Chapter V (2)

After the reign of Justinian, it is not improbable that the repairs necessary for maintaining the navigation of the canal open began to be neglected, as we know that the population and industry of Egypt began to decline. The tribute of grain to Constantinople, and the public distributions to the people of Alexandria, appear to have exhausted all the surplus produce of the country; and to facilitate their collection, Justinian forbade the exportation of grain from any part of Egypt but Alexandria, except under great restrictions.[1] This edict, doubtless, ruined both the canal and the trade in the Red Sea, and may be looked upon as one of the proximate causes of the increasing power of the Arabs about the time of the birth of Mohammed. The Arabian caravans became possessed of the commerce formerly carried on in the northern part of the Red Sea; and as the wealth and civilization of the Arabs increased, a demand for a new religion, and a more extended empire, arose.[2] Had the complete abandonment of the canal not taken place shortly after the publication of Justinian's edict, it must have been completed during the universal anarchy which prevailed while Phocas reigned at Constantinople. Shortly after Heraclius delivered the empire from Phocas, the Persians invaded Egypt, and kept possession of it for ten years; nor is it probable that Heraclius could have made any efforts to restore the canal during the time he ruled Egypt, after recovering it from the Persians. When the Saracens conquered Egypt, they found the canal filled with sand.

[1] Edict xiii., Lex de Alexandrinis et Egyptiaciis provinciis.

[2] Transport, in some states of civilization, is cheaper by caravan than by sea.

The principle of all Mohammedan governments places the supreme power of the state in the person of the sovereign; and these sovereigns, in the simplicity or barbarism of their political views, have always considered the construction of wells, fountains, caravanseries, and mosques, as the only public works, except palaces, (if palaces can be properly so called,) worthy of a monarch's attention. Ports and canals they have always utterly despised, and roads and bridges have been barely tolerated. It is as difficult to civilize the mind of a true Mohammedan, as it is to wash the skin of a negro white. But the earlier caliphs were not moulded into true Mussulmans; they had been witnesses to the making of their religion; and, when they forsook the rude superstitions of their forefathers of the desert, they had admitted some gleams of common sense and sound reason into their minds, along with the sermons of Mohammed.

And in the early ages of the caliphate, Syria and Egypt were inhabited by a numerous Christian population of the Nestorian and Jacobite heresies, firmly attached to the Saracen power, on their hatred to the orthodox Roman emperors at Constantinople. The importance of the canal of Suez to the well-being of these useful subjects of the Arab empire, could not escape the attention of the caliphs. The native population of Egypt had, with the greatest unanimity, joined the Saracens against the Romans; and the Caliph Omar would have been led by policy to restore the canal, in order to enrich these devoted partisans, as he was induced to burn the library of Alexandria to diminish the moral influence of the Greeks.

The Arabian historians and geographers contain numerous passages relating to the re-opening of the canal, and many of these will be found translated at the end of the _Mémoire sur le Canal des Deux Mers_. They state that Omar ordered the canal of Trajan to be cleared out in its whole extent. The necessity of securing a greatly increased supply of grain for the holy cities of Medina and Mecca, whose population had been suddenly augmented by their becoming the capitals of all Arabia, and the centres of the Mohammedan power, could not be overlooked. But the mind of Omar was particularly directed to the subject, in consequence of a famine which prevailed in Arabia in the eighteenth year of the Hegira, (A.D. 639,) which was afterwards called the year of the mortality. In that year, the caliph's attention was also more especially called to the fertility of Egypt, as Amron, at his pressing demand for provisions, sent such an immense caravan, that the Arabian writers, with their usual exaggeration, declare, that the convoy was so numerous as to extend the whole way from Medina to Cairo; the first camel of the train entering the Holy City with its load, as the last of the uninterrupted line quitted Misr. The descriptions of the abundance this supply spread among the Arabs are indeed less miraculous, though such eloquence is displayed in painting the gastronomic delights of the hungry Mussulmans, in devouring the savoury food cooked with the fat of the beasts of burden which had transported it.[1]

[1] Ebn-A'bdoul-Hokin.

