the wall, and kissed his feet and hands in
token of allegiance. 'You are lord of the well!' they said, as they
passed him each one to the next.

He came to the bottom of the well; under his feet, wherever he stepped
upon its waters, hands came up and sustained him. The knowledge of
everything that was there had become his. 'Give me,' he said, 'the
crystal cup that is for him who holds kingship over you; so shall I be
lord of you in all places wherever I go.'

A blue arm reached down and drew up from the water a small crystal,
that burned through the darkness with a blue fire, and gave it to
Noodle. 'Now I am your king, however far from you!' said Noodle. And
they answered, chanting:

'Under Heaven, over Hell,
You have broken the spell,
You are lord of the Well.'

'Lift me up!' said he; and the blue arms caught him and lifted him up;
from one to another they passed him in ascending circles, till he came
to the mouth of the well.

There overhead was the old witch, crouching and looking in to know
what had become of him; and her hair hung far down over her eyes into
the well. He caught her to him by it over the brink. 'Old witch,' he
said, 'you must change places with me now!' and he tossed her down to
the bottom of the well.

She went like a falling shuttlecock, shrieking as she fell; and as she
struck the water, the drowned bodies of the men she had sent there
came to the surface, and caught her by the feet and hair, and drew her
down, making an end of her, as she also had made of them.

[Illustration]

IV

THE PRINCESS MELILOT

When Noodle, carrying the crystal with him, set foot once more upon
dry land, straightway he was again upon the back of the Galloping
Plough, with the world flying away under him. But now weariness came
over him, and his head weighed this way and that, so that earth and
sky mixed themselves before his gaze, and he was so drugged with
sleep that he had no wits to bid the Plough slacken from its speed.
Therefore it happened that as they passed a wood, a hanging bough
caught him, and brushed him like a feather from his place, landing him
on a green bosom of grass, where he slept the sleep of the weary, nor
ever lifted his head to see the Plough fast disappearing over hill and
valley and plain, out of sound of his voice or sight of his eye.

When Noodle awoke and found that the Plough was gone, he was bitter
against himself for his folly. 'So poor a use to make of so no