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+Project Gutenberg's The Princess and the Goblin, by George MacDonald
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Princess and the Goblin
+
+Author: George MacDonald
+
+Illustrator: Jessie Willcox Smith
+
+Release Date: November 16, 2010 [EBook #34339]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Suzanne Shell, Emmy and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN
+
+_Illustrations especially engraved and printed by the Beck Engraving
+Company, Philadelphia_
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN
+
+_By_ George MacDonald
+
+[Illustration]
+
+          ILLUSTRATED BY
+          JESSIE WILLCOX SMITH
+          DAVID MCKAY COMPANY _Publishers_
+          Philadelphia, MCMXX.
+
+          Copyright, 1920, by David McKay Company
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                                                         FACING
+                                                          PAGE
+    She ran for some distance, turned several times, and
+      then began to be afraid                              14
+
+    She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose
+      such a flapping of wings                             22
+
+    "Never mind, Princess Irene," he said. "You mustn't
+      kiss me to-night. But you shan't break your word.
+      I will come another time"                            42
+
+    In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped
+      in his great strong arms                             68
+
+    "Come," and she still held out her arms                96
+
+    The goblins fell back a little when he began, and
+      made horrible grimaces all through the rhyme        118
+
+    Curdie went on after her, flashing his torch about    138
+
+    There sat his mother by the fire, and in her arms
+      lay the princess fast asleep                        184
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+    CHAPTER                                               PAGE
+        I. WHY THE PRINCESS HAS A STORY ABOUT HER           9
+       II. THE PRINCESS LOSES HERSELF                      13
+      III. THE PRINCESS AND--WE SHALL SEE WHO              16
+       IV. WHAT THE NURSE THOUGHT OF IT                    24
+        V. THE PRINCESS LETS WELL ALONE                    29
+       VI. THE LITTLE MINER                                32
+      VII. THE MINES                                       45
+     VIII. THE GOBLINS                                     50
+       IX. THE HALL OF THE GOBLIN PALACE                   59
+        X. THE PRINCESS'S KING-PAPA                        68
+       XI. THE OLD LADY'S BEDROOM                          73
+      XII. A SHORT CHAPTER ABOUT CURDIE                    82
+     XIII. THE COBS' CREATURES                             85
+      XIV. THAT NIGHT WEEK                                 90
+       XV. WOVEN AND THEN SPUN                             95
+      XVI. THE RING                                       106
+     XVII. SPRING-TIME                                    109
+     XVIII. CURDIE'S CLUE                                 112
+       XIX. GOBLIN COUNSELS                               122
+        XX. IRENE'S CLUE                                  128
+       XXI. THE ESCAPE                                    134
+      XXII. THE OLD LADY AND CURDIE                       147
+     XXIII. CURDIE AND HIS MOTHER                         155
+      XXIV. IRENE BEHAVES LIKE A PRINCESS                 165
+       XXV. CURDIE COMES TO GRIEF                         168
+      XXVI. THE GOBLIN-MINERS                             174
+     XXVII. THE GOBLINS IN THE KING'S HOUSE               177
+    XXVIII. CURDIE'S GUIDE                                184
+      XXIX. MASON-WORK                                    189
+       XXX. THE KING AND THE KISS                         192
+      XXXI. THE SUBTERRANEAN WATERS                       196
+     XXXII. THE LAST CHAPTER                              202
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCESS AND THE GOBLIN
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+WHY THE PRINCESS HAS A STORY ABOUT HER
+
+
+THERE was once a little princess who--
+
+"_But, Mr. Author, why do you always write about princesses?_"
+
+"_Because every little girl is a princess._"
+
+"_You will make them vain if you tell them that._"
+
+"_Not if they understand what I mean._"
+
+"_Then what do you mean?_"
+
+"_What_ do you _mean by a princess?_"
+
+"_The daughter of a king._"
+
+"_Very well, then every little girl is a princess, and there would be no
+need to say anything about it, except that she is always in danger of
+forgetting her rank, and behaving as if she had grown out of the mud. I
+have seen little princesses behave like the children of thieves and
+lying beggars, and that is why they need to be told they are
+princesses. And that is why, when I tell a story of this kind, I like to
+tell it about a princess. Then I can say better what I mean, because I
+can then give her every beautiful thing I want her to have._"
+
+"_Please go on._"
+
+There was once a little princess whose father was king over a great
+country full of mountains and valleys. His palace was built upon one of
+the mountains, and was very grand and beautiful. The princess, whose
+name was Irene, was born there, but she was sent soon after her birth,
+because her mother was not very strong, to be brought up by country
+people in a large house, half castle, half farm-house, on the side of
+another mountain, about halfway between its base and its peak.
+
+The princess was a sweet little creature, and at the time my story
+begins was about eight years old. I think, but she got older very fast.
+Her face was fair and pretty, with eyes like two bits of night-sky, each
+with a star dissolved in the blue. Those eyes you would have thought
+must have known they came from there, so often were they turned up in
+that direction. The ceiling of her nursery was blue, with stars in it,
+as like the sky as they could make it. But I doubt if ever she saw the
+real sky with the stars in it, for a reason which I had better mention
+at once.
+
+These mountains were full of hollow places underneath; huge caverns, and
+winding ways, some with water running through them, and some shining
+with all colors of the rainbow when a light was taken in. There would
+not have been much known about them, had there not been mines there,
+great deep pits, with long galleries and passages running off from them,
+which had been dug to get at the ore of which the mountains were full.
+In the course of digging, the miners came upon many of these natural
+caverns. A few of them had far-off openings out on the side of a
+mountain, or into a ravine.
+
+Now in these subterranean caverns lived a strange race of beings, called
+by some gnomes, by some kobolds, by some goblins. There was a legend
+current in the country that at one time they lived above ground, and
+were very like other people. But for some reason or other, concerning
+which there were different legendary theories, the king had laid what
+they thought too severe taxes upon them, or had required observances of
+them they did not like, or had begun to treat them with more severity in
+some way or other, and impose stricter laws; and the consequence was
+that they had all disappeared from the face of the country. According to
+the legend, however, instead of going to some other country, they had
+all taken refuge in the subterranean caverns, whence they never came out
+but at night, and then seldom showed themselves in any numbers, and
+never to many people at once. It was only in the least frequented and
+most difficult parts of the mountains that they were said to gather even
+at night in the open air. Those who had caught sight of any of them said
+that they had greatly altered in the course of generations; and no
+wonder, seeing they lived away from the sun, in cold and wet and dark
+places. They were now, not ordinarily ugly, but either absolutely
+hideous, or ludicrously grotesque both in face and form. There was no
+invention, they said, of the most lawless imagination expressed by pen
+or pencil, that could surpass the extravagance of their appearance. And
+as they grew mis-shapen in body, they had grown in knowledge and
+cleverness, and now were able to do things no mortal could see the
+possibility of. But as they grew in cunning, they grew in mischief, and
+their great delight was in every way they could think of to annoy the
+people who lived in the open-air-story above them. They had enough of
+affection left for each other, to preserve them from being absolutely
+cruel for cruelty's sake to those that came in their way; but still they
+so heartily cherished the ancestral grudge against those who occupied
+their former possession, and especially against the descendants of the
+king who had caused their expulsion, that they sought every opportunity
+of tormenting them in ways that were as odd as their inventors; and
+although dwarfed and mis-shapen, they had strength equal to their
+cunning. In the process of time they had got a king, and a government of
+their own, whose chief business, beyond their own simple affairs, was to
+devise trouble for their neighbors. It will now be pretty evident why
+the little princess had never seen the sky at night. They were much too
+afraid of the goblins to let her out of the house then, even in company
+with ever so many attendants; and they had good reason, as we shall see
+by-and-by.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE PRINCESS LOSES HERSELF
+
+
+I HAVE said the Princess Irene was about eight years old when my story
+begins. And this is how it begins.
+
+One very wet day, when the mountain was covered with mist which was
+constantly gathering itself together into rain-drops, and pouring down
+on the roofs of the great old house, whence it fell in a fringe of water
+from the eaves all round about it, the princess could not of course go
+out. She got very tired, so tired that even her toys could no longer
+amuse her. You would wonder at that if I had time to describe to you one
+half of the toys she had. But then you wouldn't have the toys
+themselves, and that makes all the difference: you can't get tired of a
+thing before you have it. It was a picture, though, worth seeing--the
+princess sitting in the nursery with the sky-ceiling over her head, at a
+great table covered with her toys. If the artist would like to draw
+this, I should advise him not to meddle with the toys. I am afraid of
+attempting to describe them, and I think he had better not try to draw
+them. He had better not. He can do a thousand things I can't, but I
+don't think he could draw those toys. No man could better make the
+princess herself than he could, though--leaning with her back bowed into
+the back of the chair, her head hanging down, and her hands in her lap,
+very miserable as she would say herself, not even knowing what she would
+like, except to go out and get very wet, catch a particularly nice
+cold, and have to go to bed and take gruel. The next moment after you
+see her sitting there, her nurse goes out of the room.
+
+[Illustration: She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then
+began to be afraid.]
+
+Even that is a change, and the princess wakes up a little, and looks
+about her. Then she tumbles off her chair, and runs out of the door, not
+the same door the nurse went out of, but one which opened at the foot of
+a curious old stair of worm-eaten oak, which looked as if never any one
+had set foot upon it. She had once before been up six steps, and that
+was sufficient reason, in such a day, for trying to find out what was at
+the top of it.
+
+Up and up she ran--such a long way it seemed to her! until she came to
+the top of the third flight. There she found the landing was the end of
+a long passage. Into this she ran. It was full of doors on each side.
+There were so many that she did not care to open any, but ran on to the
+end, where she turned into another passage, also full of doors. When she
+had turned twice more, and still saw doors and only doors about her, she
+began to get frightened. It was so silent! And all those doors must hide
+rooms with nobody in them! That was dreadful. Also the rain made a great
+trampling noise on the roof. She turned and started at full speed, her
+little footsteps echoing through the sounds of the rain--back for the
+stairs and her safe nursery. So she thought, but she had lost herself
+long ago. It doesn't follow that she _was_ lost, because she had lost
+herself though.
+
+She ran for some distance, turned several times, and then began to be
+afraid. Very soon she was sure that she had lost the way back. Rooms
+everywhere, and no stair! Her little heart beat as fast as her little
+feet ran, and a lump of tears was growing in her throat. But she was too
+eager and perhaps too frightened to cry for some time. At last her hope
+failed her. Nothing but passages and doors everywhere! She threw herself
+on the floor, and began to wail and cry.
+
+She did not cry long, however, for she was as brave as could be expected
+of a princess of her age. After a good cry, she got up, and brushed the
+dust from her frock. Oh what old dust it was! Then she wiped her eyes
+with her hands, for princesses don't always have their handkerchiefs in
+their pockets any more than some other little girls I know of. Next,
+like a true princess, she resolved on going wisely to work to find her
+way back: she would walk through the passages, and look in every
+direction for the stair. This she did, but without success. She went
+over the same ground again and again without knowing it, for the
+passages and doors were all alike. At last, in a corner, through a
+half-open door, she did see a stair. But alas! it went the wrong way:
+instead of going down, it went up. Frightened as she was, however, she
+could not help wishing to see where yet further the stair could lead. It
+was very narrow, and so steep that she went up like a four-legged
+creature on her hands and feet.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE PRINCESS AND--WE SHALL SEE WHO
+
+
+WHEN she came to the top, she found herself in a little square place,
+with three doors, two opposite each other, and one opposite the top of
+the stair. She stood for a moment, without an idea in her little head
+what to do next. But as she stood, she began to hear a curious humming
+sound. Could it be the rain? No. It was much more gentle, and even
+monotonous than the sound of the rain, which now she scarcely heard. The
+low sweet humming sound went on, sometimes stopping for a little while
+and then beginning again. It was more like the hum of a very happy bee
+that had found a rich well of honey in some globular flower, than
+anything else I can think of at this moment. Where could it come from?
+She laid her ear first to one of the doors to hearken if it was
+there--then to another. When she laid her ear against the third door,
+there could be no doubt where it came from: it must be from something in
+that room. What could it be? She was rather afraid, but her curiosity
+was stronger than her fear, and she opened the door very gently and
+peeped in. What do you think she saw? A very old lady who sat spinning.
+
+"_Oh, Mr. Editor! I know the story you are going to tell: it's The
+Sleeping Beauty; only you're spinning too, and making it longer._"
+
+"_No, indeed, it is not that story. Why should I tell one that every
+properly educated child knows already? More old ladies than one have sat
+spinning in a garret. Besides, the old lady in that story was only
+spinning with a spindle, and this one was spinning with a spinning
+wheel, else how could the princess have heard the sweet noise through
+the door? Do you know the difference? Did you ever see a spindle or a
+spinning wheel? I daresay you never did. Well, ask your mamma to explain
+to you the difference. Between ourselves, however, I shouldn't wonder if
+she didn't know much better than you. Another thing is, that this is not
+a fairy story; but a goblin story. And one thing more, this old lady
+spinning was not an old nurse--but--you shall see who. I think I have
+now made it quite plain that this is not that lovely story of The
+Sleeping Beauty. It is quite a new one, I assure you, and I will try to
+tell it as prettily as I can._"
+
+Perhaps you will wonder how the princess could tell that the old lady
+was an old lady, when I inform you that not only was she beautiful, but
+her skin was smooth and white. I will tell you more. Her hair was combed
+back from her forehead and face, and hung loose far down and all over
+her back. That is not much like an old lady--is it? Ah! but it was white
+almost as snow. And although her face was so smooth, her eyes looked so
+wise that you could not have helped seeing she must be old. The
+princess, though she could not have told you why, did think her very old
+indeed--quite fifty--she said to herself. But she was rather older than
+that, as you shall hear.
+
+While the princess stared bewildered, with her head just inside the
+door, the old lady lifted hers, and said in a sweet, but old and rather
+shaky voice, which mingled very pleasantly with the continued hum of her
+wheel:
+
+"Come in, my dear; come in. I am glad to see you."
+
+That the princess was a real princess, you might see now quite plainly;
+for she didn't hang on to the handle of the door, and stare without
+moving, as I have known some do who ought to have been princesses, but
+were only rather vulgar little girls. She did as she was told, stepped
+inside the door at once, and shut it gently behind her.
+
+"Come to me, my dear," said the old lady.
+
+And again the princess did as she was told. She approached the old
+lady--rather slowly, I confess, but did not stop until she stood by her
+side, and looked up in her face with her blue eyes and the two melted
+stars in them.
+
+"Why, what have you been doing with your eyes, child?" asked the old
+lady.
+
+"Crying," answered the princess.
+
+"Why, child?"
+
+"Because I couldn't find my way down again."
+
+"But you could find your way up."
+
+"Not at first--not for a long time."
+
+"But your face is streaked like the back of a zebra. Hadn't you a
+handkerchief to wipe your eyes with?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then why didn't you come to me to wipe them for you?"
+
+"Please I didn't know you were here. I will next time."
+
+"There's a good child!" said the old lady.
+
+Then she stopped her wheel, and rose, and, going out of the room,
+returned with a little silver basin and a soft white towel, with which
+she washed and wiped the bright little face. And the princess thought
+her hands were so smooth and nice!
+
+When she carried away the basin and towel, the little princess wondered
+to see how straight and tall she was, for, although she was so old, she
+didn't stoop a bit. She was dressed in black velvet with thick white
+heavy-looking lace about it; and on the black dress her hair shone like
+silver. There was hardly any more furniture in the room than there might
+have been in that of the poorest old woman who made her bread by her
+spinning. There was no carpet on the floor--no table anywhere--nothing
+but the spinning-wheel and the chair beside it. When she came back, she
+sat down again, and without a word began her spinning once more, while
+Irene, who had never seen a spinning-wheel, stood by her side and looked
+on. When the old lady had succeeded in getting her thread fairly in
+operation again, she said to the princess, but without looking at her:
+
+"Do you know my name, child?"
+
+"No, I don't know it," answered the princess.
+
+"My name is Irene."
+
+"That's _my_ name!" cried the princess.
+
+"I know that. I let you have mine. I haven't got your name. You've got
+mine."
+
+"How can that be?" asked the princess, bewildered. "I've always had my
+name."
+
+"Your papa, the king, asked me if I had any objection to your having it;
+and of course I hadn't. I let you have it with pleasure."
+
+"It was very kind of you to give me your name--and such a pretty one,"
+said the princess.
+
+"Oh, not so _very_ kind!" said the old lady. "A name is one of those
+things one can give away and keep all the same. I have a good many such
+things. Wouldn't you like to know who I am, child?"
+
+"Yes, that I should--very much."
+
+"I'm your great-great-grandmother," said the lady.
+
+"What's that?" asked the princess.
+
+"I'm your father's mother's father's mother."
+
+"Oh, dear! I can't understand that," said the princess.
+
+"I daresay not. I didn't expect you would. But that's no reason why I
+shouldn't say it."
+
+"Oh no!" answered the princess.
+
+"I will explain it all to you when you are older," the lady went on.
+"But you will be able to understand this much now: I came here to take
+care of you."
+
+"Is it long since you came? Was it yesterday? Or was it to-day, because
+it was so wet that I couldn't get out?"
+
+"I've been here ever since you came yourself."
+
+"What a long time!" said the princess. "I don't remember it at all."
+
+"No. I suppose not."
+
+"But I never saw you before."
+
+"No. But you shall see me again."
+
+"Do you live in this room always?"
+
+"I don't sleep in it. I sleep on the opposite side of the landing. I sit
+here most of the day."
+
+"I shouldn't like it. My nursery is much prettier. You must be a queen
+too, if you are my great big grandmother."
+
+"Yes, I am a queen."
+
+"Where is your crown then?"
+
+"In my bedroom."
+
+"I _should_ like to see it."
+
+"You shall some day--not to-day."
+
+"I wonder why nursie never told me."
+
+"Nursie doesn't know. She never saw me."
+
+"But somebody knows that you are in the house?"
+
+"No; nobody."
+
+"How do you get your dinner then?"
+
+"I keep poultry--of a sort."
+
+"Where do you keep them?"
+
+"I will show you."
+
+"And who makes the chicken broth for you?"
+
+"I never kill any of my chickens."
+
+"Then I can't understand."
+
+"What did you have for breakfast this morning?"
+
+"Oh! I had bread and milk, and an egg.--I daresay you eat their eggs."
+
+"Yes, that's it. I eat their eggs."
+
+"Is that what makes your hair so white?"
+
+"No, my dear. It's old age. I am very old."
+
+"I thought so. Are you fifty?"
+
+"Yes--more than that."
+
+"Are you a hundred?"
+
+"Yes--more than that. I am too old for you to guess. Come and see my
+chickens."
+
+[Illustration: She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose such a
+flapping of wings.]
+
+Again she stopped her spinning. She rose, took the princess by the hand,
+led her out of the room, and opened the door opposite the stair. The
+princess expected to see a lot of hens and chickens, but instead of
+that, she saw the blue sky first, and then the roofs of the house, with
+a multitude of the loveliest pigeons, mostly white, but of all colors,
+walking about, making bows to each other, and talking a language she
+could not understand. She clapped her hands with delight, and up rose
+such a flapping of wings, that she in her turn was startled.
+
+"You've frightened my poultry," said the old lady, smiling.
+
+"And they've frightened me," said the princess, smiling too. "But what
+very nice poultry! Are the eggs nice?"
+
+"Yes, very nice."
+
+"What a small egg-spoon you must have! Wouldn't it be better to keep
+hens, and get bigger eggs?"
+
+"How should I feed them, though?"
+
+"I see," said the princess. "The pigeons feed themselves. They've got
+wings."
+
+"Just so. If they couldn't fly, I couldn't eat their eggs."
+
+"But how do you get at the eggs? Where are their nests?"
+
+The lady took hold of a little loop of string in the wall at the side of
+the door, and lifting a shutter showed a great many pigeon-holes with
+nests, some with young ones and some with eggs in them. The birds came
+in at the other side, and she took out the eggs on this side. She closed
+it again quickly, lest the young ones should be frightened.
+
+"Oh what a nice way!" cried the princess. "Will you give me an egg to
+eat? I'm rather hungry."
+
+"I will some day, but now you must go back, or nursie will be miserable
+about you. I daresay she's looking for you everywhere."
+
+"Except here," answered the princess. "Oh how surprised she _will_ be
+when I tell her about my great big grand-grandmother!"
+
+"Yes, that she will!" said the old lady with a curious smile. "Mind you
+tell her all about it exactly."
+
+"That I will. Please will you take me back to her?"
+
+"I can't go all the way, but I will take you to the top of the stair,
+and then you must run down quite fast into your own room."
+
+The little princess put her hand in the old lady's, who, looking this
+way and that, brought her to the top of the first stair, and thence to
+the bottom of the second, and did not leave her till she saw her half
+way down the third. When she heard the cry of her nurse's pleasure at
+finding her, she turned and walked up the stairs again, very fast indeed
+for such a very great grandmother, and sat down to her spinning with
+another strange smile on her sweet old face.
+
+About this spinning of hers I will tell you more next time.
+
+Guess what she was spinning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+WHAT THE NURSE THOUGHT OF IT
+
+
+"WHY, where can you have been, princess?" asked the nurse, taking her in
+her arms. "It's very unkind of you to hide away so long. I began to be
+afraid--"
+
+Here she checked herself.
+
+"What were you afraid of, nursie?" asked the princess.
+
+"Never mind," she answered. "Perhaps I will tell you another day. Now
+tell me where you have been?"
+
+"I've been up a long way to see my very great, huge, old grandmother,"
+said the princess.
+
+"What do you mean by that?" asked the nurse, who thought she was making
+fun.
+
+"I mean that I've been a long way up and up to see my great grandmother.
+Ah, nursie, you don't know what a beautiful mother of grandmothers I've
+got upstairs. She is _such_ an old lady! with such lovely white
+hair!--as white as my silver cup. Now, when I think of it, I think her
+hair must be silver."
+
+"What nonsense you are talking, princess!" said the nurse.
+
+"I'm not talking nonsense," returned Irene, rather offended. "I will
+tell you all about her. She's much taller than you, and much prettier."
+
+"Oh, I daresay!" remarked the nurse.
+
+"And she lives upon pigeon's eggs."
+
+"Most likely," said the nurse.
+
+"And she sits in an empty room, spin-spinning all day long."
+
+"Not a doubt of it," said the nurse.
+
+"And she keeps her crown in her bedroom."
+
+"Of course--quite the proper place to keep her crown in. She wears it in
+bed, I'll be bound."
+
+"She didn't say that. And I don't think she does. That wouldn't be
+comfortable--would it? I don't think my papa wears his crown for a
+night-cap. Does he, nursie?"
+
+"I never asked him. I daresay he does."
+
+"And she's been there ever since I came here--ever so many years."
+
+"Anybody could have told you that," said the nurse, who did not believe
+a word Irene was saying.
+
+"Why didn't you tell me then?"
+
+"There was no necessity. You could make it all up for yourself."
+
+"You don't believe me then!" exclaimed the princess, astonished and
+angry, as well she might be.
+
+"Did you expect me to believe you, princess?" asked the nurse coldly. "I
+know princesses are in the habit of telling make-believes, but you are
+the first I ever heard of who expected to have them believed," she
+added, seeing that the child was strangely in earnest.
+
+The princess burst into tears.
+
+"Well, I must say," remarked the nurse, now thoroughly vexed with her
+for crying, "it is not at all becoming in a princess to tell stories
+_and_ expect to be believed just because she is a princess."
+
+"But it's quite true, I tell you, nursie."
+
+"You've dreamt it, then, child."
+
+"No, I didn't dream it. I went up-stairs, and I lost myself, and if I
+hadn't found the beautiful lady, I should never have found myself."
+
+"Oh, I daresay!"
+
+"Well, you just come up with me, and see if I'm not telling the truth."
+
+"Indeed I have other work to do. It's your dinner-time, and I won't have
+any more such nonsense."
+
+The princess wiped her eyes, and her face grew so hot that they were
+soon quite dry. She sat down to her dinner, but ate next to nothing. Not
+to be believed does not at all agree with princesses; for a real
+princess cannot tell a lie. So all the afternoon she did not speak a
+word. Only when the nurse spoke to her, she answered her, for a real
+princess is never rude--even when she does well to be offended.
+
+Of course the nurse was not comfortable in her mind--not that she
+suspected the least truth in Irene's story, but that she loved her
+dearly, and was vexed with herself for having been cross to her. She
+thought her crossness was the cause of the princess' unhappiness, and
+had no idea that she was really and deeply hurt at not being believed.
+But, as it became more and more plain during the evening in every motion
+and look, that, although she tried to amuse herself with her toys, her
+heart was too vexed and troubled to enjoy them, her nurse's discomfort
+grew and grew. When bedtime came, she undressed and laid her down, but
+the child, instead of holding up her little mouth to be kissed, turned
+away from her and lay still. Then nursie's heart gave way altogether,
+and she began to cry. At the sound of her first sob, the princess
+turned again, and held her face to kiss her as usual. But the nurse had
+her handkerchief to her eyes, and did not see the movement.
+
+"Nursie," said the princess, "why won't you believe me?"
+
+"Because I can't believe you," said the nurse, getting angry again.
+
+"Ah! then you can't help it," said Irene, "and I will not be vexed with
+you any more. I will give you a kiss and go to sleep."
+
+"You little angel!" cried the nurse, and caught her out of bed, and
+walked about the room with her in her arms, kissing and hugging her.
+
+"You _will_ let me take you to see my dear old great big grandmother,
+won't you?" said the princess, as she laid her down again.
+
+"And _you_ won't say I'm ugly, any more--will you, princess?"
+
+"Nursie! I never said you were ugly. What can you mean?"
+
+"Well, if you didn't say it, you meant it."
+
+"Indeed, I never did."
+
+"You said I wasn't so pretty as that--"
+
+"As my beautiful grandmother--yes, I did say that; and I say it again,
+for it's quite true."
+
+"Then I _do_ think you _are_ unkind!" said the nurse, and put her
+handkerchief to her eyes again.
+
+"Nursie, dear, everybody can't be as beautiful as every other body, you
+know. You are _very_ nice-looking, but if you had been as beautiful as
+my grandmother--"
+
+"Bother your grandmother!" said the nurse.
+
+"Nurse, that's very rude. You are not fit to be spoken to--till you can
+behave better."
+
+The princess turned away once more, and again the nurse was ashamed of
+herself.
+
+"I'm sure I beg your pardon, princess," she said, though still in an
+offended tone. But the princess let the tone pass, and heeded only the
+words.
+
+"You won't say it again, I am sure," she answered, once more turning
+toward her nurse. "I was only going to say that if you had been twice as
+nice-looking as you are, some king or other would have married you, and
+then what would have become of me?"
+
+"You are an angel!" repeated the nurse, again embracing her.
+
+"Now," insisted Irene, "you _will_ come and see my grandmother--won't
+you?"
+
+"I will go with you anywhere you like, my cherub," she answered; and in
+two minutes the weary little princess was fast asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE PRINCESS LETS WELL ALONE
+
+
+WHEN she woke the next morning, the first thing she heard was the rain
+still falling. Indeed, this day was so like the last, that it would have
+been difficult to tell where was the use of it. The first thing she
+thought of, however, was not the rain, but the lady in the tower; and
+the first question that occupied her thoughts was whether she should not
+ask the nurse to fulfill her promise this very morning, and go with her
+to find her grandmother as soon as she had had her breakfast. But she
+came to the conclusion that perhaps the lady would not be pleased if she
+took anyone to see her without first asking leave; especially as it was
+pretty evident, seeing she lived on pigeons' eggs, and cooked them
+herself, that she did not want the household to know she was there. So
+the princess resolved to take the first opportunity of running up alone
+and asking whether she might bring her nurse. She believed the fact that
+she could not otherwise convince her she was telling the truth, would
+have much weight with her grandmother.
+
+The princess and her nurse were the best of friends all dressing time,
+and the princess in consequence ate an enormous little breakfast.
+
+"I wonder, Lootie"--that was her pet-name for her nurse--"what pigeons'
+eggs taste like?" she said, as she was eating her egg--not quite a
+common one, for they always picked out the pinky ones for her.
+
+"We'll get you a pigeon's egg, and you shall judge for yourself," said
+the nurse.
+
+"Oh, no, no!" returned Irene, suddenly reflecting they might disturb the
+old lady in getting it, and that even if they did not, she would have
+one less in consequence.
+
+"What a strange creature you are," said the nurse--"first to want a
+thing and then to refuse it!"
+
+But she did not say it crossly, and the princess never minded any
+remarks that were not unfriendly.
+
+"Well, you see, Lootie, there are reasons," she returned, and said no
+more, for she did not want to bring up the subject of their former
+strife, lest her nurse should offer to go before she had had her
+grandmother's permission to bring her. Of course she could refuse to
+take her, but then she would believe her less than ever.
+
+Now the nurse, as she said herself afterward, could not be every moment
+in the room, and as never before yesterday had the princess given her
+the smallest reason for anxiety, it had not yet come into her head to
+watch her more closely. So she soon gave her a chance, and the very
+first that offered, Irene was off and up the stairs again.
+
+This day's adventure, however, did not turn out like yesterday's,
+although it began like it; and indeed to-day is very seldom like
+yesterday, if people would note the differences--even when it rains. The
+princess ran through passage after passage, and could not find the stair
+of the tower. My own suspicion is that she had not gone up high enough,
+and was searching on the second instead of the third floor. When she
+turned to go back, she failed equally in her search after the stair. She
+was lost once more.
+
+Something made it even worse to bear this time, and it was no wonder
+that she cried again. Suddenly it occurred to her that it was after
+having cried before that she had found her grandmother's stair. She got
+up at once, wiped her eyes, and started upon a fresh quest. This time,
+although she did not find what she hoped, she found what was next best:
+she did not come on a stair that went up, but she came upon one that
+went down. It was evidently not the stair she had come up, yet it was a
+good deal better than none; so down she went, and was singing merrily
+before she reached the bottom. There, to her surprise, she found herself
+in the kitchen. Although she was not allowed to go there alone, her
+nurse had often taken her, and she was a great favorite with the
+servants. So there was a general rush at her the moment she appeared,
+for every one wanted to have her; and the report of where she was soon
+reached the nurse's ears. She came at once to fetch her; but she never
+suspected how she had got there, and the princess kept her own counsel.
+
+Her failure to find the old lady not only disappointed her, but made her
+very thoughtful. Sometimes she came almost to the nurse's opinion that
+she had dreamed all about her; but that fancy never lasted very long.
