h the precious metals, and provokingly blowing
the gold-dust in each other's eyes. My hideous companion stood
partly within and partly without; he ordered the others to reach him
up heaps of gold, and showing it to me with a laugh, he then flung
it back again with a ringing noise into the immeasurable abyss."

"He then showed the piece of gold I had given him to the goblins
below, and they laughed themselves half-dead over it and hissed at
me. At last they all pointed at me with their metal-stained fingers,
and more and more wildly, and more and more densely, and more and
more madly, the swarm of spirits came clambering up to me. I was
seized with terror as my horse had been before: I put spurs to him,
and I know not how far I galloped for the second time wildly into
the forest."

"At length, when I again halted, the coolness of evening was around
me. Through the branches of the trees I saw a white foot-path
gleaming, which I fancied must lead from the forest toward the city.
I was anxious to work my way in that direction; but a face perfectly
white and indistinct, with features ever changing, kept peering at
me between the leaves; I tried to avoid it, but wherever I went it
appeared also. Enraged at this, I determined at last to ride at it,
when it gushed forth volumes of foam upon me and my horse, obliging
us half-blinded to make a rapid retreat. Thus it drove us step by
step ever away from the foot-path, leaving the way open to us only
in one direction. When we advanced in this direction, it kept indeed
close behind us, but did not do us the slightest harm."

"Looking around at it occasionally, I perceived that the white face
that had besprinkled us with foam belonged to a form equally white
and of gigantic stature. Many a time I thought that it was a moving
stream, but I could never convince myself on the subject. Wearied
out, the horse and his rider yielded to the impelling power of the
white man, who kept nodding his head, as if he would say, 'Quite
right, quite right!' And thus at last we came out here to the end of
the forest, where I saw the turf, and the lake, and your little
cottage, and where the tall white man disappeared."

"It's well that he's gone," said the old fisherman; and now he began
to talk of the best way by which his guest could return to his
friends in the city. Upon this Undine began to laugh slyly to
herself; Huldbrand observed it, and said: "I thought you were glad
to see me here; why t