The account of the canal given by the geographer Makrizy, requires to be transcribed in his own words, from the accurate summary which it contains of the later history of this great monument of civilization. "When the Most High," says the writer, "gave Islamism to mankind, and Amrou-Ben-el-A'ss conquered Egypt by the order of Omar-ben-âl-Khatâb, chief of the Faithful, he cleared out the canal in the year of the mortality. He carried it to the sea of Qolzoum, from which ships sailed to the Hedjâz, to Yemen, and to India. This canal remained open until the time when Mohammed-ben-Abdoullah-ben-El-Hosseïn-ben-Aly-ben-Aby-Thâleb revolted in the city of the Prophet (Medina) against Abou-dja'far-Abdoullah ben-Mohammed Al-Manssour, then caliph of Irâk. This prince immediately wrote to his lieutenant in Egypt, ordering him to fill up the canal of Qolzoum, that it might not serve to transport provisions to Medina. The order was executed, and all communication was cut off with the sea at Qolzoum. Since that time, matters have remained in the state we now see them."[1] As the rebellion of Mohammed Abdoullah against the caliph, Al Manssour, occurred between the 145th and the 150th years of the Hegira, (A.D. 762-767,) the canal had remained open for about 125 years under the Arab government.

[1] See the extracts of Makrizy in the work on Egypt, and in the _Notice par Langlès dans les notices et extraits des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque du Roi_, vi. 334.

We have now traced the history of the canal to its close; and we believe our readers will allow that we have proved, by incontrovertible evidence, that a continued navigation from the Nile to the Red Sea existed from the time of Darius (B.C. 500) to the time of Al-Manssour, (A.D. 765,) with the interruption of a short period preceding the extinction of the Roman power in the east. It hardly requires any proof to establish that system of navigation, and a commercial route, which remained in use for nearly 1300 years, must have been based on the internal sources of Egypt, and been regarded as absolutely necessary, under every vicissitude of foreign trade, to the prosperity of the country. The great object of the canal was to afford a high-road for the exportation of the produce of Egypt; and its connexion with the Indian trade was merely a secondary and unimportant consideration. Its connexion with the existence of the agricultural, Egyptian, or Coptic population, was more immediate.

At present, the question of restoring the canal is solely connected with the Indian trade. We own we have very great doubts whether its re-establishment, if destined only to connect our lines of steam-packets from India to Suez, and from Southampton to Alexandria, would be found a profitable speculation. The tedious navigation of the Red Sea, and, we may almost add, of the Mediterranean, would render the route by the Cape preferable for sailing vessels; and we have not yet arrived at such perfection in the construction of steamers, as to contemplate their becoming the only vessels employed in the Indian trade. It appears to us, that before any reasonable hope of restoring the canal can be entertained, or, at least, before it can ever be kept open with profit, that Egypt must be again in a condition to employ the irrigable land on the banks of the canal for agricultural purposes. Unless the country be flourishing, the population increasing, and the canal constantly employed, it would be half-filled with the sand of the desert every year. On the other hand, as soon as a demand for more irrigable land is created by an augmented population, a canal of irrigation would soon be carried through the valley of Seba Biar; and the surplus produce of the Delta would again seek for a market on the shores of the Red Sea and in Arabia. Until these things happen, even should a canal be excavated, whether from Cairo to Suez, or from Suez to Tineh, during some pecuniary plethora in the city, we venture to predict that the Suez canal shares, or Mohammedan bonds, will be as disreputable a security as honest Jonathan's American repudiated stock, or the Greek bonds of King Otho not countersigned by Great Britain.

We cannot close this article without alluding to two able pamphlets, which have been recently published, recommending the formation of a canal from Suez to Tineh, as that line might be kept always open, from the elevation of the Red Sea above the Mediterranean.[1] The subject has been ably treated by the French engineers in the great work on Egypt, and Monsieur Linant has since examined the question; but the information we possess on the effect of the currents and winds at Tineh, is not sufficient to enable any engineer to decide on the works which would be necessary to enable ships to enter the canal in bad weather. It is clear that a bar would immediately be formed; and almost as certain that any break-water but a floating one would soon be joined to the continent by a neck of sand. If it be possible to form any part at this point on the Egyptian coast, it could only be done at an enormous cost; and our information is at present too imperfect to warrant our entering on the subject. The question requires a more profound scientific examination than it has yet undergone.

[1] Enquiry into the Means of Establishing a Ship Navigation between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, with a Map. By Captain Veitch, R.E., F.R.S. Communications with India, China, &c.; Observations on the Practicability and Utility of Opening a Communication between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean, by a Ship Canal through the Isthmus of Suez, with Two Maps. By Arthur Anderson.

