th that needle was a thing that I
cannot say I liked; and I don't think his knowledge of the sciences
amounts to very much, either. He plappers out a lot of stuff that
nobody run make head or tail of, and can tell you what kind of
spatterdashes the Grand Mogul puts on; but when he goes outside, he
can't tell a lime-tree from a chestnut; and his behaviour has always
struck me as being most remarkable."

"I feel just as you do, dearest husband," said Frau von Brakel; "and,
glad as I was that your great cousin should interest himself about the
children, I feel quite sure, now, that he might have done it in other
and better ways than by saddling us with this Tutor Ink. As regards his
knowledge of the sciences, I don't pretend to give an opinion; but I
know that the little black creature, with his little weeny legs, is
more and more disagreeable to me every day. He has such a nasty way of
gobbling things. He can't see a drop of beer at the bottom of a glass,
or the fag-end of a jug of milk, but he must gulp them down his throat;
and if he finds the sugar-box open, he's at it in a moment, snuffing at
the sugar, and dipping his fingers in it, till one has to clap to the
lid in his face; and then away he darts, humming and buzzing in a way
that's most disgusting and abominable."

The baron was going to carry this conversation further, when Felix and
Christlieb came running home through amongst the birches.

"Hurrah! hurrah!" Felix kept shouting, "the pheasant prince has bitten
Master Tutor Ink to death!"

"Oh, mamma dear," cried Christlieb, "Master Tutor Ink is not a Tutor
Ink at all! What he really is, is Pepser, king of the Gnomes; a great,
monstrous fly, but a fly with a wig on, and shoes and stockings!"

The parents gazed at the children in utter amazement, as they went on
excitedly telling them all about the Stranger Child, whose mother was a
great fairy queen; and of the Gnome King Pepser, and his combat with
the pheasant prince.

"Who on earth has been cramming all this nonsense into your heads?" the
baron asked over and over again. "Have you been dreaming? or what in
the name of goodness has happened to you?" However, the children
declared, and stuck to it, that everything had happened just as they
told it, and that the horrible Pepser, who had given himself out as
being Master Ink, the tutor, must be lying killed in the wood.

Frau von Brakel struck her hands over her head and cried, in much
sorrow, "Oh, childr