CONTENTS

THE THREE
MULLA-MULGARS

"OH, BUT IF I MIGHT BUT HOLD IT IN MY HAND ONE MOMENT, I THINK THAT I SHOULD NEVER EVEN SIGH AGAIN!"

THE THREE
MULLA-MULGARS
BY
WALTER DE LA MARE
ILLUSTRATED BY
DOROTHY · P · LATHROP

New York ALFRED · A · KNOPF Mcmxxv

COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY
ALFRED A. KNOPF, Inc.
Published, December, 1919
Second Printing, February, 1925
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

TO
F. and D.
and
L. and C.

ILLUSTRATIONS

THE THREE MULLA-MULGARS

CHAPTER I

On the borders of the Forest of Munza-mulgar lived once an old grey fruit-monkey of the name of Mutt-matutta. She had three sons, the eldest Thumma, the next Thimbulla, and the youngest, who was a Nizza-neela, Ummanodda. And they called each other for short, Thumb, Thimble, and Nod. The rickety, tumble-down old wooden hut in which they lived had been built 319 Munza years before by a traveller, a Portugall or Portingal, lost in the forest 22,997 leagues from home. After he was dead, there came scrambling along on his fours one peaceful evening a Mulgar (or, as we say in English, a monkey) named Zebbah. At first sight of the hut he held his head on one side awhile, and stood quite still, listening, his broad-nosed face lit up in the blaze of the setting sun. He then hobbled a little nearer, and peeped into the hut. Whereupon he hobbled away a little, but soon came back and peeped again. At last he ventured near, and, pushing back the tangle of creepers and matted grasses, groped through the door and went in. And there, in a dark corner, lay the Portingal's little heap of bones.

The hut was dry as tinder. It had in it a broken fire-stone, a kind of chest or cupboard, a table, and a stool, both rough and insect-bitten, but still strong. Zebbah sniffed and grunted, and pushed and peered about. And he found all manner of strange and precious stuff half buried in the hut—pots for Subbub; pestles and basins for Manaka-cake, etc.; three bags of great beads, clear, blue, and emerald; an old rusty musket; nine ephelantoes' tusks; a bag of Margarita stones; and many other things, besides cloth and spider-silk and dried-up fruits and fishes. He made his dwelling there, and died there. This Mulgar, Zebbah, was Mutta-matutta's great-great-great-grandfather. Dead and gone were all.

Now, one day when Mutta-matutta was young, and her father had gone into the forest for Sudd-fruit, there came limping along a most singular Mulgar towards the house. He was bent and shrunken, shivering and coughing, but he walked as men walk, his nut-shaped head bending up out of a big red jacket. His shoulder and the top of his head were worn bare by the rubbing of the bundle he carried. And behind him came stumbling along another Mulgar, his servant, with a few rags tied round his body, who could not at first speak, his tongue was so much swollen from his having bitten in the dark a poison-spider in his nuts. The name of his master was Seelem; his own name was Glint. This Seelem fell very sick. Mutta-matutta nursed him night and day, with the sourest monkey-physic. He was pulled crooked with pain and the shivers, or rain-fever. The tips of the hairs on his head had in his wanderings turned snow-white. But he bore his pain and his sickness (and his physic) without one groan of complaint.

And Glint, who fetched water and gathered sticks and nuts, and helped Mutta-matutta, told her that his master, Seelem, was a Mulla-mulgar—that is, a Mulgar of the Blood Royal—and own brother to Assasimmon, Prince of the Valleys of Tishnar.

He told her, also, that his master had wearied of Assasimmon's valley-palace, his fine food and dishes, his music of shells and strings, his countless Mulgar-slaves, beasts, and groves and gardens; and that, having chosen three servants, Jacca, Glutt, and himself, he had left his brother's valleys, to discover what lay beyond the Arakkaboa Mountains. But Jacca had perished of frost-bite on the southern slopes of the Peak of Tishnar, and Glutt had been eaten by the Minimuls.

He was very silent and gloomy, this Mulla-mulgar, Seelem, but glad to rest his bruised and weary bones in the hut. And when Mutta-matutta's father died from sleeping in the moon-mist at Sudd-ripening, Seelem untied his travelling bundle and made his home in the hut. Mutta-matutta was a lonely and rather sad Mulgar, so at this she rejoiced, for she had grown from fearing to love the royal old wanderer. And she helped him to put away all that was in his bundles into the Portingal's chest—three shirts of cotton; two red jackets, like his own, with metal hooks; a sheep's-coat, with ivory buttons and pocket-flaps; three skin shoes (for one had been lost out of his bundle in the forest); a cap of Mamasul skin (very precious); besides knives, fire-strikers, a hollow cup of ivory, magic physic-powder, two combs of Impaleena-horn, a green serpent-skin for sweetening water, etc., and, beyond and above all, the milk-white Wonderstone of Tishnar.

Here they lived, Seelem and Mutta (as he called her), in the Portingal's old hut, for thirteen years. And Mutta was happy with Seelem and her three sons, Thumb, Thimble, and Nod. They had a water-spring, honey-boxes or baskets for the bees in the Ollaconda-trees, a shed or huddle of green branches, for Glint, and a big patch of Ummuz-cane. Nod slept in a kind of hole or burrow in the roof, with a tiny peeping-hole, from which he used to scare the birds from his father's Ummuz.

Mutta wished only that Seelem was not quite so grim and broody; that the Munza-mulgars (forest-monkeys) would not come stealing her Subbub and honey; and that the Portingal's hut stood quite out of the silvery moon-mist that rose from the swamp; for she suffered (as do most fruit-monkeys) from the bones-ache. Seelem was gentle and easy in his own moody way with Mutta and his three sons, but, most of all, he cheered his heart with tiny Nod, the Nizza-neela. Sometimes all day long this old travel-worn Mulla-mulgar never uttered a sound, save at evening, when he sang or droned his evening hymn to Tishnar.[1] He kept a thick stick, which he called his Guzza, to punish his three sons when they were idle and sullen, or gluttonous, or with Munza tricks pestered their mother. And he never favoured Nod beyond the others more than all good fathers favour the youngest, the littlest, and the gaysomest of their children.

One of the first things that Nod remembered was Glint's tumbling from the great Ukka-tree, which he had climbed at ripening-time, bough up to bough from the bottom, cracking shells and eating all the way, until, forgetting how heavy he had become, he swung his fat body on to a slender and withered branch, and fell all a-topple from top to bottom on to the back of his thick skull. Beneath this same dark-leaved tree Seelem buried his servant, together with a pot of subbub, seven loaves or cakes, and a long stick of Ummuz-cane. But Mutta-matutta after his death would never touch an Ukka-nut again.

Seelem taught his sons how to make fire, what nuts and roots and fruits and grasses were wholesome for eating; what herbs and bark and pith for physic; what reeds and barks for cloth. He taught them how to take honey without being stung; how to count; how to find their way by the chief and brightest among the stars; to cut cudgels, to build leaf-huts and huddles against heat or rain. He taught them, too, the common tongue of the Forest-monkeys—that is the language of nearly all the Mulgars that live in the forests of Munza—Jacquet-mulgars, Mullabruks, purple-faced and saffron-headed Mulgars, Skeetoes, tuft-waving Manquabees, Fly-catchers and Squirrel-tails, and many more than I can mention. Seelem taught them also a little of the languages of the dreaded Gunga-mulgars, of the Collobs, and the Babbabōōmas. But the Minimul-mulgars' and the Oomgars' or man-monkeys' languages (white, black, or yellow) he could not teach, because he did not know them. When, however, they were alone together they spoke the secret language of the Mulla-mulgars dwelling north of the Arakkaboas—that is, Mulgar-royal. This language in some ways resembles that of the Portugalls, in some that of the Oggewibbies, and, here and there—but in very little—Garniereze. Seelem, of course, taught his sons, and especially Thumb, many other things besides—more, certainly, than would contain itself in a little book like this. But, above all, he taught them to walk upright, never to taste blood, and never, unless in danger or despair, to climb trees or to grow a tail.

But now, after all these thirteen years of absence from Assasimmon's palace in the beautiful Valleys of Tishnar, Seelem began to desire more and more to see again his home and his brother, with whom as a child he had walked in scarlet and Mamasul, and drunk his syrup from an ivory cup. He grew more gloomy and morose than ever, squatted alone, his eyes fixed mournfully in the air. And Mutta would whisper to Nod: "Sst, zun nizza-neela, tus-weeta zan nuome."

The more cunning of the Forest-mulgars at first had come in troops to Seelem, laden with gifts of nuts and fruits, because they were afraid of him. But he would sit in his red jacket and merely stare at them as if they were no better than flies. And at last they began in revenge to do him as much mischief as their wits could contrive, until he grew utterly weary of their scuffling and quarrelling, their thumbs and colours, fleas and tails. At last he could hear himself no longer, and one morning, in the first haze of sunrise over the sleeping forest, he called Mutta and his three sons to where he sat in the shadow of Glint's great budding Ukka-tree. And he told them he was going on a long journey—"beyond and beyond, forest and river, forest swamp and river, the mountains of Arakkaboa, leagues, leagues away"—to seek again the Valleys of Tishnar. "And I will come back," he said, leaning his hand upon the ground and blinking at Nod, "with slaves and scarlet and food-baskets and Zevveras, and bring you all there with me. But first I must go alone and find the way through dangers thick as flies, O Mulla-mulgars. Wait here and guard your old mother, Mutta-matutta, my sons, her Ummuz and ukkas. And grow strong, O tailless ones, till I return. Zu zoubé seese muglareen, een suang no nouano zupbf!" And that was all he said.

But Mutta-matutta, though she could not hide her grief at his going, helped him in every way she could to be quickly gone. He seemed beside himself, this white, old, crooked Mulla-mulgar. His eyes blazed; he went muttering; he'd throw up his hands and snuff and snuff, as if the very wind bore Tishnar on its wings. And even at night he'd rise up in the darkness and open the door and listen as if out of the immeasurable and solitudinous forests he heard voices calling him from far away. At length, in his last shirt (which had been carefully kept these thirteen years, with a dead kingfisher and a bag of civet, to keep off the cockroaches); in his finest red jacket and his cap of Mamasul-skin; with a great bundle of Manaka-cake and Ummuz-cane, knife and fire-striker and physic, and the old Portingal's rusty musket on his shoulder, he was ready to be off. In the early morning he came stooping under the little hut-door. He looked at his hut and his water-spring, at his bees and canes; he looked at his three sons, and at old Mutta-matutta, with a great frown, and trembled. And Mutta could not bear to say good-bye; she lifted her crooked hands above her old head, the tears running down her cheeks, and she went and hid herself in the hut till he was gone. But his three sons went a little way with him.

