\n             When they've got no souls?\n\n          \"But she upon her foot, sir,\n             Has a granite shoe:\n           The strongest leather boot, sir,\n             Six would soon be through.\"\n\nThe queen gave a howl of rage and dismay; and before she recovered her\npresence of mind, Curdie, having begun with the group nearest him, had\neleven of the knights on their legs again.\n\n\"Stamp on their feet!\" he cried, as each man rose, and in a few minutes\nthe hall was nearly empty, the goblins running from it as fast as they\ncould, howling and shrieking and limping, and cowering every now and\nthen as they ran to cuddle their wounded feet in their hard hands, or to\nprotect them from the frightful stamp-stamp of the armed men.\n\nAnd now Curdie approached the group which, trusting in the queen and her\nshoe, kept their guard over the prostrate captain. The king sat on the\ncaptain's head, but the queen stood in front, like an infuriated cat,\nwith her perpendicular eyes gleaming green, and her hair standing half\nup from her horrid head. Her heart was quaking, however, and she kept\nmoving about her skin-shod foot with nervous apprehension. When Curdie\nwas within a few paces, she rushed at him, made one tremendous stamp at\nhis opposing foot, which happily he withdrew in time, and caught him\nround the waist, to dash him on the marble floor. But just as she caught\nhim, he came down with all the weight of his iron-shod shoe upon her\nskin-shod foot, and with a hideous howl she dropped him, squatted on the\nfloor and took her foot in both her hands. Meanwhile the rest rushed on\nthe king and the bodyguard sent them flying, and lifted the prostrate\ncaptain, who was all but pressed to death. It was some moments before he\nrecovered breath and consciousness.\n\n\"Where's the princess?\" cried Curdie again and again.\n\nNo one knew, and off they all rushed in search of her.\n\nThrough every room in the house they went, but nowhere was she to be\nfound. Neither was one of the servants to be seen. But Curdie, who had\nkept to the lower part of the house, which was now quiet enough, began\nto hear a confused sound as of a distant hubbub, and set out to find\nwhere it came from. The noise grew as his sharp ears guided him to a\nstair and so to the wine cellar. It was full of goblins, whom the butler\nwas supplying with wine as fast as he could draw it.\n\nWhile the queen and her party had encountered the men-at-arms, Harelip\nwith another company had gone off to search the house. They captured\nevery one they met, and when they could find no more, they hurried away\nto carry them safe to the caverns below. But when the butler, who was\namongst them, found that their path lay through the wine cellar, he\nbethought himself of persuading them to taste the wine, and, as he had\nhoped, they no sooner tasted than they wanted more. The routed goblins,\non their way below, joined them, and when Curdie entered, they were all,\nwith outstretched hands, in which were vessels of every description,\nfrom sauce-pan to silver cup, pressing around the butler, who sat at the\ntap of a huge cask, filling and filling. Curdie cast one glance around\nthe place before commencing his attack, and saw in the farthest corner a\nterrified group of the domestics unwatched, but cowering without courage\nto attempt their escape. Amongst them was the terror-stricken face of\nLootie; but nowhere could he see the princess. Seized with the horrible\nconviction that Harelip had already carried her off, he rushed amongst\nthem, unable for wrath to sing any more, but stamping and cutting with\ngreater fury than ever.\n\n\"Stamp on their feet; stamp on their feet!\" he shouted, and in a moment\nthe goblins were disappearing through the hole in the floor like rats\nand mice.\n\nThey could not vanish so fast, however, but that many more goblin feet\nhad to go limping back over the underground ways of the mountain that\nmorning.\n\nPresently however they were reinforced from above by the king and his\nparty, with the redoubtable queen at their head. Finding Curdie again\nbusy amongst her unfortunate subjects, she rushed at him once more with\nthe rage of despair, and this time gave him a bad bruise on the foot.\nThen a regular stamping fight got up between them, Curdie with the point\nof his hunting knife keeping her from clasping her mighty arms about\nhim, as he watched his opportunity of getting once more a good stamp at\nher skin-shod foot. But the queen was more wary as well as more agile\nthan hitherto.