+She wondered much whether she should ever see her again, and thought it
+very sad not to have been able to find her when she particularly wanted
+her. She resolved to say nothing more to her nurse on the subject,
+seeing it was so little in her power to prove her words.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE LITTLE MINER
+
+
+THE next day the great cloud still hung over the mountain, and the rain
+poured like water from a full sponge. The princess was very fond of
+being out of doors, and she nearly cried when she saw that the weather
+was no better. But the mist was not of such a dark dingy gray; there was
+light in it; and as the hours went on, it grew brighter and brighter,
+until it was almost too brilliant to look at; and late in the afternoon,
+the sun broke out so gloriously that Irene clapped her hands, crying,
+
+"See, see, Lootie! The sun has had his face washed. Look how bright he
+is! Do get my hat, and let us go out for a walk. Oh dear! oh dear! how
+happy I am!"
+
+Lootie was very glad to please the princess. She got her hat and cloak,
+and they set out together for a walk up the mountain; for the road was
+so hard and steep that the water could not rest upon it, and it was
+always dry enough for walking a few minutes after the rain ceased. The
+clouds were rolling away in broken pieces, like great, overwoolly sheep,
+whose wool the sun had bleached till it was almost too white for the
+eyes to bear. Between them the sky shone with a deeper and purer blue,
+because of the rain. The trees on the road-side were hung all over with
+drops, which sparkled in the sun like jewels. The only things that were
+no brighter for the rain, were the brooks that ran down the mountain;
+they had changed from the clearness of crystal to a muddy brown; but
+what they lost in color they gained in sound--or at least in noise, for
+a brook when it is swollen is not so musical as before. But Irene was in
+raptures with the great brown streams tumbling down everywhere; and
+Lootie shared in her delight, for she too had been confined to the house
+for three days. At length she observed that the sun was getting low, and
+said it was time to be going back. She made the remark again and again,
+but, every time, the princess begged her to go on just a little farther
+and a little farther; reminding her that it was much easier to go down
+hill, and saying that when they did turn, they would be at home in a
+moment. So on and on they did go, now to look at a group of ferns over
+whose tops a stream was pouring in a watery arch, now to pick a shining
+stone from a rock by the wayside, now to watch the flight of some bird.
+Suddenly the shadow of a great mountain peak came up from behind, and
+shot in front of them. When the nurse saw it, she started and shook, and
+tremulously grasping the hand of the princess turned and began to run
+down the hill.
+
+"What's all the haste, nursie?" asked Irene, running alongside of her.
+
+"We must not be out a moment longer."
+
+"But we can't help being out a good many moments longer."
+
+It was too true. The nurse almost cried. They were much too far from
+home. It was against express orders to be out with the princess one
+moment after the sun was down; and they were nearly a mile up the
+mountain! If his Majesty, Irene's papa, were to hear of it, Lootie
+would certainly be dismissed; and to leave the princess would break her
+heart. It was no wonder she ran. But Irene was not in the least
+frightened, not knowing anything to be frightened at. She kept on
+chattering as well as she could, but it was not easy.
+
+"Lootie! Lootie! why do you run so fast? It shakes my teeth when I
+talk."
+
+"Then don't talk," said Lootie.
+
+But the princess went on talking. She was always saying, "Look, look,
+Lootie," but Lootie paid no more heed to anything she said, only ran on.
+
+"Look, look, Lootie! Don't you see that funny man peeping over the
+rock?"
+
+Lootie only ran the faster. They had to pass the rock and when they came
+nearer, the princess clearly saw that it was only a large fragment of
+the rock itself that she had mistaken for a man.
+
+"Look, look, Lootie! There's _such_ a curious creature at the foot of
+that old tree. Look at it, Lootie! It's making faces at us, I do think."
+
+Lootie gave a stifled cry, and ran faster still--so fast, that Irene's
+little legs could not keep up with her, and she fell with a clash. It
+was a hard down-hill road, and she had been running very fast--so it was
+no wonder she began to cry. This put the nurse nearly beside herself;
+but all she could do was to run on, the moment she got the princess on
+her feet again.
+
+"Who's that laughing at me?" said the princess, trying to keep in her
+sobs, and running too fast for her grazed knees.
+
+"Nobody, child," said the nurse, almost angrily.
+
+But that instant there came a burst of coarse tittering from somewhere
+near, and a hoarse indistinct voice that seemed to say, "Lies! lies!
+lies!"
+
+"Oh!" cried the nurse with a sigh that was almost a scream, and ran on
+faster than ever.
+
+"Nursie! Lootie! I can't run any more. Do let us walk a bit."
+
+"What _am_ I to do?" said the nurse. "Here, I will carry you."
+
+She caught her up; but found her much too heavy to run with, and had to
+set her down again. Then she looked wildly about her, gave a great cry,
+and said--
+
+"We've taken the wrong turning somewhere, and I don't know where we are.
+We are lost, lost!"
+
+The terror she was in had quite bewildered her. It was true enough they
+had lost the way. They had been running down into a little valley in
+which there was no house to be seen.
+
+Now Irene did not know what good reason there was for her nurse's
+terror, for the servants had all strict orders never to mention the
+goblins to her, but it was very discomposing to see her nurse in such a
+fright. Before, however, she had time to grow thoroughly alarmed like
+her, she heard the sound of whistling, and that revived her. Presently
+she saw a boy coming up the road from the valley to meet them. He was
+the whistler; but before they met, his whistling changed to singing. And
+this is something like what he sang:
+
+          "Ring! dod! bang!
+           Go the hammers' clang!
+           Hit and turn and bore!
+           Whizz and puff and roar!
+           Thus we rive the rocks.
+           Force the goblin locks.
+           See the shining ore!
+           One, two, three--
+           Bright as gold can be!
+           Four, five, six--
+           Shovels, mattocks, picks!
+           Seven, eight, nine--
+           Light your lamp at mine.
+           Ten, eleven, twelve--
+           Loosely hold the helve.
+           We're the merry miner-boys,
+           Make the goblins hold their noise."
+
+"I wish you would hold _your_ noise," said the nurse rudely, for the
+very word goblin at such a time and in such a place made her tremble. It
+would bring the goblins upon them to a certainty, she thought, to defy
+them in that way. But whether the boy heard her or not, he did not stop
+his singing.
+
+          "Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen--
+           This is worth the siftin';
+           Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen--
+           There's the match, and lay't in.
+           Nineteen, twenty--
+           Goblins in a plenty."
+
+"Do be quiet," cried the nurse, in a whispered shriek. But the boy, who
+was now close at hand, still went on.
+
+          "Hush! scush! scurry!
+           There you go in a hurry!
+           Gobble! gobble! gobblin'!
+           There you go a wobblin';
+           Hobble, hobble, hobblin'!
+           Cobble! cobble! cobblin'!
+           Hob-bob-goblin--Huuuuuh!"
+
+"There!" said the boy, as he stood still opposite them. "There! that'll
+do for them. They can't bear singing, and they can't stand that song.
+They can't sing themselves, for they have no more voice than a crow; and
+they don't like other people to sing."
+
+The boy was dressed in a miner's dress, with a curious cap on his head.
+He was a very nice-looking boy, with eyes as dark as the mines in which
+he worked, and as sparkling as the crystals in their rocks. He was about
+twelve years old. His face was almost too pale for beauty, which came of
+his being so little in the open air and the sunlight--for even
+vegetables grown in the dark are white; but he looked happy, merry
+indeed--perhaps at the thought of having routed the goblins; and his
+bearing as he stood before them had nothing clownish or rude about it.
+
+"I saw them," he went on, "as I came up; and I'm very glad I did. I knew
+they were after somebody, but I couldn't see who it was. They won't
+touch you so long as I'm with you."
+
+"Why, who are you?" asked the nurse, offended at the freedom with which
+he spoke to them.
+
+"I'm Peter's son."
+
+"Who's Peter?"
+
+"Peter the miner."
+
+"I don't know him."
+
+"I'm his son, though."
+
+"And why should the goblins mind _you_, pray?"
+
+"Because I don't mind them. I'm used to them."
+
+"What difference does that make?"
+
+"If you're not afraid of them, they're afraid of you. I'm not afraid of
+them. That's all. But it's all that's wanted--up here, that is. It's a
+different thing down there. They won't always mind that song even, down
+there. And if anyone sings it, they stand grinning at him awfully; and
+if he gets frightened, and misses a word, or says a wrong one, they--oh!
+don't they give it him!"
+
+"What do they do to him?" asked Irene, with a trembling voice.
+
+"Don't go frightening the princess," said the nurse.
+
+"The princess!" repeated the little miner, taking off his curious cap.
+"I beg your pardon; but you oughtn't to be out so late. Everybody knows
+that's against the law."
+
+"Yes, indeed it is!" said the nurse, beginning to cry again. "And I
+shall have to suffer for it."
+
+"What does that matter?" said the boy. "It must be your fault. It is the
+princess who will suffer for it. I hope they didn't hear you call her
+the princess. If they did, they're sure to know her again: they're
+awfully sharp."
+
+"Lootie! Lootie!" cried the princess. "Take me home."
+
+"Don't go on like that," said the nurse to the boy, almost fiercely.
+"How could I help it? I lost my way."
+
+"You shouldn't have been out so late. You wouldn't have lost your way if
+you hadn't been frightened," said the boy. "Come along. I'll soon set
+you right again. Shall I carry your little Highness?"
+
+"Impertinence!" murmured the nurse, but she did not say it aloud, for
+she thought if she made him angry, he might take his revenge by telling
+some one belonging to the house, and then it would be sure to come to
+the king's ears.
+
+"No, thank you," said Irene. "I can walk very well, though I can't run
+so fast as nursie. If you will give me one hand, Lootie will give me
+another, and then I shall get on famously."
+
+They soon had her between them, holding a hand of each.
+
+"Now let's run," said the nurse.
+
+"No, no," said the little miner. "That's the worst thing you can do. If
+you hadn't run before, you would not have lost your way. And if you run
+now, they will be after you in a moment."
+
+"I don't want to run," said Irene.
+
+"You don't think of _me_," said the nurse.
+
+"Yes, I do, Lootie. The boy says they won't touch us if we don't run."
+
+"Yes; but if they know at the house that I've kept you out so late, I
+shall be turned away, and that would break my heart."
+
+"Turned away, Lootie. Who would turn you away?"
+
+"Your papa, child."
+
+"But I'll tell him it was all my fault. And you know it was, Lootie."
+
+"He won't mind that. I'm sure he won't."
+
+"Then I'll cry, and go down on my knees to him, and beg him not to take
+away my own dear Lootie."
+
+The nurse was comforted at hearing this, and said no more. They went on,
+walking pretty fast, but taking care not to run a step.
+
+"I want to talk to you," said Irene to the little miner; "but it's so
+awkward! I don't know your name."
+
+"My name's Curdie, little princess."
+
+"What a funny name! Curdie! What more?"
+
+"Curdie Peterson. What's your name, please?"
+
+"Irene."
+
+"What more?"
+
+"I don't know what more.--What more is my name, Lootie?"
+
+"Princesses haven't got more than one name. They don't want it."
+
+"Oh then, Curdie, you must call me just Irene, and no more."
+
+"No, indeed," said the nurse indignantly. "He shall do no such thing."
+
+"What shall he call me, then, Lootie?"
+
+"Your royal Highness."
+
+"My royal Highness! What's that? No, no, Lootie, I will not be called
+names. I don't like them. You said to me once yourself that it's only
+rude children that call names; and I'm sure Curdie wouldn't be
+rude.--Curdie, my name's Irene."
+
+"Well, Irene," said Curdie, with a glance at the nurse which showed he
+enjoyed teasing her, "it's very kind of you to let me call you anything.
+I like your name very much."
+
+He expected the nurse to interfere again; but he soon saw that she was
+too frightened to speak. She was staring at something a few yards before
+them, in the middle of the path, where it narrowed between rocks so that
+only one could pass at a time.
+
+"It's very much kinder of you to go out of your way to take us home,"
+said Irene.
+
+"I'm not going out of my way yet," said Curdie. "It's on the other side
+those rocks the path turns off to my father's."
+
+"You wouldn't think of leaving us till we're safe home, I'm sure,"
+gasped the nurse.
+
+"Of course not," said Curdie.
+
+"You dear, good, kind Curdie! I'll give you a kiss when we get home,"
+said the princess.
+
+The nurse gave her a great pull by the hand she held. But at that
+instant the something in the middle of the way, which had looked like a
+great lump of earth brought down by the rain, began to move. One after
+another it shot out four long things, like two arms and two legs, but it
+was now too dark to tell what they were. The nurse began to tremble from
+head to foot. Irene clasped Curdie's hand yet faster, and Curdie began
+to sing again.
+
+          "One, two--
+           Hit and hew!
+           Three, four--
+           Blast and bore!
+           Five, six--
+           There's a fix!
+           Seven, eight--
+           Hold it straight.
+           Nine, ten--
+           Hit again!
+           Hurry! scurry!
+           Bother! smother!
+           There's a toad
+           In the road!
+           Smash it!
+           Squash it!
+           Fry it!
+           Dry it!
+           You're another!
+           Up and off!
+           There's enough!--Huuuuuh!"
+
+As he uttered the last words, Curdie let go his hold of his companion,
+and rushed at the thing in the road, as if he would trample it under
+his feet. It gave a great spring, and ran straight up one of the rocks
+like a huge spider. Curdie turned back laughing, and took Irene's hand
+again. She grasped his very tight, but said nothing till they had passed
+the rocks. A few yards more and she found herself on a part of the road
+she knew, and was able to speak again.
+
+[Illustration: "Never mind, Princess Irene," he said. "You mustn't kiss
+me to-night. But you sha'n't break your word. I will come another
+time."]
+
+"Do you know, Curdie, I don't quite like your song; it sounds to me
+rather rude," she said.
+
+"Well, perhaps it is," answered Curdie. "I never thought of that; it's a
+way we have. We do it because they don't like it."
+
+"Who don't like it?"
+
+"The cobs, as we call them."
+
+"Don't!" said the nurse.
+
+"Why not?" said Curdie.
+
+"I beg you won't. Please don't."
+
+"Oh, if you ask me that way, of course I won't; though I don't a bit
+know why. Look! there are the lights of your great house down below.
+You'll be at home in five minutes now."
+
+Nothing more happened. They reached home in safety. Nobody had missed
+them, or even known they had gone out; and they arrived at the door
+belonging to their part of the house without anyone seeing them. The
+nurse was rushing in with a hurried and not over-gracious good-night to
+Curdie; but the princess pulled her hand from hers, and was just
+throwing her arms around Curdie's neck, when she caught her again and
+dragged her away.
+
+"Lootie, Lootie, I promised Curdie a kiss," cried Irene.
+
+"A princess mustn't give kisses. It's not at all proper," said
+Lootie.
+
+"But I promised," said the princess.
+
+"There's no occasion; he's only a miner-boy."
+
+"He is a good boy, and a brave boy, and he has been very kind to us.
+Lootie! Lootie! I promised."
+
+"Then you shouldn't have promised."
+
+"Lootie, I promised him a kiss."
+
+"Your royal Highness," said Lootie, suddenly growing very respectful,
+"must come in directly."
+
+"Nurse, a princess must _not_ break her word," said Irene, drawing
+herself up and standing stockstill.
+
+Lootie did not know which the king might count the worst--to let the
+princess be out after sunset, or to let her kiss a miner-boy. She did
+not know that, being a gentleman, as many kings have been, he would have
+counted neither of them the worse. However much he might have disliked
+his daughter to kiss the miner-boy, he would not have had her break her
+word for all the goblins in creation. But, as I say, the nurse was not
+lady enough to understand this, and so she was in a great difficulty,
+for, if she insisted, some one might hear the princess cry and run to
+see, and then all would come out. But here Curdie came again to the
+rescue.
+
+"Never mind, Princess Irene," he said. "You mustn't kiss me to-night.
+But you sha'n't break your word. I will come another time. You may be
+sure I will."
+
+"Oh, thank you, Curdie!" said the princess, and stopped crying.
+
+"Good night, Irene; good night, Lootie," said Curdie, and turned and was
+out of sight in a moment.
+
+"I should like to see him!" muttered the nurse, as she carried the
+princess to the nursery.
+
+"You _will_ see him," said Irene. "You may be sure Curdie will keep his
+word. He's _sure_ to come again."
+
+"I should like to see him!" repeated the nurse, and said no more. She
+did not want to open a new cause of strife with the princess by saying
+more plainly what she meant. Glad enough that she had succeeded both in
+getting home unseen, and in keeping the princess from kissing the
+miner's boy, she resolved to watch her far better in future. Her
+carelessness had already doubled the danger she was in. Formerly the
+goblins were her only fear; now she had to protect her charge from
+Curdie as well.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE MINES
+
+
+CURDIE went home whistling. He resolved to say nothing about the
+princess for fear of getting the nurse into trouble, for while he
+enjoyed teasing her because of her absurdity, he was careful not to do
+her any harm. He saw no more of the goblins, and was soon fast asleep in
+his bed.
+
+He woke in the middle of the night, and thought he heard curious noises
+outside. He sat up and listened; then got up, and, opening the door very
+quietly, went out. When he peeped round the corner, he saw, under his
+own window, a group of stumpy creatures, whom he at once recognized by
+their shape. Hardly, however, had he begun his "One, two, three!" when
+they broke asunder, scurried away, and were out of sight. He returned
+laughing, got into bed again, and was fast asleep in a moment.
+
+Reflecting a little over the matter in the morning, he came to the
+conclusion that, as nothing of the kind had ever happened before, they
+must be annoyed with him for interfering to protect the princess. By the
+time he was dressed, however, he was thinking of something quite
+different, for he did not value the enmity of the goblins in the least.
+
+As soon as they had had breakfast, he set off with his father for the
+mine.
+
+They entered the hill by a natural opening under a huge rock, where a
+little stream rushed out. They followed its course for a few yards,
+when the passage took a turn, and sloped steeply into the heart of the
+hill. With many angles and windings and branchings off, and sometimes
+with steps where it came upon a natural gulf, it led them deep into the
+hill before they arrived at the place where they were at present digging
+out the precious ore. This was of various kinds, for the mountain was
+very rich with the better sorts of metals. With flint and steel, and
+tinder box, they lighted their lamps, then fixed them on their heads,
+and were soon hard at work with their pickaxes and shovels and hammers.
+Father and son were at work near each other, but not in the same
+_gang_--the passages out of which the ore was dug, they called
+_gangs_--for when the _lode_, or vein of ore, was small, one miner would
+have to dig away alone in a passage no bigger than gave him just room to
+work--sometimes in uncomfortable cramped positions. If they stopped for
+a moment they could hear everywhere around them, some nearer, some
+farther off, the sounds of their companions burrowing away in all
+directions in the inside of the great mountain--some boring holes in the
+rock in order to blow it up with gunpowder, others shoveling the broken
+ore into baskets to be carried to the mouth of the mine, others hitting
+away with their pickaxes. Sometimes, if the miner was in a very lonely
+part, he would hear only a tap-tapping, no louder than that of a
+woodpecker, for the sound would come from a great distance off through
+the solid mountain rock.
+
+The work was hard at best, for it is very warm underground; but it was
+not particularly unpleasant, and some of the miners, when they wanted to
+earn a little more money for a particular purpose, would stop behind
+the rest, and work all night. But you could not tell night from day down
+there, except from feeling tired and sleepy; for no light of the sun
+ever came into those gloomy regions. Some who had thus remained behind
+during the night, although certain there were none of their companions
+at work, would declare the next morning that they heard, every time they
+halted for a moment to take breath, a tap-tapping all about them, as if
+the mountain were then more full of miners than ever it was during the
+day; and some in consequence would never stay over night, for all knew
+those were the sounds of the goblins. They worked only at night, for the
+miners' night was the goblins' day. Indeed, the greater number of the
+miners were afraid of the goblins: for there were strange stories well
+known amongst them of the treatment some had received whom the goblins
+had surprised at their work during the night. The more courageous of
+them, however, amongst them Peter Peterson and Curdie, who in this took
+after his father, had stayed in the mine all night again and again, and
+although they had several times encountered a few stray goblins, had
+never yet failed in driving them away. As I have indicated already, the
+chief defence against them was verse, for they hated verse of every
+kind, and some kinds they could not endure at all. I suspect they could
+not make any themselves, and that was why they disliked it so much. At
+all events, those who were most afraid of them were those who could
+neither make verses themselves, nor remember the verses that other
+people made for them; while those who were never afraid were those who
+could make verses for themselves; for although there were certain old
+rhymes which were very effectual, yet it was well known that a new
+rhyme, if of the right sort, was even more distasteful to them, and
+therefore more effectual in putting them to flight.
+
+Perhaps my readers may be wondering what the goblins could be about,
+working all night long, seeing they never carried up the ore and sold
+it; but when I have informed them concerning what Curdie learned the
+very next night, they will be able to understand.
+
+For Curdie had determined, if his father would permit him, to remain
+there alone this night--and that for two reasons: first, he wanted to
+get extra wages in order that he might buy a very warm red petticoat for
+his mother, who had begun to complain of the cold of the mountain air
+sooner than usual this autumn; and second, he had just a faint
+glimmering of hope of finding out what the goblins were about under his
+window the night before.
+
+When he told his father, he made no objection, for he had great
+confidence in his boy's courage and resources.
+
+"I'm sorry I can't stay with you," said Peter; "but I want to go and pay
+the parson a visit this evening, and besides I've had a bit of a
+headache all day."
+
+"I'm sorry for that, father," said Curdie.
+
+"Oh! it's not much. You'll be sure to take care of yourself, won't you?"
+
+"Yes, father; I will. I'll keep a sharp lookout, I promise you."
+
+Curdie was the only one who remained in the mine. About six o'clock the
+rest went away, every one bidding him good night, and telling him to
+take care of himself; for he was a great favorite with them all.
+
+"Don't forget your rhymes," said one.
+
+"No, no," answered Curdie.
+
+"It's no matter if he does," said another, "for he'll only have to make
+a new one."
+
+"Yes, but he mightn't be able to make it fast enough," said another;
+"and while it was cooking in his head, they might take a mean advantage
+and set upon him."
+
+"I'll do my best," said Curdie. "I'm not afraid."
+
+"We all know that," they returned, and left him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE GOBLINS
+
+
+FOR some time Curdie worked away briskly, throwing all the ore he had
+disengaged on one side behind him, to be ready for carrying out in the
+morning. He heard a good deal of goblin-tapping, but it all sounded far
+away in the hill, and he paid it little heed. Toward midnight he began
+to feel rather hungry; so he dropped his pickaxe, got a lump of bread
+which in the morning he had laid in a damp hole in the rock, sat down on
+a heap of ore and ate his supper. Then he leaned back for five minutes'
+rest before beginning his work again, and laid his head against the
+rock. He had not kept the position for one minute before he heard
+something which made him sharpen his ears. It sounded like a voice
+inside the rock. After a while he heard it again. It was a
+goblin-voice--there could be no doubt about that--and this time he could
+make out the words.
+
+"Hadn't we better be moving?" it said.
+
+A rougher and deeper voice replied:
+
+"There's no hurry. That wretched little mole won't be through to-night,
+if he work ever so hard. He's by no means at the thinnest place."
+
+"But you still think the lode does come through into our house?" said
+the first voice.
+
+"Yes, but a good bit farther on than he has got to yet. If he had struck
+a stroke more to the side just here," said the goblin, tapping the very
+stone, as it seemed to Curdie, against which his head lay, "he would
+have been through; but he's a couple of yards past it now, and if he
+follow the lode it will be a week before it leads him in. You see it
+back there--a long way. Still, perhaps, in case of accident, it would be
+as well to be getting out of this. Helfer, you'll take the great chest.
+That's your business, you know."
+
+"Yes, dad," said a third voice. "But you must help me to get it on my
+back. It's awfully heavy, you know."
+
+"Well, it isn't just a bag of smoke, I admit. But you're as strong as a
+mountain, Helfer."
+
+"You say so, dad. I think myself I'm all right. But I could carry ten
+times as much if it wasn't for my feet."
+
+"That is your weak point, I confess, my boy."
+
+"Ain't it yours, too, father?"
+
+"Well, to be honest, it is a goblin-weakness. Why they come so soft, I
+declare I haven't an idea."
+
+"Specially when your head's so hard, you know, father."
+
+"Yes, my boy. The goblin's glory is his head. To think how the fellows
+up above there have to put on helmets and things when they go fighting.
+Ha! ha!"
+
+"But why don't we wear shoes like them, father? I should like
+it--specially when I've got a chest like that on my head."
+
+"Well, you see, it's not the fashion. The king never wears shoes."
+
+"The queen does."
+
+"Yes; but that's for distinction. The first queen, you see--I mean the
+king's first wife--wore shoes of course, because she came from upstairs;
+and so, when she died, the next queen would not be inferior to her as
+she called it, and would wear shoes too. It was all pride. She is the
+hardest in forbidding them to the rest of the women."
+
+"I'm sure I wouldn't wear them--no, not for--that I wouldn't!" said the
+first voice, which was evidently that of the mother of the family. "I
+can't think why either of them should."
+
+"Didn't I tell you the first was from upstairs?" said the other. "That
+was the only silly thing I ever knew his Majesty guilty of. Why should
+he marry an outlandish woman like that--one of our natural enemies too?"
+
+"I suppose he fell in love with her."
+
+"Pooh! pooh! He's just as happy now with one of his own people."
+
+"Did she die _very_ soon? They didn't tease her to death, did they?"
+
+"Oh dear no! The king worshipped her very footmarks."
+
+"What made her die, then? Didn't the air agree with her?"
+
+"She died when the young prince was born."
+
+"How silly of her! _We_ never do that. It must have been because she
+wore shoes."
+
+"I don't know that."
+
+"Why do they wear shoes up there?"
+
+"Ah! now that's a sensible question, and I will answer it. But in order
+to do so, I must first tell you a secret. I once saw the queen's feet."
+
+"Without her shoes?"
+
+"Yes--without her shoes."
+
+"No! Did you? How was it?"
+
+"Never you mind how it was. _She_ didn't know I saw them. And what do
+you think!--they had _toes_!"
+
+"Toes! What's that?"
+
+"You may well ask! I should never have known if I had not seen the
+queen's feet. Just imagine! the ends of her feet were split up into five
+or six thin pieces!"
+
+"Oh, horrid! How _could_ the king have fallen in love with her?"
+
+"You forget that she wore shoes. That is just why she wore them. That is
+why all the men, and women too, upstairs wear shoes. They can't bear the
+sight of their own feet without them."
+
+"Ah! now I understand. If ever you wish for shoes again, Helfer, I'll
+hit your feet--I will."
+
+"No, no, mother; pray don't."
+
+"Then don't you."
+
+"But with such a big box on my head--"
+
+A horrid scream followed, which Curdie interpreted as in reply to a blow
+from his mother upon the feet of her eldest goblin.
+
+"Well, I never knew so much before!" remarked a fourth voice.
+
+"Your knowledge is not universal quite yet," said the father. "You were
+only fifty last month. Mind you see to the bed and bedding. As soon as
+we've finished our supper, we'll be up and going. Ha! ha! ha!"
+
+"What are you laughing at, husband?"
+
+"I'm laughing to think what a mess the miners will find themselves
+in--somewhere before this day ten years."
+
+"Why, what do you mean?"
+
+"Oh, nothing."
+
+"Oh yes, you do mean something. You always do mean something."
+
+"It's more than you do, then, wife."
+
+"That may be; but it's not more than I find out, you know."
+
+"Ha! ha! You're a sharp one. What a mother you've got, Helfer!"
+
+"Yes, father."
+
+"Well, I suppose I must tell you. They're all at the palace consulting
+about it to-night; and as soon as we've got away from this thin place,
+I'm going there to hear what night they fix upon. I should like to see
+that young ruffian there on the other side, struggling in the agonies
+of--"
+
+He dropped his voice so low that Curdie could hear only a growl. The
+growl went on in a low bass for a good while, as inarticulate as if the
+goblin's tongue had been a sausage; and it was not until his wife spoke
+again that it rose to its former pitch.
+
+"But what shall we do when you are at the palace?" she asked.
+
+"I will see you safe in the new house I've been digging for you for the
+last two months. Podge, you mind the table and chairs. I commit them to
+your care. The table has seven legs--each chair three. I shall require
+them all at your hands."
+
+After this arose a confused conversation about the various household
+goods and their transport; and Curdie heard nothing more that was of any
+importance.
+
+He now knew at least one of the reasons for the constant sound of the
+goblin hammers and pickaxes at night. They were making new houses for
+themselves, to which they might retreat when the miners should threaten
+to break into their dwellings. But he had learned two things of far
+greater importance. The first was, that some grievous calamity was
+preparing, and almost ready to fall upon the heads of the miners; the
+second was--the one weak point of a goblin's body: he had not known that
+their feet were so tender as he had now reason to suspect. He had heard
+it said that they had no toes: he had never had opportunity of
+inspecting them closely enough in the dusk in which they always
+appeared, to satisfy himself whether it was a correct report. Indeed, he
+had not been able even to satisfy himself as to whether they had no
+fingers, although that also was commonly said to be the fact. One of the
+miners, indeed, who had had more schooling than the rest, was wont to
+argue that such must have been the primordial condition of humanity, and
+that education and handicraft had developed both toes and fingers--with
+which proposition Curdie had once heard his father sarcastically agree,
+alleging in support of it the probability that babies' gloves were a
+traditional remnant of the old state of things; while the stockings of
+all ages, no regard being paid in them to the toes, pointed in the same
+direction. But what was of importance was the fact concerning the
+softness of the goblin-feet, which he foresaw might be useful to all
+miners. What he had to do in the mean time, however, was to discover, if
+possible, the special evil design the goblins had now in their heads.
+
+Although he knew all the gangs and all the natural galleries with which
+they communicated in the mined part of the mountain, he had not the
+least idea where the palace of the king of the gnomes was; otherwise he
+would have set out at once on the enterprise of discovering what the
+said design was. He judged, and rightly, that it must lie in a farther
+part of the mountain, between which and the mine there was as yet no
+communication. There must be one nearly completed, however; for it could
+be but a thin partition which now separated them. If only he could get
+through in time to follow the goblins as they retreated! A few blows
+would doubtless be sufficient--just where his ear now lay; but if he
+attempted to strike there with his pickaxe, he would only hasten the
+departure of the family, put them on their guard, and perhaps lose their
+involuntary guidance. He therefore began to feel the wall with his
+hands, and soon found that some of the stones were loose enough to be
+drawn out with little noise.
+
+Laying hold of a large one with both his hands, he drew it gently out,
+and let it down softly.
