st so dark that they could see neither
earth nor sky. They went through this forest, but in a short time they
grew very tired, and when they came to a path leading to a clearing
full of large tree-stumps, the father said, "I am so tired out that I
will rest here a little," and with that he sat down on a tree-stump
and cried, "Oh, how tired I am!" He had no sooner said these words
than out of the tree-stump, nobody could say how, sprang such a
little, little old man, all so wrinkled and puckered, and his beard
was quite green and reached right down to his knee.--"What dost thou
want of me, O man?" he asked.--The man was amazed at the strangeness
of his coming to light, and said to him, "I did not call thee;
begone!"--"How canst thou say that when thou didst call me?" asked the
little old man.--"Who art thou, then?" asked the father.--"I am Oh,
the Tsar of the Woods," replied the old man; "why didst thou call me,
I say?"--"Away with thee, I did not call thee," said the man.--"What!
thou didst not call me when thou saidst 'Oh'?"--"I was tired, and
therefore I said 'Oh'!" replied the man.--"Whither art thou going?"
asked Oh.--"The wide world lies before me," sighed the man. "I am
taking this sorry blockhead of mine to hire him out to somebody or
other. Perchance other people may be able to knock more sense into him
than we can at home; but send him whither we will, he always comes
running home again!"--"Hire him out to me. I'll warrant I'll teach
him," said Oh. "Yet I'll only take him on one condition. Thou shalt
come back for him when a year has run, and if thou dost know him
again, thou mayst take him; but if thou dost not know him again, he
shall serve another year with me."--"Good!" cried the man. So they
shook hands upon it, had a good drink to clinch the bargain, and the
man went back to his own home, while Oh took the son away with him.

Oh took the son away with him, and they passed into the other world,
the world beneath the earth, and came to a green hut woven out of
rushes, and in this hut everything was green; the walls were green and
the benches were green, and Oh's wife was green and his children were
green--in fact, everything there was green. And Oh had water-nixies
for serving-maids, and they were all as green as rue. "Sit down now!"
said Oh to his new labourer, "and have a bit of something to eat." The
nixies then brought him some food, and that also was green, and he ate
of it. "And now," said Oh, "take m