\n\nThe rest meantime, finding their adversary thus matched for the moment,\npaused in their headlong hurry, and turned to the shivering group of\nwomen in the corner. As if determined to emulate his father and have a\nsun-woman of some sort to share his future throne. Harelip rushed at\nthem, caught up Lootie and sped with her to the hole. She gave a great\nshriek, and Curdie heard her, and saw the plight she was in. Gathering\nall his strength, he gave the queen a sudden cut across the face with\nhis weapon, came down, as she started back, with all his weight on the\nproper foot, and sprang to Lootie's rescue. The prince had two\ndefenceless feet, and on both of them Curdie stamped just as he reached\nthe hole. He dropped his burden and rolled shrieking into the earth.\nCurdie made one stab at him as he disappeared, caught hold of the\nsenseless Lootie, and having dragged her back to the corner, there\nmounted guard over her, preparing once more to encounter the queen. Her\nface streaming with blood, and her eyes flashing green lightning through\nit, she came on with her mouth open and her teeth grinning like a\ntiger's, followed by the king and her bodyguard of the thickest goblins.\nBut the same moment in rushed the captain and his men, and ran at them\nstamping furiously. They dared not encounter such an onset. Away they\nscurried, the queen foremost. Of course the right thing would have been\nto take the king and queen prisoners, and hold them hostages for the\nprincess, but they were so anxious to find her that no one thought of\ndetaining them until it was too late.\n\nHaving thus rescued the servants, they set about searching the house\nonce more. None of them could give the least information concerning the\nprincess. Lootie was almost silly with terror, and although scarcely\nable to walk, would not leave Curdie's side for a single moment. Again\nhe allowed the others to search the rest of the house--where, except a\ndismayed goblin lurking here and there, they found no one--while he\nrequested Lootie to take him to the princess's room. She was as\nsubmissive and obedient as if he had been the king. He found the\nbed-clothes tossed about, and most of them on the floor, while the\nprincess's garments were scattered all over the room, which was in the\ngreatest confusion. It was only too evident that the goblins had been\nthere, and Curdie had no longer any doubt that she had been carried off\nat the very first of the inroad. With a pang of despair he saw how wrong\nthey had been in not securing the king and queen and prince; but he\ndetermined to find and rescue the princess as she had found and rescued\nhim, or meet the worst fate to which the goblins could doom him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nCURDIE'S GUIDE\n\n\n[Illustration: There sat his mother by the fire, and in her arms lay the\nprincess fast asleep.]\n\nJUST as the consolation of this resolve dawned upon his mind, and he was\nturning away for the cellar to follow the goblins into their hole,\nsomething touched his hand. It was the slightest touch, and when he\nlooked he could see nothing. Feeling and peering about in the gray of\nthe dawn, his fingers came upon a tight thread. He looked again, and\nnarrowly, but still could see nothing. It flashed upon him that this\nmust be the princess's thread. Without saying a word, for he knew no one\nwould believe him any more than he had believed the princess, he\nfollowed the thread with his finger, contrived to give Lootie the slip,\nand was soon out of the house, and on the mountain-side--surprised that,\nif the thread were indeed her grandmother's messenger, it should have\nled the princess, as he supposed it must, into the mountain, where she\nwould be certain to meet the goblins rushing back enraged from their\ndefeat. But he hurried on in the hope of overtaking her first. When he\narrived however at the place where the path turned off for the mine, he\nfound that the thread did not turn with it, but went straight up the\nmountain. Could it be that the thread was leading him home to his\nmother's cottage? Could the princess be there? He bounded up the\nmountain like one of its own goats, and before the sun was up, the\nthread had brought him indeed to his mother's door. There it vanished\nfrom his fingers, and he could not find it, search as he might.