One of the ablest scholars who has written on the subject of this canal, has advanced the opinion, that Nekos, the king of Egypt, who, Herodotus mentions, undertook the completion of this work, borrowed the idea of his project from the Greeks. Monsieur Letronne conjectures that he only imitated the plan, which is attributed to Periander, of having designed to cut through the isthmus of Corinth. Willing as we are to concede a great deal to Grecian genius, we are compelled to protest against the probability of the Egyptians having borrowed any project of _canalization_ from the Greeks. We own we should entertain very great doubts whether Periander had ever uttered so much as a random phrase about cutting through the isthmus of Corinth, were it not that there are some historical grounds for believing that he was a professed imitator of Egypt. He had a nephew named Psammetichus, who must have been so called after the father of Nekos.[1] All projects for making canals in Greece had a foreign origin, from the time Periander imitated Egyptian fashions, down to the days of the Bavarian regency, which talked about making a ship canal from the Piraeus to Athens, and instructed a commission to draw up a plan of canalization for the Hellenic kingdom, where every thing necessary is wanting--even to the water. The earlier projectors who proposed to cut through the isthmus of Corinth, after Periander, were the Macedonian adventurer Demetrius Poliorcetes, and the Romans, Julius Caesar, Caligula, Nero, and Herodes Atticas.[2] We should not be surprised to see this notable project revived, or to hear that the Greeks were on the point of sinking new shafts at the silver mines of Laurium. A joint-stock company, either for the one or the other, would be quite as profitable to the capitalists engaged as the scheme of making sugar from beet-root at Thermopylae, which has found some unfortunate shareholders, both at Athens and Paris. Travellers, scholars, and antiquaries, would undoubtedly take more interest in the progress of the canal, and of the silver mine, than in the confection of the sugar.

[1] Aristotolis Politic, lib. v. cap. 10, § 22, p. 193.--Ed. Tauch.

[2] A collection of the classic authorities for the different attempts at cutting the canal through the isthmus of Corinth, may be interesting to some of our readers. PERIANDER'S Diogenes Laertius, i. 99--DEMETRIUS POLIORCETES, Strabo, vol. i. p. 86, ed. Tauch.--JULIUS CAESAR, Dion Cassius, xliv. 5. Plutarch in Caesar, lviii. Suetonius in Caesar. xliv.--CALIGULA, Suetonius in Calig. xxi.--NERO, Plinii, N.H. iv. 4. Lucian, Nero. Philostratus in vit. Apollon. Tyan. iv. 24. Zonaras, i. 570, ed. Paris.--HERODES ATTICUS, Philostratus in vit. Sophist. ii. 26.

There was another canal in Greece which proved a sad stumbling-block to the Roman satirist Juvenal, whose unlucky accusation of "lying Greece," is founded on his own ignorance of a fact recorded by Herodotus and Thucydides.

--"Creditur olim
Velificatus Athos, et quicquid Graecia mendax
Audet in historia."

The words of Herodotus and Thucydides, would leave no doubt of Xerxes having made a canal through the isthmus to the north of Mount Athos, in the mind of any but a Roman.[1] But since there are modern travellers as ready to distrust the ancients, as a gentleman we once encountered at Athens was to doubt the moderns, we shall quote better evidence than any Greek. Our acquaintance of the Athenian inn, who had a very elegant appearance, appealed to us to confirm the _Graecia mendax_, saying, he had just returned from Marathon, and his guide had been telling him far greater lies than he ever heard from an Italian cicerone. "The fellow had the impudence to say, that his countrymen had defeated 500,000 Persians in the plain he showed me," said the gentleman in green. "Let alone the number--that fable might be pardoned--but he thought me such an egregious ass as not to know that the war was with the Turks, and not with the Persians at all." We bowed in amazement to find our English friend more ignorant than Juvenal. We shall now transcribe the observations of Colonel Leake, the most sharp-sighted and learned of the modern travellers who have visited the isthmus of Mount Athos:--"The modern name of this neck of land is _próvlaka_, evidently the Romanic form of the word [Greek: proaulax], having reference to the canal _in front_ of the peninsula of Athos, which crossed the isthmus, and was excavated by Xerxes. It is a hollow between natural banks, which are well described by Herodotus as [Greek: kolônoi ou megaloi], the highest points of them being scarcely 100 feet above the sea. The lowest part of the hollow is only a few feet higher than that level. About the middle of the isthmus, where the bottom is highest, are some traces of the ancient canal; where the ground is lower, it is indicated only by hollows, now filled with water in consequence of the late rains. The canal seems to have been not more than sixty feet wide. As history does not mention that it was ever kept in repair after the time of Xerxes, the waters from the heights around have naturally filled it in part with soil in the course of ages. It might, however, without much labour, be renewed; and there can be no doubt that it would be useful to the navigation of the Egean, such is the fear entertained by the Greek boatmen of the strength and uncertain direction of the currents around Mount Athos."[2]

[1] Herodotus, vii. 21. Thucydides, iv. 109

[2] Leake's Travels in Northern Greece. Vol. iii. p. 143.

THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER.

I.

I'll sing you a new song, that should make your heart beat high,
Bring crimson to your forehead, and the lustre to your eye;--
It is a song of olden time, of days long since gone by,
And of a Baron stout and bold, as e'er wore sword on thigh!
Like a brave old Scottish cavalier, all of the olden time!

