l, at all?" said he to the fairy.

"Who is yourself?" said the fairy. "But come, before we have any talk
let us have something to eat, for I am sure you are hungry."

Then they sat down to table, and the fairy rang the little brass bell
twice, and the weeny dwarf brought in two boiled snails in their shells,
and when they had eaten the snails he brought in a dormouse, and when
they had eaten the dormouse he brought in two wrens, and when they had
eaten the wrens he brought in two nuts full of wine, and they became
very merry, and the fairyman sang "Cooleen dhas," and the dwarf sang
"The little blackbird of the glen."

"Did you ever hear the 'Foggy Dew'?" said the fairy.

"No," said the dwarf.

"Well, then, I'll give it to you; but we must have some more wine."

And the wine was brought, and he sang the "Foggy Dew," and the dwarf
said it was the sweetest song he had ever heard, and that the fairyman's
voice would coax the birds off the bushes.

"You asked me who I am?" said the fairy.

"I did," said the dwarf.

"And I asked you who is yourself?"

"You did," said the dwarf.

"And who are you, then?"

"Well, to tell the truth, I don't know," said the dwarf, and he blushed
like a rose.

"Well, tell me what you know about yourself."

"I remember nothing at all," said the dwarf, "before the day I found
myself going along with a crowd of all sorts of people to the great fair
of the Liffey. We had to pass by the king's palace on our way, and as we
were passing the king sent for a band of jugglers to come and show their
tricks before him. I followed the jugglers to look on, and when the play
was over the king called me to him, and asked me who I was and where I
came from. I was dumb then, and couldn't answer; but even if I could
speak I could not tell him what he wanted to know, for I remembered
nothing of myself before that day. Then the king asked the jugglers, but
they knew nothing about me, and no one knew anything, and then the king
said he would take me into his service; and the only work I have to do
is to go once a month with a bag of corn to the hut in the lonely moor."

"And there you fell in love with the little princess," said the fairy,
winking at the dwarf.

The poor dwarf blushed twice as much as he had done before.

"You need not blush," said the fairy; "it is a good man's case. And now
tell me, truly, do you love the princess, and what would you give to
free her from the spell of enchantment