+
+"What was that noise?" said the goblin father.
+
+Curdie blew out his light, lest it should shine through.
+
+"It must be that one miner that stayed behind the rest," said the
+mother.
+
+"No; he's been gone a good while. I haven't heard a blow for an hour.
+Besides, it wasn't like that."
+
+"Then I suppose it must have been a stone carried down the brook
+inside."
+
+"Perhaps. It will have more room by and by."
+
+Curdie kept quite still. After a little while, hearing nothing but the
+sounds of their preparations for departure, mingled with an occasional
+word of direction, and anxious to know whether the removal of the stone
+had made an opening into the goblins' house, he put in his hand to feel.
+It went in a good way, and then came in contact with something soft. He
+had but a moment to feel it over, it was so quickly withdrawn: it was
+one of the toeless goblin-feet. The owner of it gave a cry of fright.
+
+"What's the matter, Helfer?" asked his mother.
+
+"A beast came out of the wall, and licked my foot."
+
+"Nonsense! There are no wild beasts in our country," said his father.
+
+"But it was, father. I felt it."
+
+"Nonsense, I say. Will you malign your native realms and reduce them to
+a level with the country up-stairs? That is swarming with wild beasts of
+every description."
+
+"But I did feel it, father."
+
+"I tell you to hold your tongue. You are no patriot."
+
+Curdie suppressed his laughter, and lay still as a mouse--but no
+stiller, for every moment he kept nibbling away with his fingers at the
+edges of the hole. He was slowly making it bigger, for here the rock had
+been very much shattered with the blasting.
+
+There seemed to be a good many in the family, to judge from the mass of
+confused talk which now and then came through the hole; but when all
+were speaking together, and just as if they had bottle-brushes--each at
+least one--in their throats, it was not easy to make out much that was
+said. At length he heard once more what the father-goblin was saying.
+
+"Now then," he said, "get your bundles on your backs. Here, Helfer, I'll
+help you up with your chest."
+
+"I wish it _was_ my chest, father."
+
+"Your turn will come in good time enough! Make haste. I _must_ go to the
+meeting at the palace to-night. When that's over, we can come back and
+clear out the last of the things before our enemies return in the
+morning. Now light your torches, and come along. What a distinction it
+is to provide our own light, instead of being dependent on a thing hung
+up in the air--a most disagreeable contrivance--intended no doubt to
+blind us when we venture out under its baleful influence! Quite glaring
+and vulgar, I call it, though no doubt useful to poor creatures who
+haven't the wit to make light for themselves!"
+
+Curdie could hardly keep himself from calling through to know whether
+they made the fire to light their torches by. But a moment's reflection
+showed him that they would have said they did, inasmuch as they struck
+two stones together, and the fire came.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE HALL OF THE GOBLIN PALACE
+
+
+A SOUND of many soft feet followed, but soon ceased. Then Curdie flew at
+the hole like a tiger, and tore and pulled. The sides gave way, and it
+was soon large enough for him to crawl through. He would not betray
+himself by rekindling his lamp, but the torches of the retreating
+company, departing in a straight line up a long avenue from the door of
+their cave, threw back light enough to afford him a glance round the
+deserted home of the goblins. To his surprise, he could discover nothing
+to distinguish it from an ordinary cave in the rock, upon many of which
+he had come with the rest of the miners in the progress of their
+excavations. The goblins had talked of coming back for the rest of their
+household gear: he saw nothing that would have made him suspect a family
+had taken shelter there for a single night. The floor was rough and
+stony; the walls full of projecting corners; the roof in one place
+twenty feet high, in another endangering his forehead; while on one side
+a stream, no thicker than a needle, it is true, but still sufficient to
+spread a wide dampness over the wall, flowed down the face of the rock.
+But the troop in front of him was toiling under heavy burdens. He could
+distinguish Helfer now and then, in the flickering light and shade, with
+his heavy chest on his bending shoulders; while the second brother was
+almost buried in what looked like a great feather-bed. "Where do they
+get the feathers?" thought Curdie; but in a moment the troop disappeared
+at a turn of the way, and it was now both safe and necessary for Curdie
+to follow them, lest they should be round the next turning before he saw
+them again, for so he might lose them altogether. He darted after them
+like a grayhound. When he reached the corner and looked cautiously
+round, he saw them again at some distance down another long passage.
+None of the galleries he saw that night bore signs of the work of
+man--or of goblin either. Stalactites far older than the mines hung from
+their roofs; and their floors were rough with boulders and large round
+stones, showing that there water must have once run. He waited again at
+this corner till they had disappeared round the next, and so followed
+them a long way through one passage after another. The passages grew
+more and more lofty, and were more and more covered in the roof with
+shining stalactites.
+
+It was a strange enough procession which he followed. But the strangest
+part of it was the household animals which crowded amongst the feet of
+the goblins. It was true they had no wild animals down there--at least
+they did not know of any; but they had a wonderful number of tame ones.
+I must, however, reserve any contributions toward the natural history of
+these for a later position in my story.
+
+At length, turning a corner too abruptly, he had almost rushed into the
+middle of the goblin family; for there they had already set down all
+their burdens on the floor of a cave considerably larger than that which
+they had left. They were as yet too breathless to speak, else he would
+have had warning of their arrest. He started back, however, before any
+one saw him, and retreating a good way, stood watching till the father
+should come out to go to the palace. Before very long, both he and his
+son Helfer appeared and kept on in the same direction as before, while
+Curdie followed them again with renewed precaution. For a long time he
+heard no sound except something like the rush of a river inside the
+rock; but at length what seemed the far-off noise of a great shouting
+reached his ears, which however presently ceased. After advancing a good
+way farther, he thought he heard a single voice. It sounded clearer and
+clearer as he went on, until at last he could almost distinguish the
+words. In a moment or two, keeping after the goblins round another
+corner, he once more started back--this time in amazement.
+
+He was at the entrance of a magnificent cavern, of an oval shape, once
+probably a huge natural reservoir of water, now the great palace hall of
+the goblins. It rose to a tremendous height, but the roof was composed
+of such shining materials, and the multitude of torches carried by the
+goblins who crowded the floor lighted up the place so brilliantly, that
+Curdie could see to the top quite well. But he had no idea how immense
+the place was, until his eyes had got accustomed to it, which was not
+for a good many minutes. The rough projections on the walls, and the
+shadows thrown upward from them by the torches, made the sides of the
+chamber look as if they were crowded with statues upon brackets and
+pedestals, reaching in irregular tiers from floor to roof. The walls
+themselves were, in many parts, of gloriously shining substances, some
+of them gorgeously colored besides, which powerfully contrasted with
+the shadows. Curdie could not help wondering whether his rhymes would be
+of any use against such a multitude of goblins as filled the floor of
+the hall, and indeed felt considerably tempted to begin his shout of
+_One, two, three!_ but as there was no reason for routing them, and much
+for endeavoring to discover their designs, he kept himself perfectly
+quiet, and peeping round the edge of the doorway, listened with both his
+sharp ears.
+
+At the other end of the hall, high above the heads of the multitude, was
+a terrace-like ledge of considerable height, caused by the receding of
+the upper part of the cavern wall. Upon this sat the king and his court,
+the king on a throne hollowed out of a huge block of green copper ore,
+and his court upon lower seats around it. The king had been making them
+a speech, and the applause which followed it was what Curdie had heard.
+One of the court was now addressing the multitude. What he heard him say
+was to the following effect:
+
+"Hence it appears that two plans have been for some time together
+working in the strong head of his Majesty for the deliverance of his
+people. Regardless of the fact that we were the first possessors of the
+regions they now inhabit, regardless equally of the fact that we
+abandoned that region from the loftiest motives; regardless also of the
+self-evident fact that we excel them as far in mental ability as they
+excel us in stature, they look upon us as a degraded race, and make a
+mockery of all our finer feelings. But the time has almost arrived
+when--thanks to his Majesty's inventive genius--it will be in our power
+to take a thorough revenge upon them once for all, in respect of their
+unfriendly behavior."
+
+"May it please your Majesty--" cried a voice close by the door, which
+Curdie recognized as that of the goblin he had followed.
+
+"Who is he that interrupts the Chancellor?" cried another from near the
+throne.
+
+"Glump," answered several voices.
+
+"He is our trusty subject," said the king himself, in a slow and stately
+voice: "let him come forward and speak."
+
+A lane was parted through the crowd, and Glump having ascended the
+platform and bowed to the king, spoke as follows:
+
+"Sire, I would have held my peace, had I not known that I only knew how
+near was the moment to which the Chancellor had just referred. In all
+probability, before another day is past, the enemy will have broken
+through into my house--the partition between being even now not more
+than a foot in thickness."
+
+"Not quite so much," thought Curdie to himself.
+
+"This very evening I have had to remove my household effects; therefore
+the sooner we are ready to carry out the plan, for the execution of
+which his Majesty has been making such magnificent preparations, the
+better. I may just add, that within the last few days I have perceived a
+small outbreak in my dining-room, which combined with observations upon
+the course of the river escaping where the evil men enter, has convinced
+me that close to the spot must lie a deep gulf in its channel. This
+discovery will, I trust, add considerably to the otherwise immense
+forces at his Majesty's disposal."
+
+He ceased, and the king graciously acknowledged his speech with a bend
+of his head; whereupon Glump, after a bow to his Majesty, slid down
+amongst the rest of the undistinguished multitude. Then the Chancellor
+rose and resumed.
+
+"The information which the worthy Glump has given us," he said, "might
+have been of considerable import at the present moment, but for that
+other design already referred to, which naturally takes precedence. His
+Majesty, unwilling to proceed to extremities, and well aware that such
+measures sooner or later result in violent reactions, has excogitated a
+more fundamental and comprehensive measure, of which I need say no more.
+Should his Majesty be successful--as who dares to doubt?--then a peace,
+all to the advantage of the goblin kingdom, will be established for a
+generation at least, rendered absolutely secure by the pledge which his
+royal Highness the prince will have and hold for the good behavior of
+his relatives. Should his Majesty fail--which who shall dare even to
+imagine in his most secret thoughts?--then will be the time for carrying
+out with rigor the design to which Glump referred, and for which our
+preparations are even now all but completed. The failure of the former
+will render the latter imperative."
+
+Curdie perceiving that the assembly was drawing to a close, and that
+there was little chance of either plan being more fully discovered, now
+thought it prudent to make his escape before the goblins began to
+disperse, and slipped quietly away.
+
+There was not much danger of meeting any goblins, for all the men at
+least were left behind him in the palace; but there was considerable
+danger of his taking a wrong turning, for he had now no light, and had
+therefore to depend upon his memory and his hands. After he had left
+behind him the glow that issued from the door of Glump's new abode, he
+was utterly without guide, so far as his eyes were concerned.
+
+He was most anxious to get back through the hole before the goblins
+should return to fetch the remains of their furniture. It was not that
+he was in the least afraid of them, but, as it was of the utmost
+importance that he should thoroughly discover what the plans they were
+cherishing were, he must not occasion the slightest suspicion that they
+were watched by a miner.
+
+He hurried on, feeling his way along the walls of rock. Had he not been
+very courageous, he must have been very anxious, for he could not but
+know that if he lost his way it would be the most difficult thing in the
+world to find it again. Morning would bring no light into these regions;
+and toward him least of all, who was known as a special rhymster and
+persecutor, could goblins be expected to exercise courtesy? Well might
+he wish that he had brought his lamp and tinder-box with him, of which
+he had not thought when he crept so eagerly after the goblins! He wished
+it all the more when, after a while, he found his way blocked up, and
+could get no farther. It was of no use to turn back, for he had not the
+least idea where he had begun to go wrong. Mechanically, however, he
+kept feeling about the walls that hemmed him in. His hand came upon a
+place where a tiny stream of water was running down the face of the
+rock. "What a stupid I am!" he said to himself. "I am actually at the
+end of my journey!--and there are the goblins coming back to fetch their
+things!" he added, as the red glimmer of their torches appeared at the
+end of the long avenue that led up to the cave. In a moment he had
+thrown himself on the floor, and wriggled backward through the hole. The
+floor on the other side was several feet lower, which made it easier to
+get back. It was all he could do to lift the largest stone he had taken
+out of the hole, but he did manage to shove it in again. He sat down on
+the ore-heap and thought.
+
+He was pretty sure that the latter plan of the goblins was to inundate
+the mine by breaking outlets for the water accumulated in the natural
+reservoirs of the mountain, as well as running through portions of it.
+While the part hollowed by the miners remained shut off from that
+inhabited by the goblins, they had had no opportunity of injuring them
+thus; but now that a passage was broken through, and the goblins' part
+proved the higher in the mountain, it was clear to Curdie that the mine
+could be destroyed in an hour. Water was always the chief danger to
+which the miners were exposed. They met with a little choke-damp
+sometimes, but never with the explosive fire-damp so common in coal
+mines. Hence they were careful as soon as they saw any appearance of
+water.
+
+As the result of his reflections while the goblins were busy in their
+old home, it seemed to Curdie that it would be best to build up the
+whole of this gang, filling it with stone, and clay or lime, so that
+there should be no smallest channel for the water to get into. There was
+not, however, any immediate danger, for the execution of the goblins'
+plan was contingent upon the failure of that unknown design which was to
+take precedence of it; and he was most anxious to keep the door of
+communication open, that he might if possible discover what that former
+plan was. At the same time they could not then resume their intermitted
+labors for the inundation without his finding it out; when by putting
+all hands to the work, the one existing outlet might in a single night
+be rendered impenetrable to any weight of water; for by filling the gang
+entirely up, their embankment would be buttressed by the sides of the
+mountain itself.
+
+As soon as he found that the goblins had again retired, he lighted his
+lamp, and proceeded to fill the hole he had made with such stones as he
+could withdraw when he pleased. He then thought it better, as he might
+have occasion to be up a good many nights after this, to go home and
+have some sleep.
+
+How pleasant the night-air felt upon the outside of the mountain after
+what he had gone through in the inside of it! He hurried up the hill,
+without meeting a single goblin on the way, and called and tapped at the
+window until he woke his father, who soon rose and let him in. He told
+him the whole story, and, just as he had expected, his father thought it
+best to work that lode no farther, but at the same time to pretend
+occasionally to be at work there still, in order that the goblins might
+have no suspicions. Both father and son then went to bed, and slept
+soundly until the morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE PRINCESS'S KING-PAPA
+
+
+THE weather continued fine for weeks, and the little princess went out
+every day. So long a period of fine weather had indeed never been known
+upon that mountain. The only uncomfortable thing was that her nurse was
+so nervous and particular about being in before the sun was down, that
+often she would take to her heels when nothing worse than a fleecy cloud
+crossing the sun threw a shadow on the hillside; and many an evening
+they were home a full hour before the sunlight had left the weathercock
+on the stables. If it had not been for such behavior, Irene would by
+this time have almost forgotten the goblins. She never forgot Curdie,
+but him she remembered for his own sake, and indeed would have
+remembered him if only because a princess never forgets her debts until
+they are paid.
+
+[Illustration: In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped in his
+great strong arms.]
+
+One splendid sunshiny day, about an hour after noon, Irene, who was
+playing on a lawn in the garden, heard the distant blast of a bugle. She
+jumped up with a cry of joy, for she knew by that particular blast that
+her father was on his way to see her. This part of the garden lay on the
+slope of the hill, and allowed a full view of the country below. So she
+shaded her eyes with her hand, and looked far away to catch the first
+glimpse of shining armor. In a few moments a little troop came
+glittering round the shoulder of a hill. Spears and helmets were
+sparkling and gleaming, banners were flying, horses prancing, and
+again came the bugle-blast, which was to her like the voice of her
+father calling across the distance, "Irene, I'm coming." On and on they
+came, until she could clearly distinguish the king. He rode a white
+horse, and was taller than any of the men with him. He wore a narrow
+circle of gold set with jewels around his helmet, and as he came still
+nearer, Irene could discern the flashing of the stones in the sun. It
+was a long time since he had been to see her, and her little heart beat
+faster and faster as the shining troop approached, for she loved her
+king-papa very dearly, and was nowhere so happy as in his arms. When
+they reached a certain point, after which she could see them no more
+from the garden, she ran to the gate, and there stood till up they came
+clanging and stamping, with one more bright bugle-blast which said,
+"Irene, I am come."
+
+By this time the people of the house were all gathered at the gate, but
+Irene stood alone in front of them. When the horseman pulled up, she ran
+to the side of the white horse, and held up her arms. The king stooped,
+and took her hands. In an instant she was on the saddle, and clasped in
+his great strong arms. I wish I could describe the king, so that you
+could see him in your mind. He had gentle blue eyes, but a nose that
+made him look like an eagle. A long dark beard, streaked with silvery
+lines, flowed from his mouth almost to his waist, and as Irene sat on
+the saddle and hid her glad face upon his bosom, it mingled with the
+golden hair which her mother had given her, and the two together were
+like a cloud with streaks of the sun woven through it. After he had held
+her to his heart for a minute, he spoke to his white horse, and the
+great beautiful creature, which had been prancing so proudly a little
+while before, walked as gently as a lady--for he knew he had a little
+lady on his back--through the gate and up to the door of the house. Then
+the king set her on the ground, and, dismounting, took her hand and
+walked with her into the great hall, which was hardly ever entered
+except when he came to see his little princess. There he sat down with
+two of his councillors who had accompanied him, to have some
+refreshment, and Irene bestowed herself on his right hand, and drank her
+milk out of a wooden bowl curiously carved.
+
+After the king had eaten and drunk, he turned to the princess and said,
+stroking her hair--
+
+"Now, my child, what shall we do next?"
+
+This was the question he almost always put to her first after their meal
+together; and Irene had been waiting for it with some impatience, for
+now, she thought, she should be able to settle a question which
+constantly perplexed her.
+
+"I should like you to take me to see my great old grandmother."
+
+The king looked grave, and said--
+
+"What does my little daughter mean?"
+
+"I mean the Queen Irene that lives up in the tower--the very old lady,
+you know, with the long hair of silver."
+
+The king only gazed at his little princess with a look which she could
+not understand.
+
+"She's got her crown in her bedroom," she went on; "but I've not been in
+there yet. You know she's here, don't you?"
+
+"No," said the king very quietly.
+
+"Then it must be all a dream," said Irene. "I half thought it was; but
+I couldn't be sure. Now I _am_ sure of it. Besides, I couldn't find her
+the next time I went up."
+
+At that moment a snow-white pigeon flew in at an open window and, with a
+flutter, settled upon Irene's head. She broke into a merry laugh,
+cowered a little and put up her hands to her head, saying--
+
+"Dear dovey, don't peck me. You'll pull out my hair with your long
+claws, if you don't have a care."
+
+The king stretched out his hand to take the pigeon, but it spread its
+wings and flew again through the open window, when its whiteness made
+one flash in the sun and vanished. The king laid his hand on the
+princess's head, held it back a little, gazed in her face, smiled half a
+smile and sighed half a sigh.
+
+"Come, my child; we'll have a walk in the garden together," he said.
+
+"You won't come up and see my huge, great, beautiful grandmother, then,
+king-papa?" said the princess.
+
+"Not this time," said the king very gently. "She has not invited me, you
+know, and great old ladies like her do not choose to be visited without
+leave asked and given."
+
+The garden was a very lovely place. Being upon a mountain side, there
+were parts in it where the rocks came through in great masses, and all
+immediately about them remained quite wild. Tufts of heather grew upon
+them, and other hardy mountain plants and flowers, while near them would
+be lovely roses and lilies, and all pleasant garden flowers. This
+mingling of the wild mountain with the civilized garden was very quaint,
+and it was impossible for any number of gardeners to make such a garden
+look formal and stiff.
+
+Against one of these rocks was a garden-seat, shadowed, from the
+afternoon sun by the overhanging of the rock itself. There was a little
+winding path up to the top of the rock, and on the top another seat; but
+they sat on the seat at its foot, because the sun was hot; and there
+they talked together of many things. At length the king said:
+
+"You were out late one evening, Irene."
+
+"Yes, papa. It was my fault; and Lootie was very sorry."
+
+"I must talk to Lootie about it," said the king.
+
+"Don't speak loud to her, please, papa," said Irene. "She's been so
+afraid of being late ever since! Indeed she has not been naughty. It was
+only a mistake for once."
+
+"Once might be too often," murmured the king to himself, as he stroked
+his child's head.
+
+I cannot tell you how he had come to know. I am sure Curdie had not told
+him. Some one about the palace must have seen them, after all. He sat
+for a good while thinking. There was no sound to be heard except that of
+a little stream which ran merrily out of an opening in the rock by where
+they sat, and sped away down the hill through the garden. Then he rose,
+and leaving Irene where she was, went into the house and sent for
+Lootie, with whom he had a talk that made her cry.
+
+When in the evening he rode away upon his great white horse, he left six
+of his attendants behind him, with orders that three of them should
+watch outside the house every night, walking round and round it from
+sunset to sunrise. It was clear he was not quite comfortable about the
+princess.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+THE OLD LADY'S BEDROOM
+
+
+NOTHING more happened worth telling for some time. The autumn came and
+went by. There were no more flowers in the garden. The winds blew
+strong, and howled among the rocks. The rain fell, and drenched the few
+yellow and red leaves that could not get off the bare branches. Again
+and again there would be a glorious morning followed by a pouring
+afternoon, and sometimes, for a week together, there would be rain,
+nothing but rain, all day, and then the most lovely cloudless night,
+with the sky all out in full-blown stars--not one missing. But the
+princess could not see much of them, for she went to bed early. The
+winter drew on, and she found things growing dreary. When it was too
+stormy to go out, and she had got tired of her toys, Lootie would take
+her about the house, sometimes to the housekeeper's room, where the
+housekeeper, who was a good, kind old woman, made much of her--sometimes
+to the servants' hall or the kitchen, where she was not princess merely,
+but absolute queen, and ran a great risk of being spoiled. Sometimes she
+would run of herself to the room where the men-at-arms whom the king had
+left, sat, and they showed her their arms and accoutrements, and did
+what they could to amuse her. Still at times she found it very dreary,
+and often and often wished that her huge great grandmother had not been
+a dream.
+
+One morning the nurse left her with the housekeeper for a while. To
+amuse her, she turned out the contents of an old cabinet upon the table.
+The little princess found her treasures, queer ancient ornaments and
+many things the uses of which she could not imagine, far more
+interesting than her own toys, and sat playing with them for two hours
+or more. But at length, in handling a curious old-fashioned brooch, she
+ran the pin of it into her thumb, and gave a little scream with the
+sharpness of the pain, but would have thought little more of it, had not
+the pain increased and her thumb begun to swell. This alarmed the
+housekeeper greatly. The nurse was fetched; the doctor was sent for; her
+hand was poulticed, and long before her usual time she was put to bed.
+The pain still continued, and although she fell asleep and dreamed a
+good many dreams, there was the pain always in every dream. At last it
+woke her up.
+
+The moon was shining brightly into the room. The poultice had fallen off
+her hand, and it was burning hot. She fancied if she could hold it into
+the moonlight, that would cool it. So she got out of bed, without waking
+the nurse who lay at the other end of the room, and went to the window.
+When she looked out, she saw one of the men-at-arms walking in the
+garden, with the moonlight glancing on his armor. She was just going to
+tap on the window and call him, for she wanted to tell him all about it,
+when she bethought herself that that might wake Lootie, and she would
+put her into bed again. So she resolved to go to the window of another
+room, and call him from there. It was so much nicer to have somebody to
+talk to than to lie awake in bed with the burning pain in her hand. She
+opened the door very gently and went through the nursery, which did not
+look into the garden, to go to the other window. But when she came to
+the foot of the old staircase, there was the moon shining down from some
+window high up, and making the worm-eaten oak look very strange and
+delicate and lovely. In a moment she was putting her little feet one
+after the other in the silvery path up the stair, looking behind as she
+went, to see the shadow they made in the middle of the silver. Some
+little girls would have been afraid to find themselves thus alone in the
+middle of the night, but Irene was a princess.
+
+As she went slowly up the stairs, not quite sure that she was not
+dreaming, suddenly a great longing woke up in her heart to try once more
+whether she could not find the old, old lady with the silvery hair.
+
+"If she is a dream," she said to herself, "then I am the likelier to
+find her, if I am dreaming."
+
+So up and up she went, stair after stair, until she came to the many
+rooms--all just as she had seen them before. Through passage after
+passage she softly sped, comforting herself that if she should lose her
+way it would not matter much, because when she woke she would find
+herself in her own bed, with Lootie not far off. But as if she had known
+every step of the way, she walked straight to the door at the foot of
+the narrow stair that led to the tower.
+
+"What if I should realliality-really find my beautiful old grandmother
+up there!" she said to herself, as she crept up the steep steps.
+
+When she reached the top, she stood a moment listening in the dark, for
+there was no moon there. Yes! it was! it was the hum of the
+spinning-wheel! What a diligent grandmother to work both day and night!
+
+She tapped gently at the door.
+
+"Come in, Irene," said the sweet voice.
+
+The princess opened the door, and entered. There was the moonlight
+streaming in at the window, and in the middle of the moonlight sat the
+old lady in her black dress with the white lace, and her silvery hair
+mingling with the moonlight, so that you could not have distinguished
+one from the other.
+
+"Come in, Irene," she said again. "Can you tell me what I am spinning?"
+
+"She speaks," thought Irene, "just as if she had seen me five minutes
+ago, or yesterday at the farthest.--No," she answered; "I don't know
+what you are spinning. Please, I thought you were a dream. Why couldn't
+I find you before, great-great-grandmother?"
+
+"That you are hardly old enough to understand. But you would have found
+me sooner if you hadn't come to think I was a dream. I will give you one
+reason, though, why you couldn't find me. I didn't want you to find me."
+
+"Why, please?"
+
+"Because I did not want Lootie to know I was here."
+
+"But you told me to tell Lootie."
+
+"Yes. But I knew Lootie would not believe you. If she were to see me
+sitting spinning here, she wouldn't believe me either."
+
+"Why."
+
+"Because she couldn't. She would rub her eyes, and go away and say she
+felt queer, and forget half of it and more, and then say it had been all
+a dream."
+
+"Just like me," said Irene, feeling very much ashamed of herself.
+
+"Yes, a good deal like you, but not just like you; for you've come
+again; and Lootie wouldn't have come again. She would have said, No,
+no--she had had enough of such nonsense."
+
+"Is it naughty of Lootie then?"
+
+"It would be naughty of you. I've never done anything for Lootie."
+
+"And you did wash my face and hands for me," said Irene, beginning to
+cry.
+
+The old lady smiled a sweet smile and said--
+
+"I'm not vexed with you, my child--nor with Lootie either. But I don't
+want you to say anything more to Lootie about me. If she should ask you,
+you must just be silent. But I do not think she will ask you."
+
+All the time they talked, the old lady kept on spinning.
+
+"You haven't told me yet what I am spinning," she said.
+
+"Because I don't know. It's very pretty stuff."
+
+It was indeed very pretty stuff. There was a good bunch of it on the
+distaff attached to the spinning-wheel, and in the moonlight it shone
+like--what shall I say it was like? It was not white enough for
+silver--yes, it was like silver, but shone gray rather than white, and
+glittered only a little. And the thread the old lady drew out from it
+was so fine that Irene could hardly see it.
+
+"I am spinning this for you, my child."
+
+"For me! What am I to do with it, please?"
+
+"I will tell you by and by. But first I will tell you what it is. It is
+spider-webs--of a particular kind. My pigeons bring it me from over the
+great sea. There is only one forest where the spiders live who make this
+particular kind--the finest and strongest of any. I have nearly finished
+my present job. What is on the rock now will be quite sufficient. I have
+a week's work there yet, though," she added, looking at the bunch.
+
+"Do you work all day and night too, great-great-great-great
+grandmother?" said the princess, thinking to be very polite with so many
+_greats_.
+
+"I am not quite so great as all that," she answered, smiling almost
+merrily. "If you call me grandmother, that will do.--No. I don't work
+every night--only moonlit nights, and then no longer than the moon
+shines upon my wheel. I sha'n't work much longer to-night."
+
+"And what will you do next, grandmother?"
+
+"Go to bed. Would you like to see my bedroom?"
+
+"Yes, that I should."
+
+"Then I think I won't work any longer to-night. I shall be in good
+time."
+
+The old lady rose, and left her wheel standing just as it was. You see
+there was no good in putting it away, for where there was not any
+furniture, there was no danger of being untidy.
+
+Then she took Irene by the hand, but it was her bad hand, and Irene gave
+a little cry of pain.
+
+"My child!" said, her grandmother, "what is the matter?"
+
+Irene held her hand into the moonlight, that the old lady might see it,
+and told her all about it, at which she looked grave. But she only
+said--"Give me your other hand"; and, having led her out upon the little
+dark landing, opened the door on the opposite side of it. What was
+Irene's surprise to see the loveliest room she had ever seen in her
+life! It was large and lofty, and dome-shaped. From the centre hung a
+lamp as round as a ball, shining as if with the brightest moonlight,
+which made everything visible in the room, though not so clearly that
+the princess could tell what many of the things were. A large oval bed
+stood in the middle, with a coverlid of rose-color, and velvet curtains
+all round it of a lovely pale blue. The walls were also blue--spangled
+all over with what looked like stars of silver.
+
+The old lady left her, and going to a strange-looking cabinet, opened it
+and took out a curious silver casket. Then she sat down on a low chair,
+and calling Irene, made her kneel before her, while she looked at her
+hand. Having examined it, she opened the casket, and took from it a
+little ointment. The sweetest odor filled the room--like that of roses
+and lilies--as she rubbed the ointment gently all over the hot swollen
+hand. Her touch was so pleasant and cool, that it seemed to drive away
+the pain and heat wherever it came.
+
+"Oh, grandmother! it is _so_ nice!" said Irene. "Thank you; thank you."
+
+Then the old lady went to a chest of drawers, and took out a large
+handkerchief of gossamer-like cambric, which she tied around her hand.
+
+"I don't think that I can let you go away to-night," she said. "Do you
+think you would like to sleep with me?"
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, dear grandmother!" said Irene, and would have clapped her
+hands, forgetting that she could not.
+
+"You won't be afraid then to go to bed with such an old woman?"
+
+"No. You are so beautiful, grandmother."
+
+"But I am _very_ old."
+
+"And I suppose I am very young. You won't mind sleeping with such a
+_very_ young woman, grandmother?"
+
+"You sweet little pertness!" said the old lady, and drew her toward her,
+and kissed her on the forehead and the cheek and the mouth.
