re quite out of humor in
consequence.

Undine laughed at them excessively all day, but they were neither of
them merry enough to join in her jests as usual. Toward evening she
went out of the cottage to avoid, as she said, two such long and
tiresome faces. As twilight advanced, there were again tokens of a
storm, and the water rushed and roared. Full of alarm, the knight
and the fisherman sprang to the door, to bring home the girl,
remembering the anxiety of that night when Huldbrand had first come
to the cottage. Undine, however, met them, clapping her little hands
with delight. "What will you give me," she said, "to provide you
with wine?" or rather, "you need not give me anything," she
continued, "for I am satisfied if you will look merrier and be in
better spirits than you have been throughout this whole wearisome
day. Only come with me; the forest stream has driven ashore a cask,
and I will be condemned to sleep through a whole week if it is not a
wine-cask." The men followed her, and in a sheltered creek on the
shore, they actually found a cask, which inspired them with the hope
that it contained the generous drink for which they were thirsting.

They at once rolled it as quickly as possible toward the cottage,
for the western sky was overcast with heavy storm-clouds, and they
could observe in the twilight the waves of the lake raising their
white, foaming heads, as if looking out for the rain which was
presently to pour down upon them. Undine helped the men as much as
she was able, and when the storm of rain suddenly burst over them,
she said, with a merry threat to the heavy clouds: "Come, come, take
care that you don't wet us; we are still some way from shelter." The
old man reproved her for this, as simple presumption, but she
laughed softly to herself, and no mischief befell any one in
consequence of her levity. Nay, more: contrary to all expectation,
they reached the comfortable hearth with their booty perfectly dry,
and it was not till they had opened the cask, and had proved that it
contained some wonderfully excellent wine, that the rain burst forth
from the dark cloud, and the storm raged among the tops of the
trees, and over the agitated billows of the lake.

Several bottles were soon filled from the great cask, which promised
a supply for many days, and they were sitting drinking and jesting
round the glowing fire, feeling comfortably secured from the raging
storm without. Suddenly the old fisherma