II.

He kept his castle in the north, hard by the thundering Spey;
And a thousand vassals dwelt around, all of his kindred they.
And not a man of all that clan had ever ceased to pray
For the Royal race they loved so well, though exiled far away
From the steadfast Scottish cavaliers, all of the olden time.

III.

His father drew the righteous sword for Scotland and her claims,
Among the loyal gentlemen and chiefs of ancient names,
Who swore to fight or fall beneath the standard of King James,
And died at Killiecrankie pass, with the glory of the Graemes,
Like a true old Scottish cavalier, all of the olden time!

IV.

He never own'd the foreign rule, no master he obey'd,
But kept his clan in peace at home, from foray and from raid;
And when they ask'd him for his oath, he touch'd his glittering
blade,
And pointed to his bonnet blue that bore the white cockade,
Like a leal old Scottish cavalier, all of the olden time!

V.

At length the news ran through the land--THE PRINCE had come again!
That night the fiery cross was sped o'er mountain and through glen;
And our old Baron rose in might, like a lion from his den,
And rode away across the hills to Charlie and his men,
With the valiant Scottish cavaliers, all of the olden time!

VI.

He was the first that bent the knee when THE STANDARD waved abroad,
He was the first that charged the foe on Preston's bloody sod;
And ever, in the van of fight, the foremost still he trod,
Until, on bleak Culloden's heath, he gave his soul to God,
Like a good old Scottish cavalier, all of the olden time!

VII.

Oh! never shall we know again a heart so stout and true--
The olden times have pass'd away, and weary are the new:
The fair White Rose has faded from the garden where it grew,
And no fond tears but those of heaven the glorious bed bedew
Of the last old Scottish cavalier, all of the olden time!

W.E.A.

TRADITIONS AND TALES OF UPPER LUSATIA.

No. III.

THE DWARF'S WELL.

We have been shown, in our two preceding pieces from Ernst Willkomm, Pathetic Fairies, and Fairies merry to rioting. Here we have, not without merriment either, Working Fairies. In the mines of the Upper Lusatian Belief, the tale of THE DWARF'S WELL strikes into a vein which our author has promised us, but of which we have not heretofore handled the ore. Here we shall see the imagination touching in some deeper sterner colours to the sketches flung forth by the fancy; and in the spirit of unreal creation, a wild self-will which rejoices to waft into the presence of the beautiful, and of unbridled laughter, cold blasts from the region of pure affright. There is in this, however, no prostration of strength--quite the reverse! Not a nervous and enfeebled sensibility, yielding itself up to a diseased taste for pain.--No child fascinated with fear, and straining its eyes to take in more horror. But here the unconquerable consciousness of strong life throws itself with an unmastered glee of battle, right into the thick of its mortal adversaries, to slay, and strip, and bind to its own triumphant chariot-wheels.

The Upper Lusatian Highlander, turned poet, dreaming at his discretion, amuses himself with converting terror and madness into merriment, and reconciles conflicting elements of invention--with an overpowering harmony?--No. But, by subjugating them all alike to one imperious lord, viz. to himself;--to his own pleasure. Hence, in the Traditions and Tales, in which he embodies his illusory creed of the Invisible, there is engendered an esthetical species, which waits, perhaps, for a name with us, and might accept that of the _Ghastly_, or at least, of the _Ghostly-Humorous_, the _Gay-Horrible_. The story of the PRIEST'S WELL soars boldly upon this pinion; that of the WILL-O'-THE-WISP HUSSAR has gone stark-raving in the same grimly-mirthful temper. The mind in which Burns imagined and chaunted his TAM-O'-SHANTER, is right down Upper Lusatian, in this key. Our Elves, however, are not yet witches.

The kinds of the spirits confine, upon every side, with one another, and the boundary lines vanish. Within the circumscription of the Fairy domain, an indeterminable difference appears betwixt the truest Fairies and the Dwarfs. The two sorts, or the two names, are sometimes brought into glaring opposition. Again, like factions made friends, they blend for a time indistinguishably. So, in the Persian belief, the ugly _Dios_, who may represent the Dwarfs of our west, are--under one aspect of the Fable--the implacable _cannibal_ foes--under another,--the loving spouses of the beautiful Peris. Comparing the Fairies of our two former tales, and the Dwarfs of this, the reader will probably see in THOSE, the daintier, the more delicate: in THESE, a little more hardness of nature.

The great length of the story precludes all thoughts (be the opportunities what they may, and these are not deficient) of bringing its illustration from other expositors--Teutonic or otherwise-of the Fairy Lore.

THE DWARF'S WELL.