+
+Then she got a large silver basin, and having poured some water into it,
+made Irene sit on the chair, and washed her feet. This done, she was
+ready for bed. And oh, what a delicious bed it was into which her
+grandmother laid her! She hardly could have told she was lying upon
+anything: she felt nothing but the softness. The old lady having
+undressed herself, lay down beside her.
+
+"Why don't you put out your moon?" asked the princess.
+
+"That never goes out, night or day," she answered. "In the darkest
+night, if any of my pigeons are out on a message, they always see my
+moon, and know where to fly to."
+
+"But if somebody besides the pigeons were to see it--somebody about the
+house, I mean--they would come to look what it was, and find you."
+
+"The better for them then," said the old lady. "But it does not happen
+above five times in a hundred years that any one does see it. The
+greater part of those who do, take it for a meteor, wink their eyes, and
+forget it again. Besides, nobody could find the room except I pleased.
+Besides again--I will tell you a secret--if that light were to go out,
+you would fancy yourself lying in a bare garret, on a heap of old straw,
+and would not see one of the pleasant things round about you all the
+time."
+
+"I hope it will never go out," said the princess.
+
+"I hope not. But it is time we both went to sleep. Shall I take you in
+my arms?"
+
+The little princess nestled close up to the old lady, who took her in
+both her arms, and held her close to her bosom.
+
+"Oh dear! this is so nice!" said the princess. "I didn't know anything
+in the whole world could be so comfortable. I should like to lie here
+for ever."
+
+"You may if you will," said the old lady. "But I must put you to one
+trial--not a very hard one, I hope.--This night week you must come back
+to me. If you don't, I do not know when you may find me again, and you
+will soon want me very much."
+
+"Oh! please, don't let me forget."
+
+"You shall not forget. The only question is whether you will believe I
+am anywhere--whether you will believe I am anything but a dream. You may
+be sure I will do all I can to help you to come. But it will rest with
+yourself after all. On the night of next Friday, you must come to me.
+Mind now."
+
+"I will try," said the princess.
+
+"Then good night," said the old lady, and kissed the forehead which lay
+in her bosom.
+
+In a moment more the little princess was dreaming in the midst of the
+loveliest dreams--of summer seas and moonlight and mossy springs and
+great murmuring trees, and beds of wild flowers with such odors as she
+had never smelled before. But after all, no dream could be more lovely
+than what she had left behind when she fell asleep.
+
+In the morning she found herself in her own bed. There was no
+handkerchief or anything else on her hand, only a sweet odor lingering
+about it. The swelling had all gone down; the prick of the brooch had
+vanished:--in fact her hand was perfectly well.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+A SHORT CHAPTER ABOUT CURDIE
+
+
+CURDIE spent many nights in the mine. His father and he had taken Mrs.
+Peterson into the secret, for they knew mother could hold her tongue,
+which was more than could be said of all the miners' wives. But Curdie
+did not tell her that every night he spent in the mine, part of it went
+in earning a new red petticoat for her.
+
+Mrs. Peterson was such a nice good mother! All mothers are more or less,
+but Mrs. Peterson was nice and good all _more_ and no _less_. She made a
+little heaven in that poor cottage on the hillside--for her husband and
+son to go home to out of the dreary earth in which they worked. I doubt
+if the princess was very much happier even in the arms of her huge
+great-grandmother than Peter and Curdie were in the arms of Mrs.
+Peterson. True, her hands were hard, and chapped, and large, but it was
+with work for them; and therefore in the sight of the angels, her hands
+were so much the more beautiful. And if Curdie worked hard to get her a
+petticoat, she worked hard every day to get him comforts which he would
+have missed much more than she would a new petticoat even in winter. Not
+that she and Curdie ever thought of how much they worked for each other:
+that would have spoiled everything.
+
+When left alone in the mine, Curdie always worked on for an hour or two
+first, following the lode which, according to Glump, would lead at last
+into the deserted habitation. After that, he would set out on a
+reconnoitering expedition. In order to manage this, or rather the return
+from it, better than the first time, he had bought a huge ball of fine
+string, having learned the trick from Hop-o'-my-Thumb, whose history his
+mother had often told him. Not that Hop-o'-my-Thumb had ever used a ball
+of string--I should be sorry to be supposed so far out in my
+classics--but the principle was the same as that of the pebbles. The end
+of this string he fastened to his pickaxe, which figured no bad anchor,
+and then, with the ball in his hand, unrolling as he went, set out in
+the dark through the natural gangs of the goblins' territory. The first
+night or two he came upon nothing worth remembering; saw only a little
+of the home-life of the _cobs_ in the various caves they called houses;
+failed in coming upon anything to cast light upon the foregoing design
+which kept the inundation for the present in the background. But at
+length, I think on the third or fourth night, he found, partly guided by
+the noise of their implements, a company of evidently the best sappers
+and miners amongst them, hard at work. What were they about? It could
+not well be the inundation, seeing that had in the meantime been
+postponed to something else. Then what was it? He lurked and watched,
+every now and then in the greatest risk of being detected, but without
+success. He had again and again to retreat in haste, a proceeding
+rendered the more difficult that he had to gather up his string as he
+returned upon its course. It was not that he was afraid of the goblins,
+but that he was afraid of their finding out that they were watched,
+which might have prevented the discovery at which he aimed. Sometimes
+his haste had to be such that, when he reached home toward morning, his
+string for lack of time to wind it up as he "dodged the cobs," would be
+in what seemed the most hopeless entanglement; but after a good sleep
+though a short one, he always found his mother had got it right again.
+There it was, wound in a most respectable ball, ready for use the moment
+he should want it!
+
+"I can't think how you do it, mother," he would say.
+
+"I follow the thread," she would answer--"just as you do in the mine."
+
+She never had more to say about it; but the less clever she was with her
+words, the more clever she was with her hands; and the less his mother
+said, the more, Curdie believed, she had to say.
+
+But still he had made no discovery as to what the goblin miners were
+about.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE COBS' CREATURES
+
+
+ABOUT this time, the gentlemen whom the king had left behind him to
+watch over the princess, had each occasion to doubt the testimony of his
+own eyes, for more than strange were the objects to which they would
+bear witness. They were of one sort--creatures--but so grotesque and
+misshapen as to be more like a child's drawings upon his slate than
+anything natural. They saw them only at night, while on guard about the
+house. The testimony of the man who first reported having seen one of
+them was that, as he was walking slowly round the house, while yet in
+the shadow, he caught sight of a creature standing on its hind legs in
+the moonlight, with its fore feet upon a window-ledge, staring in at the
+window. Its body might have been that of a dog or wolf--he thought, but
+he declared on his honor that its head was twice the size it ought to
+have been for the size of its body, and as round as a ball, while the
+face, which it turned upon him as it fled, was more like one carved by a
+boy upon the turnip inside which he is going to put a candle, than
+anything else he could think of. It rushed into the garden. He sent an
+arrow after it, and thought he must have struck it; for it gave an
+unearthly howl, and he could not find his arrow any more than the beast,
+although he searched all about the place where it vanished. They laughed
+at him until he was driven to hold his tongue; and said he must have
+taken too long a pull at the ale-jug. But before two nights were over,
+he had one to side with him; for he too had seen something strange, only
+quite different from that reported by the other. The description the
+second man gave of the creature he had seen was yet more grotesque and
+unlikely. They were both laughed at by the rest; but night after night
+another came over to their side, until at last there was only one left
+to laugh at all his companions. Two nights more passed, and he saw
+nothing; but on the third, he came rushing from the garden to the other
+two before the house, in such an agitation that they declared--for it
+was their turn now--that the band of his helmet was cracking under his
+chin with the rising of his hair inside it. Running with him into that
+part of the garden which I have already described, they saw a score of
+creatures, to not one of which they could give a name, and not one of
+which was like another, hideous and ludicrous at once, gamboling on the
+lawn in the moonlight. The supernatural or rather subnatural ugliness of
+their faces, the length of legs and necks in some, and the apparent
+absence of both or either in others, made the spectators, although in
+one consent as to what they saw, yet doubtful, as I have said, of the
+evidence of their own eyes--and ears as well; for the noises they made,
+although not loud, were as uncouth and varied as their forms, and could
+be described neither as grunts nor squeaks nor roars nor howls nor barks
+nor yells nor screams nor croaks nor hisses nor mews nor shrieks, but
+only as something like all of them mingled in one horrible dissonance.
+Keeping in the shade, the watchers had a few moments to recover
+themselves before the hideous assembly suspected their presence; but all
+at once, as if by common consent, they scampered off in the direction
+of a great rock, and vanished before the men had come to sufficiently to
+think of following them.
+
+My readers will suspect what these were; but I will now give them full
+information concerning them. They were of course household animals
+belonging to the goblins, whose ancestors had taken their ancestors many
+centuries before from the upper regions of light into the lower regions
+of darkness. The original stocks of these horrible creatures were very
+much the same as the animals now seen about farms and homes in the
+country, with the exception of a few of them, which had been wild
+creatures, such as foxes, and indeed wolves and small bears, which the
+goblins, from their proclivity toward the animal creation, had caught
+when cubs and tamed. But in the course of time, all had undergone even
+greater changes than had passed upon their owners. They had
+altered--that is, their descendants had altered--into such creatures as
+I have not attempted to describe except in the vaguest manner--the
+various parts of their bodies assuming, in an apparently arbitrary and
+self-willed manner, the most abnormal developments. Indeed, so little
+did any distinct type predominate in some of the bewildering results,
+that you could only have guessed at any known animal as the original,
+and even then, what likeness remained would be more one of general
+expression than of definable conformation. But what increased the
+gruesomeness tenfold, was that, from constant domestic, or indeed rather
+family association with the goblins, their countenances had grown in
+grotesque resemblance to the human. No one understands animals who does
+not see that every one of them, even amongst the fishes, it may be with
+a dimness and vagueness infinitely remote, yet shadows the human: in the
+case of these the human resemblance had greatly increased: while their
+owners had sunk toward them, they hod risen toward their owners. But the
+conditions of subterranean life being equally unnatural for both, while
+the goblins were worse, the creatures had not improved by the
+approximation, and its result would have appeared far more ludicrous
+than consoling to the warmest lover of animal nature. I shall now
+explain how it was that just then these animals began to show themselves
+about the king's country house.
+
+The goblins, as Curdie had discovered, were mining on--at work both day
+and night, in divisions, urging the scheme after which he lay in wait.
+In the course of their tunneling, they had broken into the channel of a
+small stream, but the break being in the top of it, no water had escaped
+to interfere with their work. Some of the creatures, hovering as they
+often did about their masters, had found the hole, and had, with the
+curiosity which had grown to a passion from the restraints of their
+unnatural circumstances, proceeded to explore the channel. The stream
+was the same which ran out by the seat on which Irene and her king-papa
+had sat as I have told, and the goblin-creatures found it jolly fun to
+get out for a romp on a smooth lawn such as they had never seen in all
+their poor miserable lives. But although they had partaken enough of the
+nature of their owners to delight in annoying and alarming any of the
+people whom they met on the mountain, they were of course incapable of
+designs of their own, or of intentionally furthering those of their
+masters.
+
+For several nights after the men-at-arms were at length of one mind as
+to the facts of the visits of some horrible creatures, whether bodily or
+spectral they could not yet say, they watched with special attention
+that part of the garden where they had last seen them. Perhaps indeed
+they gave in consequence too little attention to the house. But the
+creatures were too cunning to be easily caught; nor were the watchers
+quick-eyed enough to descry the head, or the keen eyes in it, which,
+from the opening whence the stream issued, would watch them in turn,
+ready, the moment they left the lawn to report the place clear.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THAT NIGHT WEEK
+
+
+DURING the whole of the week, Irene had been thinking every other moment
+of her promise to the old lady, although even now she could not feel
+quite sure that she had not been dreaming. Could it really be that an
+old lady lived up in the top of the house with pigeons and a
+spinning-wheel, and a lamp that never went out? She was, however, none
+the less determined, on the coming Friday, to ascend the three stairs,
+walk through the passages with the many doors, and try to find the tower
+in which she had either seen or dreamed her grandmother.
+
+Her nurse could not help wondering what had come to the child--she would
+sit so thoughtfully silent, and even in the midst of a game with her,
+would so suddenly fall into a dreamy mood. But Irene took care to betray
+nothing, whatever efforts Lootie might make to get at her thoughts. And
+Lootie had to say to herself, "What an odd child she is!" and give it
+up.
+
+At length the long looked-for Friday arrived, and lest Lootie should be
+moved to watch her, Irene endeavored to keep herself as quiet as
+possible. In the afternoon she asked for her doll's house, and went on
+arranging and rearranging the various rooms and their inhabitants for a
+whole hour. Then she gave a sigh and threw herself back in her chair.
+One of the dolls would not sit, and another would not stand, and they
+were all very tiresome. Indeed there was one that would not even lie
+down, which was too bad. But it was now getting dark, and the darker it
+got the more exited Irene became, and the more she felt it necessary to
+be composed.
+
+"I see you want your tea, princess," said the nurse: "I will go and get
+it. The room feels close: I will open the window a little. The evening
+is mild: it won't hurt you."
+
+"There's no fear of that, Lootie," said Irene, wishing she had put off
+going for the tea till it was darker, when she might have made her
+attempt with every advantage.
+
+I fancy Lootie was longer in returning than she had intended; for when
+Irene, who had been lost in thought, looked up, she saw it was nearly
+dark, and at the same moment caught sight of a pair of eyes, bright with
+a green light, glowering at her through the open window. The next
+instant something leaped into the room. It was like a cat, with legs as
+long as a horse's, Irene said, but its body no bigger and its legs no
+thicker than those of a cat. She was too frightened to cry out, but not
+too frightened to jump from her chair and run from the room.
+
+It is plain enough to every one of my readers what she ought to have
+done--and indeed Irene thought of it herself; but when she came to the
+foot of the old stair, just outside the nursery door, she imagined the
+creature running up those long ascents after her, and pursuing her
+through the dark passages--_which, after all, might lead to no tower!_
+That thought was too much. Her heart failed her, and turning from the
+stair, she rushed along to the hall, whence, finding the front-door
+open, she darted into the court, pursued--at least she thought so--by
+the creature. No one happening to see her, on she ran, unable to think
+for fear, and ready to run anywhere to elude the awful creature with
+the stilt-legs. Not daring to look behind her, she rushed straight out
+of the gate, and up the mountain. It was foolish indeed--thus to run
+farther and farther from all who could help her, as if she had been
+seeking a fit spot for the goblin-creature to eat her in at his leisure;
+but that is the way fear serves us: it always takes the side of the
+thing that we are afraid of.
+
+The princess was soon out of breath with running up hill; but she ran
+on, for she fancied the horrible creature just behind her, forgetting
+that, had it been after her, such legs as those must have overtaken her
+long ago. At last she could run no longer, and fell, unable even to
+scream, by the roadside, where she lay for sometime, half dead with
+terror. But finding nothing lay hold of her, and her breath beginning to
+come back, she ventured at length to get half up, and peer anxiously
+about her. It was now so dark that she could see nothing. Not a single
+star was out. She could not even tell in what direction the house lay,
+and between her and home she fancied the dreadful creature lying ready
+to pounce upon her. She saw now that she ought to have run up the stairs
+at once. It was well she did not scream; for, although very few of the
+goblins had come out for weeks, a stray idler or two might have heard
+her. She sat down upon a stone, and nobody but one who had done
+something wrong could have been more miserable. She had quite forgotten
+her promise to visit her grandmother. A rain-drop fell on her face. She
+looked up, and for a moment her terror was lost in astonishment. At
+first she thought the rising moon had left her place, and drawn nigh to
+see what could be the matter with the little girl, sitting alone,
+without hat or cloak, on the dark bare mountain; but she soon saw she
+was mistaken, for there was no light on the ground at her feet, and no
+shadow anywhere. But a great silvery globe was hanging in the air; and
+as she gazed at the lovely thing, her courage revived. If she were but
+indoors again she would fear nothing, not even the terrible creature
+with the long legs! But how was she to find her way back? What could
+that light be? Could it be--? No, it couldn't. But what if it should
+be--yes--it must be--her great-great-grandmother's lamp, which guided
+her pigeons home through the darkest night! She jumped up: she had but
+to keep that light in view, and she must find the house.
+
+Her heart grew strong. Speedily, yet softly, she walked down the hill,
+hoping to pass the watching creature unseen. Dark as it was, there was
+little danger now of choosing the wrong road. And--which was most
+strange--the light that filled her eyes from the lamp, instead of
+blinding them for a moment to the object upon which they next fell,
+enabled her for a moment to see it, despite the darkness. By looking at
+the lamp and then dropping her eyes, she could see the road for a yard
+or two in front of her, and this saved her from several falls, for the
+road was very rough. But all at once, to her dismay, it vanished, and
+the terror of the beast, which had left her the moment she began to
+return, again laid hold of her heart. The same instant, however, she
+caught the light of the windows, and knew exactly where she was. It was
+too dark to run, but she made what haste she could, and reached the gate
+in safety. She found the house door still open, ran through the hall,
+and, without even looking into the nursery, bounded straight up the
+stair, and the next, and the next; then turning to the right, ran
+through the long avenue of silent rooms, and found her way at once to
+the door at the foot of the tower stair.
+
+When first the nurse missed her, she fancied she was playing her a
+trick, and for some time took no trouble about her; but at last, getting
+frightened, she had begun to search; and when the princess entered, the
+whole household was hither and thither, over the house, hunting for her.
+A few seconds after she reached the stair of the tower, they had even
+begun to search the neglected rooms, in which they would never have
+thought of looking had they not already searched every other place they
+could think of in vain. But by this time she was knocking at the old
+lady's door.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+WOVEN AND THEN SPUN
+
+
+"COME in, Irene," said the silvery voice of her grandmother.
+
+The princess opened the door, and peeped in. But the room was quite
+dark, and there was no sound of the spinning-wheel. She grew frightened
+once more, thinking that, although the room was there, the old lady
+might be a dream after all. Every little girl knows how dreadful it is
+to find a room empty where she thought somebody was; but Irene had to
+fancy for a moment that the person she came to find was nowhere at all.
+She remembered however that at night she spun only in the moonlight, and
+concluded that must be why there was no sweet, bee-like humming: the old
+lady might be somewhere in the darkness. Before she had time to think
+another thought, she heard her voice again, saying as before--
+
+"Come in, Irene."
+
+From the sound, she understood at once that she was not in the room
+beside her. Perhaps she was in her bedroom. She turned across the
+passage, feeling her way to the other door. When her hand fell on the
+lock, again the old lady spoke--
+
+"Shut the other door behind you, Irene. I always close the door of my
+workroom when I go to my chamber."
+
+Irene wondered to hear her voice so plainly through the door; having
+shut the other, she opened it and went in. Oh, what a lovely haven to
+reach from the darkness and fear through which she had come! The soft
+light made her feel as if she were going into the heart of the milkiest
+pearl; while the blue walls and their silver stars for a moment
+perplexed her with the fancy that they were in reality the sky which she
+had left outside a minute ago covered with rainclouds.
+
+[Illustration: "Come," and she still held out her arms.]
+
+"I've lighted a fire for you, Irene: you're cold and wet," said her
+grandmother.
+
+Then Irene looked again, and saw that what she had taken for a huge
+bouquet of red roses on a low stand against the wall, was in fact a fire
+which burned in the shapes of the loveliest and reddest roses, glowing
+gorgeously between the heads and wings of two cherubs of shining silver.
+And when she came nearer, she found that the smell of roses with which
+the room was filled, came from the fire-roses on the hearth. Her
+grandmother was dressed in the loveliest pale-blue velvet, over which
+her hair, no longer white, but of a rich gold color, streamed like a
+cataract, here falling in dull gathered heaps, there rushing away in
+smooth shining falls. And even as she looked, the hair seemed pouring
+down from her head, and vanishing in a golden mist ere it reached the
+floor. It flowed from under the edge of a circle of shining silver, set
+with alternated pearls and opals. On her dress was no ornament whatever,
+neither was there a ring on her hand, or a necklace or carcanet about
+her neck. But her slippers glimmered with the light of the Milky-way,
+for they were covered with seed-pearls and opals in one mass. Her face
+was that of a woman of three-and-twenty.
+
+The princess was so bewildered with astonishment and admiration that she
+could hardly thank her, and drew nigh with timidity, feeling dirty and
+uncomfortable. The lady was seated on a low chair by the side of the
+fire, with hands outstretched to take her, but the princess hung back
+with a troubled smile.
+
+"Why, what's the matter?" asked her grandmother. "You haven't been doing
+anything wrong--I know that by your face, though it _is_ rather
+miserable. What's the matter, my dear?"
+
+And still she held out her arms.
+
+"Dear grandmother," said Irene, "I'm not so sure that I haven't done
+something wrong. I ought to have run up to you at once when the
+long-legged cat came in at the window, instead of running out on the
+mountain, and making myself such a fright."
+
+"You were taken by surprise, my child, and are not so likely to do it
+again. It is when people do wrong things willfully that they are the
+more likely to do them again. Come."
+
+And still she held out her arms.
+
+"But, grandmother, you're so beautiful and grand with your crown on! and
+I am so dirty with mud and rain!--I should quite spoil your beautiful
+blue dress."
+
+With a merry little laugh, the lady sprang from her chair, more lightly
+far than Irene herself could, caught the child to her bosom, and kissing
+the tear-stained face over and over, sat down with her in her lap.
+
+"Oh, grandmother! you'll make yourself such a mess!" cried Irene,
+clinging to her.
+
+"You darling! do you think I care more for my dress than for my little
+girl? Beside--look here!"
+
+As she spoke she set her down, and Irene saw to her dismay that the
+lovely dress was covered with the mud of her fall on the mountain road.
+But the lady stooped to the fire, and taking from it, by the stalk in
+her fingers, one of the burning roses, passed it once and again and a
+third time over the front of her dress; and when Irene looked, not a
+single stain was to be discovered.
+
+"There!" said her grandmother, "you won't mind coming to me now?"
+
+But Irene again hung back, eyeing the flaming rose which the lady held
+in her hand.
+
+"You're not afraid of the rose--are you?" she said, and she was about to
+throw it on the hearth again.
+
+"Oh! don't, please!" cried Irene. "Won't you hold it to my frock and my
+hands and my face? And I'm afraid my feet and my knees want it too!"
+
+"No," answered her grandmother, smiling a little sadly, as she threw the
+rose from her; "it is too hot for you yet. It would set your frock in a
+flame. Besides, I don't want to make you clean to-night. I want your
+nurse and the rest of the people to see you as you are, for you will
+have to tell them how you ran away for fear of the long-legged cat. I
+should like to wash you, but they would not believe you then. Do you see
+that bath behind you?"
+
+The princess looked, and saw a large oval tub of silver, shining
+brilliantly in the light of the wonderful lamp.
+
+"Go and look into it," said the lady.
+
+Irene went, and came back very silently, with her eyes shining.
+
+"What did you see?" asked her grandmother.
+
+"The sky and the moon and the stars," she answered. "It looked as if
+there was no bottom to it."
+
+The lady smiled a pleased, satisfied smile, and was silent also for a
+few moments. Then she said--
+
+"Any time you want a bath, come to me. I know you have a bath every
+morning, but sometimes you want one at night too."
+
+"Thank you, grandmother; I will--I will indeed," answered Irene, and was
+again silent for some moments thinking. Then she said, "How was it,
+grandmother, that I saw your beautiful lamp--not the light of it
+only--but the great round silver lamp itself, hanging alone in the great
+open air high up? It was your lamp I saw--wasn't it?"
+
+"Yes, my child; it was my lamp."
+
+"Then how was it? I don't see a window all round."
+
+"When I please, I can make the lamp shine through the walls--shine so
+strong that it melts them away from before the sight, and shows itself
+as you saw it. But, as I told you, it is not everybody can see it."
+
+"How is it that I can then? I'm sure I don't know."
+
+"It is a gift born with you. And one day I hope everybody will have it."
+
+"But how do you make it shine through the walls?"
+
+"Ah! that you would not understand if I were to try ever so much to make
+you--not yet--not yet. But," added the lady rising, "you must sit in my
+chair while I get you the present I have been preparing for you. I told
+you my spinning was for you. It is finished now, and I am going to fetch
+it. I have been keeping it warm under one of my brooding pigeons."
+
+Irene sat down in the low chair, and her grandmother left her, shutting
+the door behind her. The child sat gazing, now at the rose-fire, now at
+the starry walls, now at the silvery light; and a great quietness came
+over her heart. If all the long-legged cats in the world had come
+rushing helter-skelter at her then, she would not have been afraid of
+them for a single moment. How this was, however, she could not
+tell;--she only knew there was no fear in her, and everything was so
+right and safe that it could not get in.
+
+She had been gazing at the lovely lamp for some minutes fixedly: turning
+her eyes, she found the wall had vanished, for she was looking out on
+the dark cloudy night. But though she heard the wind blowing, none of it
+blew upon her. In a moment more, the clouds themselves parted, or rather
+vanished like the wall, and she looked straight into the starry herds,
+flashing gloriously in the dark blue. It was but for a moment. The
+clouds gathered again and shut out the stars; the wall gathered again
+and shut out the clouds; and there stood the lady beside her with the
+loveliest smile on her face, and a shimmering ball in her hand, about
+the size of a pigeon's egg.
+
+"There, Irene; there is my work for you!" she said, holding out the ball
+to the princess.
+
+She took it in her hand, and looked at it all over. It sparkled a
+little, and shone here and shone there, but not much. It was of a sort
+of gray whiteness, something like spun glass.
+
+"Is this _all_ your spinning, grandmother?" she asked.
+
+"All since you came to the house. There is more there than you think."
+
+"How pretty it is! What am I to do with it?"
+
+"That I will now explain to you," answered the lady, turning from her,
+and going to her cabinet.
+
+She came back with a small ring in her hand. Then she took the ball from
+Irene's, and did something with the two--Irene could not tell what.
+
+"Give me your hand," she said.
+
+Irene held up her right hand.
+
+"Yes, that is the hand I want," said the lady, and put the ring on the
+forefinger of it.
+
+"What a beautiful ring!" said Irene. "What is the stone called?"
+
+"It is a fire-opal."
+
+"Please, am I to keep it?"
+
+"Always."
+
+"Oh, thank you, grandmother! It's prettier than anything I ever saw,
+except those--of all colors--in your--Please, is that your crown?"
+
+"Yes, it is my crown. The stone in your ring is of the same sort--only
+not so good. It has only red, but mine have all colors, you see."
+
+"Yes, grandmother. I will take such care of it!--But--" she added,
+hesitating.
+
+"But what?" asked her grandmother.
+
+"What am I to say when Lootie asks me where I got it?"
+
+"_You_ will ask _her_ where you got it," answered the lady smiling.
+
+"I don't see how I can do that."
+
+"You will though."
+
+"Of course I will if you say so. But you know I can't pretend not to
+know."
+
+"Of course not. But don't trouble yourself about it. You will see when
+the time comes."
+
+So saying, the lady turned, and threw the little ball into the
+rose-fire.
+
+"Oh, grandmother!" exclaimed Irene; "I thought you had spun it for me."
+
+"So I did, my child. And you've got it."
+
+"No; it's burnt in the fire."
+
+The lady put her hand in the fire, brought out the ball, glimmering as
+before, and held it toward her. Irene stretched out her hand to take it,
+but the lady turned, and going to her cabinet, opened a drawer, and laid
+the ball in it.
+
+"Have I done anything to vex you, grandmother?" said Irene pitifully.
+
+"No, my darling. But you must understand that no one ever gives anything
+to another properly and really without keeping it. That ball is yours."
+
+"Oh! I'm not to take it with me! You are going to keep it for me!"
+
+"You are to take it with you. I've fastened the end of it to the ring on
+your finger."
+
+Irene looked at the ring.
+
+"I can't see it there, grandmother," she said.
+
+"Feel--a little way from the ring--toward the cabinet," said the lady.
+
+"Oh! I do feel it!" exclaimed the princess. "But I can't see it," she
+added, looking close to her outstretched hand.
+
+"No. The thread is too fine for you to see it. You can only feel it. Now
+you can fancy how much spinning that took, although it does seem such a
+little ball."
+
+"But what use can I make of it, if it lies in your cabinet?"
+
+"That is what I will explain to you. It would be of no use to you--it
+wouldn't be yours at all if it did not lie in my cabinet. Now listen. If
+ever you find yourself in any danger--such, for example, as you were in
+this evening--you must take off your ring, and put it under the pillow
+of your bed. Then you must lay your forefinger, the same that wore the
+ring, upon the thread, and follow the thread wherever it leads you."
+
+"Oh, how delightful! It will lead me to you, grandmother, I know!"
+
+"Yes. But, remember, it may seem to you a very roundabout way indeed,
+and you must not double the thread. Of one thing you may be sure, that
+while you hold it, I hold it too."
+
+"It is very wonderful!" said Irene thoughtfully. Then suddenly becoming
+aware, she jumped up, crying--"Oh, grandmother! here I have been sitting
+all this time in your chair, and you standing! I _beg_ your pardon."
+
+The lady laid her hand on her shoulder and said:
+
+"Sit down again, Irene. Nothing pleases me better than to see any one
+sit in my chair. I am only too glad to stand so long as any one will sit
+in it."
+
+"How kind of you!" said the princess, and sat down again.
+
+"It makes me happy," said the lady.
+
+"But," said Irene, still puzzled, "won't the thread get in somebody's
+way and be broken, if the one end is fast to my ring and the other laid
+in your cabinet?"
+
+"You will find all that arranges itself. I am afraid it is time for you
+to go."
+
+"Mightn't I stay and sleep with you to-night, grandmother?"
+
+"No, not to-night. If I had meant you to stay to-night, I should have
+given you a bath; but you know everybody in the house is miserable about
+you, and it would be cruel to keep them so all night. You must go down
+stairs."
+
+"I'm so glad, grandmother, you didn't say--_go home_--for this is my
+home. Mayn't I call this my home?"
+
+"You may, my child. And I trust you will always think it your home. Now
+come. I must take you back without any one seeing you."
+
+"Please, I want to ask you one question more," said Irene. "Is it
+because you have your crown on that you look so young?"
+
+"No, child," answered her grandmother; "it is because I felt so young
+this evening, that I put my crown on. And it occurred to me that you
+would like to see your old grandmother in her best."
+
+"Why do you call yourself old? You're not old, grandmother."
+
+"I am very old indeed. It is so silly of people--I don't mean you, for
+you are such a tiny, and couldn't know better--but it is so silly of
+people to fancy that old age means crookedness and witheredness and
+feebleness and sticks and spectacles and rheumatism and forgetfulness!