Thumb and Thimble hopped along with his heavy bundle on a stick between them to the branching of the Mulgar-track, which here runs nearly two paces wide into the gloom of Munza-mulgar; while Nod sat on Seelem's shoulder, sucking a stick of Ummuz-cane, and clutching the long, cold, rusty barrel of his musket. The trees of the forest lifted their branches in a trembling haze of heat, hung with grey thorny ropes, and vines and trailing creepers of Cullum and Samarak, vivid with leaves, and with large cuplike waxen flowers, moon-white, amber, mauve, and scarlet. Butterflies like blots and splashes of flame, wee Tominiscoes, ruby and emerald and amethyst, shimmered and spangled and sipped and hovered. And a thin, twangling, immeasurable murmur like the strings of Nōōmanossi's harp rose from the tiny millions that made their nests and mounds and burrows in the forest.

Seelem took his sons one by one by the shoulders, and looked into their eyes, and touched noses. And they lifted their hands in salutation, and watched him till he was gone from sight. But though his grey face was all wizened up with trouble and wet with tears, he never so much as once looked behind him, lest his sons should cry after him, or he turn back. So, presently, after they all three lifted their hands once more, as if his Meermut[2] might still haunt near; and then they went home to their mother.

But the rains came; he did not return. The long days strode softly by, the chatter and screams of Munza at dawn, the long-drawn, moaning shout of Mullabruk to Mullabruk as darkness deepened. Nod would sometimes venture a little way into the forest, hoping to hear the gongs that his father had told him the close-shorn slaves of Assasimmon tie with leopard-thongs about their Zevveras' necks. He would sit in the gigantic shadows of evening, watching the fireflies, and saying to himself: "Sst, Nod, see what they say—to-morrow!" But the morrow never came that brought him back his father.

Mutta-matutta cared and cooked for them. She made a great store of Manaka-cake, packed for coolness all neatly in plantain-leaves; Nano-cheese, and two or three big pots of Subbub. She kept them clean and combed; plastered and physicked them; taught them to cook, and many things else, until, as one by one they grew up, they knew all that she could teach them, except the wisdom to use what they had learnt. She would often, too, in the first hush of night, tell them stories of their father, and of her own father, back even to Zebbah, and the Portingal dangling with his bunch of wild-cats' tails in the corner.

But as the years wasted away, she grew thin and mournful, and fell ill of pining and grief and age, and even had at last to keep to her bed of moss and cotton in the hut.

Her sons worked hard for her, pushing into the forest and across the narrow swamp in search of fruits to tempt her appetite. Nod heaped up fresh leaves for her bed, and sang in his shrill, quavering voice every evening Tishnar's hymn to his poor old mother. He baked her sweet potatoes and Nanoes wrapped in leaves, and would dance round, "wriggle and stamp—wriggle and stamp," as Seelem had told him dance the Oomgar-nuggas, to try to make her cheerful. But by-and-by she began to languish, her teeth chattering, her eyes burning, unable to eat.... And one still afternoon, when only Nod was near (his brothers, tired of the heat and buzzing in the green hut, having gone to gather nuts and sticks in the forest), as Mutta-matutta sat dozing and muttering in her corner, came the voice of Tishnar, calling in the hush of evening: and she knew she must die.

Nod crept close to her, thinking at first the strange voice singing was the sound of Seelem's Zevveras' distant gongs, and he held the hard thin hand between his. When Thumb and Thimble returned with their bags and faggots of smoulder-wood, she called them all three, and told them she too must go away now, perhaps even, if only in Meermut, to find their father. And she besought them to be always true and faithful one to another, and to be brave. "Five fingers serve one hand, my good men," she said. "And oh, remember this always: that you are all three Mulla-mulgars, sons of Seelem, whose home is far from here—Mulla-mulgars who never do walk flambo—that is, on all fours—never taste blood, and never, unless in danger and despair, climb trees or grow a tail."

It was hot and gloomy in the tangled little hut, lit only by the violet of the dying afterglow. And when she had rested a little while to recover her breath, she told them that Seelem, the night before he left them, had said that, should he perish on his journey and not return, in seven Munza years they were, as best they could, bravely to follow after him. In time they would perhaps reach the Valleys of Tishnar, and their uncle, Prince Assasimmon, would welcome them.

"His country lies beyond and beyond," she said, "forest and river, forest, swamp and river, the Mountains of Arakkaboa—leagues, leagues away."

And, as she paused, a feeble wind sighed through the open window, stirring the dangling bones of the Portingal, so that, with their faint clicking, they too, seemed to echo, "leagues, leagues away."

"It will be a long and dreary journey, my sons. But the Prince Assasimmon, Mulla-mulla of the Mulgars, is great and powerful, and has for hut a palace of ivory and Azmamogreel, with scarlet and Mamasul, slaves and peacocks, and beasts uncountable; and leagues of Ukka and Barbary-nuts; and boundless fields of Ummuz, and orchards of fruit, and bowers of flowers and pleasure. And his, too, is the Rose of all the Mulgars." And as he listened Thimble shuffled from foot to foot, his heart uneasy, to hear her cry so hollowly the beauty of that Rose. And at her bidding, out of the cupboard they took the civeted bundles of all the stuff and little Mulgar treasures she had been hoarding up all these years for them against this last day.

She gave Thumb and Thimble each a red Oomgar's jacket with curved metal hooks, and to Nod the little coat of mountain-sheep's wool, with its nine ivory buttons. She divided and shared everything between them—their father's knives and cudgels, the beads blue and emerald, the Margarita stones. The Portingal's rusty hatchet, burned with a cross on its stock, she gave to Thumb; a little fat black greasy book of sorcery, made of Exxswixxia leaves, to Thimble; and to Nod, last of all, picking it out of the stitched serpent-skin lining of her great wool cap, she gave the Wonderstone.

"I give this to Nod," she said to his brothers, "because he is a Nizza-neela, and has magic in him. Come close, my sons, Thumb and Thimble, and see. His winking [or left][3] eye has green within the hazel; his thumbs grow lean and long; he still keeps two milk-teeth; and bears the Nizza-neela tuft betwixt his ears." With her hot skinny fingers she stroked softly back his hair, and showed his brothers the little velvety patch, or tuft, or badge, or crest, on the top of his head, above the parting. "O Mulla-mulgars, how I begged your father to take this Wonderstone with him on his journey! but he would not. He said, 'Keep it, and let my sons, if need be, carry it after me to the kingdom of my brother. He will know by this one thing that they are indeed my sons, Mulla-mulgars, Princes of Tishnar, sibbetha eena manga Môh!'"

"Never, little Nod," said his old dying mother—"never lose, nor give away, nor sport with, nor even lend this Wonderstone; and if in your long journey you are in danger of the Third Sleep,[4] or lost, or in great fear, spit with your spittle on the stone, and rub softly three times with your left thumb, Samaweeza: Tishnar will hear you; help will come."

Then, with her small, clumsy fingers, she tied up the sleeping milk-white Wonderstone in the hem of his woolly sheep's coat, and lay back in her bed, too feeble to speak again. Thumb, Thimble, and Nod sat all three, each with his little heap of house-stuff before him, which it seemed hateful now to have, staring through the doorway. In the purple gloom the fireflies were mazily flickering. Night was still, like a simmering pot, with heat. And out of the swamp they heard the Ooboë calling to its mate, singing marvellous sweet and clear in the darkness above its woven nest; while over their heads the tiny Nikka-nakkas, or mouse-owls, sat purring in the thatch. And Nod said: "Listen, Mutta, listen; how the Ooboë's telling secrets!" And she smiled with tight-shut lids, wagging her wizened head.

And in the deepest dead of night, when Thimble sat sleeping, his long arms thrown out over the Portingal's rough table, and Thumb crouching at the door, Nod heard in the silence a very faint sigh. He crept to his mother's bed. She softly raised her hand to him, and her eyes closed.

So her three sons dug her a deep grave beside Glint's, under the Ukka-tree, as she had bidden them. And many of the Forest-mulgars, specially those of her own kind and kindred, came down solemnly out of the forest towards evening of that day, and keened or droned for Mutta-matutta, squatting together at some little distance from the Portingal's hut. Beyond their counting (though that is not a hard matter) was the number of the years she and her father and her father's father, back even to Zebbah, had lived in the hut. But they did not come near, because they feared the Portingal's yellow bones hung up in the corner.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Tishnar is a very ancient word in Munza, and means that which cannot be thought about in words, or told, or expressed. So all the wonderful, secret, and quiet world beyond the Mulgars' lives is Tishnar—wind and stars, too, the sea and the endless unknown. But here it is only the Beautiful One of the Mountains that is meant. So beautiful is she that a Mulgar who dreams even of one of her Maidens, and wakes still in the presence of his dream, can no longer be happy in the company of his kind. He hides himself away in some old hole or rocky fastness, lightless, matted, and uncombed, and so thins and pines, or becomes a Wanderer or Môh-mulgar. But it is rare for this to be, for very few Mulgars dream beyond the mere forest, as it were; and fewer still keep the memories of their dreams when the livelong vision of Munza returns to their waking eyes. The Valleys of Tishnar lie on either flank of the Mountains of Arakkaboa, though she herself wanders only in the stillness of the mountain snows. She is shown veiled on the rude pots of Assasimmon and in Mulgar scratch-work, with one slim-fingered hand clasping her robe of palest purple, her head bent a little, as if hearkening to her thoughts; and she is shod with sandals of silver. Of these things the wandering Oomgar-nuggas, or black men, tell. From Tishnar, too, comes the Last Sleep—the sleep of all the World. The last sleep just of their own life only is N[=o=o]manossi—darkness, change, and the unreturning. And Immanâla is she who preys across these shadows, in this valley. So, too, the Mulgars say, "N[=o=o]ma, N[=o=o]ma," when they mean shadow, as "In the sun paces a leopard's N[=o=o]ma at her side." Meermut, which means in part also shadow, is the shadow, as it were, of lesser light lost in Tishnar's radiance, just as moonlight may cast a shadow of a pine-tree across a smouldering fire. There is, too, a faint wind that breathes in the first twilight and starshine of Munza called the Wind of Tishnar. It was, I think, the faint murmur of this wind that echoed in the ear of Mutta-matutta as she lay dying, for in dying one hears, it is said, what in life would carry no more tidings to the mind than light brings to the hand. Nod's bells that he heard, and thought were his father's, must have been the Zevveras' bells of Tishnar's Water-middens, all wandering Meermuts. These Water-middens, or Water-maidens, are like the beauty of the moonlight. The countless voices of fountain, torrent, and cataract are theirs. They, with other of Tishnar's Maidens, come riding on their belled Zevveras, and a strange silence falls where their little invisible horses are tethered; while, perhaps, the Maidens sit feasting in a dell, grey with moonbeams and ghostly flowers. Even the sullen Mullabruk learns somehow of their presence, and turns aside on his fours from the silvery mist of their glades and green alleys, just as in the same wise a cold air seems to curdle his skin when some haunting N[=o=o]ma passes by. All the inward shadows of the creatures of Munza-mulgar are N[=o=o]manossi's; all their phantoms, spirits, or Meermuts are Tishnar's. And so there is a never-ending changeableness and strife in their short lives. The leopard (or Roses, as they call her, for the beauty of her clear black spots) is Meermut to her cubs, N[=o=o]ma to the dodging Skeetoes she lies in wait for, stretched along a bough. Her beauty is Tishnar's; the savagery of her claws is Nōōmanossi's. So Munza's children are dark or bright, lovely or estranging, according as Meermut or Nōōma prevails in their natures. And thus, too, they choose the habitation of their bodies. Yet because dark is but day gone, and cruelty unkindness, therefore even the heart-shattering Nōōmanossi, even Immanâla herself, is only absent Tishnar. But there, as everyone can see, I am only chattering about what I cannot understand.

