Part 2 (1/2)

He could see nothing but he could hear how the whole hill rang with laughter; the elves formed a ring around him, danced over him, nipped him on the cheeks like gnats, and were beside themselves with joy over their comical trick.

”Lie there and starve until you can be satisfied with a dewdrop and a gnat leg,” said the elves.

Knut fell to pleading with them. ”Listen now, little elves,” said he. ”I shall be content if I may bite on a small piece of reed I have in my jacket pocket. Will not some of you be so good as to stick it into my mouth?”

The elves thought it would be inexpressibly amusing to see this greedy human child eat a piece of reed; so four of them climbed into his jacket pocket and with their united strength drew forth the magic pipe, which, with great effort, they succeeded in putting into his mouth. Thereupon they danced more merrily than ever around and over him, and the hill resounded with their delicate laughter. It was like the humming of a million swarms of gnats.

Knut no sooner felt the pipe between his lips than he began to blow; and this time the tone was _p?_, _p?_. At once the merry laughter came to an end, and sobbing was heard from every direction,--a sound as of a hundred thousand sobbing together, not unlike what one hears in summer when the beating rain lashes the hill.

Knut could not see, but he knew that the elves were crying and he felt that it was a sin, no matter what they had done, to make such merry creatures sob so grievously.

”Set me free and you shall laugh again,” said Knut to the weeping elves.

Now it is the elves' greatest joy to laugh. Indeed, they laugh away their short lives in the summer evenings knowing nothing of sorrow.

At Knut's words, hundreds of elves began immediately to chase away the spiders, and to set free the prisoner, loosening his arms and his legs, and unplastering his eyelids. Knut could now see his tiny enemies and his anger rose again, so that he blew _p?_ once more. Oh, how the poor little creatures grimaced and trembled! They wished so much to laugh and yet they must weep because of that frightful _p?_!

Knut had not the heart to tease them any longer. He changed the note to _pu_ and the elves became almost crazy with joy. They leaped so high in the air that they nearly overtook the larks, and as they came down, some of them alighted upon Knut and he had to shake them off. He did not notice that one elf had fallen into his pocket and remained there.

”Good-bye, little elves,” said Knut as he hastily set off again on his way through the forest.

”I must watch out well for that other troll, the Forest King,” thought Knut. ”He is said to be the worst of all. Where was I in the Catechism?

Oh, yes. 'What does that mean?'”

After a while Knut came to a swamp at the roadside where cloudberries grew in profusion.

”It can't be wrong to pick a few of these berries as I pa.s.s by, since I sha'n't have any food until four o'clock this afternoon,” thought Knut.

To reach the swamp he had to climb over a huge fallen pine-tree, which lay in the way. Scarcely did he find himself clambering across its gnarly trunk and thick close branches than the pine-tree, to Knut's great fright, raised itself high in air, and roared with a gruff voice:

”Good-day, Knut Spelevink. Why do you look so poorly to-day?”

Knut, hanging over the road in the pine-tree's top, still found courage to answer:

”Why shouldn't I look poorly when I have had nothing to eat since yesterday noon except Catechism, and bar iron, and frozen quicksilver and a gnat's leg?”

”Well, why did you interrupt my midday nap?” asked the pine-tree. ”Don't you know that I am the King of the Forest and rule over all the trees and swamps for seven times seven miles around! Here you see my palace.

Haven't I a fine place to live in?”

Knut saw nothing but a bleak wilderness, so did not answer the question but ventured to inquire most humbly if he might not get down and pick some cloudberries to eat.

”What is that? Cloudberries?” roared the Forest King. ”Take a fir-tree for a ladle and ladle into yourself seven cartloads of swamp mud. That is what I call a regular meal. It is my favorite food.”

”Perhaps you would give me one load of apple marmalade, and a moderately big ditch full of wild honey instead!” suggested merry Knut.

”Apple marmalade? Humph! I shall make marmalade of you for disturbing me in my nap. My Lord Eagle, I give the boy to you. You can tear him into Scotch collops for your young ones.”

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE PINE-TREE RAISED ITSELF HIGH IN AIR.--_Page 31_.]