"Nicholas Stringstriker was the most popular ale-house fiddler for a good twenty miles round, and consequently quite indispensable at all christenings, marriages, and wakes. Klaus knew this as well as every body else, and, like a wise man, did the best he could to turn his popularity to account--the more so, poor fellow! because he was obliged to put up with all kinds of ridicule and teasing. Stringstriker, you must know, was a most comical little fellow, with very small thin bandy legs, that had to bear the burden of a huge square trunk, which, in its turn, supported a big head that was for ever waggling to and fro, without affording the slightest indication of a neck. The entire little man measured exactly three feet five inches and an eighth, and he was best known to his acquaintance by the name of _Dwarf-fiddler_ or _Dwarf-piper_; for the little gentleman smoked away for his life, and liked nothing better.

"So misshapen a figure, it may readily be supposed, made a very good target for the shafts of mockery. Nicholas, however, troubled himself but little about them; and it was small complaint you heard from him so long as he was well paid, got his savoury morsel, and, above all, a liberal supply of his choice favourite--_Tobacco_. True, folks might now and then, as the saying is, _draw the cord too tight_ and be too hard upon the scraper; and then Klaus, like most deformed creatures, had wit and venom enough at his command, and could rid himself right easily of his tormentors.

"The Dwarf--it might be to render himself thoroughly independent, or, more likely still, to surround his diminutive individuality with an air of mystery--had abandoned his birth-place, and established himself about two miles away from it, near a singularly-formed sandstone rock, situated in a small but exceedingly pretty fir-wood, and commonly known by the name of the Bear's church. Here he spent his quiet life, wholly engaged in the practice of his art. Travellers taking their road by night, and in calm weather, from _Bertsdorf_ to _Hörnitz_ or over the Breitenberg to _Gross-schönau_ were arrested by the exquisite strains, now touchingly plaintive, now joyously merry, that poured from Klaus's magical instrument; and many a happy soul, allured by the enchanting melody, lingered within sound of it, until wholly subdued and rendered powerless by awe and superstitious fear. Although by day the fiddler was visible to none, yet by night he was often seen waddling out of the wood and over the fields, on his way to a clear spring, whence he drew water for his housekeeping, which--to add to the mystery that he delighted to create--he doggedly looked after himself. This spring belonged to a substantial farmer in Bertsdorf, named _Michael Simon_, though called by the people _Twirling-stick Mike_, in commemoration of his cutting down yearly in his wood a handsome quantity of young trees, which he afterwards manufactured into twirling-sticks. Simon not only was master of a good farm, but proprietor likewise of the village tavern, in which he gave a dance every Sunday, taking care to secure for the festivity the services of Stringstriker, to whose fiddle, it was well known, the lads and lasses invariably danced an hour longer than to that of any other scraper in the country.

"The visits of Stringstriker to the well were a continual vexation to the farmer. The Dwarf asked no man's permission to draw his water, but helped himself as often and as liberally as he thought proper, without the slightest regard to the wants of other people, which were often left unsatisfied by his wantonness and extravagance. It was in consequence of this audacious appropriation, that the spring by degrees acquired the name of THE DWARF'S WELL. Countless were the complaints and menaces of Mike--numberless the promised threshings, if he did not give up his thieving; but the effect of them all upon Klaus was to make him laugh outright, fill his pipe, and strike up a jolly tune upon his fiddle.

"Now it happened that Twirling-stick Mike held a christening, and he not only asked the Dwarf as a guest to the feast, but actually went so far as to invite the creature to stand godfather to his child. Klaus was mightily pleased with the honour, and behaved like a gentleman on the occasion. He made his godson a handsome present, and promised to do a good deal more for him, stipulating only that the child, being a boy, should be named Nicholas after himself.

"There was a merry party at the christening, and at first matters went on smoothly and comfortably enough; but as the eating, and drinking, and dancing advanced, quips and cranks became very plentiful, and the greater number, as might be expected, were flung, and not very lightly, at the head of poor Stringstriker. The fiddler for a time received his cuffs very manfully--but they grew intolerable at last. First, his legs were criticised--then his lank withered arms; even his fiddling was disparaged, and he himself pronounced highly indecorous, because he persisted in smoking his pipe all the while he scraped.

"'Klaus, Klaus!' said the master of the house, his sides shaking with laughter, 'if you don't forswear smoking this very instant, your sponsorship sha'n't stand. As sure as my name is Twirling-stick Mike, I won't allow it; and the boy shall be called Michael after his father.'

"Klaus laughed too, went on smoking, and tuned his fiddle.

"'Did you hear what I said, you bandy-legged Dwarf-piper?' bawled Simon, in continuation.