[2] "Meermut" is shadow, phantom, spectre, or even the pictured remembrance of anything in the mind.

[3] On the right or cudgel side, the Mulgars say, sits Bravery; on the winking, woman, or left side, Craft.

[4] First Sleep is night-sleep; Second Sleep is swoon-sleep; Third Sleep is death, or Nōōmanossi. So, too, the Mulgars say, the first is "Little-go," the second is "Great-go," and the third is "Come-no-more"; as if their bodies were a lodging, and sleep a kind of out-of-doors.

CHAPTER II

At first the three brothers lived so forlorn and solitary together they could scarcely eat. Everything they saw or handled told them only over and over again that their mother was dead. But there was work to be done, and brave hearts must take courage, else sorrow and trouble would be nothing but evil. This, too, was no time for sitting idle and doleful. For a little before the gathering of the rains there began to seem a strangeness in the air. After the great heat had flown up a tempest of wind and lightning of such a brightness that Nod, peering out of his little tangled window-hole, could see beneath the gleaming rods of rain and the huge, bowed, groaning trees no less than three leopards crouching for shelter beneath the Portingal's sturdy little hut. He could hear them, too, in the pauses of the tempest, mewling, spitting, and swearing, and the lash of their angry tails against the wall of the hut. After the tempest, it fell cold and very still, with sometimes a moaning in the air. Strange weather was in the sky at rise and set of sun. And the three brothers, looking out, and seeing the numberless flights of birds winging with cries all in one direction, and hearing this moaning, hardly knew what to be doing. They went out every day to gather great bundles of wood and as many nuts and fruits and roots as they could carry. And they found everywhere wise creatures doing the same—I mean, of course, collecting food—for none beside the Minimuls, the Gungas, and the Mulla-mulgars have fire-sticks, and most of them fear even the sight and smell of flames.

And Nod, having his mother's quick hand, made a great store of Manaka-cake and Sudd-bread. He dried some fruits, pulped others. And some he poured with honey or Ummuz-juice into the Portingal's little earthen pots, many of which were still unbroken, while he who had first used them was but a bony shadow-trap in the corner. And Nod and Thumb made two great gourds of Subbub, very sweet and potent, so that, because of the sweet smell of it, the four-clawed Weddervols came barking about their hut all night. But the Manga-cheese their mother had made melted in the heat of the great fires they burned, and most of it ran down out of the cupboard. They filled the wood-hole with firewood, and stacked it outside, above Nod's shoulder, all against the hut.

And it was about the nineteenth week after Mutta's death that Thumb, as he came stooping to the door one night, saw fires of Tishnar on the ground. Over the swamp stood a shaving of moon, clear as a bow of silver. And all about, on every twig, on every thorn, and leaf, and pebble; all along the nine-foot grasses, on every cushion and touch of bark, even on the walls of their hut, lay this spangling fiery meal of Tishnar—frost. He called his brothers. Their breath stood round them like smoke. They stared and snuffed, they coughed in the cold air. Never, since birds wore feathers—never had hoar-frost glittered on Munza-mulgar before.

These Mullas danced; they crouched down in the dreadful cold, thinking to warm their hands at these uncountable fires. And, lo and behold! in a little while, looking at one another, each was a Mulgar, white and sparkling too. Their very hairs, down-arm and up-arm, every tuft stood stiff and white with frost. Like millers they stood, all blazing in the night.

And that was the beginning of Witzaweelwūlla (the White Winter). For it was only three days after Tishnar's fires were kindled that Nod first saw snow. Now one, two, three, a scatter of flakes, just a few. "Feathers," thought Nod.

But faster, faster; twirling, rustling, hovering. "Butterflies," thought Nod.

And then it seemed the sky, the air, was all aflock. He ran out snuffing and frightened. He clapped his hands; he leapt and frisked and shouted. And there, coming up out of the swamp, were his brothers, laden with rushes, and as woolly with snow as sheep. Because it looked so white and crisp and beautiful Nod even brought out a pot and filled it with snow to cook for their supper. But there, when he lifted the lid, was only a little steaming water.

By-and-by they began to wonder and to fear no more. How glad they were of all the wood they had brought in, and of their great cupboardful of victuals! They made themselves long poles, and would go leaping about to keep themselves warm. They built such roaring fires on the hearth they squatted round that the sparks flew up like fireflies under the black, starry sky. Snug in their hut, the brothers would sit of an evening on their three stools, with their smoking bowls between their legs. And they would open their great mouths and drone and sing the songs their father had taught them, beating to the notes with their flat feet on the earth floor. But, nevertheless, they pined for the cold and the snow to be over and gone, so that they might start on their journey! Every morning broke bleak and sparkling. Often of a night new snow came, till they walked between low white walls on their little path to the forest. But in spite of the cold which made them ache and shiver, and their toes and fingers burn and itch, they went out searching for frozen nuts and fruits every morning, and still fetched in faggots.

Often while they squatted, toasting themselves round their fire, Nod would look up, blinking his eyes, to see the faces of the Forest-mulgars peeping in at the window, envying the Mullas their warmth, though afraid of their fire, and calling softly one to another: "Ho, ho! look at the Mulla-sluggas [lazy princes] sitting round their fire!" And Thumb and Thimble would grin and softly scratch their hairy knees. Thumb, indeed, made up a Mulgar drone, which he used to buzz to himself when the Munza-mulgars came miching and mocking and peeping. (But it was a bad and dull drone, and I will not make it worse by turning it into my poor English from Mulgar-royal.)

Nod often sat watching the Forest-mulgars frisking in the forest, though every morning the light shone through on many perched frozen in the boughs. The Mullabruks and Manquabees made huddles in the snow. But the tiny Squirrel-tails, with their dark, grave, beautiful eyes and silken amber coats, still roosted high where the frost-wind stirred in the dark. Sometimes on a crusted branch of snow Nod would see five—seven—nine of these tiny, frost-powdered Mulgars cuddling together in a row, poor little frozen and empty boxes, their gay lives fled away. And when his brothers were gathering sticks in the forest, he would smuggle out for them two or three handfuls of nuts and pieces of cake and Sudd-bread. All the crusts and husks and morsels he kept in a shallow grass-basket, which his mother had plaited, to feed these pillowy Squirrel-tails, the lean Skeetoes, and the spindle-legged flycatchers.

Birds of all colours and many other odd little beasts came in the snow to Nod to be fed. He summoned them with the clapping of two sticks of ivory together, till his brothers began to wonder how it was their victuals were dwindling so fast. But once, when Thumb and Thimble were away in the forest with their jumping-poles, and he had ventured out on this errand with his basket full of scraps, he forgot to put up the door behind him. When he returned, skipping as fast as his fours would carry him, wild pigs and long-snouted Brackanolls, Weddervols, and hungry birds had come in and eaten more than half their store. The last of their mother's treasured cheese was gone, and all their Ummuz-cane. That night Thumb and Thimble went very sulky to bed. And for the next few days all three brothers sallied out together, with their poles, searching and grubbing after every scrap of victuals they could find with which to fill their larder again.

Some time after this, so hard and sharp grew the cold that Thumb and Thimble were minded to put on their red metal-hooked jackets when they went out stick-gathering. They took their knives and nut-sacks over their shoulders, and muffled and bunched themselves up close, with cotton-leaves wound round their stomachs, and their skin caps pulled low over their round frost-enticing ears. And they told Nod to cook them a smoking hot supper against the dark, for now the snow was so deep it was a hard matter to find and carry sticks, and they meant to look for more before matters worsened yet. So Nod at once set to his cookery.

He made up a great fire on the hearthstone. But in spite of its flames, so louring with gathering snow-clouds was the day that he had to keep the door down to give him clearer light; and, though he kept scuttling about, driving out the thieving Brackanolls and Peekodillies that came nosing into the hut, and scaring away the famished birds that kept hopping in through the window-hole, even then he could not keep himself warm. So at last he went to the lower cupboard, under the dangling Portingal, and took out his sheepskin coat. He put away the dried kingfisher which his mother had wrapped in the fleece to keep it sweet, and buttoned the ivory buttons, and skipped about nimbly over his cooking in that. Then he heaped more wood on—logs and brush and smoulder-wood—higher and higher, till the flames leapt red, gold, and lichen-green out of the chimney-hole. Then he said to himself, flinging yet another armful on: "Now Nod will go down and get some ice to melt for water to make Sudd-bread." So he went down to the water-spring.

And he stood watching the Mulgars frisking at the edge of the forest, vain that they should see him with his pole and basket, standing in his sheep's jacket. He broke up some ice and put in into his basket. Then he plodded over to his mother's grave and cleared away the hardened snow that had fallen during the night on her little heap of stones. "Kara, kara Mutta, Mutta-matutta," he whispered, laying his bony cheek on the stones—"dearest Mutta!" And while he stood there thinking of his mother, and of how he would go and bring down a pot of honeycomb for her death-shadow; and then of his father; and then of the strange journey they were all going to set out on when Tishnar returned to her mountains; and then of his Wonderstone; and then of Assasimmon, Prince of the Valleys, his peacocks and Ummuz-cane, and Ummuz-cane, and Ummuz-cane—while he was thus softly thinking of all these happy things, he suddenly saw the gigantic Ukka-tree above him, lit up marvellously red, and glowing as if with the setting of the sun. He shut his eyes with dread, for he saw all the forest monkeys lit up too, stock-still, staring, staring; and he heard a curious crackle and whs-s-s-ss.