\n\nThe door was on the latch, and he entered. There sat his mother by the\nfire, and in her arms lay the princess fast asleep.\n\n\"Hush, Curdie!\" said his mother. \"Do not wake her. I'm so glad you're\ncome! I thought the cobs must have got you again!\"\n\nWith a heart full of delight, Curdie sat down at a corner of the hearth,\non a stool opposite his mother's chair, and gazed at the princess, who\nslept as peacefully as if she had been in her own bed. All at once she\nopened her eyes and fixed them on him.\n\n\"Oh, Curdie! you're come!\" she said quietly. \"I thought you would!\"\n\nCurdie rose and stood before her with downcast eyes.\n\n\"Irene,\" he said, \"I am very sorry I did not believe you.\"\n\n\"Oh, never mind, Curdie!\" answered the princess. \"You couldn't, you\nknow. You do believe me now, don't you?\"\n\n\"I can't help it now. I ought to have helped it before.\"\n\n\"Why can't you help it now?\"\n\n\"Because, just as I was going into the mountain to look for you, I got\nhold of your thread, and it brought me here.\"\n\n\"Then you've come from my house, have you?\"\n\n\"Yes, I have.\"\n\n\"I didn't know you were there.\"\n\n\"I've been there two or three days, I believe.\"\n\n\"And I never knew it!--Then perhaps you can tell me why my grandmother\nhas brought me here? I can't think. Something woke me--I didn't know\nwhat, but I was frightened, and I felt for the thread, and there it was!\nI was more frightened still when it brought me out on the mountain, for\nI thought it was going to take me into it again, and I like the outside\nof it best. I supposed you were in trouble again, and I had to get you\nout, but it brought me here instead; and, oh, Curdie! your mother has\nbeen so kind to me--just like my own grandmother!\"\n\nHere Curdie's mother gave the princess a hug, and the princess turned\nand gave her a sweet smile, and held up her mouth to kiss her.\n\n\"Then you didn't see the cobs?\" asked Curdie.\n\n\"No; I haven't been into the mountain, I told you, Curdie.\"\n\n\"But the cobs have been into your house--all over it--and into your\nbedroom making such a row!\"\n\n\"What did they want there? It was very rude of them.\"\n\n\"They wanted you--to carry you off into the mountain with them, for a\nwife to their Prince Harelip.\"\n\n\"Oh, how dreadful!\" cried the princess, shuddering.\n\n\"But you needn't be afraid, you know. Your grandmother takes care of\nyou.\"\n\n\"Ah! you do believe in my grandmother then? I'm so glad! She made me\nthink you would some day.\"\n\nAll at once Curdie remembered his dream, and was silent, thinking.\n\n\"But how did you come to be in my house, and me not know it?\" asked the\nprincess.\n\nThen Curdie had to explain everything--how he had watched for her sake,\nhow he had been wounded and shut up by the soldiers, how he heard the\nnoises and could not rise, and how the beautiful old lady had come to\nhim, and all that followed.\n\n\"Poor Curdie! to lie there hurt and ill, and me never to know it!\"\nexclaimed the princess, stroking his rough hand. \"I would not have\nhesitated to come and nurse you, if they had told me.\"\n\n\"I didn't see you were lame,\" said his mother.\n\n\"Am I, mother? Oh--yes--I suppose I ought to be. I declare I've never\nthought of it since I got up to go down amongst the cobs!\"\n\n\"Let me see the wound,\" said his mother.\n\nHe pulled down his stocking--when behold, except a great scar, his leg\nwas perfectly sound!\n\nCurdie and his mother gazed in each other's eyes, full of wonder, but\nIrene called out--\n\n\"I thought so, Curdie! I was sure it wasn't a dream. I was sure my\ngrandmother had been to see you.--Don't you smell the roses? It was my\ngrandmother healed your leg, and sent you to help me.\"\n\n\"No, Princess Irene,\" said Curdie; \"I wasn't good enough to be allowed\nto help you: I didn't believe you. Your grandmother took care of you\nwithout me.\"\n\n\"She sent you to help my people, anyhow. I wish my king-papa would come.\nI do want so to tell him how good you have been!\"\n\n\"But,\" said the mother, \"we are forgetting how frightened your people\nmust be.--You must take the princess home at once, Curdie--or at least\ngo and tell them where she is.\"\n\n\"Yes, mother. Only I'm dreadfully hungry. Do let me have some breakfast\nfirst. They ought to have listened to me, and then they wouldn't have\nbeen taken by surprise as they were.