; but this was a mere boast, for it did not
contain so many.

And again little Tuk lay in his bed, scarcely knowing whether he
was dreaming or not, for some one stood by him.

"Tuk! little Tuk!" said a voice. It was a very little person who
spoke. He was dressed as a sailor, and looked small enough to be a
middy, but he was not one. "I bring you many greetings from Corsor. It
is a rising town, full of life. It has steamships and mail-coaches. In
times past they used to call it ugly, but that is no longer true. I
lie on the sea-shore," said Corsor; "I have high-roads and
pleasure-gardens; I have given birth to a poet who was witty and
entertaining, which they are not all. I once wanted to fit out a
ship to sail round the world, but I did not accomplish it, though most
likely I might have done so. But I am fragrant with perfume, for close
to my gates most lovely roses bloom."

Then before the eyes of little Tuk appeared a confusion of colors,
red and green; but it cleared off, and he could distinguish a cliff
close to the bay, the slopes of which were quite overgrown with
verdure, and on its summit stood a fine old church with pointed
towers. Springs of water flowed out of the cliff in thick waterspouts,
so that there was a continual splashing. Close by sat an old king with
a golden crown on his white head. This was King Hroar of the Springs
and near the springs stood the town of Roeskilde, as it is called.
Then all the kings and queens of Denmark went up the ascent to the old
church, hand in hand, with golden crowns on their heads, while the
organ played and the fountains sent forth jets of water.

Little Tuk saw and heard it all. "Don't forget the names of
these towns," said King Hroar.

All at once everything vanished; but where! It seemed to him
like turning over the leaves of a book. And now there stood before him
an old peasant woman, who had come from Soroe where the grass grows in
the market-place. She had a green linen apron thrown over her head and
shoulders, and it was quite wet, as if it had been raining heavily.
"Yes, that it has," said she, and then, just as she was going to
tell him a great many pretty stories from Holberg's comedies, and
about Waldemar and Absalom, she suddenly shrunk up together, and
wagged her head as if she were a frog about to spring. "Croak," she
cried; "it is always wet, and as quiet as death in Soroe." Then little
Tuk saw she was changed into a frog. "Croak," and again she was