e water sprite. With which she drew
some of her golden hairs over her arm, and tuning them as if they had
been the strings of a harp, she began to sing:

"Warp of woollen and woof of gold:
When seven and seven and seven are told."

But when Kind William heard that the river was running with the
cadence of the tune, he could bear it no longer, and took to his
heels. When he had run a few yards he heard a splash, as if a salmon
had jumped, and on looking back he found that the yellow-haired maiden
was gone.

Kind William was trustworthy as well as obliging, and he kept his
word. He said nothing of his adventure. He put the yellow lock into an
old china teapot that had stood untouched on the mantelpiece for
years. And fishing up the river and down the river he never again cast
net into the haunted pool. And in course of time the whole affair
passed from his mind.

Fourteen years went by, and Kind William was Kind William still. He
was as obliging as ever, and still loved the miller's daughter, who,
for her part, had not forgotten her old playmate. But the miller's
memory was not so good, for the fourteen years had been prosperous
ones with him, and he was rich, whereas they had only brought bad
trade and poverty to the weaver and his son. So the lovers were not
allowed even to speak to each other.

One evening Kind William wandered by the river-side lamenting his hard
fate. It was his twenty-first birthday, and he might not even receive
the good wishes of the day from his old playmate. It was just growing
dusk, a time when prudent bodies hurry home from the neighbourhood of
fairy rings, sprite-haunted streams, and the like, and Kind William
was beginning to quicken his pace, when a voice from behind him sang:

"Warp of woollen and woof of gold:
When seven and seven and seven are told."

Kind William felt sure that he had heard this before, though he could
not recall when or where; but suspecting that it was no mortal voice
that sang, he hurried home without looking behind him. Before he
reached the house he remembered all, and also that on this very day
his promise of secrecy expired.

Meanwhile the old weaver had been sadly preparing the loom to weave a
small stock of yarn, which he had received in payment for some work.
He had set up the warp, and was about to fill the shuttle, when his
son came in and told the story, and repeated the water sprite's song.

"Where is the lock of hair, my son?"