hamber was round and caved, and on the walls were still visible the
marks of the Minimuls' hands and scoops which had hollowed it out.
Through the roof a rugged root pierced, crossed over, and dipped into
the earth again. The candle-worms cast a gentle sheen on the golden
sanded walls. Hung from the roof were strings of dried flowers, shedding
so heavy and languid a smell in the narrow chamber that Nod's drowsy
eyelids soon began to droop. His bright eyes glanced like fireflies,
darting to and fro with his thoughts. But the odour of the flowers soon
soothed them all to rest. Nod fell asleep.

The next day (that is, the next Minimul day, which is Munza night) crept
slowly by. Nod was never left alone. Every hour the little
soft-shuffling Mouse-faces tended and fed and watched him, and burnt
little magic sticks around him. Three dead Skeetoes, with fast-shut
eyes, lay on the floor, shot by their poisoned darts in the dusk of the
evening, when he was carried into the big fire-chamber, or kitchen,
again. They were soon skinned and trussed by the hungry Minimuls, and
stretched along the spit. The smell of their roasting rose up in smoke.
At last came sleeping-time again. And then, when all was silent, Nod
rose softly from his grass-mat, and stealing down the low, narrow
earth-run, looked out into the kitchen where he had lain all day. The
fire was dying in faintly glowing embers. All was utterly still. But
which way should he go now, he wondered, to seek his brothers? And which
of these dark arches led to the open forest, the snow, and the
Assasimmon?

[Illustration: NOD WAS NEVER LEFT ALONE.]

His quick eyes caught sight of the thin smoke winding silently up from
the logs. Somewhere that must escape into the air. But on high it was so
dim he could scarcely see the roof, only the steep walls, ragged with
snake-skins, and the huge pods of the silky poison-seed. He crept
stealthily under one of the arches hung at the entrance with the dried
carcass of a little fierce-faced, snow-white Gunga cub, and presently
came to where, all in their sandy beds, with their tails curled up, side
by side in double rows, the mousey Earth-mulgars slept. He returned to
the kitchen, and called softly in the hollow cavern, "Thumb, Thumb!"

Only his own voice echoed back to him. Yet a sound feeble as this awoke
the light-sleeping Minimuls. For their mounds echo more than mere
hollowness would seem to make them. The lightest stir or footfall