Nowcame the seventh and last, what could she do? Well she could tell stories as many as ever she liked.
“Here are my five fingers,” said the old Trold, “tell me a story for each one.”
The elf-maiden took hold of his wrist, and he chuckled and laughed, till he nearly choked. When she came to the fourth finger, which had a gold ring on it, as if it knew there was to be a betrothal, the Trold said, “Hold fast what you have got, the hand is yours, I will have you for a wife myself!” The elf-maiden said that the stories about Guldbrand, the fourth finger, and little Peter Playman, the fifth, had not yet been told.
“Never mind, keep those till winter. Then you shall tell us about the fir, and the birch, and the fairy gifts, and the tingling frost. You shall have every opportunity of telling us stories; nobody up there does it yet. We will sit in the Stone Hall, where the pine logs blaze, and drink mead out of the golden horns of the old Norwegian kings. The river god gave me a couple. When we sit there the mountain sprite comes to pay us a visit, and he will sing you the songs of the Sæter girls. The salmon will leap in the waterfalls, and beat against the stone wall, but it won’t get in. Ah, you may believe me when I say that we lead a merry life there in good old Norway. But where are the lads?”
Yes, where were the lads? They were running about the fields, blowing out the will-o’-the-wisps, who came so willingly for the torchlight procession.
“Why do you gad about out there?” said the Trold. “I have taken a mother for you, now you can come and take one of the aunts.”
But the lads said they would rather make a speech, and drink toasts; they had no wish to marry. Then they made their speeches, and drank toasts and tipped their glasses up to shew that they had emptied them. After that they pulled off their coats and went to sleep on the table, to show that they were quite at home. But the old Trold danced round and round the room with hisyoung bride, and exchanged boots with her, which was grander than exchanging rings.
“There is the cock crowing!” said the old housekeeper. “Now we must shut the shutters, so that the sun may not burn us up.”
Then the hill closed up. But the lizards went on running up and down the clefts of the tree; and they said to each other, “Ah, how much I liked the old Trold.”
“I liked the boys better,” said the earthworm, “but then it couldn’t see, poor, miserable creature that it was.”
“That reminds me of another story,” said the French Fay, who had already told one story, but was evidently ready and willing to tell another.
“We don’t want to hear two stories that are like each other,” said King Oberon.
“Please your Majesty it is not like that which the Danish Elf has just told, only his one reminded me of mine,” answered the Fay.
“What is it about?” enquired the Queen who remembered how much she had liked the dainty little creature’s first tale.
“It is a story showing how that which is ugly may become beautiful through love,” readily responded the French Fay.
“Let us hear it,” said Oberon, “if my Titania wishes it.”
Titania having answered that she certainlydidwish it, the Fay sprang lightly to the stool and began telling the pretty little love story of