\"\n\n\"That is true, Curdie; but it is not for you to blame them much. You\nremember?\"\n\n\"Yes, mother, I do. Only I must really have something to eat.\"\n\n\"You shall, my boy--as fast as I can get it,\" said his mother, rising\nand setting the princess on her chair.\n\nBut before his breakfast was ready, Curdie jumped up so suddenly as to\nstartle both his companions.\n\n\"Mother, mother!\" he cried, \"I was forgetting. You must take the\nprincess home yourself. I must go and wake my father.\"\n\nWithout a word of explanation, he rushed to the place where his father\nwas sleeping. Having thoroughly roused him with what he told him, he\ndarted out of the cottage.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\nMASON-WORK\n\n\nHE had all at once remembered the resolution of the goblins to carry out\ntheir second plan upon the failure of the first. No doubt they were\nalready busy, and the mine was therefore in the greatest danger of being\nflooded and rendered useless--not to speak of the lives of the miners.\n\nWhen he reached the mouth of the mine, after rousing all the miners\nwithin reach, he found his father and a good many more just entering.\nThey all hurried to the gang by which he had found a way into the goblin\ncountry. There the foresight of Peter had already collected a great many\nblocks of stone, with cement, ready for building up the weak place--well\nenough known to the goblins. Although there was not room for more than\ntwo to be actually building at once, they managed, by setting all the\nrest to work in preparing the cement, and passing the stones, to finish\nin the course of the day a huge buttress filling the whole gang, and\nsupported everywhere by the live rock. Before the hour when they usually\ndropped work, they were satisfied that the mine was secure.\n\nThey had heard goblin hammers and pickaxes busy all the time, and at\nlength fancied they heard sounds of water they had never heard before.\nBut that was otherwise accounted for when they left the mine; for they\nstepped out into a tremendous storm which was raging all over the\nmountain. The thunder was bellowing, and the lightning lancing out of a\nhuge black cloud which lay above it, and hung down its edges of thick\nmist over its sides. The lightning was breaking out of the mountain,\ntoo, and flashing up into the cloud. From the state of the brooks, now\nswollen into raging torrents, it was evident that the storm had been\nstorming all day.\n\nThe wind was blowing as if it would blow him off the mountain, but,\nanxious about his mother and the princess, Curdie darted up through the\nthick of the tempest. Even if they had not set out before the storm came\non, he did not judge them safe, for, in such a storm even their poor\nlittle house was in danger. Indeed he soon found that but for a huge\nrock against which it was built, and which protected it both from the\nblasts and the waters, it must have been swept if it was not blown away;\nfor the two torrents into which this rock parted the rush of water\nbehind it united again in front of the cottage--two roaring and\ndangerous streams, which his mother and the princess could not possibly\nhave passed. It was with great difficulty that he forced his way through\none of them, and up to the door.\n\nThe moment his hand fell on the latch, through all the uproar of winds\nand waters came the joyous cry of the princess:--\n\n\"There's Curdie! Curdie! Curdie!\"\n\nShe was sitting wrapped in blankets on the bed, his mother trying for\nthe hundredth time to light the fire which had been drowned by the rain\nthat came down the chimney. The clay floor was one mass of mud, and the\nwhole place looked wretched. But the faces of the mother and the\nprincess shone as if their troubles only made them merrier. Curdie\nlaughed at sight of them.\n\n\"I never _had_ such fun!\" said the princess, her eyes twinkling and her\npretty teeth shining. \"How nice it must be to live in a cottage on the\nmountain!\"\n\n\"It all depends on what kind your inside house is,\" said the mother.\n\n\"I know what you mean,\" said Irene. \"That's the kind of thing my\ngrandmother says.\"\n\nBy the time Peter returned, the storm was nearly over, but the streams\nwere so fierce and so swollen, that it was not only out of the question\nfor the princess to go down the mountain, but most dangerous for Peter\neven or Curdie to make the attempt in the gathering darkness.