Nod turned his little head and looked back over his shoulder. And against the snowy gloom of the forest he saw not only sparks, but flames, wagging up out of the chimney-hole. The door of the hut was like the frame of a furnace. And a trembling fear came over him, so that for a moment he could neither breathe nor move. Then, throwing down his basket of ice, and calling softly, "Mutta, O Mutta!" he scrambled over the snow as fast as he could and rushed into the hut. But he was too late; before he could jump, spluttering and choking, out of the door again, with just an armful of anything he could see, its walls were ablaze. Dry and tangled, its roof burnt like straw—a huge red fire pouring out smoke and flame, hissing, gushing, crackling, bubbling, roaring. And presently after, while Nod ran snapping his fingers, dancing with horror in the snow, and calling shriller and shriller,

"Thumb, Thimble; Thimble, Thumb,
Leave your sticks and hurry home:
Thicker and thicker the smoke do come!
Thumb, Thimble; Thimble, Thumb!"

he heard above the flames a multitudinous howling and squealing, and he looked over his shoulder, and saw hundreds upon hundreds of faces in the forest staring out between the branches at the fire. By the time that Thimble and Thumb in their red jackets were scampering on all fours, helter-skelter, downhill out of the forest, a numberless horde of the Forest-mulgars were frisking and howling round the blaze, and the flames were floating half as high as Glint's great Ukka-tree. They squealed, "Walla, walla!" (water), grinning and gibbering one to another as they came tumbling along; but they might just as well have called "Moonshine!" for every drop was frozen. Nor would twenty flowing springs and all Assasimmon's slaves have quenched that fire now. And when the Forest-mulgars saw that the Mulla-mulgars had given up hope of putting the fire out, they pelted it with snowballs, and scampered about, gathering up every stick and straw and shred they could find, and did their utmost to keep it in. For at last, in their joy that the little Portingal's bones were in the burning, and in their envy of the Mulla-mulgars, their fear of fire was gone.

And so Night came down, and there they all were, hand-in-hand in a huge monkey-ring, dancing and prancing round the little Portingal's burning hut, and squealing at the top of their voices; while countless beasts of Munza-mulgar, too frightened of fire to draw near, prowled, with flame-emblazoned eyes, staring out of the forest. And this was the Forest-mulgars' dancing-song:

"Bhoor juggub duppa singlee—duppa singlee—duppa singlee;
Bhoor juggub duppa singlee;
Sal rosen ghar Bhōōsh!"

They sing at first in a kind of droning zap-zap, and through their noses, these Munza-mulgar, their yelps gradually gathering in speed and volume, till they lift their spellbound faces in the air and howl aloud. And with such a resounding shout and clamour on the Bhōōsh you would think they were in pain.

For the best part of that night the fire flared and smouldered, while the stars wheeled in the black sky above the forest; and still round and round the Mulgars jigged and danced in the glistening snow. For the frost was so hard and still, not even this great fire could melt it fifteen paces distant from its flames. And Thimble and Thumb in their red jackets, and Nod in his cotton breeches and sheepskin coat, shivered and shook, because they weren't hardened, like the Forest-mulgars, to the icy night-wind that stole fitfully abroad.

When morning broke, the fire had burned down to a smother, and most of the dancing Mulgars had trooped back, tired out and sleepy, to their tree-houses and huddles and caverns and hanging ropes in the forest. But no sleep stole over those Mulla-sluggas, Thumb, Thimble, and Nod, sitting on their stones in the snow, watching their home-smoke drooping down and down. Nod stared and stared at the embers, his teeth chattering, ashamed and nearly heart-broken. But his brothers looked now at the smoke, and now at him, and whenever they looked at Nod they muttered, "Foh! Mulla-jugguba, foh!"—that is to say, "Foh! Royal-Flame-Shining One!" or "Your Highness Firebright!" or "What think you now, Prince of Bonfires?" But they were too sullen and angry, and Nod was too downcast, even to get up to drive away the little mole-skinned Brackanolls and the Peekodillies which came nosing and grunting and scratching in the ashes, in search of the scorched oil-nuts and the charred Sudd and Manaka-cake.

The three Mulla-mulgars sat there until the sun began to be bright on their faces and to make a splendour of the snow; then they did not feel quite so cold and miserable. And when they had nibbled a few nuts and berries which a friendly old Manquabee brought down to them, they began to think and talk over what they had best be doing now—at least, Nod listened, while Thumb and Thimble talked. And at length they decided that, their hut being burnt, and they without refuge from the cold, or any hoard of food, they would wait no longer, but set off at once into the forest on the same long journey as their father Seelem had gone, to seek out their Uncle Assasimmon, Prince of the Valleys of Tishnar.

This once said, Thumb lifted his fat body stiffly from his stone, and took his jumping-pole, and frisked high, leaping to and fro to make himself warm again. Soon he began to tingle, and laughed out to cheer the others when he tumbled head over heels into a snowdrift. And they combed themselves, and stood up to their trouble, and thought stubbornly, as far as their monkey-wits would let them, only of the future (which is easier to manage than the past). Then they searched close in the cooling ashes and embers of the hut, and found a few beads undimmed by the heat, and all the Margarita stones, which, like the Salamander, no flame can change; also, one or two unbroken pots and jars and an old stone kettle or Ghôb. Nod, indeed, found also a piece of gold that had lain hid in the Portingal's rags. But all the little Traveller's bones except his left thumb knuckle-bone were fallen to ashes. Nod gave Thumb the noddle of gold, and himself kept the knuckle-bone. "Sōōtli,"[5] he whispered, touched his nose with it, and put it secretly into his pocket. And glad were they to think that only that morning they had fetched out their red jackets and Nod his wool coat.

When the Forest-mulgars heard that the three brothers were setting out on their long journey, they came trooping down from their leafy villages, carrying presents, two skin water-bags (for the longed-for time when the ice should bestir itself), a rough stone knife, a wild-bee honeycomb, a plaited bag of dried Nanoes and nuts, and so on. But of these Mulgar tribes few, like ants, or bees, or squirrels, make any store, and none uses fire, nor, save one or two solitaries here and there, can any walk upright or carry a cudgel. They munch and frisk and chatter, and scratch and quarrel and mock, having their own ways and wisdom and their own musts and mustn'ts. There are few, too, that cherish not some kindness, if not for all, at least for one another—the leopard to her cubs, the Coccadrillo to her eggs. But back to our Mulla-mulgars.

The forest of Munza-mulgar saw a feast upon its borders that day. The Forest-mulgars sat in a great ring, and ate and drank, and when the sun had ascended into the middle of the sky and the snow-piled branches shone white as Tishnar's lambs, Thumb, Thimble, and Nod, rose up and sang, "Gar Mulgar Dusangee"—the Mulgars' Farewell. While they sang, all the Forest-mulgars, in their companies and tribes, sat solemnly around them, furred and coloured and pouched and tailed. Shave their chops and put them in breeches, they might well be little men. And they waved slowly palm-branches and greenery to the time of the tune; some even moaned and grunted, too.

"Far away in Nanga-noon
Lived an old and grey Baboon,[6]
Ah-mi, Sulâni!
Once a Prince among his kind,
Now forsaken, left behind,
Feeble, lonely, all but blind:
Sulâni, ghar magleer.

"Peaceful Tishnar came by night,
In the moonbeams cold and white;
Ah-mi, Sulâni!
'Far away from Nanga-noon,
Thou old and grey Baboon;
Is a journey for thee soon!'
Sulâni, ghar magleer.

"'Be not frightened, shut thine eye;
Comfort take, nor weep, nor sigh;
Solitary Tishnar's nigh!'
Sulâni, ghar magleer.

"Old Baboon, he gravely did
All that peaceful Tishnar bid;
Ah-mi, Sulâni!
In the darkness cold and grim
Drew his blanket over him;
Closed his old eyes, sad and dim:
Sulâni, ghar magleer."

And here the Mulgars all lay flat, with their faces in the snow, and put the palms of their hands on their heads; while the three Mulla-mulgars paced slowly round, singing the last verse, which, after the doggerel I have made of the others, I despair of putting into English:

"Talaheeti sul magloon
Olgar, ulgar Nanga-noon;
Ah-mi, Sulâni!
Tishnar sōōtli maltmahee,
Ganganareez soongalee,
Manni Mulgar sang suwhee:
Sulâni, ghar magleer."

Then the Mulla-mulgars cut down stout boughs to make cudgels, and, having tied up their few possessions into three bundles and filled their pockets with old nuts, they took palm-leaves and honey-comb and withered scarlet and green berries, with which they canopied as best they could their mother's grave, nor forgot poor gluttonous Glint's. They stood there in the snow, and raised their hands in lamentable salutation. And each took up a stone and jerked it (for they cannot throw as men do) as far as he could towards the forest, as if to say, "Go with us!" Then, with one last sorrowful look at the befrosted ashes of their hut, they took up their bundles and started on their journey.

At first, as I have said, the Mulgar-track is wide, and even in this continually falling snow was beaten clear by hundreds of hand and foot prints. But after a while the lofty branches began to knit themselves above, and to hang thickly over the travellers, and to shut out the light. And the path grew faint and narrow.

One by one their friends waved good-bye and left them, until only Noll and Nunga (Mutta-matutta's only sister's only children) accompanied them. Just before sunset, when the forest seemed like a cage of music with the voices of the birds that now sang, many of them desperately from cold and hunger rather than for delight, Noll, too, and Nunga raised their hands, touched noses, and said good-bye. And the three brothers stood watching them till they had waved their branches for the last time. Then they went on.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] That is, Magic, or Strangeness. When the Mulgars of Munza see anything strange or unknown, they will whimper to one another, as they stand with eyes fixed, "Sōōtli, Sōōtli, Sōōtli," or some such sound.

[6] So I have translated "Babbabooma."

CHAPTER III

It was now, what with the snow and what with natural evening, growing quickly dark. The birds had ceased to sing; only the Munza night-jar rattled. Now near, now far away, the Mulla-mulgars heard the beasts of the forest beginning to range and roar in the gloom. Nod buttoned up his sheep's jacket, for there was a frost-mist beneath the trees. He was cold, and began to be tired and very homesick. But Thumb was broad and fat and prodigiously strong, Thimble lean and sinewy. And when Thumb saw that Nod went stumbling under his bundle, he said: "Give it to me, Mulla-jugguba!" (Prince of Bonfires). And Thimble laughed.

But Nod refused to give up his bundle, and trudged on behind his brothers, until night came down in earnest. Then, when it was quite dark, after listening and muttering together, they thought that if they spent the night down here they would certainly sleep "in danger." So Thumb clambered into a great Ollaconda-tree, and let down a rope or twist of the thick creeper called Cullum, and drew up all three bundles. Then Thimble pushed and Thumb pulled, and up went Nod, too stiff and cold to climb up by himself, after the bundles, sheep's-jacket and all. Then Thimble climbed up too. They made their supper of Mulgar-bread and frost-cockled Mambel-berries, which are sour and quench the thirst, and drank or sucked splinters of ice, plenty of which hung glassy in the great, still, winter-troubled tree. And for fear of leopards (or "Roses," as their Munza name signifies), they agreed to keep watch in turn, Thumb first, then Thimble, then Nod. They tied their bundles to the boughs, chose smooth forks to squat in, and soon Thimble was fast asleep.

But when Nod found himself alone in the midst of the great icy tree in the black forest, he could not sleep for thinking of it. He stroked his face with his brown hand over and over to keep his eyes shut. He nuzzled down into his sheep's-jacket. He counted his fingers again and again. He repeated the lingo of the Seventy-seven Travellers from beginning to end. It was in vain. Far and near he heard the cries and wanderings of the forest beasts; the Ollaconda-tree was full of the nests of the weaver-birds; and, worse still, soon Thimble began to snore so loud and so sorrowfully that poor Nod trembled where he sat. He could bear himself no longer. He stooped forward and called softly: "Thumb, my brother, are you awake, Thumb?"