"Klaus laid his fiddle aside.

"'Gossip!' said he, in a tone of meaning, 'keep within bounds--within bounds, I say--and don't force me for once to fiddle to an ugly tune. I am your boy's godfather; his name is Klaus, and Klaus he shall be called amongst my children!'

"The whole company simultaneously broke out into loud laughter, and exclaimed with one voice--

"'Amongst his children!'

"'Why, where have you left your respectable better-half, then?' asked Simon, 'and what wench ever gave herself up to two such noble shanks? Where, in Heaven's name, Klaus, was the parson ordained that trusted a poor woman to you for better or worse?'

"The Dwarf smoked away, and could hardly be seen through the cloud that enveloped him.

"'Idiots!' he murmured to himself, 'as if we lived like mere human Creatures'--

"'What's that you say?' asked Simon, interrupting him. 'Don't talk blasphemy, you heathenish imp, or'--

"'Be quiet, gossip!' returned the Dwarf, with a savage frown. 'Don't put me up, or I and my children may be troublesome to you and yours yet. You had better give me some more tobacco, for I love smoking, and so do my people!'

"'If he isn't cracked, I am a Turk!' exclaimed Simon. 'Pride has turned that added head of his quite round. Well, Heaven preserve me from a cracked godfather, any how!'

"'Body of me!' interposed an old boor, one of the party, 'what the crab says is true.'

"'True!' said Simon.

"'Yes! What, have you never heard of the Spirits and Dwarfs who, for thousands of years, have carried on their precious games in all kinds of underground pits and holes? Now, take my word for it, he has something to do with them. Klaus is just the fellow for the rogues. They make choice of a king once every fifty years--one of flesh and blood, like ourselves. His majesty must be shaped like a dwarf--that's quite necessary; but when he is lifted to the throne, the creatures heap upon him all sorts of wondrous gifts. They teach him to play the fiddle, flute, and clarinet like an angel. They put him up to the art of manufacturing wonderful clocks--of eclipsing the sun and moon, and all that kind of thing. They once had a dwarf king, a shoemaker, and that fellow never had his equal. Whenever he took it into his head, he would sit down, call for seventy thousand skins, and then set to work. How long do you suppose he was getting them out of hand? Why, in just one hour and a half the whole stock was manufactured. Shoes, gaiters, spatterdashes, jack-boots and bluchers for five hundred thousand men, and all their wives and children. You may believe it. There never was a chap that flung the things about as he did. And you may take my word for it, Klaus Stringstriker could do something too, if he chose. Why do you think he is so insolent and conceited, and presumes so much upon his playing and smoking? Why--just because these little earthmen are his familiars, and back him up in every thing!'

"'Oh, that's it--is it?' said Simon dryly. 'Klaus is King of the Dwarfs, is he? Then if that's the case, he shall perform a trick for us directly. Now I give you all warning, young and old, not to stop his pipe, or fill his glass again, till he fiddles himself into a fit, and glass and pipe replenish themselves!'

"Klaus remonstrated against the proceeding--but the guests were brimful of fun and mischief, and wouldn't listen to him. It was evident that nothing would satisfy the company but the exhibition of the misery to which they resolved to subject the unhappy knave forthwith. The Dwarf implored, threatened, cursed; he struck about him like a madman, screamed, roared, and struggled to escape; all in vain. The untractable little fellow was held fast, and then, amidst the jokes and gibes of the assembly, securely tied, with his fiddle in his hand, against the roof-tree of the room. Once pinned, there was no use in further resistance. The poor deformed creature had nothing better to do than to play, as commanded.

"And he did play, so touchingly and heartbreakingly, that the listeners were very soon in agonies before him. The eyes of the Dwarf rolled like little fire-balls in their cells--his cheeks grew paler and paler, and cold sweat poured down in a stream from his forehead. Nevertheless, he fiddled away incessantly--now merrily, now mournfully, now slowly, now quicker than ever. Every dancer had reason that night to thank his stars, if he left off without having thrown himself into a phthisic; for, when he once began, it was as easy for him to fly into the air as to come to a stand-still, until it pleased Klaus Stringstriker to make a pause with his fiddle.

"The horrible jest lasted till towards midnight, and then the tormentors were willing to grant their victim some indulgence. The fiddler was unbound, and he would have had to eat and drink, and his own dear pipe of tobacco would have been restored to him, had not the company immediately perceived to their astonishment that both his pipe and glass stood already filled before him, although not a single soul amongst them had lifted or touched either one or the other. If the guests had been riotous before, they were hushed and quiet enough now. And Klaus, too, struck up another tune _instanter_. He bowed ironically to the assembly, emptied his glass, lit his pipe, and tucked his fiddle under his arm.