\n\n\"They will be dreadfully frightened about you,\" said Peter to the\nprincess, \"but we cannot help it. We must wait till the morning.\"\n\nWith Curdie's help, the fire was lighted at last, and the mother set\nabout making their supper; and after supper they all told the princess\nstories till she grew sleepy. Then Curdie's mother laid her in Curdie's\nbed, which was in a tiny little garret-room. As soon as she was in bed,\nthrough a little window low down in the roof she caught sight of her\ngrandmother's lamp shining far away beneath, and she gazed at the\nbeautiful silvery globe until she fell fast asleep.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\n\nTHE KING AND THE KISS\n\n\nTHE next morning the sun rose so bright that Irene said the rain had\nwashed his face and let the light out clean. The torrents were still\nroaring down the side of the mountain, but they were so much smaller as\nnot to be dangerous in the daylight. After an early breakfast, Peter\nwent to his work, and Curdie and his mother set out to take the princess\nhome. They had difficulty in getting her dry across the streams, and\nCurdie had again and again to carry her, but at last they got safe on\nthe broader part of the road, and walked gently down toward the king's\nhouse. And what should they see as they turned the last corner, but the\nlast of the king's troop riding through the gate!\n\n\"Oh, Curdie!\" cried Irene, clapping her hands right joyfully, \"my\nking-papa is come.\"\n\nThe moment Curdie heard that, he caught her up in his arms, and set off\nat full speed, crying--\n\n\"Come on, mother dear! The king may break his heart before he knows that\nshe is safe.\"\n\nIrene clung round his neck, and he ran with her like a deer. When he\nentered the gate into the court, there sat the king on his horse, with\nall the people of the house about him, weeping and hanging their heads.\nThe king was not weeping, but his face was white as a dead man's, and he\nlooked as if the life had gone out of him. The men-at-arms he had\nbrought with him, sat with horror-stricken faces, but eyes flashing\nwith rage, waiting only for the word of the king to do something--they\ndid not know what, and nobody knew what.\n\nThe day before the men-at-arms belonging to the house, as soon as they\nwere satisfied the princess had been carried away, rushed after the\ngoblins into the hole, but found that they had already so skilfully\nblockaded the narrowest part, not many feet below the cellar, that\nwithout miners and their tools they could do nothing. Not one of them\nknew where the mouth of the mine lay, and some of those who had set out\nto find it had been overtaken by the storm and had not even yet\nreturned. Poor Sir Walter was especially filled with shame, and almost\nentertained the hope that the king would order him to be decapitated,\nfor the very thought of that sweet little face down amongst the goblins\nwas unendurable.\n\nWhen Curdie ran in at the gate with the princess in his arms, they were\nall so absorbed in their own misery and awed by the king's presence and\ngrief, that no one observed his arrival. He went straight up to the\nking, where he sat on his horse.\n\n\"Papa! papa!\" the princess cried, stretching out her arms to him; \"here\nI am!\"\n\nThe king started. The color rushed to his face. He gave an inarticulate\ncry. Curdie held up the princess, and the king bent down and took her\nfrom his arms. As he clasped her to his bosom, the big tears went\ndropping down his cheeks and his beard. And such a shout arose from all\nthe bystanders, that the startled horses pranced and capered, and the\narmor rang and clattered, and the rocks of the mountain echoed back the\nnoises. The princess greeted them all as she nestled in her father's\nbosom, and the king did not set her down until she had told them all the\nstory. But she had more to tell about Curdie than about herself, and\nwhat she did tell about herself none of them could understand except the\nking and Curdie, who stood by the king's knee stroking the neck of the\ngreat white horse. And still as she told what Curdie had done, Sir\nWalter and others added to what she told, even Lootie joining in the\npraises of his courage and energy.\n\nCurdie held his peace, looking quietly up in the king's face. And his\nmother stood on the outskirts of the crowd listening with delight, for\nher son's deeds were pleasant in her ears, until the princess caught\nsight of her.\n\n\"And there is his mother, king-papa!