"Sleep on, little Ummanodda," said Thumb; "if I watch, I watch."

"But I cannot sleep," said Nod; "these weavers chatter so."

Thumb laughed. "Thimble sings in his dreams," he said. "Why shouldn't the little tailors sing, too?"

"Do you think any leopards will come?" said Nod.

"Think good things, my brother, not bad," Thumb answered. "But this we will do—wait a little while awake, and I will sleep, and as soon as sleep begins to come, call me and wake me; then, little brother, you shall sleep in peace till morning."

He put his head under his arm without waiting for an answer; and soon, even louder and more dismal than Thimble's, rose Thumb's snoring into the Ollaconda-tree.

Nod sat cold and stiff, his eyes stretched open, his ears twitching. And a thin moonlight began to tremble between the leaves. The light cheered his spirits, and he thought, "Nod will soon feel sleepy now," when suddenly out of the gloom of the forest burst a sounder or drove of wild pig, scuffling and chuggling beneath the tree. Peeping down, Nod could just see them in the faint moonshine, with their long, black, hairy ears and tufted tails.

And presently, while they were grubbing in the snow, one lifted up its snout and cried in a loud voice: "Co-older—and colder!"

"Co-older—and colder," cried another.

"Co-older—and colder," cried a third. And all silently grubbed on as before.

"The Queen of the Mountains is in the Forest," began the first again, "with fingers of frost."

"And shoulders of snow."

"THE QUEEN OF THE MOUNTAINS IS IN THE FOREST ... WITH FINGERS OF FROST."

"And feet of ice," screamed the third.

"The Queen of the Mountains," they grunted all together; and went on burrowing, and shouldering, and faintly squeaking.

"Hungrier and hungrier," cried one in a shrill voice, suddenly lifting its head, so that Nod could see quite clearly its pale green, greedy slits of eyes.

"Leaner and leaner," answered another.

"All the Sudd hid, all the Ukkas gone, all the Bōōbab frozen!" squealed a third.

"The Queen of the Mountains is in the Forest," they grunted all together. But the pig that had looked up into the tree was still staring—staring and wrinkling his narrow snout, till at last all the pigs stopped feeding. "Pigs, my brothers; pigs, my brothers," he muttered. "Up in this tree are Mulgar three, which travellers be.... Ho, there!" But Nod thought it best to make no answer. And the pig turned round and beat with his hind-feet against the bole or trunk of the Ollaconda. "Ho, there, little Mulgar in the sheep-skin coat!"

"If you beat like that, horny-foot, you'll wake my brothers," said Nod.

"Brothers!" said the pig angrily. "What's brothers to Ukka-nuts? What's your names, and where are you going?"

"My brothers' names," said Nod, "are Thumma and Thimbulla, and I am Nod. We are going to the palace of ivory and Azmamogreel that is our Uncle Assasimmon's, Prince of the Valleys of Tishnar." At that all the pigs began muttering together.

"Come down and tell us!" said a lean yellow pig; and as he snapped his jaws Nod saw in the moonbeam the frost-light blinking on his bristles.

"Tell you what?" said Nod.

"About this Prince of Tishnar. Oh, these false-tongued Mulgars!" Nod made no answer.

Then a fat old she-pig began speaking in a soft, pleasant voice. "You must be very, very rich, Prince Nod, with those great bags of nuts; and, surely, it must be royal Sudd I smell! And Assasimmon his uncle! whose house is more than a thousand pigs'-tails long; and gardens so thick with trees of fruit and honey, one groans to have only one stomach. Come down a little way, Prince Nod, and tell us poor hungry pigs of the royal Assasimmon and the dainty food he eats."

So pleasant was her flattering voice Nod thought there could not possibly be any harm in scrambling down just one or two branches. And though his fingers were still stiff with cold, he began to edge down.

"Oh, but bring a bundle—bring a bundle, little Prince. It's cold for gentlefolk sitting in the snow."

"Pigs—pigs must naked go; but not for gentlefolk the snow," squealed the herd shrilly.

"Come gently, Prince Nod; do not stir your royal brothers, Prince Nod!" said the old crafty one.

Nod listened to her flattery, and, having untied his precious bundle, he slid down with it softly to the ground.

"A seat—a seat for Prince Nod," cried the old sow. "Oh, what a royal jacket—oh, what a handsome jacket!" So Nod sat down on his bundle in the moonlight of the snow, and all the wild pig, scenting his Sudd, pressed close—forty wild pig at least.

"Assasimmon, Assasimmon, Prince of Tishnar, Prince of Tishnar," they kept grunting, and at every word they squeezed and edged closer and closer, their hungry snouts in air—closer and closer, till Nod had to hold tight to keep his seat; closer and closer, and again they began squealing: "Pigs are hungry, brother Nod. Cakes of Sudd, cakes of Sudd!" And then, like a great scrambling wave of pigs, they rushed at him all together. Over went Nod into the snow. Scores of little sharp hoofs scuttled over him. And when at last he was able to get up and look about him, bruised and scratched and breathless, no trace of pigs was there, no trace of bundle; every nut and crust of Sudd and crumb of pulpy Mulgar-bread was gone. And suddenly came a loud, harsh voice out of the tree. "Ho, ho, and ahôh! What's the trouble? what's the trouble?" Nod looked up, and saw Thumb and Thimble staring down between their out-stretched arms through the moon-silvery leaves. And he told them, trembling, of how he could not sleep, and about the pigs and the bundle.

"O most wise Nizza-neela!" said Thumb when he had finished. "Last night Mulla-jugguba; this night Nodda-nellipogo" (Prince of Bonfires, Noddle of Pork). But Thimble was too sore to say anything, for his little Exxswixxia-book of sorcery had been stuffed into Nod's bundle, and now it was lost for ever. And they left Nod to climb up again by himself. Once safely back on his fork, he was so tired and miserable that, with his hands over his face, he fell almost directly fast asleep.

When he opened his small clear eyes again, sunrise was glinting here and there through the green twilight on the icicles and snow in the trees. He looked down, and saw Thumb and Thimble combing themselves. So down he went, too, and took off his jacket, and skipped and frisked till he grew warm. Then he, too, combed himself, and went and sat down beside his brothers at the foot of the Ollaconda-tree to eat his morning's share of musty nuts. At first his brothers sat angry and sullen, munching with their great dog-teeth, and seeming to begrudge him every Ukka-nut he cracked. But as the daybeams brightened, here where the trees grew not so dense, and the birds, some wellnigh as small as acorns, flashed and zigzagged, and Parrakeetoes squeaked and screamed in hundreds on the branches, watching the three hungry travellers, they began to forget Nod's supper with the pigs. And when they had eaten, into the gloom of Munza they set out once more.

As a dog smells out the footsteps of his master so these Mulla-mulgars seemed to smell out their way. No path was to be seen except where pig-droves had rambled by, or droves of Mullabruks and packs of Munza-dogs. And once Thumb, on a sudden, stood still, and pointed to the ground, opening his great grinning mouth, with its little wall of glistening teeth, and muttered, "Roses!" They stood together looking down at the frozen footprints of a mother-leopard and her cubs in the fresh-laid snow. Nod fancied, even, he could smell her breath on the icy air. After this they went forward more warily, but carried their cudgels with a bravery, looking very fierce in their red jackets and great caps of furry skins. And, after a while, the huge trees gathered in again, and soon arched loftily overhead as thick as thatch, so that it was all in a cold and sluggish gloom they walked, like the dusk of coming night. Nor, so thick was the leafy roof overhead, had any snow floated into its twilight. Only a rare frost shimmered on the spiky husks of fruit thrown down by the Tree-mulgars. Huge frozen ropes of Cullum and wild Pepper dangled in knots and loops from bough to bough, and sometimes a troop of Squirrel-tails or spidery Skeetoes swung lightly down these hoar-frost ropes, chattering and scolding at the three strangers. But though Thumb called to them in their own tongue. "Ullalullaubbajub," or some such sounds as that, meaning, "We are friends," they skipped off, hand, foot, and tail, into their leafy roofs and shadows, afraid of these cudgel-carrying travellers in their red jackets, who walked, like the dreaded Oomgar, heads in air.

Yet Nod was glad even of such company as this, so silent was the forest. In this darkness they sat and ate their handful of food, with scorpions and speckled tree-spiders watching them from their holes, not knowing where the sun was, nor daring to kindle a fire with their fire-sticks for fear of the tree-shadows. And at night they slept huddled close together for warmth and safety, while Thumb and Thimble kept watch in turn.

In this way many days passed almost without blink of sunlight. Once and again they would sidle over some pig-track, or stand, with club in hand, to watch a leopard pass. And often troops of Mulgars kept pace with them awhile, swinging from branch to branch, and chattering threats at the travellers. But most of the forest creatures, parched and famished by such a cold as had never fallen on Munza-mulgar before, had been driven down out of the forest in search of food and warmth. And often the travellers were compelled to search the bark of the trees and in the crevices of rocks and under stones, as do the Babbaboomas, and eat whatever creeping things they could find. Beside the dangling Skeetoes, and now and then father, mother, and chidderkins of some old sour-faced mournful Mullabruk, they saw few things living, except the little ivory-gnawing M'boko, Peekodillies, and poison-spiders. But many of these, too, had died of cold and hunger. And now, instead of the pale green and amber lamps of firefly and glowworm, burned only the fires of Tishnar's frost. Birds rarely ventured down into this snowy shadowland, except only the tiny Telateuties, blood-red as ladybirds, that ran chittering up the trees. These birds haunt only where daylight rarely steals, and it is said they talk with the tree-spirits, or giant Nōōmas, that roam these shades.

At last, their feet sore with poison-needles, which sometimes pierced clean through their thick skins, their eyes aching with the darkness, the three travellers, on the eighth day, broke out of the dense forest into broad daylight and shining snow again. Down and down they descended into a frozen swampy valley. And about noon, half hidden in the fume and steam of their own breath, they saw a great herd or muster of Ephelantoes feeding. They stood in a line beyond Nod's counting—big, middling-sized, and little—tearing down the rime-laden branches of the trees, whose leaves and fruits they first warmed with their bellows-breath before stuffing them into their mouths. The swampy ground shook with their tramplings. Nod gazed in wonder as he and his brothers, marching abreast, paced softly but doggedly on. And very soon the watchful eyes, that glitter small in the great stone-coloured heads of these mountainous beasts, perceived the red jackets moving betwixt the grasses. And a silence came; the beasts stopped feeding.

"Meelmūtha glaren djhar!" muttered Thumb.

