d not laugh properly because his mouth was crooked. 'Welcome to my
kingdom! Have you slept well and eaten well and drunk well?' he asked.

'Yes, indeed we have,' said both the girls, 'but tell us . . .' and they
wanted to ask who the old man was, but were afraid to.

'I will tell you who I am,' said the old man; 'I am the raspberry king,
who reigns over all this kingdom of raspberry bushes, and I have lived
here for more than a thousand years. But the great spirit who rules over
the woods, and the sea, and the sky, did not want me to become proud of
my royal power and my long life. Therefore he decreed that one day in
every hundred years I should change into a little raspberry worm, and
live in that weak and helpless form from sunrise till sunset. During
that time my life is dependent on the little worm's life, so that a bird
can eat me, a child can pick me with the berries and trample under foot
my thousand years of life. Now yesterday was just my transformation day,
and I was taken with the raspberry and would have been trampled to death
if you had not saved my life. Until sunset I lay helpless in the grass,
and when I was swept away from your table I twisted one of my feet, and
my mouth became crooked with terror; but when evening came and I could
take my own form again, I looked for you to thank you and reward you.
Then I found you both here in my kingdom, and tried to meet you both as
well as I could without frightening you. Now I will send a bird from my
wood to show you the way home. Good-bye, little children, thank you for
your kind hearts; the raspberry king can show that he is not
ungrateful.' The children shook hands with the old man and thanked him,
feeling very glad that they had saved the little raspberry worm. They
were just going when the old man turned round, smiled mischievously with
his crooked mouth, and said: 'Greetings to Otto from me, and tell him
when I meet him again I shall do him the honour of eating him up.'

'Oh, please don't do that,' cried both the girls, very frightened.

'Well, for your sake I will forgive him,' said the old man, 'I am not
revengeful. Greetings to Otto and tell him that he may expect a gift
from me, too. Good-bye.'

The two girls, light of heart, now took their berries and ran off
through the wood after the bird; and soon it began to get lighter in the
wood and they wondered how they could have lost their way yesterday, it
seemed so easy and plain now.

One can imag