\" she said. \"See--there. She is such\na nice mother, and has been so kind to me!\"\n\nThey all parted asunder as the king made a sign to her to come forward.\nShe obeyed, and he gave her his hand, but could not speak.\n\n\"And now, king-papa,\" the princess went on, \"I must tell you another\nthing. One night long ago Curdie drove the goblins away and brought\nLootie and me safe from the mountain. And I promised him a kiss when we\ngot home, but Lootie wouldn't let me give it to him. I would not have\nyou scold Lootie, but I want you to impress upon her that a princess\n_must_ do as she promises.\"\n\n\"Indeed she must, my child--except it be wrong,\" said the king. \"There,\ngive Curdie a kiss.\"\n\nAnd as he spoke he held her toward him.\n\nThe princess reached down, threw her arms round Curdie's neck, and\nkissed him on the mouth, saying--\n\n\"There, Curdie! There's the kiss I promised you!\"\n\nThen they all went into the house, and the cook rushed to the kitchen,\nand the servants to their work. Lootie dressed Irene in her shiningest\nclothes, and the king put off his armor, and put on purple and gold; and\na messenger was sent for Peter and all the miners, and there was a great\nand grand feast, which continued long after the princess was put to\nbed.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\nTHE SUBTERRANEAN WATERS\n\n\nTHE king's harper, who always formed a part of his escort, was chanting\na ballad which he made as he went on playing on his instrument--about\nthe princess and the goblins, and the prowess of Curdie, when all at\nonce he ceased, with his eyes on one of the doors of the hall. Thereupon\nthe eyes of the king and his guests turned thitherward also. The next\nmoment, through the open doorway came the princess Irene. She went\nstraight up to her father, with her right hand stretched out a little\nsideways, and her forefinger, as her father and Curdie understood,\nfeeling its way along the invisible thread. The king took her on his\nknee, and she said in his ear--\n\n\"King-papa, do you hear that noise?\"\n\n\"I hear nothing,\" said the king.\n\n\"Listen,\" she said, holding up her forefinger.\n\nThe king listened, and a great stillness fell upon the company. Each\nman, seeing that the king listened, listened also, and the harper sat\nwith his harp between his arms, and his fingers silent upon the strings.\n\n\"I do hear a noise,\" said the king at length--\"a noise as of distant\nthunder. It is coming nearer and nearer. What can it be?\"\n\nThey all heard it now, and each seemed ready to start to his feet as he\nlistened. Yet all sat perfectly still. The noise came rapidly nearer.\n\n\"What can it be?\" said the king again.\n\n\"I think it must be another storm coming over the mountain,\" said Sir\nWalter.\n\nThen Curdie, who at the first word of the king had slipped from his\nseat, and laid his ear to the ground, rose up quickly, and approaching\nthe king said, speaking very fast--\n\n\"Please your Majesty, I think I know what it is. I have no time to\nexplain, for that might make it too late for some of us. Will your\nMajesty order that everybody leave the house as quickly as possible, and\nget up the mountain?\"\n\nThe king, who was the wisest man in the kingdom, knew well there was a\ntime when things must be done, and questions left till afterward. He had\nfaith in Curdie, and rose instantly, with Irene in his arms.\n\n\"Every man and woman follow me,\" he said, and strode out into the\ndarkness.\n\nBefore he had reached the gate, the noise had grown to a great\nthundering roar, and the ground trembled beneath their feet, and before\nthe last of them had crossed the court, out after them from the great\nhall-door came a huge rush of turbid water, and almost swept them away.\nBut they got safe out of the gate and up the mountain, while the torrent\nwent roaring down the road into the valley beneath.\n\nCurdie had left the king and the princess to look after his mother, whom\nhe and his father, one on each side, caught up when the stream overtook\nthem and carried safe and dry.\n\nWhen the king had got out of the way of the water, a little up the\nmountain, he stood with the princess in his arms, looking back with\namazement on the issuing torrent, which glimmered fierce and foamy\nthrough the night. There Curdie rejoined them.\n\n\"Now, Curdie,\" said the king, \"what does it mean! Is this what you\nexpected?