+It is so silly! Old age has nothing whatever to do with all that. The
+right old age means strength and beauty and mirth and courage and clear
+eyes and strong painless limbs. I am older than you are able to think,
+and--"
+
+"And look at you, grandmother!" cried Irene, jumping up, and flinging
+her arms about her neck. "I won't be so silly again, I promise you. At
+least--I'm rather afraid to promise--but if I am, I promise to be sorry
+for it--I do. I wish I were as old as you, grandmother. I don't think
+you are ever afraid of anything."
+
+"Not for long, at least, my child. Perhaps by the time I am two thousand
+years of age, I shall, indeed, never be afraid of anything. But I must
+confess that I have sometimes been afraid about my children--sometimes
+about you, Irene."
+
+"Oh, I'm so sorry, grandmother!--To-night, I suppose, you mean."
+
+"Yes--a little to-night; but a good deal when you had all but made up
+your mind that I was a dream, and no real great-great-grandmother. You
+must not suppose that I am blaming you for that, I daresay it was out of
+your power to help it."
+
+"I don't know, grandmother," said the princess, beginning to cry. "I
+can't always do myself as I should like. And I don't always try. I'm
+very sorry anyhow."
+
+The lady stooped, lifted her in her arms, and sat down with her in her
+chair, holding her close to her bosom. In a few minutes the princess had
+sobbed herself to sleep. How long she slept, I do not know. When she
+came to herself she was sitting in her own high chair at the nursery
+table, with her doll's-house before her.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+THE RING
+
+
+THE same moment her nurse came into the room, sobbing. When she saw her
+sitting there, she started back with a loud cry of amazement and joy.
+Then running to her, she caught her up in her arms and covered her dear
+little face with kisses.
+
+"My precious darling princess! where have you been? What has happened to
+you? We've all been crying our eyes out, and searching the house from
+top to bottom for you."
+
+"Not quite from the top," thought Irene to herself; and she might have
+added--"not quite to the bottom," perhaps, if she had known all. But the
+one she would not, and the other she could not say.
+
+"Oh, Lootie! I've had such a dreadful adventure!" she replied, and told
+her all about the cat with the long legs, and how she ran out upon the
+mountain, and came back again. But she said nothing of her grandmother
+or her lamp.
+
+"And there we've been searching for you all over the house for more than
+an hour and a half!" exclaimed the nurse. "But that's no matter, now
+we've got you! Only, princess, I must say," she added, her mood
+changing, "what you ought to have done was to call for your own Lootie
+to come and help you, instead of running out of the house, and up the
+mountain, in that wild--I must say, foolish fashion."
+
+"Well, Lootie," said Irene quietly, "perhaps if you had a big cat, all
+legs, running at you, you mightn't exactly know which was the wisest
+thing to do at the moment."
+
+"I wouldn't run up the mountain, anyhow," returned Lootie.
+
+"Not if you had time to think about it. But when those creatures came at
+you that night on the mountain, you were so frightened yourself that you
+lost your way home."
+
+This put a stop to Lootie's reproaches. She had been on the point of
+saying that the long-legged cat must have been a twilight fancy of the
+princess's, but the memory of the horrors of that night, and of the
+talking-to which the king had given her in consequence, prevented her
+from saying that which after all she did not half believe--having a
+strong suspicion that the cat was a goblin; for the fact was that she
+knew nothing of the difference between the goblins and their creatures:
+she counted them all just goblins.
+
+Without another word she went and got some fresh tea and bread and
+butter for the princess. Before she returned, the whole household,
+headed by the housekeeper, burst into the nursery to exult over their
+darling. The gentlemen-at-arms followed, and were ready enough to
+believe all she told them about the long-legged cat. Indeed, though wise
+enough to say nothing about it, they remembered with no little horror,
+just such a creature amongst those they had surprised at their gambols
+upon the princess's lawn. In their own hearts they blamed themselves for
+not having kept better watch. And their captain gave order that from
+this night the front door and all the windows on the ground floor should
+be locked immediately the sun set, and opened after upon no pretence
+whatever. The men-at-arms redoubled their vigilance, and for some time
+there was no further cause of alarm.
+
+When the princess woke the next morning, her nurse was bending over her.
+
+"How your ring does glow this morning, princess!--just like a fiery
+rose!" she said.
+
+"Does it, Lootie?" returned Irene. "Who gave me the ring, Lootie? I know
+I've had it a long time, but where did I get it? I don't remember."
+
+"I think it must have been your mother gave it you, princess; but
+really, for as long as you have worn it, I don't remember that ever I
+heard," answered her nurse.
+
+"I will ask my king-papa the next time he comes," said Irene.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+SPRING-TIME
+
+
+THE spring, so dear to all creatures, young and old, came at last, and
+before the first few days of it had gone, the king rode through its
+budding valleys to see his little daughter. He had been in a distant
+part of his dominions all the winter, for he was not in the habit of
+stopping in one great city, or of visiting only his favorite country
+houses, but he moved from place to place, that all his people might know
+him. Wherever he journeyed, he kept a constant lookout for the ablest
+and best men to put into office, and wherever he found himself mistaken,
+and those he had appointed incapable or unjust, he removed them at once.
+Hence you see it was his care of the people that kept him from seeing
+his princess so often as he would have liked. You may wonder why he did
+not take her about with him; but there were several reasons against his
+doing so, and I suspect her great-great-grandmother had had a principal
+hand in preventing it. Once more Irene heard the bugle-blast, and once
+more she was at the gate to meet her father as he rode up on his great
+white horse.
+
+After they had been alone for a little while, she thought of what she
+had resolved to ask him.
+
+"Please, king-papa," she said, "will you tell me where I got this pretty
+ring? I can't remember."
+
+The king looked at it. A strange, beautiful smile spread like sunshine
+over his face, and an answering smile, but at the same time a
+questioning one, spread like moonlight over Irene's.
+
+"It was your queen-mamma's once," he said.
+
+"And why isn't it hers now?" asked Irene.
+
+"She does not want it now," said the king, looking grave.
+
+"Why doesn't she want it now?"
+
+"Because she's gone where all those rings are made."
+
+"And when shall I see her?" asked the princess.
+
+"Not for some time yet," answered the king, and the tears came in his
+eyes.
+
+Irene did not remember her mother, and did not know why her father
+looked so, and why the tears came in his eyes; but she put her arms
+round his neck and kissed him, and asked no more questions.
+
+The king was much disturbed on hearing the report of the
+gentlemen-at-arms concerning the creatures they had seen; and I presume
+would have taken Irene with him that very day, but for what the presence
+of the ring on her finger assured him of. About an hour before he left,
+Irene saw him go up the old stair; and he did not come down again till
+they were just ready to start; and she thought with herself that he had
+been up to see the old lady. When he went away, he left the other six
+gentlemen behind him, that there might be six of them always on guard.
+
+And now, in the lovely spring-weather, Irene was out on the mountain the
+greater part of the day. In the warmer hollows there were lovely
+primroses, and not so many that she ever got tired of them. As often as
+she saw a new one opening an eye of light in the blind earth, she would
+clap her hands with gladness, and, unlike some children I know, instead
+of pulling it, would touch it as tenderly as if it had been a new baby,
+and, having made its acquaintance, would leave it as happy as she found
+it. She treated the plants on which they grew like birds' nests; every
+fresh flower was like a new little bird to her. She would pay a visit to
+all the flower-nests she knew, remembering each by itself. She would go
+down on her hands and knees beside one and say "Good morning! Are you
+all smelling very sweet this morning? Good-bye!" And then she would go
+to another nest, and say the same. It was a favorite amusement with her.
+There were many flowers up and down, and she loved them all, but the
+primroses were her favorites.
+
+"They're not too shy, and they're not a bit forward," she would say to
+Lootie.
+
+There were goats too about, over the mountain, and when the little kids
+came, she was as pleased with them as with the flowers. The goats
+belonged to the miners mostly--a few of them to Curdie's mother; but
+there were a good many wild ones that seemed to belong to nobody. These
+the goblins counted theirs, and it was upon them partly that they lived.
+They set snares and dug pits for them; and did not scruple to take what
+tame ones happened to be caught; but they did not try to steal them in
+any other manner, because they were afraid of the dogs the hill-people
+kept to watch them, for the knowing dogs always tried to bite their
+feet. But the goblins had a kind of sheep of their own--very queer
+creatures, which they drove out to feed at night, and the other
+goblin-creatures were wise enough to keep good watch over them, for they
+knew they should have their bones by and by.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+CURDIE'S CLUE
+
+
+CURDIE was as watchful as ever, but was almost getting tired of his
+ill-success. Every other night or so he followed the goblins about, as
+they went on digging and boring, and getting as near them as he could,
+watched them from behind stones and rocks; but as yet he seemed no
+nearer finding out what they had in view. As at first, he always kept
+hold of the end of his string, while his pickaxe left just outside the
+hole by which he entered the goblins' country from the mine, continued
+to serve as an anchor and hold fast the other end. The goblins hearing
+no more noise in that quarter, had ceased to apprehend an immediate
+invasion, and kept no watch.
+
+One night, after dodging about and listening till he was nearly falling
+asleep with weariness, he began to roll up his ball, for he had resolved
+to go home to bed. It was not long, however, before he began to feel
+bewildered. One after another he passed goblin-houses, caves that is,
+occupied by goblin families, and at length was sure they were many more
+than he had passed as he came. He had to use great caution to pass
+unseen--they lay so close together. Could his string have led him wrong?
+He still followed winding it, and still it led him into more thickly
+populated quarters, until he became quite uneasy, and indeed
+apprehensive; for although he was not afraid of the _cobs_, he was
+afraid of not finding his way out. But what could he do? It was of no
+use to sit down and wait for the morning--the morning made no difference
+here. It was all dark, and always dark; and if his string failed him he
+was helpless. He might even arrive within a yard of the mine, and never
+know it. Seeing he could do nothing better, he would at least find where
+the end of the string was, and if possible how it had come to play him
+such a trick. He knew by the size of the ball that he was getting pretty
+near the last of it, when he began to feel a tugging and pulling at it.
+What could it mean? Turning a sharp corner, he thought he heard strange
+sounds. These grew, as he went on, to a scuffling and growling and
+squeaking; and the noise increased, until, turning a second sharp
+corner, he found himself in the midst of it, and the same moment tumbled
+over a wallowing mass, which he knew must be a knot of the cobs'
+creatures. Before he could recover his feet, he had caught some great
+scratches on his face, and several severe bites on his legs and arms.
+But as he scrambled to get up, his hand fell upon his pickaxe, and
+before the horrid beasts could do him any serious harm, he was laying
+about with it right and left in the dark. The hideous cries which
+followed gave him the satisfaction of knowing that he had punished some
+of them pretty smartly for their rudeness, and by their scampering and
+their retreating howls, he perceived that he had routed them. He stood a
+little, weighing his battle-axe in his hand as if it had been the most
+precious lump of metal--but indeed no lump of gold itself could have
+been so precious at that time as that common tool--then untied the end
+of the string from it, put the ball in his pocket, and still stood
+thinking. It was clear that the cobs' creatures had found his axe, had
+between them carried it off, and had so led him he knew not where. But
+for all his thinking he could not tell what he ought to do, until
+suddenly he became aware of a glimmer of light in the distance. Without
+a moment's hesitation he set out for it, as fast as the unknown and
+rugged way would permit. Yet again turning a corner, led by the dim
+light, he spied something quite new in his experience of the underground
+regions--a small irregular shape of something shining. Going up to it,
+he found it was a piece of mica, or Muscovy glass, called sheep-silver
+in Scotland, and the light flickering as if from a fire behind it. After
+trying in vain for some time to discover an entrance to the place where
+it was burning, he came at length to a small chamber in which an opening
+high in the wall revealed a glow beyond. To this opening he managed to
+scramble up, and then he saw a strange sight.
+
+Below sat a little group of goblins around a fire, the smoke of which
+vanished in the darkness far aloft. The sides of the cave were full of
+shining minerals like those of the palace-hall; and the company was
+evidently of a superior order, for every one wore stones about head, or
+arms, or waist, shining, dull, gorgeous colors in the light of the fire.
+Nor had Curdie looked long before he recognized the king himself, and
+found that he had made his way into the inner apartment of the royal
+family. He had never had such a good chance of hearing something! He
+crept through the hole as softly as he could, scrambled a good way down
+the wall toward them without attracting attention, and then sat down and
+listened. The king, evidently the queen, and probably the crown-prince
+and the prime minister were talking together. He was sure of the queen
+by her shoes, for as she warmed her feet at the fire, he saw them quite
+plainly.
+
+"That _will_ be fun!" said the one he took for the crown-prince.
+
+It was the first whole sentence he heard.
+
+"I don't see why you should think it such a grand affair!" said his
+stepmother, tossing her head backward.
+
+"You must remember, my spouse," interposed his Majesty, as if making
+excuse for his son, "he has got the same blood in him. His mother--"
+
+"Don't talk to me of his mother! You positively encourage his unnatural
+fancies. Whatever belongs to _that_ mother, ought to be cut out of him."
+
+"You forget yourself, my dear!" said the king.
+
+"I don't," said the queen, "nor you either. If you expect _me_ to
+approve of such coarse tastes, you will find yourself mistaken. _I_
+don't wear shoes for nothing."
+
+"You must acknowledge, however," the king said, with a little groan,
+"that this at least is no whim of Harelip's, but a matter of
+state-policy. You are well aware that his gratification comes purely
+from the pleasure of sacrificing himself to the public good. Does it
+not, Harelip?"
+
+"Yes, father; of course it does. Only it _will_ be nice to make her cry.
+I'll have the skin taken off between her toes, and tie them up till they
+grow together. Then her feet will be like other people's, and there will
+be no occasion for her to wear shoes."
+
+"Do you mean to insinuate _I've_ got toes, you unnatural wretch?" cried
+the queen; and she moved angrily toward Harelip. The councilor, however,
+who was betwixt them, leaned forward so as to prevent her touching him,
+but only as if to address the prince.
+
+"Your royal Highness," he said, "possibly requires to be reminded that
+you have got three toes yourself--one on one foot, two on the other."
+
+"Ha! ha! ha!" shouted the queen triumphantly.
+
+The councilor, encouraged by this mark of favor, went on.
+
+"It seems to me, your royal Highness, it would greatly endear you to
+your future people, proving to them that you are not the less one of
+themselves that you had the misfortune to be born of a sun-mother, if
+you were to command upon yourself the comparatively slight operation
+which, in a more extended form, you so wisely meditate with regard to
+your future princess."
+
+"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the queen, louder than before, and the king and
+the minister joined in the laugh. It was anything but a laughing matter
+to Harelip. He growled, and for a few moments the others continued to
+express their enjoyment of his discomfiture.
+
+The queen was the only one Curdie could see with any distinctness. She
+sat sideways to him, and the light of the fire shone full upon her face.
+He could not consider her handsome. Her nose was certainly broader at
+the end than its extreme length, and her eyes, instead of being
+horizontal, were set up like two perpendicular eggs, one on the broad,
+the other on the small, end. Her mouth was no bigger than a small
+buttonhole until she laughed, when it stretched from ear to ear--only
+to be sure her ears were very nearly in the middle of her cheeks.
+
+Anxious to hear everything they might say, Curdie ventured to slide down
+a smooth part of the rock just under him, to a projection below, upon
+which he thought to rest. But whether he was not careful enough, or the
+projection gave way, down he came with a rush on the floor of the
+cavern, bringing with him a great rumbling shower of stones.
+
+The goblins jumped from their seats in more anger than consternation,
+for they had never yet seen anything to be afraid of in the palace. But
+when they saw Curdie with his pick in his hand, their rage was mingled
+with fear, for they took him for the first of an invasion of miners. The
+king notwithstanding drew himself up to his full height of four feet,
+spread himself to his full breadth of three and a half, for he was the
+handsomest and squarest of all the goblins, and strutting up to Curdie,
+planted himself with outspread feet before him, and said with dignity--
+
+"Pray what right have you in my palace?"
+
+"The right of necessity, your majesty," answered Curdie. "I lost my way,
+and did not know where I was wandering to."
+
+"How did you get in?"
+
+"By a hole in the mountain."
+
+"But you are a miner! Look at your pickaxe!"
+
+Curdie did look at it, answering,
+
+"I came upon it, lying on the ground, a little way from here. I tumbled
+over some wild beasts who were playing with it. Look, your majesty." And
+Curdie showed him how he was scratched and bitten.
+
+[Illustration: The goblins fell back a little when he began, and made
+horrible grimaces all through the rhyme.]
+
+The king was pleased to find him behave more politely than he had
+expected from what his people had told him concerning the miners, for he
+attributed it to the power of his own presence; but he did not therefore
+feel friendly to the intruder.
+
+"You will oblige me by walking out of my dominions at once," he said,
+well knowing what a mockery lay in the words.
+
+"With pleasure, if your majesty will give me a guide," said Curdie.
+
+"I will give you a thousand," said the king, with a scoffing air of
+magnificent liberality.
+
+"One will be quite sufficient," said Curdie.
+
+But the king uttered a strange shout, half halloo, half roar, and in
+rushed goblins till the cave was swarming. He said something to the
+first of them which Curdie could not hear, and it was passed from one to
+another till in a moment the farthest in the crowd had evidently heard
+and understood it. They began to gather about him in a way he did not
+relish, and he retreated toward the wall. They pressed upon him.
+
+"Stand back," said Curdie, grasping his pickaxe tighter by his knee.
+
+They only grinned and pressed closer. Curdie bethought himself, and
+began to rhyme.
+
+          "Ten, twenty, thirty--
+           You're all so very dirty!
+           Twenty, thirty, forty--
+           You're all so thick and snorty!
+
+          "Thirty, forty, fifty--
+           You're all so puff-and-snifty!
+           Forty, fifty, sixty--
+           Beast and man so mixty!
+
+          "Fifty, sixty, seventy--
+           Mixty, maxty, leaventy--
+           Sixty, seventy, eighty--
+           All your cheeks so slaty.
+
+          "Seventy, eighty, ninety,
+           All your hands so flinty!
+           Eighty, ninety, hundred,
+           Altogether dundred!"
+
+The goblins fell back a little when he began, and made horrible grimaces
+all through the rhyme, as if eating something so disagreeable that it
+set their teeth on edge and gave them the creeps; but whether it was
+that the rhyming words were most of them no words at all, for a new
+rhyme being considered more efficacious, Curdie had made it on the spur
+of the moment, or whether it was that the presence of the king and queen
+gave them courage, I cannot tell; but the moment the rhyme was over,
+they crowded on him again, and out shot a hundred long arms, with a
+multitude of thick nailless fingers at the end of them, to lay hold upon
+him. Then Curdie heaved up his axe. But being as gentle as courageous
+and not wishing to kill any of them, he turned the end which was square
+and blunt like a hammer, and with that came down a great blow on the
+head of the goblin nearest him. Hard as the heads of all goblins are, he
+thought he must feel that. And so he did, no doubt; but he only gave a
+horrible cry, and sprung at Curdie's throat. Curdie however drew back in
+time, and just at that critical moment, remembered the vulnerable part
+of the goblin-body. He made a sudden rush at the king, and stamped with
+all his might on his Majesty's feet. The king gave a most unkingly howl,
+and almost fell into the fire. Curdie then rushed into the crowd,
+stamping right and left. The goblins drew back howling on every side as
+he approached, but they were so crowded that few of those he attacked
+could escape his tread; and the shrieking and roaring that filled the
+cave would have appalled Curdie, but for the good hope it gave him. They
+were tumbling over each other in heaps in their eagerness to rush from
+the cave, when a new assailant suddenly faced him:--the queen, with
+flaming eyes and expanded nostrils, her hair standing half up from her
+head, rushed at him. She trusted in her shoes; they were of
+granite--hollowed like French _sabots_. Curdie would have endured much
+rather than hurt a woman, even if she was a goblin; but here was an
+affair of life and death: forgetting her shoes, he made a great stamp on
+one of her feet. But she instantly returned it with very different
+effect, causing him frightful pain and almost disabling him. His only
+chance with her would have been to attack the granite shoes with his
+pickaxe, but before he could think of that, she had caught him up in her
+arms, and was rushing with him across the cave. She dashed him into a
+hole in the wall, with a force that almost stunned him. But although he
+could not move, he was not too far gone to hear her great cry, and the
+rush of multitudes of soft feet, followed by the sounds of something
+heaved up against the rock; after which came a multitudinous patter of
+stones falling near him. The last had not ceased when he grew very
+faint, for his head had been badly cut, and at last insensible.
+
+When he came to himself, there was perfect silence about him, and utter
+darkness, but for the merest glimmer in one tiny spot. He crawled to it,
+and found that they had heaved a slab against the mouth of the hole,
+past the edge of which a poor little gleam found its way from the fire.
+He could not move it a hair's breadth, for they had piled a great heap
+of stones against it. He crawled back to where he had been lying, in the
+faint hope of finding his pickaxe. But after a vain search, he was at
+last compelled to acknowledge himself in an evil plight. He sat down and
+tried to think, but soon fell fast asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+GOBLIN COUNSELS
+
+
+HE must have slept a long time, for when he awoke, he felt wonderfully
+restored--indeed he felt almost well, and he was also very hungry. There
+were voices in the outer cave.
+
+Once more then, it was night; for the goblins slept during the day, and
+went about their affairs during the night.
+
+In the universal and constant darkness of their dwelling, they had no
+reason to prefer the one arrangement to the other; but from aversion to
+the sun-people, they chose to be busy when there was least chance of
+their being met either by the miners below, when they were burrowing, or
+by the people of the mountain above, when they were feeding their sheep
+or catching their goats. And indeed it was only when the sun was away
+that the outside of the mountain was sufficiently like their own dismal
+regions to be endurable to their mole-eyes, so thoroughly had they
+become disused to any light beyond that of their own fires and torches.
+
+Curdie listened, and soon found that they were talking of himself.
+
+"How long will it take?" asked Harelip.
+
+"Not many days, I should think," answered the king. "They are poor
+feeble creatures, those sun-people, and want to be always eating. _We_
+can go a week at a time without food, and be all the better for it; but
+I've been told _they_ eat two or three times every day! Can you believe
+it?--They must be quite hollow inside--not at all like us, nine-tenths
+of whose bulk is solid flesh and bone. Yes--I judge a week of starvation
+will do for him."
+
+"If I may be allowed a word," interposed the queen, "--and I think I
+ought to have some voice in the matter--"
+
+"The wretch is entirely at your disposal, my spouse," interrupted the
+king. "He is your property. You caught him yourself. We should never
+have done it."
+
+The queen laughed. She seemed in far better humor than the night before.
+
+"I was about to say," she resumed, "that it does seem a pity to waste so
+much fresh meat."
+
+"What are you thinking of, my love?" said the king. "The very notion of
+starving him implies that we are not going to give him any meat, either
+salt or fresh."
+
+"I'm not such a stupid as that comes to," returned her Majesty. "What I
+mean is, that by the time he is starved, there will hardly be a picking
+upon his bones."
+
+The king gave a great laugh.
+
+"Well, my spouse, you may have him when you like," he said. "I don't
+fancy him for my part. I am pretty sure he is tough eating."
+
+"That would be to honor instead of punish his insolence," returned the
+queen. "But why should our poor creatures be deprived of so much
+nourishment? Our little dogs and cats and pigs and small bears would
+enjoy him very much."
+
+"You are the best of housekeepers, my lovely queen!" said her husband.
+"Let it be so by all means. Let us have our people in, and get him out
+and kill him at once. He deserves it. The mischief he might have brought
+upon us, now that he had penetrated so far as our most retired citadel,
+is incalculable. Or rather let us tie him hand and foot, and have the
+pleasure of seeing him torn to pieces by full torchlight in the great
+hall."
+
+"Better and better!" cried the queen and prince together, both of them
+clapping their hands. And the prince made an ugly noise with his
+hare-lip, just as if he had intended to be one at the feast.
+
+"But," added the queen, bethinking herself, "he is so troublesome. For
+as poor creatures as they are, there is something about those sun-people
+that is _very_ troublesome. I cannot imagine how it is that with such
+superior strength and skill and understanding as ours, we permit them to
+exist at all. Why do we not destroy them entirely, and use their cattle
+and grazing lands at our pleasure? Of course, we don't want to live in
+their horrid country! It is far too glaring for our quieter and more
+refined tastes. But we might use it for a sort of outhouse, you know.
+Even our creatures' eyes might get used to it, and if they did grow
+blind, that would be of no consequence, provided they grew fat as well.
+But we might even keep their great cows and other creatures, and then we
+should have a few more luxuries, such as cream and cheese, which at
+present we only taste occasionally, when our brave men have succeeded in
+carrying some off from their farms."
+
+"It is worth thinking of," said the king; "and I don't know why you
+should be the first to suggest it, except that you have a positive
+genius for conquest. But still, as you say, there is something very
+troublesome about them; and it would be better, as I understand you to
+suggest, that we should starve him for a day or two first, so that he
+may be a little less frisky when we take him out."
+
+          "Once there was a goblin
+           Living in a hole;
+           Busy he was cobblin'
+           A shoe without a sole.
+
+          "By came a birdie:
+           'Goblin, what do you do?'
+           'Cobble at a sturdie
+           Upper leather shoe.'
+
+          "'What's the good o' that, sir?'
+           Said the little bird,
+           'Why it's very pat, sir--
+           Plain without a word.
+
+          "'Where 'tis all a hill, sir,
+           Never can be holes:
+           Why should their shoes have soles, sir,
+           When they've got no souls?'"
+
+"What's that horrible noise?" cried the queen, shuddering from pot-metal
+head to granite shoes.
+
+"I declare," said the king with solemn indignation, "it's the
+sun-creature in the hole!"
+
+"Stop that disgusting noise!" cried the crown-prince valiantly, getting
+up and standing in front of the heap of stones, with his face toward
+Curdie's prison.--"Do now, or I'll break your head."
+
+"Break away," shouted Curdie, and began singing again--
+
+          "Once there was a goblin
+           Living in a hole,--"
+
+"I really cannot bear it," said the queen. "If I could only get at his
+horrid toes with my slippers again!"
+
+"I think we had better go to bed," said the king.
+
+"It's not time to go to bed," said the queen.
+
+"I would if I was you," said Curdie.
+
+"Impertinent wretch!" said the queen, with the utmost scorn in her
+voice.
+
+"An impossible _if_," said his Majesty with dignity.
+
+"Quite," returned Curdie, and began singing again--
+
+          "Go to bed,
+           Goblin, do.
+           Help the queen
+           Take off her shoe.
+
+          "If you do,
+           It will disclose
+           A horrid set
+           Of sprouting toes."
+
+"What a lie!" roared the queen in a rage.
+
+"By the way, that reminds me," said the king, "that, for as long as we
+have been married, I have never seen your feet, queen. I think you might
+take off your shoes when you go to bed! They positively hurt me
+sometimes."
+
+"I will do just as I like," retorted the queen sulkily.
+
+"You ought to do as your hubby wishes you," said the king.
+
+"I will not," said the queen.
+
+"Then I insist upon it," said the king.
+
+Apparently his Majesty approached the queen for the purpose of following
+the advice given by Curdie, for the latter heard a scuffle, and then a
+great roar from the king.
+
+"Will you be quiet then?" said the queen wickedly.
+
+"Yes, yes, queen. I only meant to coax you."
+
+"Hands off!" cried the queen triumphantly. "I'm going to bed. You may
+come when you like. But as long as I am queen, I will sleep in my shoes.
+It is my royal privilege. Harelip, go to bed."
+
+"I'm going," said Harelip sleepily.
+
+"So am I," said the king.
+
+"Come along then," said the queen; "and mind you are good, or I'll--"
+
+"Oh, no, no, no!" screamed the king, in the most supplicating of tones.
+
+Curdie heard only a muttered reply in the distance; and then the cave
+was quite still.
+
+They had left the fire burning, and the light came through brighter than
+before. Curdie thought it was time to try again if anything could be
+done. But he found he could not get even a finger through the chink
+between the slab and the rock. He gave a great rush with his shoulder
+against the slab, but it yielded no more than if it had been part of the
+rock. All he could do was to sit down and think again.
+
+By and by he came to the resolution to pretend to be dying, in the hope
+they might take him out before his strength was too much exhausted to
+let him have a chance. Then, for the creatures, if he could but find his
+axe again, he would have no fear of them; and if it were not for the
+queen's horrid shoes, he would have no fear at all.
+
+Meantime, until they should come again at night, there was nothing for
+him to do but forge new rhymes, now his only weapons. He had no
+intention of using them at present, of course; but it was well to have a
+stock, for he might live to want them, and the manufacture of them would
+help to while away the time.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+IRENE'S CLUE
+
+
+THAT same morning, early, the princess woke in a terrible fright. There
+was a hideous noise in her room--of creatures snarling and hissing and
+racketing about as if they were fighting. The moment she came to
+herself, she remembered something she had never thought of again--what
+her grandmother told her to do when she was frightened. She immediately
+took off her ring and put it under her pillow. As she did so, she
+fancied she felt a finger and thumb take it gently from under her palm.
+"It must be my grandmother!" she said to herself, and the thought gave
+her such courage that she stopped to put on her dainty little slippers
+before running from the room. While doing this, she caught sight of a
+long cloak of sky-blue, thrown over the back of a chair by her bedside.
+She had never seen it before, but it was evidently waiting for her. She
+put it on, and then, feeling with the forefinger of her right hand, soon
+found her grandmother's thread, which she proceeded at once to follow,
+expecting it would lead her straight up the old stair. When she reached
+the door, she found it went down and ran along the floor, so that she
+had almost to crawl in order to keep a hold of it. Then, to her
+surprise, and somewhat to her dismay, she found that instead of leading
+her toward the stair it turned in quite the opposite direction. It led
+her through certain narrow passages toward the kitchen, turning aside
+ere she reached it, and guiding her to a door which communicated with a
+small back yard. Some of the maids were already up, and this door was
+standing open. Across the yard the thread still ran along the ground,
+until it brought her to a door in the wall which opened upon the
+mountain side. When she had passed through, the thread rose to about
+half her height, and she could hold it with ease as she walked. It led
+her straight up the mountain.
+
+The cause of her alarm was less frightful than she supposed. The cook's
+great black cat, pursued by the housekeeper's terrier, had bounced
+against her bedroom door, which had not been properly fastened, and the
+two had burst into her room together and commenced a battle royal. How
+the nurse came to sleep through it, was a mystery, but I suspect the old
+lady had something to do with it.