"'Thank you, gossip!' said he, 'thank you kindly for your christening. I have enjoyed every thing--thoroughly; your compliments, your beer, your tobacco, and your sport! Rest assured, Mike, I shall quit scores with you, in good time, for all. As to my little godchild, you'll be pleased to call the boy Nicholas, that is to say, if you are not tired of your life. For yourself, Twirling-stick Mike,' he continued with a frown, 'depend upon it, you shall be settled, all in good time, very comfortably amongst my children. Meanwhile, Fare-you-well!'

"And with these words, the little fellow, repeating his scornful obeisance, hobbled away. He was heard to strike up a lively air, and some of the guests, whose curiosity took them out of doors, averred that he cut across the fields with supernatural swiftness, whilst there glittered around him a bright tremulous light, in which at times the tiniest phantoms were distinguishable.

"Whether this statement were really true, or whether a mere imagination, came never to be rightly known; and it is most likely that nothing more would have been said about it, if, on the following morning, the report had not run like a fire through the village, that the Dwarf-piper, in the night, had come to an untimely end, and was then lying as dead as mutton on Twirling-stick Mike's farm and field, with his fiddle jammed under his broad chin, and the bow still resting on the strings. Half the village, headed by the authorities, sallied forth upon the intelligence. Simon, you may be certain, was not long in following--and sure enough, there lay the poor Dwarf, dead upon the ground. His head was half immersed in the Dwarf's Well, which, in the dark, he had probably not observed. But whether or not, Klaus Stringstriker had been upset, and had stumbled, poor wretch, upon his death!

"It was very natural for Twirling-stick Mike to repent him suddenly of his wanton cruelty. The scoffing words of the dwarf rang in his ears, and he felt by no means easy. To make what amends he might to the deceased, he had him sumptuously buried at his own expense, with funeral oration, psalms, prayer, and benediction; and what is more, put up a very pretty monument to his memory, which, in very legible characters, made known the talents and virtues of the fiddler, and carried them down to remote posterity. The Dwarf, however, was scarcely in his grave, before all manner of strange reports were whispered about in the neighbourhood. In the first place, Twirling-stick Mike's garden was said to be haunted o' nights. Noises were heard and lights seen on the path crossing his fields; and you had only to stray into the vicinity of the Dwarf's Well to be forsaken at once of seeing and hearing. If Simon enquired more particularly into these worrying rumours, every body professed to know nothing at all of the matter. One man referred him to his neighbour, and he to the next; who, in his turn, protested that the whole was a heap of lies; or said any thing that seemed most likely to appease the farmer's anxious state of mind. Simon, troubled as he was by the absurd babbling of the people, was nevertheless unable to suppress it, or prevent its growth. Indeed there was a small chance of its diminishing, when, in less than two months, there was not a soul in the neighbourhood who could not swear that he had been a witness to most unearthly doings. There was no need of further mystery, of doubtful head-shaking, and ominous whispers--every one had seen Klaus Stringstriker near Twirling-stick Mike's house, playing his fiddle in the clear light of the moon. It was true, none could aver that he had heard a single note; but it was impossible to mistake his figure, and that had been seen, time after time, gliding in from the adjoining field, making the tour of Simon's house, and exhibiting all the gesticulations of a violin-player. Many affirmed, too, that the fiddler was followed by a swarm of fluttering lights causing an odd noise, like nothing so much as the multitudinous clacking of little hammers. If the Dwarf and his luminous retinue encountered any one, he stood still until the latter had passed, and then quietly pursued his road. The more inquisitive who had ventured to steal after the apparition, swore deep and high that the Dwarf and his lights had gone hissing into the well that stood upon Twirling-stick Mike's land, and then the ghostly procession altogether ceased.

"Simon gave himself a deal of trouble to witness some of these remarkable things; but he met with nothing; and accordingly, seeing that the ghost of the dead sponsor in no way molested him, he permitted the people to chatter on as they would. His indifference, indeed, had nearly reduced all disagreeable rumours to silence, when another very sensible unpleasantness took rise under his own roof.

"Young Klaus could hardly run alone before he manifested a most undesirable faculty of seeing spirits. It grew with his years; and at last it came to pass that no day or night went by upon which he had not something very extraordinary to relate. The occurrences certainly were chiefly of that nature that it required a most resolute and unbounded-- an absolute Christianly-simple faith to believe them: and since the majority of Klaus's auditors were not excessively that way disposed, the accounts of the boy were held for so much downright swagger; and the poor ghost-seer acquired, to the no small vexation of his parent, the unenviable nickname of _Mike's Lying Klaus_. It was very singular, however, and could not fail to be remarked by every reflecting mind, that all the stories related by young Nicholas were in close connexion with the notorious well belonging to his father. There it was that he saw prodigious flames blazing forth, gold burning, and dances performed by the most grotesque and strangely-shaped little creatures. Passing this spot, earth, sand, glass, and even silver-pieces, would strike him on the head, without doing him the slightest injury. If he led his waggon by the spring, his good horses had to strain and torture themselves for a full quarter of an hour before they could draw the empty wain from the spot. The wheels seemed to have been locked and set fast, and yet the slightest hindrance could not be detected.