So the Mulla-mulgars pushed quietly and bravely on, without turning their heads or letting their eyes wander. For it is said that there is nothing frets and angers these monsters so much as a watchful eye. They leave their feeding and wallowing, even the big Shes their suckling. Their great bodies trembling, they stand in disquiet and unrest if but just one small clear eye beneath its lid be fixed too close or earnestly upon them. Oomgars, Mulgars, leopards—even down to the brooding Mullabruk, with its clay-coloured face—they abhor all scrutiny. But why this is so I cannot say.

It may be, then, that Nod, in his first wonder, dwelt too lingeringly with his eye on these Lords of Munza: for a behemothian bull-Ephelanto, with one of his tusks broken, lurched forward through the long grasses, his tail stock-stiff behind him, and stood in their path. And as the Mulgar travellers passed him by, he wound his long, two-fingered trunk round Nod's belly, shook him softly, and lifted him high above the sedge into the air.

At this many other of the Ephelantoes stamped across the swamp and stood in the mist around him. Nod's hand was in his pocket and pressed against his slim thigh-bone, and there, hard and round, he felt as in a dream his Wonderstone. And he caught back his fears, and thus, up aloft, twenty feet or more between earth and sky, he twisted his head and said softly: "Deal with the Nizza-neela gently, Lord of the Forest; we are servants of Tishnar." At the sound of the name of Tishnar all the Ephelantoes lifted up their trunks, and with a great blast trumpeted in unison. Whereupon the bull-Ephelanto that had, half in sport, tossed Nod up into the air set him gently on the earth again. And the three brothers, hastening their hobbling pace a little, journeyed on once more.

CHAPTER IV

A little before evening Thumb suddenly stopped, and stood listening. They went on a little farther, and again he stood still, with lifted head, snuffing the air. And soon they all heard plainly the sound of a great river. In the last light of sunset the travellers broke out of the forest and looked down on the waters of the deep and swollen Obea-munza. Along its banks grew giant sedge, stiff and grey with frost like meal. In this sedge little birds were disporting themselves, flitting and twittering, with long plumes of every colour that changes in the sunlight, brushing off with their tiny wings the gathered hoarfrost into the still sunset air. The Mulgars stood like painted wooden images, with their bundles and cudgels, staring down at the river, wide and turbulent, its gloomy hummocks of ice and frozen snow nodding down upon the pale green waters. They glanced at one another as if with the question on their faces, "How now, O Mulla-mulgars?"

"'His country lies beyond and beyond,'" muttered Thimble. "'Forest and river, forest, swamp, and river.' Could, then, our father Seelem walk on water?"

Thumb coughed in his throat. "What matters it? He went: we follow," he grunted stubbornly. "We must journey on till our wings grow, Mulla Thimble, or till your long legs can straddle bank to bank." And they all three stared in silence again at the swirling icy water.

Now, it was just beginning to be twilight, which is many times more brief than England's in Munza, and the frozen forest was utterly still in the fading rose and purple, the beasts not yet having come down to drink. And while the travellers stood listening, there came, as it were from afar off, the beating of a drum—seven hollow beats, and then silence.

"What in Munza, Thumb, makes a noise like that?" Nod whispered. "Listen, listen!"

They all three hearkened again, with heads bent and eyes fixed, and soon once more they heard the hollow drumming. Thumb shook his head uneasily.

"It is wary walking, my brothers," he said; "maybe there are Oomgar-nuggas [black men] by the riverside; or maybe it is one of the great hairy Gunga-mulgars whose country our father Seelem told me lies five days' journey towards the daybreak. Whicheversoever, Mulla-mulgars, we will hobble on and discover."

Thimble dropped lightly, and rested on all-fours a moment. His eyes squinted a little, for he greatly feared the drumming they had heard.

But Thumb, moving softly, edged watchfully on, and Thimble and Nod followed as he led along the reedy bank of the river. Ever and again they heard the drumming repeated, but it seemed no less distant, so they squatted down to eat while there was light enough in the sky to find the way from fingers to mouth. They sat down under a twisted Bōōbab-tree, opened their bundles, and took out the frosted nuts and fruits which they had lately gathered for their supper. But it was so bitterly cold by the waterside Nod could scarcely crack his shells between his chattering teeth. And now the waning moon was beginning to silver river and forest. From the farther bank rose the cries of Munza's beasts come down to drink, mournful, lean, and fierce from hunger and cold. Soon the long-billed river-birds began their night-talk across the water. And while the Mulgars were sitting silently munching, out of the shadow before their faces came on her soundless pads a young she-leopard, and with catlike face stood regarding them.

Thumb and Thimble dropped softly their hands, and very slowly stooped their stiff-haired heads. But the leopard, after regarding them awhile, and seeing them to be three together and Mulgars-royal, drew back her head, yawned, and leapt lightly back into the shadowy grasses from which she had stolen out. "One Roses brings many," said Thumb sourly; "let us hobble on, Mulla-mulgars, until we find a quieter sleeping-place."

But it was now so dark beside the river that the Mulgars had to stop and walk on the knuckles of their hands, as do all the Munza-mulgars. And while they walked heedfully forward, they heard the trump-billed river-birds calling their secrets one to another:

"I see Mulgars, one, two, three,
Creeping, crawling, one, two, three."

Once Thumb trod on a forest-pig that was lying half dead with cold under a root of Samarak. But the pig was too weak to squeal. Nod stooped and gave him three Ukka-nuts and a pepper-pod. "There, pig," he said, "tell your brothers who stole my bundle that Nod Nizza-neela gave you these when you were frozen." And the pig, being a pig, opened its slits of eyes and feebly snapped at his fingers. Nod laughed and hastened after his brothers.

Over the half-moon a cloud of snow was drawing, and soon the whispering flakes began to float again between the branches. The wind that blew steadily down the river was sharp and icy. The travellers were afraid, if they slept in the trees again, they would be frozen. And if even one big toe of any one of them got frost-bitten, how distant would the Valley of Tishnar seem then! They heard, too, now and then the faint sounds of snapping twig and rustling reed, and a low whimpering growl would sometimes set the giant grasses trembling. Stiff and crusted with frost, and in constant danger of falling into the river, they crawled stubbornly on.

And suddenly straight before them burned out a light in the darkness that was neither of moon, star, nor frost-fire. On they rustled, very warily now, because they knew somewhere here must lurk the Oomgar-nugga or Gunga-mulgar whose drumming they had heard. One by one they presently crept out of the sedge, and stood up a few paces from a kind of huddle or hut, standing crooked and smoking in the moonlight, and built of two or three rows of huge stakes, three times plaited, very fast and close, with Samarak and withies of all kinds. It stood about three Mulgars high, and its walls were more than four spans thick.

The light which the travellers had espied burning in the distance streamed from a misshapen window-hole far above Thimble's head. The Mulgars stood staring at one another in the shadow of the black forest, and now and then they would hear a rumble or clatter from behind the thick walls, and presently a sneeze or cough. After which would suddenly roll out the loud and hollow drumming of the great creature within.

So Thumb bade Nod climb softly on to Thimble's shoulder, and very slowly lift his face up and look in. Up went Nod, and softly drew his sheep-skinned head into the light. And the first thing he noticed was a wonderful steaming smell of broth cooking, and then, as he pushed his head farther through the window-hole, he looked down into the hut. And he saw, sitting there on a huge bench before his eating-board, a gigantic Gunga-mulgar in a shift or shirt of fish-skin. He was guzzling down broth out of a gourd, and fishing for titbits of fish-fat in it with a wooden prong or skewer. He knew his comfort, this ugly Gunga. He sat with crossed legs before a blazing fire. It shone on his fangs and teeth and flaming eyes. A huge axe, made out of a stone, hung on the wall. In one corner lay a heap of brushwood and fish-bones, and in a hole in the ground a pile of logs. There were skins, too, on the walls of fishes and birds and little furry beasts, and two fat hog-fish shone silvery in the fire-light. Besides these, there was an Oomgar-nugga's bow of wood, thrice strung with twisted string. But what pleased Nod most to see, as he peeped stealthily down through the thorny wattle window, was an old grey Burbhrie cat, which sat washing her face in front of the fire.

He was still peeping and peering into the hut, when Thumb pinched his leg to bid him come down. So he slid cautiously down Thimble's back into the cold moonlight again, and told his brothers all he had seen.

"Yes, Mulla-mulgars," he said, "and beside his bow and his sharp-nosed darts, he has three big knubbly cudgels in the corner higher than is Nod. He sits there, muttering and chuffing and sticking a long wood spit in his soup, and then he coughs and says 'Ug!' and beats his black fists on his chest till the flames shake."

Thumb's short thick scalp twitched to and fro as he sat on his heels, staring into the moonlight. "Is he very big and strong? Is he as broad and thick as Thumb?" he said.

"He's sitting in a spangly shirt," said Nod, "and his arms are like Bōōbab-roots—like Bōōbab-roots—and his eyes, Mulla-mulgars, they burn in bony houses, and his face is black as charcoal."

Thumb lifted his face uneasily and yawned. "We will push on; we will not meddle with the Gunga, my brothers," he said. "Better sleep cold than never wake." He laughed, and patted Nod on the head with his stump-thumbed hand, just as Seelem used to do when Nod was a baby. So they crept softly past the huddle on their fours, turning their heads this way, that way, snuffing softly along on an icy path that led through the sword-grass to the river's edge. And there, tossing lightly on the water, they found a boat, or Bobberie, of Bemba-wood and skin pegged down with wooden pegs. It was moored fast with a rope of Samarak, and two broad paddles lay inside it. All this the travellers saw faintly in the moonlit dusk. Far away they heard the barking and weeping of Coccadrilloes as they stooped together over the Bobberie, rising and falling on the gloomy water.

"Let us not trouble the Gunga at his supper," said Thimble, "but get in first and ask leave after."

And Thumb began softly hauling on the rope. But the smooth round stone on which they stood was coated green with ice, and as he pulled his foot slipped. He flung out his arms: down went Thumb; down went Nod. No sooner had their uproar died away than an angry and ogreish voice broke out from the hut. Thumb, with Thimble at his heels, had only just time enough to scramble off and hide himself in the giant sedge before down swung the gibbering Gunga on the crutches of his hairy arms to see what was amiss, and who was meddling with his boat.

There he found Nod, floating like a sheeny bubble in his puffed-out sheep's-jacket on the icy water. He stooped down and clawed him up with one enormous paw, and carried him off into his hut. Then, putting up the wooden door, he sat him down with a shout before his blazing fire.

"Ohé, ohé, ohé!" he bellowed. "Zutha mu beluthli zakketi zanga xūt!"

Nod, cold and trembling, lifted his little grey face out of his streaming sheep's-coat and shook his head.

Then the Gunga, seeing this crackle-shell did not understand his language, bawled at him in Munza-mulgar: "Thief, thief! What were you after, fishing from great Gunga's boat?" Nod shook his head again, for he expected every moment that great hand to clutch him up and fling him into the fire.