+
+It was a clear warm morning. The wind blew deliciously over the
+mountain-side. Here and there she saw a late primrose, but she did not
+stop to call on them. The sky was mottled with small clouds. The sun was
+not yet up, but some of their fluffy edges had caught his light and hung
+out orange and gold-colored fringes upon the air. The dew lay in round
+drops upon the leaves, and hung like tiny diamonds from the blades of
+grass about her path.
+
+"How lovely that bit of gossamer is!" thought the princess, looking at a
+long undulating line that shone at some distance from her up the hill.
+It was not the time for gossamers though; and Irene soon discovered that
+it was her own thread she saw shining on before her in the light of the
+morning. It was leading her she knew not whither; but she had never in
+her life been out before sunrise, and everything was so fresh and cool
+and lively and full of something coming, that she felt too happy to be
+afraid of anything.
+
+After leading her up a good distance, the thread turned to the left, and
+down the path upon which she and Lootie had met Curdie. But she never
+thought of that, for now in the morning light, with its far outlook over
+the country, no path could have been more open and airy and cheerful.
+She could see the road almost to the horizon, along which she had so
+often watched her king-papa and his troop come shining, with the
+bugle-blast cleaving the air before them; and it was like a companion to
+her. Down and down the path went, then up, and then down, and then up
+again, getting rugged and more rugged as it went; still along the path
+went the silvery thread, and still along the thread went Irene's little
+rosy-tipped forefinger. By and by she came to a little stream that
+jabbered and prattled down the hill, and up the side of the stream went
+both path and thread. And still the path grew rougher and steeper, and
+the mountain grew wilder, till Irene began to think she was going a very
+long way from home; and when she turned to look back, she saw that the
+level country had vanished and the rough bare mountain had closed in
+about her. But still on went the thread, and on went the princess.
+Everything around her was getting brighter and brighter as the sun came
+nearer; till at length his first rays all at once alighted on the top of
+a rock before her, like some golden creature fresh from the sky. Then
+she saw that the little stream ran out of a hole in that rock, that the
+path did not go past the rock, and that the thread was leading her
+straight up to it. A shudder ran through her from head to foot when she
+found that the thread was actually taking her into the hole out of which
+the stream ran. It ran out babbling joyously, but she had to go in.
+
+She did not hesitate. Right into the hole she went, which was high
+enough to let her walk without stooping. For a little way there was a
+brown glimmer, but at the first turn it all but ceased, and before she
+had gone many paces she was in total darkness. Then she began to be
+frightened indeed. Every moment she kept feeling the thread backward,
+and as she went farther and farther into the darkness of the great
+hollow mountain, she kept thinking more and more about her grandmother,
+and all that she had said to her, and how kind she had been, and how
+beautiful she was, and all about her lovely room, and the fire of roses,
+and the great lamp that sent its light through stone walls. And she
+became more and more sure that the thread could not have gone there of
+itself, and that her grandmother must have sent it. But it tried her
+dreadfully when the path went down very steep, and especially when she
+came to places where she had to go down rough stairs, and even sometimes
+a ladder. Through one narrow passage after another, over lumps of rock
+and sand and clay, the thread guided her, until she came to a small hole
+through which she had to creep. Finding no change on the other
+side--"Shall I ever get back?" she thought, over and over again,
+wondering at herself that she was not ten times more frightened, and
+often feeling as if she were only walking in the story of a dream.
+Sometimes she heard the noise of water, a dull gurgling inside the rock.
+By and by she heard the sounds of blows, which came nearer and nearer;
+but again they grew duller and almost died away. In a hundred directions
+she turned, obedient to the guiding thread.
+
+At last she spied a dull red shine, and came up to the mica-window, and
+thence away and round about, and right into a cavern, where glowed the
+red embers of a fire. Here the thread began to rise. It rose as high as
+her head, and higher still. What _should_ she do if she lost her hold?
+She was pulling it down! She might break it! She could see it far up,
+glowing as red as her fire-opal in the light of the embers.
+
+But presently she came to a huge heap of stones, piled in a slope
+against the wall of the cavern. On these she climbed, and soon recovered
+the level of the thread--only however to find, the next moment, that it
+vanished through the heap of stones, and left her standing on it, with
+her face to the solid rock. For one terrible moment, she felt as if her
+grandmother had forsaken her. The thread which the spiders had spun far
+over the seas, which her grandmother had sat in the moonlight and spun
+again for her, which she had tempered in the rose-fire, and tied to her
+opal ring, had left her--had gone where she could no longer follow
+it--had brought her into a horrible cavern, and there left her! She was
+forsaken indeed!
+
+"When _shall_ I wake?" she said to herself in an agony, but the same
+moment knew that it was no dream. She threw herself upon the heap, and
+began to cry. It was well she did not know what creatures, one of them
+with stone shoes on her feet, were lying in the next cave. But neither
+did she know who was on the other side of the slab.
+
+At length the thought struck her, that at least she could follow the
+thread backward, and thus get out of the mountain, and home. She rose at
+once, and found the thread. But the instant she tried to feel it
+backward, it vanished from her touch. Forward, it led her hand up to the
+heap of stones--backward, it seemed nowhere. Neither could she see it as
+before in the light of the fire. She burst into a wailing cry, and again
+threw herself down on the stones.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+THE ESCAPE
+
+
+AS the princess lay and sobbed, she kept feeling the thread
+mechanically, following it with her finger many times up the stones in
+which it disappeared. By and by she began, still mechanically, to poke
+her finger in after it between the stones as far as she could. All at
+once it came into her head that she might remove some of the stones and
+see where the thread went next. Almost laughing at herself for never
+having thought of this before, she jumped to her feet. Her fear
+vanished: once more she was certain her grandmother's thread could not
+have brought her there just to leave her there; and she began to throw
+away the stones from the top as fast as she could, sometimes two or
+three at a handful, sometimes taking both hands to lift one. After
+clearing them away a little, she found that the thread turned and went
+straight downward. Hence, as the heap sloped a good deal, growing of
+course wider toward its base, she had to throw away a multitude of
+stones to follow the thread. But this was not all, for she soon found
+that the thread, after going straight down for a little way, turned
+first sideways in one direction, then sideways in another, and then
+shot, at various angles, hither and thither inside the heap, so that she
+began to be afraid that to clear the thread, she must remove the whole
+huge gathering. She was dismayed at the very idea, but, losing no time,
+set to work with a will; and with aching back, and bleeding fingers and
+hands, she worked on, sustained by the pleasure of seeing the heap
+slowly diminish, and begin to show itself on the opposite side of the
+fire. Another thing which helped to keep up her courage was, that as
+often as she uncovered a turn of the thread, instead of lying loose upon
+the stones, it tightened up; this made her sure that her grandmother was
+at the end of it somewhere.
+
+She had got about half way down when she started, and nearly fell with
+fright. Close to her ear as it seemed, a voice broke out singing--
+
+          "Jabber, bother, smash!
+           You'll have it all in a crash.
+           Jabber, smash, bother!
+           You'll have the worst of the pother.
+           Smash, bother, jabber!--"
+
+Here Curdie stopped, either because he could not find a rhyme to
+_jabber_, or because he remembered what he had forgotten when he woke up
+at the sound of Irene's labors, that his plan was to make the goblins
+think he was getting weak. But he had uttered enough to let Irene know
+who he was.
+
+"It's Curdie!" she cried joyfully.
+
+"Hush, hush!" came Curdie's voice again from somewhere. "Speak softly."
+
+"Why, you were singing loud!" said Irene.
+
+"Yes. But they know I am here, and they don't know you are. Who are
+you?"
+
+"I'm Irene," answered the princess. "I know who you are quite well.
+You're Curdie."
+
+"Why, how ever did you come here, Irene?"
+
+"My great-great-grandmother sent me; and I think I've found out why. You
+can't get out, I suppose?"
+
+"No, I can't. What are you doing?"
+
+"Clearing away a huge heap of stones."
+
+"There's a princess!" exclaimed Curdie, in a tone of delight, but still
+speaking in little more than a whisper. "I can't think how you got here,
+though."
+
+"My grandmother sent me after her thread."
+
+"I don't know what you mean," said Curdie; "but so you're there, it
+doesn't much matter."
+
+"Oh, yes it does!" returned Irene. "I should never have been here but
+for her."
+
+"You can tell me all about it when we get out, then. There's no time to
+lose now," said Curdie.
+
+And Irene went to work, as fresh as when she began.
+
+"There's such a lot of stones!" she said. "It will take me a long time
+to get them all away."
+
+"How far on have you got?" asked Curdie.
+
+"I've got about the half way, but the other half is ever so much
+bigger."
+
+"I don't think you will have to move the lower half. Do you see a slab
+laid up against the wall?"
+
+Irene looked and felt about with her hands, and soon perceived the
+outlines of the slab.
+
+"Yes," she answered, "I do."
+
+"Then, I think," rejoined Curdie, "when you have cleared the slab about
+half way down, or a little more, I shall be able to push it over."
+
+"I must follow my thread," returned Irene, "whatever I do."
+
+"What _do_ you mean?" exclaimed Curdie.
+
+"You will see when you get out of here," answered the princess, and then
+she went on harder than ever.
+
+But she was soon satisfied that what Curdie wanted done, and what the
+thread wanted done, were one and the same thing. For she not only saw
+that by following the turns of the thread she had been clearing the face
+of the slab, but that, a little more than half way down, the thread went
+through the chink between the slab and the wall into the place where
+Curdie was confined, so that she could not follow it any farther until
+the slab was out of her way. As soon as she found this, she said in a
+right joyous whisper--
+
+"Now, Curdie! I think if you were to give a great push, the slab would
+tumble over."
+
+"Stand quite clear of it then," said Curdie, "and let me know when you
+are ready."
+
+Irene got off the heap, and stood on one side of it.
+
+"Now, Curdie!" she cried.
+
+Curdie gave a great rush with his shoulder against it. Out tumbled the
+slab on the heap, and out crept Curdie over the top of it.
+
+"You've saved my life, Irene!" he whispered.
+
+"Oh, Curdie! I'm so glad! Let's get out of this horrid place as fast as
+we can."
+
+"That's easier said than done," returned he.
+
+"Oh, no! it's quite easy," said Irene. "We have only to follow my
+thread. I am sure that it's going to take us out now."
+
+She had already begun to follow it over the fallen slab into the hole,
+while Curdie was searching the floor of the cavern for his pickaxe.
+
+[Illustration: Curdie went on after her, flashing his torch about.]
+
+"Here it is!" he cried. "No, it is not!" he added, in a disappointed
+tone. "What can it be then?--I declare it's a torch. That _is_ jolly!
+It's better almost than my pickaxe. Much better if it weren't for those
+stone shoes!" he went on, as he lighted the torch by blowing the last
+embers of the expiring fire.
+
+When he looked up, with the lighted torch casting a glare into the great
+darkness of the huge cavern, he caught sight of Irene disappearing in
+the hole out of which he had himself just come.
+
+"Where are you going there?" he cried. "That's not the way out. That's
+where I couldn't get out."
+
+"I know that," whispered Irene. "But this is the way my thread goes, and
+I must follow it."
+
+"What nonsense the child talks!" said Curdie to himself. "I must follow
+her, though, and see that she comes to no harm. She will soon find she
+can't get out that way, and then she will come with me."
+
+So he crept once more over the slab into the hole with his torch in his
+hand. But when he looked about in it, he could see her nowhere. And now
+he discovered that although the hole was narrow, it was much larger than
+he had supposed; for in one direction the roof came down very low, and
+the hole went off in a narrow passage, of which he could not see the
+end. The princess must have crept in there. He got on his knees and one
+hand, holding the torch with the other, and crept after her. The hole
+twisted about, in some parts so low that he could hardly get through,
+in others so high that he could not see the roof, but everywhere it was
+narrow--far too narrow for a goblin to get through, and so I presume
+they never thought that Curdie might. He was beginning to feel very
+uncomfortable lest he could not see the end. The princess when he heard
+her voice almost close to his ear, whispering--
+
+"Aren't you coming, Curdie?"
+
+And when he turned the next corner, there she stood waiting for him.
+
+"I knew you couldn't go wrong in that narrow hole, but now you must keep
+by me, for here is a great wide place," she said.
+
+"I can't understand it," said Curdie, half to himself, half to Irene.
+
+"Never mind," she returned. "Wait till we get out."
+
+Curdie, utterly astonished that she had already got so far, and by a
+path he had known nothing of, thought it better to let her do as she
+pleased.
+
+"At all events," he said again to himself, "I know nothing about the
+way, miner as I am; and she seems to think she does know something about
+it, though how she should, passes my comprehension. So she's just as
+likely to find her way as I am, and as she insists on taking the lead, I
+must follow. We can't be much worse off than we are, anyhow."
+
+Reasoning thus, he followed her a few steps, and came out in another
+great cavern, across which Irene walked in a straight line, as
+confidently as if she knew every step of the way. Curdie went on after
+her, flashing his torch about, and trying to see something of what lay
+around them. Suddenly he started back a pace as the light fell upon
+something close by which Irene was passing. It was a platform of rock
+raised a few feet from the floor and covered with sheep skins, upon
+which lay two horrible figures asleep, at once recognized by Curdie as
+the king and queen of the goblins. He lowered his torch instantly lest
+the light should awake them. As he did so, it flashed upon his pickaxe,
+lying by the side of the queen, whose hand lay close by the handle of
+it.
+
+"Stop one moment," he whispered. "Hold my torch, and don't let the light
+on their faces."
+
+Irene shuddered when she saw the frightful creatures whom she had passed
+without observing them, but she did as he requested, and turning her
+back, held the torch low in front of her. Curdie drew his pickaxe
+carefully away, and as he did so, spied one of her feet, projecting from
+under the skins. The great clumsy granite shoe, exposed thus to his
+hand, was a temptation not to be resisted. He laid hold of it, and with
+cautious efforts, drew it off. The moment he succeeded, he saw to his
+astonishment that what he had sung in ignorance, to annoy the queen, was
+actually true: she had six horrible toes. Overjoyed at his success, and
+seeing by the huge bump in the sheep skins where the other foot was, he
+proceeded to lift them gently, for, if he could only succeed in carrying
+away the other shoe as well, he would be no more afraid of the goblins
+than of so many flies. But as he pulled at the second shoe, the queen
+gave a growl and sat up in bed. The same instant the king awoke also,
+and sat up beside her.
+
+"Run, Irene!" cried Curdie, for though he was not now in the least
+afraid for himself, he was for the princess.
+
+Irene looked once round, saw the fearful creatures awake, and like the
+wise princess she was, dashed the torch on the ground and extinguished
+it, crying out--
+
+"Here, Curdie, take my hand."
+
+He darted to her side, forgetting neither the queen's shoe nor his
+pickaxe, and caught hold of her hand, as she sped fearlessly where her
+thread guided her. They heard the queen give a great bellow; but they
+had a good start, for it would be some time before they could get
+torches lighted to pursue them. Just as they thought they saw a gleam
+behind them, the thread brought them to a very narrow opening, through
+which Irene crept easily, and Curdie with difficulty.
+
+"Now," said Curdie; "I think we shall be safe."
+
+"Of course we shall," returned Irene.
+
+"Why do you think so?" asked Curdie.
+
+"Because my grandmother is taking care of us."
+
+"That's all nonsense," said Curdie. "I don't know what you mean."
+
+"Then if you don't know what I mean, what right have you to call it
+nonsense?" asked the princess, a little offended.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Irene," said Curdie; "I did not mean to vex you."
+
+"Of course not," returned the princess. "But why do _you_ think we shall
+be safe?"
+
+"Because the king and queen are far too stout to get through that hole."
+
+"There may be ways round," said the other.
+
+"To be sure there might; we are not out of it yet," acknowledged
+Curdie.
+
+"But what do you mean by the king and queen?" asked the princess. "I
+should never call such creatures as those a king and a queen."
+
+"Their own people do, though," answered Curdie.
+
+The princess asked more questions, and Curdie, as they walked leisurely
+along, gave her a full account, not only of the character and habits of
+the goblins, so far as he knew them, but of his own adventures with
+them, beginning from the very night after that in which he had met her
+and Lootie upon the mountain. When he had finished, he begged Irene to
+tell him how it was that she had come to his rescue. So Irene too had to
+tell a long story, which she did in rather a roundabout manner,
+interrupted by many questions concerning things she had not explained.
+But her tale, as he did not believe more than half of it, left
+everything as unaccountable to him as before, and he was nearly as much
+perplexed as to what he must think of the princess. He could not believe
+that she was deliberately telling stories, and the only conclusion he
+could come to was that Lootie had been playing the child tricks,
+inventing no end of lies to frighten her for her own purposes.
+
+"But how ever did Lootie come to let you go into the mountain alone?" he
+asked.
+
+"Lootie knows nothing about it. I left her fast asleep--at least I think
+so. I hope my grandmother won't let her get into trouble, for it wasn't
+her fault at all, as my grandmother very well knows."
+
+"But how did you find your way to me?" persisted Curdie.
+
+"I told you already," answered Irene;--"by keeping my finger upon my
+grandmother's thread, as I am doing now."
+
+"You don't mean you've got the thread there?"
+
+"Of course I do. I have told you so ten times already. I have
+hardly--except when I was removing the stones--taken my finger off it.
+There!" she added, guiding Curdie's hand to the thread, "you feel it
+yourself--don't you?"
+
+"I feel nothing at all," replied Curdie.
+
+"Then what can be the matter with your finger? I feel it perfectly. To
+be sure it is very thin, and in the sunlight looks just like the thread
+of a spider, though there are many of them twisted together to make
+it--but for all that I can't think why you shouldn't feel it as well as
+I do."
+
+Curdie was too polite to say he did not believe there was any thread
+there at all. What he did say was--
+
+"Well, I can make nothing of it."
+
+"I can though, and you must be glad of that, for it will do for both of
+us."
+
+"We're not out yet," said Curdie.
+
+"We soon shall be," returned Irene confidently.
+
+And now the thread went downward, and led Irene's hand to a hole in the
+floor of the cavern, whence came a sound of running water which they had
+been hearing for some time.
+
+"It goes into the ground now, Curdie," she said, stopping.
+
+He had been listening to another sound, which his practised ear had
+caught long ago, and which also had been growing louder. It was the
+noise the goblin miners made at their work, and they seemed to be at no
+great distance now. Irene heard it the moment she stopped.
+
+"What is that noise?" she asked. "Do you know, Curdie?"
+
+"Yes. It is the goblins digging and burrowing," he answered.
+
+"And don't you know for what purpose they do it?"
+
+"No; I haven't the least idea. Would you like to see them?" he asked,
+wishing to have another try after their secret.
+
+"If my thread took me there, I shouldn't much mind; but I don't want to
+see them, and I can't leave my thread. It leads me down into the hole,
+and we had better go at once."
+
+"Very well. Shall I go in first?" said Curdie.
+
+"No; better not. You can't feel the thread," she answered, stepping down
+through a narrow break in the floor of the cavern. "Oh!" she cried, "I
+am in the water. It is running strong--but it is not deep, and there is
+just room to walk. Make haste, Curdie."
+
+He tried, but the hole was too small for him to get in.
+
+"Go on a little bit," he said, shouldering his pickaxe.
+
+In a few moments he had cleared a large opening and followed her. They
+went on, down and down with the running water, Curdie getting more and
+more afraid it was leading them to some terrible gulf in the heart of
+the mountain. In one or two places he had to break away the rock to make
+room before even Irene could get through--at least without hurting
+herself. But at length they spied a glimmer of light, and in a minute
+more, they were almost blinded by the full sunlight into which they
+emerged. It was some little time before the princess could see well
+enough to discover that they stood in her own garden, close by the seat
+on which she and her king-papa had sat that afternoon. They had come out
+by the channel of the little stream. She danced and clapped her hands
+with delight.
+
+"Now, Curdie!" she cried, "won't you believe what I told you about my
+grandmother and her thread?"
+
+For she had felt all the time that Curdie was not believing what she had
+told him.
+
+"There!--don't you see it shining on before us?" she added.
+
+"I don't see anything," persisted Curdie.
+
+"Then you must believe without seeing," said the princess; "for you
+can't deny it has brought me out of the mountain."
+
+"I can't deny we _are_ out of the mountain, and I should be very
+ungrateful indeed to deny that _you_ had brought _me_ out of it."
+
+"I couldn't have done it but for the thread," persisted Irene.
+
+"That's the part I don't understand."
+
+"Well, come along, and Lootie will get you something to eat. I am sure
+you must want it very much."
+
+"Indeed I do. But my father and mother will be so anxious about me, I
+must make haste--first up the mountain to tell my mother, and then down
+into the mine again to acquaint my father."
+
+"Very well, Curdie; but you can't get out without coming this way, and I
+will take you through the house, for that is nearest."
+
+They met no one by the way, for indeed, as before, the people were here
+and there and everywhere searching for the princess. When they got in,
+Irene found that the thread, as she had half expected, went up the old
+staircase, and a new thought struck her. She turned to Curdie and
+said--
+
+"My grandmother wants me. Do come up with me, and see her. Then you will
+know that I have been telling you the truth. Do come--to please me,
+Curdie. I can't bear you should think I say what is not true."
+
+"I never doubted you believed what you said," returned Curdie. "I only
+thought you had some fancy in your head that was not correct."
+
+"But do come, dear Curdie."
+
+The little miner could not withstand this appeal, and though he felt shy
+in what seemed to him such a huge grand house, he yielded, and followed
+her up the stair.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+THE OLD LADY AND CURDIE
+
+
+UP the stair then they went, and the next and the next, and through the
+long rows of empty rooms, and up the little tower stairs, Irene growing
+happier and happier as she ascended. There was no answer when she
+knocked at length at the door of the workroom, nor could she hear any
+sound of the spinning-wheel, and once more her heart sank within
+her--but only for one moment, as she turned and knocked at the other
+door.
+
+"Come in," answered the sweet voice of her grandmother, and Irene opened
+the door and entered, followed by Curdie.
+
+"You darling!" cried the lady, who was seated by a fire of red roses
+mingled with white--"I've been waiting for you, and indeed getting a
+little anxious about you, and beginning to think whether I had not
+better go and fetch you myself."
+
+As she spoke she took the little princess in her arms and placed her
+upon her lap. She was dressed in white now, and looking if possible more
+lovely than ever.
+
+"I've brought Curdie, grandmother. He wouldn't believe what I told him,
+and so I've brought him."
+
+"Yes--I see him. He is a good boy, Curdie, and a brave boy. Aren't you
+glad you have got him out?"
+
+"Yes, grandmother. But it wasn't very good of him not to believe me when
+I was telling him the truth."
+
+"People must believe what they can, and those who believe more must not
+be hard upon those who believe less. I doubt if you would have believed
+it all yourself if you hadn't seen some of it."
+
+"Ah! yes, grandmother, I daresay. I'm sure you are right. But he'll
+believe now."
+
+"I don't know that," replied her grandmother.
+
+"Won't you, Curdie?" said Irene, looking round at him as she asked the
+question.
+
+He was standing in the middle of the floor, staring, and looking
+strangely bewildered. This she thought came of his astonishment at the
+beauty of the lady.
+
+"Make a bow to my grandmother, Curdie," she said.
+
+"I don't see any grandmother," answered Curdie, rather gruffly.
+
+"Don't see my grandmother when I'm sitting in her lap!" exclaimed the
+princess.
+
+"No I don't," said Curdie, almost sulkily.
+
+"Don't you see the lovely fire of roses--white ones amongst them this
+time?" asked Irene almost as bewildered as he.
+
+"No I don't," answered Curdie, almost sulkily.
+
+"Nor the blue bed? Nor the rose-colored counterpane? Nor the beautiful
+light, like the moon, hanging from the roof?"
+
+"You're making game of me, your royal Highness; and after what we have
+come through together this day, I don't think it is kind of you," said
+Curdie, feeling very much hurt.
+
+"Then what _do_ you see?" asked Irene, who perceived at once that for
+her not to believe him was at least as bad as for him not to believe
+her.
+
+"I see a big, bare garret-room--like the one in mother's cottage, only
+big enough to take the cottage itself in, and leave a good margin all
+round," answered Curdie.
+
+"And what more do you see?"
+
+"I see a tub, and a heap of musty straw, and a withered apple and a ray
+of sunlight coming through a hole in the middle of the roof, and shining
+on your head, and making all the place look a curious dusky brown. I
+think you had better drop it, princess, and go down to the nursery, like
+a good girl."
+
+"But don't you hear my grandmother talking to me?" asked Irene, almost
+crying.
+
+"No. I hear the cooing of a lot of pigeons. If you won't come down, I
+will go without you. I think that will be better anyhow, for I'm sure
+nobody who met us would believe a word we said to them. They would think
+we made it all up. I don't expect anybody but my own father and mother
+to believe me. They _know_ I wouldn't tell a story."
+
+"And yet _you_ won't believe _me_, Curdie?" expostulated the princess,
+now fairly crying with vexation, and sorrow at the gulf between her and
+Curdie.
+
+"No. I _can't_, and I can't help it," said Curdie, turning to leave the
+room.
+
+"What _shall_ I do, grandmother?" sobbed the princess, turning her face
+round upon the lady's bosom, and shaking with suppressed sobs.
+
+"You must give him time," said her grandmother; "and you must be content
+not to be believed for a while. It is very hard to bear; but I have had
+to bear it, and shall have to bear it many a time yet. I will take care
+of what Curdie thinks of you in the end. You must let him go now."
+
+"You are not coming, are you?" asked Curdie.
+
+"No, Curdie; my grandmother says I must let you go. Turn to the right
+when you get to the bottom of all the stairs, and in that way you will
+arrive safely at the hall where the great door is."
+
+"Oh! I don't doubt I can find my way--without you, princess, or your old
+grannie's thread either," said Curdie, quite rudely.
+
+"Oh, Curdie! Curdie!"
+
+"I wish I had gone home at once. I'm very much obliged to you, Irene,
+for getting me out of that hole, but I wish you hadn't made a fool of me
+afterward."
+
+He said this as he opened the door, which he left open, and, without
+another word, went down the stairs. Irene listened with dismay to his
+departing footsteps. Then turning again to the lady--
+
+"What does it all mean, grandmother?" she sobbed, and burst into fresh
+tears.
+
+"It means, my love, that I did not mean to show myself. Curdie is not
+yet able to believe some things. Seeing is not believing--it is only
+seeing. You remember I told you that if Lootie were to see me, she would
+rub her eyes, forget the half she saw, and call the other half
+nonsense."
+
+"Yes; but I should have thought Curdie--"
+
+"You are right. Curdie is much farther on than Lootie, and you will see
+what will come of it. But in the meantime, you must be content, I say,
+to be misunderstood for a while. We are all very anxious to be
+understood, and it is very hard not to be. But there is one thing much
+more necessary."
+
+"What is that, grandmother?"
+
+"To understand other people."
+
+"Yes, grandmother. I must be fair--for if I'm not fair to other people,
+I'm not worth being understood myself I see. So as Curdie can't help it,
+I will not be vexed with him, but just wait."
+
+"There's my own dear child," said her grandmother, and pressed her close
+to her bosom.
+
+"Why weren't you in your workroom, when we came up, grandmother?" asked
+Irene, after a few moments' silence.
+
+"If I had been there, Curdie would have seen me well enough. But why
+should I be there rather than in this beautiful room?"
+
+"I thought you would be spinning."
+
+"I've nobody to spin for just at present. I never spin without knowing
+for whom I am spinning."
+
+"That reminds me--there is one thing that puzzles me," said the
+princess: "how are you to get the thread out of the mountain again?
+Surely you won't have to make another for me! That would be such a
+trouble!"
+
+The lady set her down, and rose, and went to the fire. Putting in her
+hand, she drew it out again, and held up the shining ball between her
+finger and thumb.
+
+"I've got it now, you see," she said, coming back to the princess, "all
+ready for you when you want it."
+
+Going to her cabinet, she laid it in the same drawer as before.
+
+"And here is your ring," she added, taking it from the little finger of
+her left hand, and putting it on the forefinger of Irene's right hand.
+
+"Oh, thank you, grandmother. I feel so safe now!"
+
+"You are very tired, my child," the lady went on. "Your hands are hurt
+with the stones, and I have counted nine bruises on you. Just look what
+you are like."
+
+And she held up to her a little mirror which she had brought from the
+cabinet. The princess burst into a merry laugh at the sight. She was so
+draggled with the stream, and dirty with creeping through narrow places,
+that if she had seen the reflection without knowing it was a reflection,
+she would have taken herself for some gypsy-child whose face was washed
+and hair combed about once in a month. The lady laughed too, and lifting
+her again upon her knee, took off her cloak and night-gown. Then she
+carried her to the side of the room. Irene wondered what she was going
+to do with her, but asked no questions--only starting a little when she
+found that she was going to lay her in the large silver bath; for as she
+looked into it, again she saw no bottom, but the stars shining miles
+away as it seemed in a great blue gulf. Her hands closed involuntarily
+on the beautiful arms that held her, and that was all.
+
+The lady pressed her once more to her bosom, saying--
+
+"Do not be afraid, my child."
+
+"No, grandmother," answered the princess, with a little gasp; and the
+next instant she sank in the clear cool water.
+
+When she opened her eyes, she saw nothing but a strange lovely blue over
+and beneath and all about her. The lady and the beautiful room had
+vanished from her sight, and she seemed utterly alone. But instead of
+being afraid, she felt more than happy--perfectly blissful. And from
+somewhere came the voice of the lady, singing a strange sweet song, of
+which she could distinguish every word; but of the sense she had only a
+feeling--no understanding. Nor could she remember a single line after it
+was gone. It vanished, like the poetry in a dream, as fast as it came.
+In after years, however, she would sometimes fancy that snatches of
+melody suddenly rising in her brain, must be little phrases and
+fragments of the air of that song; and the very fancy would make her
+happier, and abler to do her duty.
+
+How long she lay in the water she did not know. It seemed a long
+time--not from weariness, but from pleasure. But at last she felt the
+beautiful hands lay hold of her, and through the gurgling waters she was
+lifted out into the lovely room. The lady carried her to the fire, and
+sat down with her in her lap, and dried her tenderly with the softest
+towel. It was so different from Lootie's drying! When the lady had done,
+she stooped to the fire, and drew from it her night-gown, as white as
+snow.
+
+"How delicious!" exclaimed the princess. "It smells of all the roses in
+the world, I think."
+
+When she stood up on the floor, she felt as if she had been made over
+again. Every bruise and all weariness were gone, and her hands were soft
+and whole as ever.
+
+"Now I am going to put you to bed for a good sleep," said her
+grandmother.
