while he was so thinking he heard
fierce and angry snortings, and, coming swiftly from the island to the
shore, he saw the swimming and prancing steeds. Sometimes their heads
and manes only were visible, and sometimes, rearing, they rose half out
of the water, and, striking it with their hoofs, churned it into foam,
and tossed the white spray to the skies. As they approached nearer and
nearer their snortings became more terrible, and their nostrils shot
forth clouds of vapor. The Dwarf trembled at the sight and sound, and
his old horse, quivering in every limb, moaned piteously, as if in pain.
On came the steeds, until they almost touched the shore, then rearing,
they seemed about to spring on to it.

The frightened Dwarf turned his head to fly, and as he did so he heard
the twang of a golden harp, and right before him whom should he see but
the little man of the hills, holding a harp in one hand and striking the
strings with the other.

"Are you ready to pay the price?" said he, nodding gayly to the Dwarf.

As he asked the question, the listening water-steeds snorted more
furiously than ever.

"Are you ready to pay the price?" said the little man a second time.

A shower of spray, tossed on shore by the angry steeds, drenched the
Dwarf to the skin, and sent a cold shiver to his bones, and he was so
terrified that he could not answer.

"For the third and last time, are you ready to pay the price?" asked the
Fairy, as he flung the harp behind him and turned to depart.

When the Dwarf saw him going he thought of the little Princess in the
lonely moor, and his courage came back, and he answered bravely:

"Yes, I am ready."

The water-steeds, hearing his answer, and snorting with rage, struck the
shore with their pounding hoofs.

"Back to your waves!" cried the little harper; and as he ran his fingers
across his lyre, the frightened steeds drew back into the waters.

"What is the price?" asked the Dwarf.

"Your right eye," said the Fairy; and before the Dwarf could say a word,
the Fairy scooped out the eye with his finger, and put it into his
pocket.

The Dwarf suffered most terrible agony; but he resolved to bear it for
the sake of the little Princess. Then the Fairy sat down on a rock at
the edge of the sea, and, after striking a few notes, he began to play
the "Strains of Slumber."

The sound crept along the waters, and the steeds, so ferocious a moment
before, became perfectly still. They had no longer