no sound but my own hammer within hearing, and
the terrible tall spirit of the mountain came to me; I'd wager you
would twist your face into some other look, and would not laugh as you
do here where the merry morning sun is shining on you. Everybody can
grin; but seeing is the lot of few; and still fewer can behave like
men, when their eyes are thrown open."

"I will pay you for the book, my good old man," replied Edward kindly,
"and keep it for our William till he comes back again."

"Ha ha!" cried the miner, laughing heartily and putting up the money;
"and read it too, and pore over it by yourself, and go on Sundays and
holidays to look out for the marks and the secret passages. Only don't
let them befool you, young man, or cajole, or frighten you; and when
you have found anything, keep a fast hold. Look you, the lord of these
hills, or the old man of the mountain, as many choose to call him,
knows all about the matter: he has thrust his hands into the pockets
of all the richest ghosts and elves and goblins; and they have been
forced to empty them out for him."

"Whom do you mean?" asked Edward a good deal surprised; and at the
same time he wanted to give the besmeared book back again to the old
man, saying with some irritation: "since you cannot trust me, or
rather hold me to be such a fool, keep the treasure-casket yourself
for our friend, and only give the master miner his money."

"No," exclaimed the old man; "what has once been made over and paid
for, must stay in the hands of the buyer: that is a sacred law, and if
we break it, the maste rminer and I shall be under a ban. But whom do
I mean, ask you, by the old man of the mountain, or by the lord of
these hills? Are you ignorant of that? and have already been here a
round dozen of years and more. Why, this is the name all the world
gives to your high and mighty manufacturer, mine-holder, merchant,
gold-maker, ghost-seer, your all-powerful man of millions, your
Balthasar. And perhaps you would make believe into the bargain that
you don't know how he comes by all his unnatural riches. Ay, ay,
friend, the pale old sour-faced growler has them all in
leading-strings, the whole posse of spirits: he is often absent for
weeks, and tarrying with them in their secret chambers: then they pay
away to him; then they break their old crowns in bits, and pour out
the diamonds into his skinny hands; then they strike with their
magical rods against the stone walls, and the wa