+
+"But what will Lootie be thinking? And what am I to say to her when she
+asks me where I have been?"
+
+"Don't trouble yourself about it. You will find it all come right," said
+her grandmother, and laid her into the blue bed, under the rosy
+counterpane.
+
+"There is just one thing more," said Irene. "I am a little anxious about
+Curdie. As I brought him into the house, I ought to have seen him safe
+on his way home."
+
+"I took care of all that," answered the lady. "I told you to let him go,
+and therefore I was bound to look after him. Nobody saw him, and he is
+now eating a good dinner in his mother's cottage, far up the mountain."
+
+"Then I will go to sleep," said Irene, and in a few minutes, she was
+fast asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+CURDIE AND HIS MOTHER
+
+
+CURDIE went up the mountain neither whistling nor singing, for he was
+vexed with Irene for taking him in, as he called it; and he was vexed
+with himself for having spoken to her so angrily. His mother gave a cry
+of joy when she saw him, and at once set about getting him something to
+eat, asking him questions all the time, which he did not answer so
+cheerfully as usual. When his meal was ready, she left him to eat it,
+and hurried to the mine to let his father know he was safe. When she
+came back, she found him fast asleep upon her bed; nor did he wake until
+the arrival home of his father in the evening.
+
+"Now, Curdie," his mother said, as they sat at supper, "tell us the
+whole story from beginning to end, just as it all happened."
+
+Curdie obeyed, and told everything to the point where they came out upon
+the lawn in the garden of the king's house.
+
+"And what happened after that?" asked his mother. "You haven't told us
+all. You ought to be very happy at having got away from those demons,
+and instead of that, I never saw you so gloomy. There must be something
+more. Besides, you do not speak of that lovely child as I should like to
+hear you. She saved your life at the risk of her own, and yet somehow
+you don't seem to think much of it."
+
+"She talked such nonsense!" answered Curdie, "and told me a pack of
+things that weren't a bit true; and I can't get over it."
+
+"What were they?" asked his father. "Your mother may be able to throw
+some light upon them."
+
+Then Curdie made a clean breast of it, and told them everything.
+
+They all sat silent for some time, pondering the strange tale. At last
+Curdie's mother spoke.
+
+"You confess, my boy," she said, "there is something about the whole
+affair you do not understand?"
+
+"Yes, of course, mother," he answered, "I cannot understand how a child
+knowing nothing about the mountain, or even that I was shut up in it,
+should come all that way alone, straight to where I was; and then, after
+getting me out of the hole, lead me out of the mountain, too, where I
+should not have known a step of the way if it had been as light as in
+the open air."
+
+"Then you have no right to say that what she told you was not true. She
+did take you out, and she must have had something to guide her: why not
+a thread as well as a rope, or anything else? There is something you
+cannot explain, and her explanation may be the right one."
+
+"It's no explanation at all, mother; and I can't believe it."
+
+"That may be only because you do not understand it. If you did, you
+would probably find it was an explanation, and believe it thoroughly. I
+don't blame you for not being able to believe it, but I do blame you for
+fancying such a child would try to deceive you. Why should she? Depend
+upon it, she told you all she knew. Until you had found a better way of
+accounting for it all, you might at least have been more sparing of your
+judgment."
+
+"That is what something inside me has been saying all the time," said
+Curdie, hanging down his head. "But what do you make of the grandmother?
+That is what I can't get over. To take me up to an old garret, and try
+to persuade me against the sight of my own eyes that it was a beautiful
+room, with blue walls and silver stars, and no end of things in it, when
+there was nothing there but an old tub and a withered apple and a heap
+of straw and a sunbeam! It was too bad! She _might_ have had some old
+woman there at least who could pass for her precious grandmother!"
+
+"Didn't she speak as if she saw those other things herself, Curdie?"
+
+"Yes. That's what bothers me. You would have thought she really meant
+and believed that she saw every one of the things she talked about. And
+not one of them there! It was too bad, I say."
+
+"Perhaps some people can see things other people can't see, Curdie,"
+said his mother very gravely. "I think I will tell you something I saw
+myself once--only perhaps you won't believe me either!"
+
+"Oh, mother, mother!" cried Curdie, bursting into tears; "I don't
+deserve that, surely!"
+
+"But what I am going to tell you is very strange," persisted his mother;
+"and if having heard it, you were to say I must have been dreaming, I
+don't know that I should have any right to be vexed with you, though I
+know at least that I was not asleep."
+
+"Do tell me, mother. Perhaps it will help me to think better of the
+princess."
+
+"That's why I am tempted to tell you," replied his mother. "But first, I
+may as well mention, that according to old whispers, there is something
+more than common about the king's family; and the queen was of the same
+blood, for they were cousins of some degree. There were strange stories
+told concerning them--all good stories--but strange, very strange. What
+they were I cannot tell, for I only remember the faces of my grandmother
+and my mother as they talked together about them. There was wonder and
+awe--not fear, in their eyes, and they whispered, and never spoke aloud.
+But what I saw myself, was this: Your father was going to work in the
+mine, one night, and I had been down with his supper. It was soon after
+we were married, and not very long before you were born. He came with me
+to the mouth of the mine, and left me to go home alone, for I knew the
+way almost as well as the floor of our own cottage. It was pretty dark,
+and in some parts of the road where the rocks overhung, nearly quite
+dark. But I got along perfectly well, never thinking of being afraid,
+until I reached a spot you know well enough, Curdie, where the path has
+to make a sharp turn out of the way of a great rock on the left-hand
+side. When I got there, I was suddenly surrounded by about half-a-dozen
+of the cobs, the first I had ever seen, although I had heard tell of
+them often enough. One of them blocked up the path, and they all began
+tormenting and teasing me in a way it makes me shudder to think of even
+now."
+
+"If I had only been with you!" cried father and son in a breath.
+
+The mother gave a funny little smile, and went on.
+
+"They had some of their horrible creatures with them too, and I must
+confess I was dreadfully frightened. They had torn my clothes very much,
+and I was afraid they were going to tear myself to pieces, when suddenly
+a great white soft light shone upon me. I looked up. A broad ray, like a
+shining road, came down from a large globe of silvery light, not very
+high up, indeed not quite so high as the horizon--so it could not have
+been a new star or another moon or anything of that sort. The cobs
+dropped persecuting me, and looked dazed, and I thought they were going
+to run away, but presently they began again. The same moment, however,
+down the path from the globe of light came a bird, shining like silver
+in the sun. It gave a few rapid flaps first, and then, with its wings
+straight out, shot sliding down the slope of the light. It looked to me
+just like a white pigeon. But whatever it was, when the cobs caught
+sight of it coming straight down upon them, they took to their heels and
+scampered away across the mountain, leaving me safe, only much
+frightened. As soon as it had sent them off, the bird went gliding again
+up the light, and just at the moment it reached the globe, the light
+disappeared, just the same as if a shutter had been closed over a
+window, and I saw it no more. But I had no more trouble with the cobs
+that night, or at any time afterward."
+
+"How strange!" exclaimed Curdie.
+
+"Yes, it is strange; but I can't help believing it, whether you do or
+not," said his mother.
+
+"It's exactly as your mother told it to me the very next morning," said
+his father.
+
+"You don't think I'm doubting my own mother!" cried Curdie.
+
+"There are other people in the world quite as well worth believing as
+your own mother," said his mother. "I don't know that she's so much the
+fitter to be believed that she happens to be _your_ mother, Mr. Curdie.
+There are mothers far more likely to tell lies than that little girl I
+saw talking to the primroses a few weeks ago. If she were to lie I
+should begin to doubt my own word."
+
+"But princesses _have_ told lies as well as other people," said Curdie.
+
+"Yes, but not princesses like that child. She's a good girl, I am
+certain, and that's more than being a princess. Depend upon it you will
+have to be sorry for behaving so to her, Curdie. You ought at least to
+have held your tongue."
+
+"I am sorry now," answered Curdie.
+
+"You ought to go and tell her so, then."
+
+"I don't see how I could manage that. They wouldn't let a miner boy like
+me have a word with her alone; and I couldn't tell her before that nurse
+of hers. She'd be asking ever so many questions, and I don't know how
+many of them the little princess would like me to answer. She told me
+that Lootie didn't know anything about her coming to get me out of the
+mountain. I am certain she would have prevented her somehow if she had
+known it. But I may have a chance before long, and meantime I must try
+to do something for her. I think, father, I have got on the track at
+last."
+
+"Have you, indeed, my boy?" said Peter. "I am sure you deserve some
+success; you have worked very hard for it. What have you found out?"
+
+"It's difficult you know, father, inside the mountain, especially in the
+dark, and not knowing what turns you have taken, to tell the lie of
+things outside."
+
+"Impossible, my boy, without a chart, or at least a compass," returned
+his father.
+
+"Well, I think I have nearly discovered in what direction the cobs are
+mining. If I am right, I know something else that I can put to it, and
+then one and one will make three."
+
+"They very often do, Curdie, as we miners ought to be well aware. Now
+tell us, my boy, what the two things are, and see whether we guess at
+the same third as you."
+
+"I don't see what that has to do with the princess," interposed his
+mother.
+
+"I will soon let you see that, mother. Perhaps you may think me foolish,
+but until I am sure there is nothing in my present fancy, I am more
+determined than ever to go on with my observations. Just as we came to
+the channel by which we got out, I heard the miners at work somewhere
+near--I think down below us. Now since I began to watch them, they have
+mined a good half mile, in a straight line; and so far as I am aware,
+they are working in no other part of the mountain. But I never could
+tell in what direction they were going. When we came out in the king's
+garden, however, I thought at once whether it was possible they were
+working toward the king's house; and what I want to do to-night is to
+make sure whether they are or not. I will take a light with me--"
+
+"Oh, Curdie," cried his mother, "then they will see you."
+
+"I'm no more afraid of them now than I was before," rejoined
+Curdie,--"now that I've got this precious shoe. They can't make another
+such in a hurry, and one bare foot will do for my purpose. Woman as she
+may be, I won't spare her next time. But I shall be careful with my
+light, for I don't want them to see me. I won't stick it in my hat."
+
+"Go on, then, and tell us what you mean to do."
+
+"I mean to take a bit of paper with me and a pencil, and go in at the
+mouth of the stream by which we came out. I shall mark on the paper as
+near as I can the angle of every turning I take until I find the cobs at
+work, and so get a good idea in what direction they are going. If it
+should prove to be nearly parallel with the stream, I shall know it is
+toward the king's house they are working."
+
+"And what if you should. How much wiser will you be then?"
+
+"Wait a minute, mother, dear. I told you that when I came upon the royal
+family in the cave, they were talking of their prince--Harelip, they
+called him--marrying a sun-woman--that means one of us--one with toes to
+her feet. Now in the speech one of them made that night at their great
+gathering, of which I heard only a part, he said that peace would be
+secured for a generation at least by the pledge the prince would hold
+for the good behavior of _her_ relatives: that's what he said, and he
+must have meant the sun-woman the prince was to marry. I am quite sure
+the king is much too proud to wish his son to marry any but a princess,
+and much too knowing to fancy that his having a peasant woman for a wife
+would be of any material advantage to them."
+
+"I see what you are driving at now," said his mother.
+
+"But," said his father, "the king would dig the mountain to the plain
+before he would have his princess the wife of a cob, if he were ten
+times a prince."
+
+"Yes; but they think so much of themselves!" said his mother. "Small
+creatures always do. The bantam is the proudest cock in my little yard."
+
+"And I fancy," said Curdie, "if they once get her, they would tell the
+king they would kill her except, he consented to the marriage."
+
+"They might say so," said his father, "but they wouldn't kill her; they
+would keep her alive for the sake of the hold it gave them over our
+king. Whatever he did to them, they would threaten to do the same to the
+princess."
+
+"And they are bad enough to torment her just for their own amusement--I
+know that," said his mother.
+
+"Anyhow, I will keep a watch on them, and see what they are up to," said
+Curdie. "It's too horrible to think of. I daren't let myself do it. But
+they sha'n't have her--at least if I can help it. So, mother dear--my
+clue is all right--will you get me a bit of paper and a pencil and a
+lump of pease-pudding, and I will set out at once. I saw a place where I
+can climb over the wall of the garden quite easily."
+
+"You must mind and keep out of the way of the men on the watch," said
+his mother.
+
+"That I will. I don't want them to know anything about it. They would
+spoil it all. The cobs would only try some other plan--they are such
+obstinate creatures! I shall take good care, mother. They won't kill and
+eat me either, if they should come upon me. So you needn't mind them."
+
+His mother got him what he asked for, and Curdie set out. Close beside
+the door by which the princess left the garden for the mountain, stood a
+great rock, and by climbing it Curdie got over the wall. He tied his
+clue to a stone just inside the channel of the stream, and took his
+pickaxe with him. He had not gone far before he encountered a horrid
+creature coming toward the mouth. The spot was too narrow for two of
+almost any size or shape, and besides Curdie had no wish to let the
+creature pass. Not being able to use his pickaxe, however, he had a
+severe struggle with him, and it was only after receiving many bites,
+some of them bad, that he succeeded in killing him with his pocket
+knife. Having dragged him out, he made haste to get in again before
+another should stop up the way.
+
+I need not follow him farther in this night's adventures. He returned to
+his breakfast, satisfied that the goblins were mining in the direction
+of the palace--on so low a level that their intention must, he thought,
+be to burrow under the walls of the king's house, and rise up inside
+it--in order, he fully believed, to lay hands on the little princess,
+and carry her off for a wife to their horrid Harelip.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+IRENE BEHAVES LIKE A PRINCESS
+
+
+WHEN the princess awoke from the sweetest of sleeps, she found her nurse
+bending above her, the housekeeper looking over the nurse's shoulder,
+and the laundry-maid looking over the housekeeper's. The room was full
+of women-servants; and the gentlemen-at-arms, with a long column of
+men-servants behind them, were peeping, or trying to peep in at the door
+of the nursery.
+
+"Are those horrid creatures gone?" asked the princess, remembering first
+what had terrified her in the morning.
+
+"You naughty little princess!" cried Lootie.
+
+Her face was very pale, with red streaks in it, and she looked as if she
+were going to shake her; but Irene said nothing--only waited to hear
+what should come next.
+
+"How _could_ you get under the clothes like that, and make us all fancy
+you were lost! And keep it up all day too! You _are_ the most obstinate
+child! It's anything but fun to us, I can tell you!"
+
+It was the only way the nurse could account for her disappearance.
+
+"I didn't do that, Lootie," said Irene, very quietly.
+
+"Don't tell stories!" cried her nurse quite rudely.
+
+"I shall tell you nothing at all," said Irene.
+
+"That's just as bad," said the nurse.
+
+"Just as bad to say nothing at all as to tell stories!" exclaimed the
+princess. "I will ask my papa about that. He won't say so. And I don't
+think he will like you to say so."
+
+"Tell me directly what you mean by it!" screamed the nurse, half wild
+with anger at the princess, and fright at the possible consequences to
+herself.
+
+"When I tell you the truth, Lootie," said the princess, who somehow did
+not feel at all angry, "you say to me _Don't tell stories_: it would
+appear that I must tell stories before you will believe me."
+
+"You are very rude, my dear princess," said the nurse.
+
+"You are so rude, Lootie, that I will not speak to you again till you
+are sorry. Why should I, when I know you will not believe me?" returned
+the princess.
+
+For she did know perfectly well that if she were to tell Lootie what she
+had been about, the more she went on to tell her, the less would she
+believe her.
+
+"You are the most provoking child!" cried her nurse. "You deserve to be
+well punished for your wicked behavior."
+
+"Please, Mrs. Housekeeper," said the princess, "will you take me to your
+room and keep me till my king-papa comes? I will ask him to come as soon
+as he can."
+
+Every one stared at these words. Up to this moment, they had all
+regarded her as little more than a baby.
+
+But the housekeeper was afraid of the nurse, and sought to patch matters
+up, saying--
+
+"I am sure, princess, nursey did not mean to be rude to you."
+
+"I do not think my papa would wish me to have a nurse who spoke to me as
+Lootie does. If she thinks I tell lies, she had better either say so to
+my papa, or go away. Sir Walter, will you take charge of me?"
+
+"With the greatest of pleasure, princess," answered the captain of the
+gentlemen-at-arms, walking with his great stride into the room. The
+crowd of servants made eager way for him, and he bowed low before the
+little princess's bed. "I shall send my servant at once, on the fastest
+horse in the stable, to tell your king-papa that your royal Highness
+desires his presence. When you have chosen one of these under-servants
+to wait upon you, I shall order the room to be cleared."
+
+"Thank you very much, Sir Walter," said the princess, and her eye
+glanced toward a rosy-cheeked girl who had lately come to the house as a
+scullery-maid.
+
+But when Lootie saw the eyes of her dear princess going in search of
+another instead of her, she fell upon her knees by the bedside, and
+burst into a great cry of distress.
+
+"I think, Sir Walter," said the princess, "I will keep Lootie. But I put
+myself under your care; and you need not trouble my king-papa until I
+speak to you again. Will you all please to go away? I am quite safe and
+well, and I did not hide myself for the sake either of amusing myself,
+or of troubling my people. Lootie, will you please to dress me?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+CURDIE COMES TO GRIEF
+
+
+EVERYTHING was for some time quiet above ground. The king was still away
+in a distant part of his dominions. The men-at-arms kept watching about
+the house. They had been considerably astonished by finding at the foot
+of the rock in the garden, the hideous body of the goblin-creature
+killed by Curdie; but they came to the conclusion that it had been slain
+in the mines, and had crept out there to die; and except an occasional
+glimpse of a live one they saw nothing to cause alarm. Curdie kept
+watching in the mountain, and the goblins kept burrowing deeper into the
+earth. As long as they went deeper, there was, Curdie judged, no
+immediate danger.
+
+To Irene, the summer was as full of pleasure as ever, and for a long
+time, although she often thought of her grandmother during the day, and
+often dreamed about her at night, she did not see her. The kids and the
+flowers were as much her delight as ever, and she made as much
+friendship with the miners' children she met on the mountain as Lootie
+would permit; but Lootie had very foolish notions concerning the dignity
+of a princess, not understanding that the truest princess is just the
+one who loves all her brothers and sisters best, and who is most able to
+do them good by being humble toward them. At the same time she was
+considerably altered for the better in her behavior to the princess.
+She could not help seeing that she was no longer a mere child, but wiser
+than her age would account for. She kept foolishly whispering to the
+servants, however--sometimes that the princess was not right in her
+mind, sometimes that she was too good to live, and other nonsense of the
+same sort.
+
+All this time, Curdie had to be sorry, without a chance of confessing,
+that he had behaved so unkindly to the princess. This perhaps made him
+the more diligent in his endeavors to serve her. His mother and he often
+talked on the subject, and she comforted him, and told him she was sure
+he would some day have the opportunity he so much desired.
+
+Here I should like to remark, for the sake of princes and princesses in
+general, that it is a low and contemptible thing to refuse to confess a
+fault, or even an error. If a true princess has done wrong, she is
+always uneasy until she has had an opportunity of throwing the wrongness
+away from her by saying, "I did it; and I wish I had not; and I am sorry
+for having done it." So you see there is some ground for supposing that
+Curdie was not a miner only, but a prince as well. Many such instances
+have been known in the world's history.
+
+At length, however, he began to see signs of a change in the proceedings
+of the goblin excavators: they were going no deeper, but had commenced
+running on a level; and he watched them, therefore, more closely than
+ever. All at once, one night, coming to a slope of very hard rock, they
+began to ascend along the inclined plane of its surface. Having reached
+its top, they went again on a level for a night or two, after which they
+began to ascend once more, and kept on at a pretty steep angle. At
+length Curdie judged it time to transfer his observation to another
+quarter, and the next night, he did not go to the mine at all; but,
+leaving his pickaxe and clue at home, and taking only his usual lumps of
+bread and pease-pudding, went down the mountain to the king's house. He
+climbed over the wall, and remained in the garden the whole night,
+creeping on hands and knees from one spot to the other, and lying at
+full length with his ear to the ground, listening. But he heard nothing
+except the tread of the men-at-arms as they marched about, whose
+observation, as the night was cloudy and there was no moon, he had
+little difficulty in avoiding. For several following nights, he
+continued to haunt the garden and listen, but with no success.
+
+At length, early one evening, whether it was that he had got careless of
+his own safety, or that the growing moon had become strong enough to
+expose him, his watching came to a sudden end. He was creeping from
+behind the rock where the stream ran out, for he had been listening all
+round it in the hope it might convey to his ear some indication of the
+whereabouts of the goblin miners, when just as he came into the
+moonlight on the lawn, a whizz in his ear and a blow upon his leg
+startled him. He instantly squatted in the hope of eluding further
+notice. But when he heard the sound of running feet, he jumped up to
+take the chance of escape by flight. He fell, however, with a keen shoot
+of pain, for the bolt of a cross-bow had wounded his leg, and the blood
+was now streaming from it. He was instantly laid hold of by two or three
+of the men-at-arms. It was useless to struggle, and he submitted in
+silence.
+
+"It's a boy!" cried several of them together, in a tone of amazement. "I
+thought it was one of those demons."
+
+"What are you about here?"
+
+"Going to have a little rough usage apparently," said Curdie laughing,
+as the men shook him.
+
+"Impertinence will do you no good. You have no business here in the
+king's grounds, and if you don't give a true account of yourself, you
+shall fare as a thief."
+
+"Why, what else could he be?" said one.
+
+"He might have been after a lost kid, you know," suggested another.
+
+"I see no good in trying to excuse him. He has no business here anyhow."
+
+"Let me go away then, if you please," said Curdie.
+
+"But we don't please--not except you give a good account of yourself."
+
+"I don't feel quite sure whether I can trust you," said Curdie.
+
+"We are the king's own men-at-arms," said the captain, courteously, for
+he was taken with Curdie's appearance and courage.
+
+"Well, I will tell you all about it--if you will promise to listen to me
+and not do anything rash."
+
+"I call that cool!" said one of the party laughing. "He will tell us
+what mischief he was about, if we promise to do as pleases him."
+
+"I was about no mischief," said Curdie.
+
+But ere he could say more he turned faint, and fell senseless on the
+grass. Then first they discovered that the bolt they had shot, taking
+him for one of the goblin creatures, had wounded him.
+
+They carried him into the house, and laid him down in the hall. The
+report spread that they had caught a robber, and the servants crowded in
+to see the villain. Amongst the rest came the nurse. The moment she saw
+him she exclaimed with indignation:
+
+"I declare it's the same young rascal of a miner that was rude to me and
+the princess on the mountain. He actually wanted to kiss the princess.
+_I_ took good care of that--the wretch! And _he_ was prowling about--was
+he? Just like his impudence!"
+
+The princess being fast asleep, and Curdie in a faint, she could
+misrepresent at her pleasure.
+
+When he heard this, the captain, although he had considerable doubt of
+its truth, resolved to keep Curdie a prisoner until they could search
+into the affair. So, after they had brought him round a little, and
+attended to his wound, which was rather a bad one, they laid him, still
+exhausted from the loss of blood, upon a mattress in a disused room--one
+of those already so often mentioned--and locked the door, and left him.
+He passed a troubled night, and in the morning they found him talking
+wildly. In the evening he came to himself, but felt very weak, and his
+leg was exceedingly painful. Wondering where he was, and seeing one of
+the men-at-arms in the room, he began to question him, and soon recalled
+the events of the preceding night. As he was himself unable to watch any
+more, he told the soldier all he knew about the goblins, and begged him
+to tell his companions, and stir them up to watch with tenfold
+vigilance; but whether it was that he did not talk quite coherently, or
+that the whole thing appeared incredible, certainly the man concluded
+that Curdie was only raving still, and tried to coax him into holding
+his tongue. This, of course, annoyed Curdie dreadfully, who now felt in
+his turn what it was not to be believed, and the consequence was that
+his fever returned, and by the time when, at his persistent entreaties,
+the captain was called, there could be no doubt that he was raving. They
+did for him what they could, and promised everything he wanted, but with
+no intention of fulfilment. At last he went to sleep, and when at length
+his sleep grew profound and peaceful, they left him, locked the door
+again, and withdrew, intending to revisit him early in the morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+THE GOBLIN MINERS
+
+
+THAT same night several of the servants were having a chat together
+before going to bed.
+
+"What can that noise be?" said one of the housemaids, who had been
+listening for a moment or two.
+
+"I've heard it the last two nights," said the cook. "If there were any
+about the place, I should have taken it for rats, but my Tom keeps them
+far enough."
+
+"I've heard though," said the scullery-maid, "that rats move about in
+great companies sometimes. There may be an army of them invading us. I
+heard the noises yesterday and to-day too."
+
+"It'll be grand fun then for my Tom and Mrs. Housekeeper's Bob," said
+the cook. "They'll be friends for once in their lives, and fight on the
+same side. I'll engage Tom and Bob together will put to flight any
+number of rats."
+
+"It seems to me," said the nurse, "that the noises are much too loud for
+that. I have heard them all day, and my princess has asked me several
+times what they could be. Sometimes they sound like distant thunder, and
+sometimes like the noises you hear in the mountain from those horrid
+miners underneath."
+
+"I shouldn't wonder," said the cook, "if it was the miners after all.
+They may have come on some hole in the mountain through which the
+noises reach to us. They are always boring and blasting and breaking,
+you know."
+
+As he spoke there came a great rolling rumble beneath them, and the
+house quivered. They all started up in affright, and rushing to the hall
+found the gentlemen-at-arms in consternation also. They had sent to wake
+their captain, who said from their description that it must have been an
+earthquake, an occurrence which, although very rare in that country, had
+taken place almost within the century; and then went to bed again,
+strange to say, and fell fast asleep without once thinking of Curdie, or
+associating the noises they had heard with what he had told them. He had
+not believed Curdie. If he had, he would at once have thought of what he
+had said, and would have taken precautions. As they heard nothing more,
+they concluded that Sir Walter was right, and that the danger was over
+for perhaps another hundred years. The fact, as discovered afterward,
+was that the goblins had, in working up a second sloping face of stone,
+arrived at a huge block which lay under the cellars of the house, within
+the line of the foundations. It was so round that when they succeeded,
+after hard work, in dislodging it without blasting, it rolled thundering
+down the slope with a bounding, jarring roll, which shook the
+foundations of the house. The goblins were themselves dismayed at the
+noise, for they knew, by careful spying and measuring, that they must
+now be very near, if not under, the king's house, and they feared giving
+an alarm. They, therefore, remained quiet for awhile, and when they
+began to work again, they no doubt thought themselves very fortunate in
+coming upon a vein of sand which filled a winding fissure in the rock
+on which the house was built. By scooping this away they soon came out
+in the king's wine-cellar.
+
+No sooner did they and where they were, than they scurried back again,
+like rats into their holes, and running at full speed to the goblin
+palace, announced their success to the king and queen with shouts of
+triumph. In a moment the goblin royal family and the whole goblin people
+were on their way in hot haste to the king's house, each eager to have a
+share in the glory of carrying off that same night the Princess Irene.
+
+The queen went stumping along in one shoe of stone and one of skin. This
+could not have been pleasant, and my readers may wonder that, with such
+skillful workmen about her, she had not yet replaced the shoe carried
+off by Curdie. As the king however had more than one ground of objection
+to her stone shoes, he no doubt took advantage of the discovery of her
+toes, and threatened to expose her deformity if she had another made. I
+presume he insisted on her being content with skin-shoes, and allowed
+her to wear the remaining granite one on the present occasion only
+because she was going out to war.
+
+They soon arrived in the king's wine-cellar, and regardless of its huge
+vessels, of which they did not know the use, began as quietly as they
+could to force the door that led upward.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+THE GOBLINS IN THE KING'S HOUSE
+
+
+WHEN Curdie fell asleep he began at once to dream. He thought he was
+ascending the mountain-side from the mouth of the mine, whistling and
+singing "_Ring, dod, bang!_" when he came upon a woman and child who
+were lost; and from that point he went on dreaming all that had happened
+since he met the princess and Lootie; how he had watched the goblins,
+and been taken by them, how he had been rescued by the princess;
+everything indeed, until he was wounded, and imprisoned by the
+men-at-arms. And now he thought he was lying wide awake where they had
+laid him, when suddenly he heard a great thundering sound.
+
+"The cobs are coming!" he said. "They didn't believe a word I told them!
+The cobs'll be carrying off the princess from under their stupid noses!
+But they sha'n't! that they sha'n't!"
+
+He jumped up, as he thought, and began to dress, but, to his dismay,
+found that he was still lying in bed.
+
+"Now then I will!" he said. "Here goes! I _am_ up now!"
+
+But yet again he found himself snug in bed. Twenty times he tried, and
+twenty times he failed; for in fact he was not awake, only dreaming that
+he was. At length in an agony of despair, fancying he heard the goblins
+all over the house, he gave a great cry. Then there came, as he thought,
+a hand upon the lock of the door. It opened, and, looking up, he saw a
+lady with white hair, carrying a silver box in her hand, enter the
+room. She came to his bed, he thought, stroked his head and face with
+cool, soft hands, took the dressing from his leg, rubbed it with
+something that smelled like roses, and then waved her hands over him
+three times. At the last wave of her hands everything vanished, he felt
+himself sinking into the profoundest slumber, and remembered nothing
+more until he awoke in earnest.
+
+The setting moon was throwing a feeble light through the casement, and
+the house was full of uproar. There was soft heavy multitudinous
+stamping, a clashing and clanging of weapons, the voices of men and the
+cries of women, mixed with a hideous bellowing, which sounded
+victorious. The cobs were in the house! He sprang from his bed, hurried
+on some of his clothes, not forgetting his shoes, which were armed with
+nails; then spying an old hunting-knife, or short sword, hanging on the
+wall, he caught it, and rushed down the stairs, guided by the sounds of
+strife, which grew louder and louder.
+
+When he reached the ground floor he found the whole place swarming. All
+the goblins of the mountain seemed gathered there. He rushed amongst
+them, shouting--
+
+          "One, two,
+           Hit and hew!
+           Three, four,
+           Blast and bore!"
+
+and with every rhyme he came down a great stamp upon a foot, cutting at
+the same time at their faces--executing, indeed, a sword dance of the
+wildest description. Away scattered the goblins in every
+direction,--into closets, upstairs, into chimneys, up on rafters, and
+down to the cellars. Curdie went on stamping and slashing and singing,
+but saw nothing of the people of the house until he came to the great
+hall, in which, the moment he entered it, arose a great goblin shout.