"Thief, thief, and son of a thief!" squalled the Gunga again, opening his great mouth.

But at that Nod's wits grew suddenly clear and still. "Not so fast—not so fast, Master Gunga," he said. "Mulla-mulgars are neither thieves nor sons of thieves. Squeal that at the Munza-mulgars, not at Ummanodda!"

The old Gunga stared with jutting teeth. "Mulla-mulgars," he grunted mockingly. "Off with that sheep-skin, Prince of Fleas! I'll skin ye 'fore I cook ye!"

Nod stared bravely into the glinting sooty face. "Gunga duseepi sooklar, by Nōōmanossi's harp!"

The old Gunga stooped closer on his fleshless legs and blinked. "What knows a fly-catching Skeeto of Nōōmanossi's harp?" he said.

"What knows a fish-bait Gunga of the Princes of Tishnar?" Nod answered, and calmly sat down beside the old Burbhrie cat on a log in front of the fire. The savage old Puss stretched out her claws, spread back her tufted ash-coloured ears, and with grey-green eyes stared fiercely into his face. But Nod clutched tight his Wonderstone, and paid no heed; and soon she lazily turned again to the flames, and began to purr like a nestful of Nikkanakkas.

The Gunga stared, too, snapped his great jaws, coughed, then beat with his warty fist on his great breast. "Ohé, ohé!" he said. "I meant no evil to the Mulla-mulgar. Princes of Tishnar journey not often past old Gunga's house. I hutch alone, far from my own country, Royal Stranger, with only my black-man's Bobberie for friend."

Nod, when he heard this, almost laughed out. "Not now, 'Prince of Bonfires,' nor 'Noddle of Pork,'" he thought, "but 'Royal Stranger,' and 'Prince of Tishnar.'"

"Why, then," he said aloud to the Gunga, "tongues chatter best when they have something good to say. I'll take a platter of soup with you, Friend of Fishes. And better still, I'll dry my magic coat." He slipped out of his dripping jacket, and spread it out in front of the fire, and there he sat, slim and silky, in his little cotton-leaf breeches, scratching Puss's head and pretending himself at home. But the old Fish-catcher's bloodshot eyes were watching—watching all the time. He was thinking what snug and beautiful breeches that sheep's-coat would make him this icy weather. But he thought, too, it would be best to speak civilly and smoothly to his visitor—at least, for the present. Not even a Gunga-mulgar cares to quarrel with peaceful Tishnar.

"Make yourself easy, Traveller," he said, nodding his peaked head with a hideous smile. "The moon was at hide-and-seek when I found you in the water; I could not see your royal countenance. But Simmul, she knows best." The old Burbhrie cat turned to her master at sound of her name, put up her tufted paw towards Nod, and mewed.

"Ohé, ohé!" said the Gunga mournfully. "She's mewing 'Magic.' And what knows a feeble old Fish-catcher of Magic?" He poured out some soup into a bowl, put in a skewer, and handed it to Nod.

"I will hang the Royal Stranger's beautiful sheep's-coat on a hook," he said slyly. "There it will dry much quicker."

But Nod guessed easily what he was after. Once hung up there, how was he ever going to reach his jacket down again? "No, no," says he; "it's nearly dry already."

He took the gourd of soup between his knees. It tasted strong of fish, and was green with a satiny river-weed; but it was hot and sweetish, and he supped it up greedily. And just as he was tilting the bowl for the last mouthful he looked up and saw Thumb's round, astonished face staring in at the little dark window. He put down his gourd and burst out laughing.

"What makes the stranger laugh?" said the old Gunga-mulgar. "It's very good broth."

"I was laughing," said Nod, "laughing at that last fish I caught."

"Was it a big fish—a fat, heavy fish?" said the Gunga.

Nod stared, with one eye shut and his head a little awry, at the two hog-fish dangling on the wall. "Five times as big as them," he said.

"Five?" said the Gunga.

"Five or six," said Nod.

"Or six!" said the Gunga.

"Truly," said Nod softly, "he fishes not for minnows who knows the magic fish-song of the Water-middens."

The old Gunga turned his great black skull, and beneath the beetling porches of his eyes glowered greedily on Nod. "And what," he said cunningly—"what song is that, O Royal Stranger?" And he stooped down suddenly and pushed Nod's jacket under the bench.

"Why do you push my sheep's-coat under the bench?" said Nod angrily.

"I smelt—I smelt," said Gunga, throwing back his head, "scorching. But softly, Mulla-mulgar. What is this Water-middens' song that catches fishes five—six times as big as mine? And if you know all this wisdom, and are truly a Prince of Tishnar, why do you sit here, this freezing night, supping up a poor old Fish-catcher's broth?"

CHAPTER V

By this time, it was plain, Thimble and Thumb had found something to raise them to the window-hole, for Nod, as he glanced up, saw half of both their astonished faces (one eye of each) peering in at the window. He waved his lean little arms, and their faces vanished.

"Why do you wave your long thumbs in the air?" said the old Gunga uneasily.

"I wave to Tishnar," said Nod, "who watches over her wandering Princes, and will preserve them from thieves and cunning ones. And as for your filthy green-weed soup, how should a Mulla-mulgar soil his thumbs with gutting fish? And as for the Water-middens' song, that I cannot teach you, nor would I teach it you if I could, Master Fish-catcher. But I can catch fish with it."

The old Gunga squatted close on his stool, and grinned as graciously as he could. "I am poor and growing old," he said, "and I cannot catch fish as once I could. How is that done, O Royal Traveller?"

Nod stood up and put his finger on his lips. "Secrets, Puss!" says he, and stepped softly over and peeped out of the door. He came back. "Listen," he said. "I go down to the water—at daybreak; oh yes, just at daybreak. Then I row out a little way in my little Bobberie, quite, quite alone—no one must be near to spy or listen; then I cast my nets into the water and sing and sing."

"What nets?" said the Gunga.

Nod dodged a crisscross with his finger in the air.

"Sōōtli, sōōtli," mewed Puss, with her eyes half shut.

The old Gunga wriggled his head with his great lip sagging. "What happens then?" said he.

"Then," said Nod, "from far and near my Magic draws the fishes, head, fin, and tail, hundreds and hundreds, all to hear my Water-middens' lovely song."

"And what then?" said Gunga.

"Then," said Nod, peeping with his eye, "I look and I look till I see the biggest fish of all—seven, eight, nine times as big as that up there, and I draw him out gently, gently, just as I choose him, into my Bobberie."

"And wouldn't any fish come to the little Prince unless he fished alone?" said the greedy Gunga.

"None," said Nod. "But there, why should we be gossiping of fishing? My boat is far away."

"But," said the Gunga cunningly, "I have a boat."

"Ohé, maybe," said Nod easily. "One cannot drown on dry land. But I did speak of a Bobberie of skin and Bemba-wood, made by the stamping Oomgar-nuggas next the sea."

"Ay," said the Gunga triumphantly, "but that's just what my Bobberie is made of, and I broke the backbone of the Oomgar-nugga chief that made it with one cuff of my cudgel-hand."

Nod yawned. "Tishnar's Prince is tired," he said, "and cannot talk of fishes any more. A bowlful more broth, Master Fish-catcher, and then I'll just put on my jacket and go to sleep." And he laughed, oh, so softly to himself to see that sooty, gluttonous, velvety face, and the red, gleaming eyes, and the thick, twitching thumbs.

"Ootz nuggthli!" coughed the Gunga sourly. He ladled out the broth, bobbing with broken pods, with a great nutshell, muttering angrily to himself as he stooped over the pot. And there, as soon as he had turned his back, came those two dark wondering faces at the window, grinning to see little Nod so snug and comfortable before the fire.

And when the Gunga had poured out the broth, he brought his stool nearer to Nod, and, leaning his great hands on the floor, he said: "See here, Prince of Tishnar, if I lend you my skin Bobberie to-morrow morning, will you catch me some fish with your magic song?"

Nod frowned and stared into the fire. "The crafty Gunga would be peeping between the trees," he said, "and then——"

"What then?" said he.

"Then Tishnar's Meermuts would come with their silver thongs and drive you squalling into the water. And the Middens would pick your eyes out, Master Fish-catcher."

"I promise, I promise," said the old Gunga, and his enormous body trembled.

"Where is this talked-of Bobberie?" said Nod solemnly. "Was it that old log Nod saw when whispering with the Water-middens?"

"Follow, follow," said the other. "I'll show the Prince this log." But first Nod stooped under the bench, and pulled out his sheep's-coat and put it on. Then he followed the old Fish-catcher down his frosty path between its banks of snow, clear now in the silver shining of the moon.

The Fish-catcher showed him everything—how to untie the knotted rope of Samarak, how to use the paddles, where the mooring-stone for deep water was. He held it up in his hand, a great round stone as big as a millstone. Nod listened and listened, half hiding his face in his jacket lest the Gunga-mulgar should see him laughing. Last of all, the Fish-catcher, lifting him lightly in his hand, pointed across the turbid water, and bade him have care not to drift out far in his fishing, for the stream ran very swiftly, the ice-floes or hummocks were sharp, and under the Shining-one, he said, snorting River-horses and the weeping Mumbo lurk.

"Never fear, Master Fish-catcher," said Nod. "Tishnar will watch over me. How many big fish, now, can the old Glutton eat in comfort?"

The Gunga lifted his black bony face, and glinted on the moon. "Five would be good," he said. "Ten would be better. Ohé, do not count, Royal Traveller. It makes the head ache after ten." And he thought within himself what a fine thing it was to have kept this Magic-mulgar, this Prince of Tishnar, for his friend, when he might in his rage have flung him clean across Obea-munza into that great Bōōbab-tree grey in the moon. "He shall teach me the Middens' song, and then I'll fish for myself," he thought, all his thick skin stirring on his bones with greed.

So he cozened and cringed and flattered, and used Nod as if he were his mother's son. He made him lie on his own bed; he put on him a great skin ear-cap; he filled a bowl with the hot fish-water to bathe his feet; and he fetched out from a lidded hole in the floor a necklet of scalloped Bamba-shells, and hung it round his slender neck.

But Nod, as soon as he lay down, began thinking of those poor Mulla-mulgars, his brothers, hungry and shivering in the tree-tops. And he pondered how he could help them. Presently he began to chafe and toss in his bed, to sigh and groan.

Up started the old Gunga from his corner beside the fire. "What ails the Prince? Why does he groan? Are you in pain, Mulla-mulgar?"

"In pain!" cried Nod, as if in a great rage, "How shall a Prince sleep with twice ten thousand Gunga fleas in his blanket?"

He got up, dragging after him the thick Munzaram's fleece off his bed, and, opening the door, flung it out into the snow. "Try that, my hungry hopping ones," he said, and pushed up the door again. "Now I must have another one," he said.

The old Fish-catcher excused himself for the fleas. "It is cold to comb in the doorway," he said, rubbing his flat nose. And he took another woolly skin out of his earth-cupboard and laid it over Nod.