\"\n\n\"It is, your Majesty,\" said Curdie; and proceeded to tell him about the\nsecond scheme of the goblins, who, fancying the miners of more\nimportance to the upper world than they were, had resolved, if they\nshould fail in carrying off the king's daughter, to flood the mine and\ndrown the miners. Then he explained what the miners had done to prevent\nit. The goblins had, in pursuance of their design, let loose all the\nunderground reservoirs and streams, expecting the water to run down into\nthe mine, which was lower than their part of the mountain, for they had,\nas they supposed, not knowing of the solid wall close behind, broken a\npassage through into it. But the readiest outlet the water could find\nhad turned out to be the tunnel they had made to the king's house, the\npossibility of which catastrophe had not occurred to the mind of the\nyoung miner until he placed his ear close to the floor of the hall.\n\nWhat was then to be done? The house appeared in danger of falling, and\nevery moment the torrent was increasing.\n\n\"We must set out at once,\" said the king. \"But how to get at the\nhorses!\"\n\n\"Shall I see if we can manage that?\" said Curdie.\n\n\"Do,\" said the king.\n\nCurdie gathered the men-at-arms, and took them over the garden wall, and\nso to the stables. They found their horses in terror; the water was\nrising fast around them, and it was quite time they were got out. But\nthere was no way to get them out, except by riding them through the\nstream, which was now pouring from the lower windows as well as the\ndoor. As one horse was quite enough for any man to manage through such a\ntorrent, Curdie got on the king's white charger, and leading the way,\nbrought them all in safety to the rising ground.\n\n\"Look, look, Curdie!\" cried Irene, the moment that, having dismounted,\nhe led the horse up to the king.\n\nCurdie did look, and saw, high in the air, somewhere about the top of\nthe king's house, a great globe of light, shining like the purest\nsilver.\n\n\"Oh!\" he cried in some consternation, \"that is your grandmother's lamp!\nWe _must_ get her out. I will go and find her. The house may fall, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"My grandmother is in no danger,\" said Irene, smiling.\n\n\"Here, Curdie, take the princess while I get on my horse,\" said the\nking.\n\nCurdie took the princess again, and both turned their eyes to the globe\nof light. The same moment there shot from it a white bird, which,\ndescending with outstretched wings, made one circle round the king and\nCurdie and the princess, and then glided up again. The light and the\npigeon vanished together.\n\n\"Now, Curdie,\" said the princess, as he lifted her to her father's arms,\n\"you see my grandmother knows all about it, and isn't frightened. I\nbelieve she could walk through that water and it wouldn't wet her a\nbit.\"\n\n\"But, my child,\" said the king, \"you will be cold if you haven't\nsomething more on. Run, Curdie, my boy, and fetch anything you can lay\nyour hands on, to keep the princess warm. We have a long ride before\nus.\"\n\nCurdie was gone in a moment, and soon returned with a great rich fur,\nand the news that dead goblins were tossing about in the current through\nthe house. They had been caught in their own snare; instead of the mine\nthey had flooded their own country, whence they were now swept up\ndrowned. Irene shuddered, but the king held her close to his bosom. Then\nhe turned to Sir Walter, and said--\n\n\"Bring Curdie's father and mother here.\"\n\n\"I wish,\" said the king, when they stood before him, \"to take your son\nwith me. He shall enter my bodyguard at once, and wait further\npromotion.\"\n\nPeter and his wife, overcome, only murmured almost inaudible thanks. But\nCurdie spoke aloud.\n\n\"Please your Majesty,\" he said, \"I cannot leave my father and mother.\"\n\n\"That's right, Curdie!\" cried the princess. \"_I_ wouldn't if I was you.\"\n\nThe king looked at the princess and then at Curdie with a glow of\nsatisfaction on his countenance.\n\n\"I too think you are right, Curdie,\" he said, \"and I will not ask you\nagain. But I shall have a chance of doing something for you some time.\"\n\n\"Your Majesty has already allowed me to serve you,\" said Curdie.\n\n\"But, Curdie,\" said his mother, \"why shouldn't you go with the king? We\ncan get on very well without you.\"\n\n\"But I can't get on very well without you,\" said Curdie. \"The king is\nvery kind, but I could not be half the use to him that I am to you.