+The last of the men-at-arms, the captain himself, was on the floor,
+buried beneath a wallowing crowd of goblins. For, while each knight was
+busy defending himself as well as he could, by stabs in the thick bodies
+of the goblins, for he had soon found their heads all but invulnerable,
+the queen had attacked his legs and feet with her horrible granite shoe,
+and he was soon down; but the captain had got his back to the wall and
+stood out longer. The goblins would have torn them all to pieces, but
+the king had given orders to carry them away alive, and over each of
+them, in twelve groups, was standing a knot of goblins, while as many as
+could find room were sitting upon their prostrate bodies.
+
+Curdie burst in dancing and gyrating and stamping and singing like a
+small incarnate whirlwind,
+
+          "Where 'tis all a hole, sir,
+             Never can be holes:
+           Why should their shoes have soles, sir,
+             When they've got no souls?
+
+          "But she upon her foot, sir,
+             Has a granite shoe:
+           The strongest leather boot, sir,
+             Six would soon be through."
+
+The queen gave a howl of rage and dismay; and before she recovered her
+presence of mind, Curdie, having begun with the group nearest him, had
+eleven of the knights on their legs again.
+
+"Stamp on their feet!" he cried, as each man rose, and in a few minutes
+the hall was nearly empty, the goblins running from it as fast as they
+could, howling and shrieking and limping, and cowering every now and
+then as they ran to cuddle their wounded feet in their hard hands, or to
+protect them from the frightful stamp-stamp of the armed men.
+
+And now Curdie approached the group which, trusting in the queen and her
+shoe, kept their guard over the prostrate captain. The king sat on the
+captain's head, but the queen stood in front, like an infuriated cat,
+with her perpendicular eyes gleaming green, and her hair standing half
+up from her horrid head. Her heart was quaking, however, and she kept
+moving about her skin-shod foot with nervous apprehension. When Curdie
+was within a few paces, she rushed at him, made one tremendous stamp at
+his opposing foot, which happily he withdrew in time, and caught him
+round the waist, to dash him on the marble floor. But just as she caught
+him, he came down with all the weight of his iron-shod shoe upon her
+skin-shod foot, and with a hideous howl she dropped him, squatted on the
+floor and took her foot in both her hands. Meanwhile the rest rushed on
+the king and the bodyguard sent them flying, and lifted the prostrate
+captain, who was all but pressed to death. It was some moments before he
+recovered breath and consciousness.
+
+"Where's the princess?" cried Curdie again and again.
+
+No one knew, and off they all rushed in search of her.
+
+Through every room in the house they went, but nowhere was she to be
+found. Neither was one of the servants to be seen. But Curdie, who had
+kept to the lower part of the house, which was now quiet enough, began
+to hear a confused sound as of a distant hubbub, and set out to find
+where it came from. The noise grew as his sharp ears guided him to a
+stair and so to the wine cellar. It was full of goblins, whom the butler
+was supplying with wine as fast as he could draw it.
+
+While the queen and her party had encountered the men-at-arms, Harelip
+with another company had gone off to search the house. They captured
+every one they met, and when they could find no more, they hurried away
+to carry them safe to the caverns below. But when the butler, who was
+amongst them, found that their path lay through the wine cellar, he
+bethought himself of persuading them to taste the wine, and, as he had
+hoped, they no sooner tasted than they wanted more. The routed goblins,
+on their way below, joined them, and when Curdie entered, they were all,
+with outstretched hands, in which were vessels of every description,
+from sauce-pan to silver cup, pressing around the butler, who sat at the
+tap of a huge cask, filling and filling. Curdie cast one glance around
+the place before commencing his attack, and saw in the farthest corner a
+terrified group of the domestics unwatched, but cowering without courage
+to attempt their escape. Amongst them was the terror-stricken face of
+Lootie; but nowhere could he see the princess. Seized with the horrible
+conviction that Harelip had already carried her off, he rushed amongst
+them, unable for wrath to sing any more, but stamping and cutting with
+greater fury than ever.
+
+"Stamp on their feet; stamp on their feet!" he shouted, and in a moment
+the goblins were disappearing through the hole in the floor like rats
+and mice.
+
+They could not vanish so fast, however, but that many more goblin feet
+had to go limping back over the underground ways of the mountain that
+morning.
+
+Presently however they were reinforced from above by the king and his
+party, with the redoubtable queen at their head. Finding Curdie again
+busy amongst her unfortunate subjects, she rushed at him once more with
+the rage of despair, and this time gave him a bad bruise on the foot.
+Then a regular stamping fight got up between them, Curdie with the point
+of his hunting knife keeping her from clasping her mighty arms about
+him, as he watched his opportunity of getting once more a good stamp at
+her skin-shod foot. But the queen was more wary as well as more agile
+than hitherto.
+
+The rest meantime, finding their adversary thus matched for the moment,
+paused in their headlong hurry, and turned to the shivering group of
+women in the corner. As if determined to emulate his father and have a
+sun-woman of some sort to share his future throne. Harelip rushed at
+them, caught up Lootie and sped with her to the hole. She gave a great
+shriek, and Curdie heard her, and saw the plight she was in. Gathering
+all his strength, he gave the queen a sudden cut across the face with
+his weapon, came down, as she started back, with all his weight on the
+proper foot, and sprang to Lootie's rescue. The prince had two
+defenceless feet, and on both of them Curdie stamped just as he reached
+the hole. He dropped his burden and rolled shrieking into the earth.
+Curdie made one stab at him as he disappeared, caught hold of the
+senseless Lootie, and having dragged her back to the corner, there
+mounted guard over her, preparing once more to encounter the queen. Her
+face streaming with blood, and her eyes flashing green lightning through
+it, she came on with her mouth open and her teeth grinning like a
+tiger's, followed by the king and her bodyguard of the thickest goblins.
+But the same moment in rushed the captain and his men, and ran at them
+stamping furiously. They dared not encounter such an onset. Away they
+scurried, the queen foremost. Of course the right thing would have been
+to take the king and queen prisoners, and hold them hostages for the
+princess, but they were so anxious to find her that no one thought of
+detaining them until it was too late.
+
+Having thus rescued the servants, they set about searching the house
+once more. None of them could give the least information concerning the
+princess. Lootie was almost silly with terror, and although scarcely
+able to walk, would not leave Curdie's side for a single moment. Again
+he allowed the others to search the rest of the house--where, except a
+dismayed goblin lurking here and there, they found no one--while he
+requested Lootie to take him to the princess's room. She was as
+submissive and obedient as if he had been the king. He found the
+bed-clothes tossed about, and most of them on the floor, while the
+princess's garments were scattered all over the room, which was in the
+greatest confusion. It was only too evident that the goblins had been
+there, and Curdie had no longer any doubt that she had been carried off
+at the very first of the inroad. With a pang of despair he saw how wrong
+they had been in not securing the king and queen and prince; but he
+determined to find and rescue the princess as she had found and rescued
+him, or meet the worst fate to which the goblins could doom him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+CURDIE'S GUIDE
+
+
+[Illustration: There sat his mother by the fire, and in her arms lay the
+princess fast asleep.]
+
+JUST as the consolation of this resolve dawned upon his mind, and he was
+turning away for the cellar to follow the goblins into their hole,
+something touched his hand. It was the slightest touch, and when he
+looked he could see nothing. Feeling and peering about in the gray of
+the dawn, his fingers came upon a tight thread. He looked again, and
+narrowly, but still could see nothing. It flashed upon him that this
+must be the princess's thread. Without saying a word, for he knew no one
+would believe him any more than he had believed the princess, he
+followed the thread with his finger, contrived to give Lootie the slip,
+and was soon out of the house, and on the mountain-side--surprised that,
+if the thread were indeed her grandmother's messenger, it should have
+led the princess, as he supposed it must, into the mountain, where she
+would be certain to meet the goblins rushing back enraged from their
+defeat. But he hurried on in the hope of overtaking her first. When he
+arrived however at the place where the path turned off for the mine, he
+found that the thread did not turn with it, but went straight up the
+mountain. Could it be that the thread was leading him home to his
+mother's cottage? Could the princess be there? He bounded up the
+mountain like one of its own goats, and before the sun was up, the
+thread had brought him indeed to his mother's door. There it vanished
+from his fingers, and he could not find it, search as he might.
+
+The door was on the latch, and he entered. There sat his mother by the
+fire, and in her arms lay the princess fast asleep.
+
+"Hush, Curdie!" said his mother. "Do not wake her. I'm so glad you're
+come! I thought the cobs must have got you again!"
+
+With a heart full of delight, Curdie sat down at a corner of the hearth,
+on a stool opposite his mother's chair, and gazed at the princess, who
+slept as peacefully as if she had been in her own bed. All at once she
+opened her eyes and fixed them on him.
+
+"Oh, Curdie! you're come!" she said quietly. "I thought you would!"
+
+Curdie rose and stood before her with downcast eyes.
+
+"Irene," he said, "I am very sorry I did not believe you."
+
+"Oh, never mind, Curdie!" answered the princess. "You couldn't, you
+know. You do believe me now, don't you?"
+
+"I can't help it now. I ought to have helped it before."
+
+"Why can't you help it now?"
+
+"Because, just as I was going into the mountain to look for you, I got
+hold of your thread, and it brought me here."
+
+"Then you've come from my house, have you?"
+
+"Yes, I have."
+
+"I didn't know you were there."
+
+"I've been there two or three days, I believe."
+
+"And I never knew it!--Then perhaps you can tell me why my grandmother
+has brought me here? I can't think. Something woke me--I didn't know
+what, but I was frightened, and I felt for the thread, and there it was!
+I was more frightened still when it brought me out on the mountain, for
+I thought it was going to take me into it again, and I like the outside
+of it best. I supposed you were in trouble again, and I had to get you
+out, but it brought me here instead; and, oh, Curdie! your mother has
+been so kind to me--just like my own grandmother!"
+
+Here Curdie's mother gave the princess a hug, and the princess turned
+and gave her a sweet smile, and held up her mouth to kiss her.
+
+"Then you didn't see the cobs?" asked Curdie.
+
+"No; I haven't been into the mountain, I told you, Curdie."
+
+"But the cobs have been into your house--all over it--and into your
+bedroom making such a row!"
+
+"What did they want there? It was very rude of them."
+
+"They wanted you--to carry you off into the mountain with them, for a
+wife to their Prince Harelip."
+
+"Oh, how dreadful!" cried the princess, shuddering.
+
+"But you needn't be afraid, you know. Your grandmother takes care of
+you."
+
+"Ah! you do believe in my grandmother then? I'm so glad! She made me
+think you would some day."
+
+All at once Curdie remembered his dream, and was silent, thinking.
+
+"But how did you come to be in my house, and me not know it?" asked the
+princess.
+
+Then Curdie had to explain everything--how he had watched for her sake,
+how he had been wounded and shut up by the soldiers, how he heard the
+noises and could not rise, and how the beautiful old lady had come to
+him, and all that followed.
+
+"Poor Curdie! to lie there hurt and ill, and me never to know it!"
+exclaimed the princess, stroking his rough hand. "I would not have
+hesitated to come and nurse you, if they had told me."
+
+"I didn't see you were lame," said his mother.
+
+"Am I, mother? Oh--yes--I suppose I ought to be. I declare I've never
+thought of it since I got up to go down amongst the cobs!"
+
+"Let me see the wound," said his mother.
+
+He pulled down his stocking--when behold, except a great scar, his leg
+was perfectly sound!
+
+Curdie and his mother gazed in each other's eyes, full of wonder, but
+Irene called out--
+
+"I thought so, Curdie! I was sure it wasn't a dream. I was sure my
+grandmother had been to see you.--Don't you smell the roses? It was my
+grandmother healed your leg, and sent you to help me."
+
+"No, Princess Irene," said Curdie; "I wasn't good enough to be allowed
+to help you: I didn't believe you. Your grandmother took care of you
+without me."
+
+"She sent you to help my people, anyhow. I wish my king-papa would come.
+I do want so to tell him how good you have been!"
+
+"But," said the mother, "we are forgetting how frightened your people
+must be.--You must take the princess home at once, Curdie--or at least
+go and tell them where she is."
+
+"Yes, mother. Only I'm dreadfully hungry. Do let me have some breakfast
+first. They ought to have listened to me, and then they wouldn't have
+been taken by surprise as they were."
+
+"That is true, Curdie; but it is not for you to blame them much. You
+remember?"
+
+"Yes, mother, I do. Only I must really have something to eat."
+
+"You shall, my boy--as fast as I can get it," said his mother, rising
+and setting the princess on her chair.
+
+But before his breakfast was ready, Curdie jumped up so suddenly as to
+startle both his companions.
+
+"Mother, mother!" he cried, "I was forgetting. You must take the
+princess home yourself. I must go and wake my father."
+
+Without a word of explanation, he rushed to the place where his father
+was sleeping. Having thoroughly roused him with what he told him, he
+darted out of the cottage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+MASON-WORK
+
+
+HE had all at once remembered the resolution of the goblins to carry out
+their second plan upon the failure of the first. No doubt they were
+already busy, and the mine was therefore in the greatest danger of being
+flooded and rendered useless--not to speak of the lives of the miners.
+
+When he reached the mouth of the mine, after rousing all the miners
+within reach, he found his father and a good many more just entering.
+They all hurried to the gang by which he had found a way into the goblin
+country. There the foresight of Peter had already collected a great many
+blocks of stone, with cement, ready for building up the weak place--well
+enough known to the goblins. Although there was not room for more than
+two to be actually building at once, they managed, by setting all the
+rest to work in preparing the cement, and passing the stones, to finish
+in the course of the day a huge buttress filling the whole gang, and
+supported everywhere by the live rock. Before the hour when they usually
+dropped work, they were satisfied that the mine was secure.
+
+They had heard goblin hammers and pickaxes busy all the time, and at
+length fancied they heard sounds of water they had never heard before.
+But that was otherwise accounted for when they left the mine; for they
+stepped out into a tremendous storm which was raging all over the
+mountain. The thunder was bellowing, and the lightning lancing out of a
+huge black cloud which lay above it, and hung down its edges of thick
+mist over its sides. The lightning was breaking out of the mountain,
+too, and flashing up into the cloud. From the state of the brooks, now
+swollen into raging torrents, it was evident that the storm had been
+storming all day.
+
+The wind was blowing as if it would blow him off the mountain, but,
+anxious about his mother and the princess, Curdie darted up through the
+thick of the tempest. Even if they had not set out before the storm came
+on, he did not judge them safe, for, in such a storm even their poor
+little house was in danger. Indeed he soon found that but for a huge
+rock against which it was built, and which protected it both from the
+blasts and the waters, it must have been swept if it was not blown away;
+for the two torrents into which this rock parted the rush of water
+behind it united again in front of the cottage--two roaring and
+dangerous streams, which his mother and the princess could not possibly
+have passed. It was with great difficulty that he forced his way through
+one of them, and up to the door.
+
+The moment his hand fell on the latch, through all the uproar of winds
+and waters came the joyous cry of the princess:--
+
+"There's Curdie! Curdie! Curdie!"
+
+She was sitting wrapped in blankets on the bed, his mother trying for
+the hundredth time to light the fire which had been drowned by the rain
+that came down the chimney. The clay floor was one mass of mud, and the
+whole place looked wretched. But the faces of the mother and the
+princess shone as if their troubles only made them merrier. Curdie
+laughed at sight of them.
+
+"I never _had_ such fun!" said the princess, her eyes twinkling and her
+pretty teeth shining. "How nice it must be to live in a cottage on the
+mountain!"
+
+"It all depends on what kind your inside house is," said the mother.
+
+"I know what you mean," said Irene. "That's the kind of thing my
+grandmother says."
+
+By the time Peter returned, the storm was nearly over, but the streams
+were so fierce and so swollen, that it was not only out of the question
+for the princess to go down the mountain, but most dangerous for Peter
+even or Curdie to make the attempt in the gathering darkness.
+
+"They will be dreadfully frightened about you," said Peter to the
+princess, "but we cannot help it. We must wait till the morning."
+
+With Curdie's help, the fire was lighted at last, and the mother set
+about making their supper; and after supper they all told the princess
+stories till she grew sleepy. Then Curdie's mother laid her in Curdie's
+bed, which was in a tiny little garret-room. As soon as she was in bed,
+through a little window low down in the roof she caught sight of her
+grandmother's lamp shining far away beneath, and she gazed at the
+beautiful silvery globe until she fell fast asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+THE KING AND THE KISS
+
+
+THE next morning the sun rose so bright that Irene said the rain had
+washed his face and let the light out clean. The torrents were still
+roaring down the side of the mountain, but they were so much smaller as
+not to be dangerous in the daylight. After an early breakfast, Peter
+went to his work, and Curdie and his mother set out to take the princess
+home. They had difficulty in getting her dry across the streams, and
+Curdie had again and again to carry her, but at last they got safe on
+the broader part of the road, and walked gently down toward the king's
+house. And what should they see as they turned the last corner, but the
+last of the king's troop riding through the gate!
+
+"Oh, Curdie!" cried Irene, clapping her hands right joyfully, "my
+king-papa is come."
+
+The moment Curdie heard that, he caught her up in his arms, and set off
+at full speed, crying--
+
+"Come on, mother dear! The king may break his heart before he knows that
+she is safe."
+
+Irene clung round his neck, and he ran with her like a deer. When he
+entered the gate into the court, there sat the king on his horse, with
+all the people of the house about him, weeping and hanging their heads.
+The king was not weeping, but his face was white as a dead man's, and he
+looked as if the life had gone out of him. The men-at-arms he had
+brought with him, sat with horror-stricken faces, but eyes flashing
+with rage, waiting only for the word of the king to do something--they
+did not know what, and nobody knew what.
+
+The day before the men-at-arms belonging to the house, as soon as they
+were satisfied the princess had been carried away, rushed after the
+goblins into the hole, but found that they had already so skilfully
+blockaded the narrowest part, not many feet below the cellar, that
+without miners and their tools they could do nothing. Not one of them
+knew where the mouth of the mine lay, and some of those who had set out
+to find it had been overtaken by the storm and had not even yet
+returned. Poor Sir Walter was especially filled with shame, and almost
+entertained the hope that the king would order him to be decapitated,
+for the very thought of that sweet little face down amongst the goblins
+was unendurable.
+
+When Curdie ran in at the gate with the princess in his arms, they were
+all so absorbed in their own misery and awed by the king's presence and
+grief, that no one observed his arrival. He went straight up to the
+king, where he sat on his horse.
+
+"Papa! papa!" the princess cried, stretching out her arms to him; "here
+I am!"
+
+The king started. The color rushed to his face. He gave an inarticulate
+cry. Curdie held up the princess, and the king bent down and took her
+from his arms. As he clasped her to his bosom, the big tears went
+dropping down his cheeks and his beard. And such a shout arose from all
+the bystanders, that the startled horses pranced and capered, and the
+armor rang and clattered, and the rocks of the mountain echoed back the
+noises. The princess greeted them all as she nestled in her father's
+bosom, and the king did not set her down until she had told them all the
+story. But she had more to tell about Curdie than about herself, and
+what she did tell about herself none of them could understand except the
+king and Curdie, who stood by the king's knee stroking the neck of the
+great white horse. And still as she told what Curdie had done, Sir
+Walter and others added to what she told, even Lootie joining in the
+praises of his courage and energy.
+
+Curdie held his peace, looking quietly up in the king's face. And his
+mother stood on the outskirts of the crowd listening with delight, for
+her son's deeds were pleasant in her ears, until the princess caught
+sight of her.
+
+"And there is his mother, king-papa!" she said. "See--there. She is such
+a nice mother, and has been so kind to me!"
+
+They all parted asunder as the king made a sign to her to come forward.
+She obeyed, and he gave her his hand, but could not speak.
+
+"And now, king-papa," the princess went on, "I must tell you another
+thing. One night long ago Curdie drove the goblins away and brought
+Lootie and me safe from the mountain. And I promised him a kiss when we
+got home, but Lootie wouldn't let me give it to him. I would not have
+you scold Lootie, but I want you to impress upon her that a princess
+_must_ do as she promises."
+
+"Indeed she must, my child--except it be wrong," said the king. "There,
+give Curdie a kiss."
+
+And as he spoke he held her toward him.
+
+The princess reached down, threw her arms round Curdie's neck, and
+kissed him on the mouth, saying--
+
+"There, Curdie! There's the kiss I promised you!"
+
+Then they all went into the house, and the cook rushed to the kitchen,
+and the servants to their work. Lootie dressed Irene in her shiningest
+clothes, and the king put off his armor, and put on purple and gold; and
+a messenger was sent for Peter and all the miners, and there was a great
+and grand feast, which continued long after the princess was put to
+bed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+THE SUBTERRANEAN WATERS
+
+
+THE king's harper, who always formed a part of his escort, was chanting
+a ballad which he made as he went on playing on his instrument--about
+the princess and the goblins, and the prowess of Curdie, when all at
+once he ceased, with his eyes on one of the doors of the hall. Thereupon
+the eyes of the king and his guests turned thitherward also. The next
+moment, through the open doorway came the princess Irene. She went
+straight up to her father, with her right hand stretched out a little
+sideways, and her forefinger, as her father and Curdie understood,
+feeling its way along the invisible thread. The king took her on his
+knee, and she said in his ear--
+
+"King-papa, do you hear that noise?"
+
+"I hear nothing," said the king.
+
+"Listen," she said, holding up her forefinger.
+
+The king listened, and a great stillness fell upon the company. Each
+man, seeing that the king listened, listened also, and the harper sat
+with his harp between his arms, and his fingers silent upon the strings.
+
+"I do hear a noise," said the king at length--"a noise as of distant
+thunder. It is coming nearer and nearer. What can it be?"
+
+They all heard it now, and each seemed ready to start to his feet as he
+listened. Yet all sat perfectly still. The noise came rapidly nearer.
+
+"What can it be?" said the king again.
+
+"I think it must be another storm coming over the mountain," said Sir
+Walter.
+
+Then Curdie, who at the first word of the king had slipped from his
+seat, and laid his ear to the ground, rose up quickly, and approaching
+the king said, speaking very fast--
+
+"Please your Majesty, I think I know what it is. I have no time to
+explain, for that might make it too late for some of us. Will your
+Majesty order that everybody leave the house as quickly as possible, and
+get up the mountain?"
+
+The king, who was the wisest man in the kingdom, knew well there was a
+time when things must be done, and questions left till afterward. He had
+faith in Curdie, and rose instantly, with Irene in his arms.
+
+"Every man and woman follow me," he said, and strode out into the
+darkness.
+
+Before he had reached the gate, the noise had grown to a great
+thundering roar, and the ground trembled beneath their feet, and before
+the last of them had crossed the court, out after them from the great
+hall-door came a huge rush of turbid water, and almost swept them away.
+But they got safe out of the gate and up the mountain, while the torrent
+went roaring down the road into the valley beneath.
+
+Curdie had left the king and the princess to look after his mother, whom
+he and his father, one on each side, caught up when the stream overtook
+them and carried safe and dry.
+
+When the king had got out of the way of the water, a little up the
+mountain, he stood with the princess in his arms, looking back with
+amazement on the issuing torrent, which glimmered fierce and foamy
+through the night. There Curdie rejoined them.
+
+"Now, Curdie," said the king, "what does it mean! Is this what you
+expected?"
+
+"It is, your Majesty," said Curdie; and proceeded to tell him about the
+second scheme of the goblins, who, fancying the miners of more
+importance to the upper world than they were, had resolved, if they
+should fail in carrying off the king's daughter, to flood the mine and
+drown the miners. Then he explained what the miners had done to prevent
+it. The goblins had, in pursuance of their design, let loose all the
+underground reservoirs and streams, expecting the water to run down into
+the mine, which was lower than their part of the mountain, for they had,
+as they supposed, not knowing of the solid wall close behind, broken a
+passage through into it. But the readiest outlet the water could find
+had turned out to be the tunnel they had made to the king's house, the
+possibility of which catastrophe had not occurred to the mind of the
+young miner until he placed his ear close to the floor of the hall.
+
+What was then to be done? The house appeared in danger of falling, and
+every moment the torrent was increasing.
+
+"We must set out at once," said the king. "But how to get at the
+horses!"
+
+"Shall I see if we can manage that?" said Curdie.
+
+"Do," said the king.
+
+Curdie gathered the men-at-arms, and took them over the garden wall, and
+so to the stables. They found their horses in terror; the water was
+rising fast around them, and it was quite time they were got out. But
+there was no way to get them out, except by riding them through the
+stream, which was now pouring from the lower windows as well as the
+door. As one horse was quite enough for any man to manage through such a
+torrent, Curdie got on the king's white charger, and leading the way,
+brought them all in safety to the rising ground.
+
+"Look, look, Curdie!" cried Irene, the moment that, having dismounted,
+he led the horse up to the king.
+
+Curdie did look, and saw, high in the air, somewhere about the top of
+the king's house, a great globe of light, shining like the purest
+silver.
+
+"Oh!" he cried in some consternation, "that is your grandmother's lamp!
+We _must_ get her out. I will go and find her. The house may fall, you
+know."
+
+"My grandmother is in no danger," said Irene, smiling.
+
+"Here, Curdie, take the princess while I get on my horse," said the
+king.
+
+Curdie took the princess again, and both turned their eyes to the globe
+of light. The same moment there shot from it a white bird, which,
+descending with outstretched wings, made one circle round the king and
+Curdie and the princess, and then glided up again. The light and the
+pigeon vanished together.
+
+"Now, Curdie," said the princess, as he lifted her to her father's arms,
+"you see my grandmother knows all about it, and isn't frightened. I
+believe she could walk through that water and it wouldn't wet her a
+bit."
+
+"But, my child," said the king, "you will be cold if you haven't
+something more on. Run, Curdie, my boy, and fetch anything you can lay
+your hands on, to keep the princess warm. We have a long ride before
+us."
+
+Curdie was gone in a moment, and soon returned with a great rich fur,
+and the news that dead goblins were tossing about in the current through
+the house. They had been caught in their own snare; instead of the mine
+they had flooded their own country, whence they were now swept up
+drowned. Irene shuddered, but the king held her close to his bosom. Then
+he turned to Sir Walter, and said--
+
+"Bring Curdie's father and mother here."
+
+"I wish," said the king, when they stood before him, "to take your son
+with me. He shall enter my bodyguard at once, and wait further
+promotion."
+
+Peter and his wife, overcome, only murmured almost inaudible thanks. But
+Curdie spoke aloud.
+
+"Please your Majesty," he said, "I cannot leave my father and mother."
+
+"That's right, Curdie!" cried the princess. "_I_ wouldn't if I was you."
+
+The king looked at the princess and then at Curdie with a glow of
+satisfaction on his countenance.
+
+"I too think you are right, Curdie," he said, "and I will not ask you
+again. But I shall have a chance of doing something for you some time."
+
+"Your Majesty has already allowed me to serve you," said Curdie.
+
+"But, Curdie," said his mother, "why shouldn't you go with the king? We
+can get on very well without you."
+
+"But I can't get on very well without you," said Curdie. "The king is
+very kind, but I could not be half the use to him that I am to you.
+Please your Majesty, if you wouldn't mind giving my mother a red
+petticoat! I should have got her one long ago, but for the goblins."
+
+"As soon as we get home," said the king, "Irene and I will search out
+the warmest one to be found, and send it by one of the gentlemen."
+
+"Yes, that we will, Curdie!" said the princess.
+
+"And next summer we'll come back and see you wear it, Curdie's mother,"
+she added. "Sha'n't we, king-papa?"
+
+"Yes, my love; I hope so," said the king.
+
+Then turning to the miners, he said----
+
+"Will you do the best you can for my servants to-night? I hope they will
+be able to return to the house to-morrow."
+
+The miners with one voice promised their hospitality.
+
+Then the king commanded his servants to mind whatever Curdie should say
+to them, and after shaking hands with him and his father and mother, the
+king and the princess and all their company rode away down the side of
+the new stream which had already devoured half the road, into the starry
+night.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+THE LAST CHAPTER
+
+
+ALL the rest went up the mountain, and separated in groups to the homes
+of the miners. Curdie and his father and mother took Lootie with them.
+And the whole way, a light, of which all but Lootie understood the
+origin, shone upon their path. But when they looked round they could see
+nothing of the silvery globe.
+
+For days and days the water continued to rush from the doors and windows
+of the king's house, and a few goblin bodies were swept out into the
+road.
+
+Curdie saw that something must be done. He spoke to his father and the
+rest of the miners, and they at once proceeded to make another outlet
+for the waters. By setting all hands to the work, tunneling here and
+building there, they soon succeeded; and having also made a little
+tunnel to drain the water away from under the king's house, they were
+soon able to get into the wine cellar, where they found a multitude of
+dead goblins--among the rest the queen, with the skin-shoe gone, and the
+stone one fast to her ankle--for the water had swept away the barricade
+which prevented the men-at-arms from following the goblins, and had
+greatly widened the passage. They built it securely up, and then went
+back to their labors in the mine.
+
+A good many of the goblins with their creatures escaped from the
+inundation out upon the mountain. But most of them soon left that part
+of the country, and most of those who remained grew milder in character,
+and indeed became very much like the Scotch Brownies. Their skulls
+became softer as well as their hearts, and their feet grew harder, and
+by degrees they became friendly with the inhabitants of the mountain and
+even with the miners. But the latter were merciless to any of the _cobs'
+creatures_ that came their way, until at length they all but
+disappeared. Still--
+
+"_But, Mr. Author, we would rather hear more about the Princess and
+Curdie. We don't care about the goblins and their nasty creatures. They
+frighten us--rather._"
+
+"_But you know if you once get rid of the goblins there is no fear of
+the princess or of Curdie._"
+
+"_But we want to know more about them._"
+
+"_Some day, perhaps, I may tell you the further history of both of them;
+how Curdie came to visit Irene's grandmother, and what she did for him;
+and how the princess and he met again after they were older--and
+how--But there! I don't mean to go any farther at present._"
+
+"_Then you're leaving the story unfinished, Mr. Author!_"
+
+"_Not more unfinished than a story ought to be, I hope. If you ever knew
+a story finished, all I can say is, I never did. Somehow, stories won't
+finish. I think I know why, but I won't say that either, now._"
+
+
+THE END
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
+
+Page 11, "clevernesss" changed to "cleverness" (knowledge and
+cleverness)
+
+Page 68, "gleamimg" changed to "gleaming" (were sparkling and gleaming)
+
+Page 77, "would'nt" changed to "wouldn't" (wouldn't have come)
+
+Page 103, "arrange" changed to "arranges" (all that arranges itself)
+
+Page 191, "of thing" added to text (the kind of thing)
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Princess and the Goblin, by George MacDonald
+
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