"That's one for Thumb," Nod said to himself, laughing. And presently once more he began fretting and tossing. "Oh, oh, oh!" he cried out, "What! More of ye! more of ye!" and with that away he went again, and flung the second ram's fleece after the first.

"Master Traveller, Master Traveller!" yelped the old Fish-catcher, starting up, "if you throw all my blankets out, those thieves the smudge-faces will steal them."

"Better no blankets than a million fleas," said Nod; "and yours, Master Fish-catcher, are as greedy as Ephelanto tics. And now I think I will sleep by the fire, then the first peep of day will shine in my eyes from that little window-hole up there, and wake me to my fishing."

"Udzmutchakiss" ("So be it"), growled the Gunga. But he was very angry underneath. "Wait ye, wait ye, wait ye, my pretty Squirrel-tail," he kept muttering to himself as he sat with crossed arms. "For every blanket a Bobberie or great fish."

But Nod had never felt so merry in his life. To think of his brothers wrapped warm in the Gunga-mulgar's blankets!—He laughed aloud.

"What ails the Traveller? What is he mocking at now?" said the Fish-catcher, glowering out of his corner.

"Why," said Nod, "I laughed to hear the mice in this box hanging over my head."

"Mice?" said the Gunga.

"Why, yes; a score or more," said Nod. "And one old husky Muttakin keeps saying, 'Nibble all, nibble all; leave not one whole, my little pretty ones—not the crumb of a crumb for the ugly old glutton.' I think, O generous Gunga, she means the bread of Sudd, I smell."

At that the Gunga flamed up in a fury. He rushed to his food-box, shouting, "Will ye, oh, will ye, ye nibbling thieves!" And, opening the door, he flung it after the blankets—Sudd-loaves, Nanoes, river-weed, and all. And he stood a minute in the doorway, looking out on the cold, moonlit snow.

"Shut to the door, shut to the door, Master Fish-catcher," called Nod. "I hear a distant harp-playing."

The Gunga very quickly shut the door at that. But he came to the fire and stood leaning on his hand, looking into it, very sullen and angry. "Did I not say it, Prince of Tishnar?" he said. "My blankets are gone already. Stolen!"

"Sleep softly, my friend," said Nod, "and weary me not with talking. There's better rams in the forest than ever were flayed. Your blankets will creep back, never fear. Even to a Mullabruk his own fleas! But, there! I'll make magic even this very moment, and to-morrow, when you go down to the river to fetch up the fish, there shall your blankets be, folded and civeted, on the stones by the water."

Then he rose up in his littleness, and began to dance slowly from one foot to the other, waving his lean arms over the fire, and singing, in the secret language of the Mulla-mulgars, as loud as ever he could:

"Thumb, Thimble, Mulgar meese,
In your blankets dream at ease,
And never mind the frozen fleas;
But don't forget the loaves and cheese!"

"It is very strange magic," said the Fish-catcher.

"Nay," said Nod; "they were very strange fleas."

"And 'Thumthimble'—what does that mean?"

"'Thumb' means short and fat, and 'Thimble' means long and lean, which is Mulgar-royal for both kinds, Master Fish-catcher."

"Ohé! the Prince knows best," said the old Gunga; "but I never heard such magic. And I've watched the Dancing Oomgars leagues and leagues from here, and drummed them home to their Shes."

Nod yawned.

As soon as it was daybreak the old Fish-catcher, who had scarcely slept a wink for thinking of the fishes he was to have for his breakfast, came and woke Nod up. And Nod said: "Now I go, Master Fish-catcher; but be sure you do not venture one toe's breadth beyond the door till you hear me bringing back the fishes."

"How can the Prince carry them, fishes big as that?" said the Gunga.

"One at a time, my friend, as Ephelantoes root up trees," said Nod, staring at his bristling arms and tusks of teeth. "Ohé!" he went on, "when you hear my sweet-sounding Water-middens' song, you will not be able to keep yourself from peeping. You must be bound with Cullum, Master Fish-catcher. Oh, I should weep riversful of salt tears if the Water-middens picked your gentle eyes out."

At first the cunning old Gunga would not consent to be bound up. But Nod refused to stir until he did. So at last he fetched a thick rope of Samarak (which is stronger and tougher than Cullum) out of his old chest or coffer, and Nod wound it round and round him—legs, arms, and shoulders—and tied the ends to the great fish-scaly table.

"Sit easy, my friend," said he; "my magic begins wonderfully to burn in me." And, without another word, he skipped out and pulled up the door behind him.

Words could not tell how rejoiced were his brothers to see him from their tree-tops come frisking across the snow. Away went the travellers in the first light, hastening like thieves in their jackets, Nod in his sheep's-coat leading the way. They left the blankets as Nod had promised the Gunga. Then, one, two, three, they pushed the Bobberie into deep water. In jumped Nod, in jumped Thimble, in jumped Thumb. Out splashed the heavy paddles, and soon the Bobberie was floating like a cork among the ice-humps in the red glare of dawn. They shoved off, Thumb at one paddle, Thimble and Nod at the other. The farther they floated, the swifter swept the water. And soon, however hard they pushed at the heavy paddles, the Bobberie began twirling round and round, zig-zagging faster and faster down with the stream.

But scarcely were they more than fifteen fathoms from the bank when a shrill and piercing "Illa olla! illa olla!" broke out behind them. No need to look back. There on the bank in his glistening fish-skins, gnashing his teeth and beating with his crusted hands on the drum of his great chest, stood the terrible Gunga-mulgar, his Samarak-ropes all burst asunder. He stooped and tore up huge stones and lumps of ice as big as a sheep, and flung them high into the air after the tossing Bobberie. Splash, splash, splash, they fell, around the three poor sweating travellers, drenching them with water and melting snow. The faster they paddled the faster swirled the water, and the thicker came tumbling the Gunga's huge boulders of stone and ice. Let but one fall plump upon their Bobberie, down they would go to be Mumbo-meat for good and all. But ever farther the surging water was sweeping them on. Suddenly the hailstones ceased, and they spied their dreadful enemy swinging furiously back on his thick five-foot arms.

"Gone, gone!" cried Thimble in triumph, leaning breathless on his paddle.

"Crow when your egg's hatched, brother Thimble," muttered Thumb. "He's gone to fetch his bow."

True it was. Down swung the gibbering Gunga, his Oomgar-nugga's bow across his shoulder. Crouching by the water-side, he stretched its string with all his strength. And a thin, keen dart sung shrill as a parakeet over their heads. Again, again, and then it seemed to Nod a red-hot skewer had suddenly spitted him through the shoulder, and he knew the Fish-catcher had aimed true. He plucked the arrow out and waved it over his head, scrunching his teeth together, and saying nothing save "Paddle, Thimble! Paddle, O Thumb!"

Mightily they leaned on their broad, unwieldy paddles. But now, not looking where the water was sweeping them, of a sudden the Bobberie butted full tilt into a great hummock of ice, and water began welling up through a hole in the bottom. Nod knelt down, and, while his brothers paddled, he flung out the water as fast as he could with his big fish-skin cap. But fast though he baled, the water rilled in faster, and just as they floated under a long, snow-laden branch of an Ollaconda-tree, the Bobberie began to sink.

Then Thimble cried in a loud voice, "Guzza-guzza-nahoo!" and, with a great leap, sprang out of the boat and caught the drooping branch. Thumb clutched his legs and Nod Thumb's; and there they were, all three swinging over the water, while the branch creaked and trembled over their heads.

Down sank the staved-in Bobberie, and up—one, two, three, four, five—floated huge, sluggish Mumboes or Coccadrilloes, with dull, grass-green eyes fixed gluttonously on the dangling Mulgars. And a thick muskiness filled the air around them.

Inch by inch Thimble edged along the bough, until, because of the jutting twigs and shoots, he could edge no farther. Then, slowly and steadily at first, but gradually faster, the three travellers began to swing, sweeping to and fro through the air, above the enraged and snapping Coccadrilloes. The wind rushed past Nod's ears; his jacket flapped about him. "Go!" squealed Thumb; and away whisked Nod, like a flying squirrel across the water, and landed high and dry on the bank under the wide-spreading Ollaconda-tree. Thumb followed. Thimble, with only his own weight to lift, quickly scrambled up into the boughs above him. And soon all three Mulla-mulgars were sitting in safety, munching what remained of the Gunga's Sudd-bread, and between their mouthfuls shouting mockery at the musky Coccadrilloes.

While they were thus eating happily together Thumb suddenly threw up his hands and called: "Blood, blood, O Ummanodda—blood, red blood!" And then it seemed to Nod, trees, sky, and river swam mazily before his eyes. Darkness swept up. He rolled over against a jutting root of the Ollaconda, and knew no more.

CHAPTER VI

When Nod opened his eyes again, he found himself blinking right into the middle of a blazing fire, over which hung sputtering a huddled carcass on a long black spit. Nod's head ached; his shoulder burned and throbbed. He touched it gently, and found that it was swathed and bound up with leaves that smelt sleepily sweet and cool. He looked around him as best he could, but at first could see nothing, because of the brightness of the flames. Gradually he perceived small grey creatures, with big heads and white hands, that reached almost to the ground, hastening to and fro. His smooth brown poll stood up stiff with terror at sight of them, for he knew he must be lying in the earth-mounds of the flesh-eating Minimuls.

THE WONDERSTONE.

Memories one by one returned to him—the Bobberie, the river, the yapping Coccadrilloes, the burning dart. One thing he could not recall—how he came to be lying alone and helpless here in the root-houses of these cunning enemies of all Mulgars, great and small. He remembered the stories Mutta-matutta used to tell him of their snares and poisons and enticements; of their earth-galleries and their horrible flesh-feasts at the full moon. His one comfort was that he still lay in his sheep's jacket, and felt his little Wonderstone pressed close against his side.

When one of the Minimuls that stood basting the spit saw that Nod was awake he summoned others who were standing near, and many stooped softly over, staring at him, and whispering together. Nod put his finger to his tongue, and said, "Walla!" One of them instantly shuffled away and brought him a little gourd of a sweetish juice like Keeri, which greatly refreshed him.

Then he called out, "Mulgars, Mulla-mulgars?" This, too, they seemed at once to understand. For, indeed, Seelem had told Nod that these Minimuls are nothing but a kind of Munza-mulgar, though their faces more closely resemble the twilight or moonshine Mulgars, and for craft and greed the dwarf Oomgar-nuggas, that long ago had trooped away beyond Arakkaboa. Nod heard presently many faint voices, and then thick guttural cries of pain and anger. And by turning a little his head he could see a host of these mouse-faced mannikins tugging at a rope. At the end of this rope, all bound up with Cullum, with sticky leaves plastered over their eyes, and hung with dangling festoons of greenery and flowers, like jacks-in-the-green, Thumb and Thimble hobbled slowly in from under an earthen arch. Nod was weak with pain. He cried out hollowly to see his brothers blind and helpless.