\nPlease your Majesty, if you wouldn't mind giving my mother a red\npetticoat! I should have got her one long ago, but for the goblins.\"\n\n\"As soon as we get home,\" said the king, \"Irene and I will search out\nthe warmest one to be found, and send it by one of the gentlemen.\"\n\n\"Yes, that we will, Curdie!\" said the princess.\n\n\"And next summer we'll come back and see you wear it, Curdie's mother,\"\nshe added. \"Sha'n't we, king-papa?\"\n\n\"Yes, my love; I hope so,\" said the king.\n\nThen turning to the miners, he said----\n\n\"Will you do the best you can for my servants to-night? I hope they will\nbe able to return to the house to-morrow.\"\n\nThe miners with one voice promised their hospitality.\n\nThen the king commanded his servants to mind whatever Curdie should say\nto them, and after shaking hands with him and his father and mother, the\nking and the princess and all their company rode away down the side of\nthe new stream which had already devoured half the road, into the starry\nnight.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\n\nTHE LAST CHAPTER\n\n\nALL the rest went up the mountain, and separated in groups to the homes\nof the miners. Curdie and his father and mother took Lootie with them.\nAnd the whole way, a light, of which all but Lootie understood the\norigin, shone upon their path. But when they looked round they could see\nnothing of the silvery globe.\n\nFor days and days the water continued to rush from the doors and windows\nof the king's house, and a few goblin bodies were swept out into the\nroad.\n\nCurdie saw that something must be done. He spoke to his father and the\nrest of the miners, and they at once proceeded to make another outlet\nfor the waters. By setting all hands to the work, tunneling here and\nbuilding there, they soon succeeded; and having also made a little\ntunnel to drain the water away from under the king's house, they were\nsoon able to get into the wine cellar, where they found a multitude of\ndead goblins--among the rest the queen, with the skin-shoe gone, and the\nstone one fast to her ankle--for the water had swept away the barricade\nwhich prevented the men-at-arms from following the goblins, and had\ngreatly widened the passage. They built it securely up, and then went\nback to their labors in the mine.\n\nA good many of the goblins with their creatures escaped from the\ninundation out upon the mountain. But most of them soon left that part\nof the country, and most of those who remained grew milder in character,\nand indeed became very much like the Scotch Brownies. Their skulls\nbecame softer as well as their hearts, and their feet grew harder, and\nby degrees they became friendly with the inhabitants of the mountain and\neven with the miners. But the latter were merciless to any of the _cobs'\ncreatures_ that came their way, until at length they all but\ndisappeared. Still--\n\n\"_But, Mr. Author, we would rather hear more about the Princess and\nCurdie. We don't care about the goblins and their nasty creatures. They\nfrighten us--rather._\"\n\n\"_But you know if you once get rid of the goblins there is no fear of\nthe princess or of Curdie._\"\n\n\"_But we want to know more about them._\"\n\n\"_Some day, perhaps, I may tell you the further history of both of them;\nhow Curdie came to visit Irene's grandmother, and what she did for him;\nand how the princess and he met again after they were older--and\nhow--But there! I don't mean to go any farther at present._\"\n\n\"_Then you're leaving the story unfinished, Mr. Author!_\"\n\n\"_Not more unfinished than a story ought to be, I hope. If you ever knew\na story finished, all I can say is, I never did. Somehow, stories won't\nfinish. I think I know why, but I won't say that either, now._\"\n\n\nTHE END\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nTranscriber's Notes:\n\nObvious punctuation errors repaired.\n\nPage 11, \"clevernesss\" changed to \"cleverness\" (knowledge and\ncleverness)\n\nPage 68, \"gleamimg\" changed to \"gleaming\" (were sparkling and gleaming)\n\nPage 77, \"would'nt\" changed to \"wouldn't\" (wouldn't have come)\n\nPage 103, \"arrange\" changed to \"arranges\" (all that arranges itself)\n\nPage 191, \"of thing\" added to text (the kind of thing)","title":"The Princess and the Goblin","tradition":"folklore-oral-tradition","translated_text":null,"word_count":51863}