"Even to these incidents the ageing Simon had, by degrees, accustomed himself; but at length, and all on a sudden, it became his own frightful lot to perceive that his fine property was diminishing--yes, daily and hourly dropping and dropping away from him. He lived economically, as he had always done, even to parsimoniousness. The produce of his land, the income from his twirling-stick trade, were as satisfactory as could be-- both improving! How could it happen then? Simon made known his misery to his neighbours, craved counsel from his pastor. Each chucked in his farthing's worth of wisdom; but it availed him nothing. In the meanwhile, the strapping youth grew every day more and more a ghost-seer; and the Dwarf was said to beset the premises of the farmer nightly. Simon, at all events to show a reason in his complaints, building upon these facts, boldly cast upon his son the imputation of robbing him. Violent scenes ensued between the two--they quarrelled and wrangled from morning till night; and at length, upon Simon's refusing his assent to the marriage of his hulking boy with a very honest, but at the same time somewhat uncouth and very poor girl--went bodily to law.

"Whilst father and son were valiantly tugging against each other in court, the lawyers gleefully rubbing their hands over the case, and many a good joint flying into their larders from the stalls of Twirling-stick Mike, the substance of the honest farmer underwent rapid decay. His neighbours, soon aware that Simon had falsely taxed his son, cleared up the question, as folks in such cases are fain to do, with suppositions and surmises. They gave out that the Dwarfs were gnawing away his fortune; every body believed it, and from that moment forward, he was a marked and doomed man.

"As the belief became general, Simon grew irritable and wild. He cursed, and stormed, and raved, till his people trembled for their master's reason. Vexation ate his flesh away, and Avarice, which had gained entire possession of His soul, drove him restlessly about in the endeavour to save and to secure as much as still remained to him. At night, with his sullenly-burning lamp, he sped from room to room, bearing in his two quivering hands leathern purses of money; then shutting himself up in the most secret of his hiding-places, he counted his dollars again and again--and with such haste and fear, that the cold sweat dropped from him as he laboured. Horrible to relate, as often as he added the same sums together, so often he found the total less. Oh, it was like nothing else than the devil's own game; for the money, unperceived by mortal eye, melted in the pure air!

"Unfortunately for Simon, he was a man of violent passions, and on one occasion his fury betrayed him into blasphemous exclamations. Sadly beside himself, he swore, with a most fearful oath, that he was ready and willing to make over body and soul to the devil, or even to his old gossip the fiddler, provided either of them would undertake to restore to him the mass of wealth that had so unaccountably escaped from him.

"There is an old proverb that runs--_'Give the devil your little finger, and he will take your whole hand.'_ And the truth of this saying Simon was now about to experience; for he had scarcely brought his impious words to a close, before the fiddler popped into his presence, too willing to enter into any arrangement which the reckless farmer was silly enough to propose. 'Here I am, gossip!' said the cunning little rascal with well-assumed affability, 'and ready to do your will. Not that I shall ask your body and soul. I am not so greedy. Bequeath me your head at your death, you shall have all you ask, and I'll be satisfied.'

"'Go to the devil, you bandy-legged monster!' screamed Michael in his fury, poking his lamp at the same time under the Dwarf's beard, so that the vapoury phantom was nigh being in a blaze.

"'Don't put yourself out, Mike; don't put yourself out!' said Klaus patronizingly, seating himself upon a chest, and then tuning his fiddle. 'Getting into a passion won't bring the shiners back! What do you say, gossip, to a tune? Will you dance if I play? I have improved wonderfully, I can tell you, since I left this half-and-half sort of a world. Nobody dances now to my touch who doesn't praise it to the skies. You can't care much for dancing at your time of life, I know; and yet, if you could get a ducat for every step, and one or two for every hop, you would put your best foot forward, and try to do something any how-- wouldn't you?'

"'What, what, what? What's that you say?' cried Simon, squeezing his empty money-bags. 'A ducat for every step! two for a hop! _Kremnitz_ or _Dutch_, my dear old friend?'

"'_Kremnitz_, old gentleman, and full weight too!' replied the Dwarf. 'But,' added the little monster, 'about the head, Mike--what do you say, am I to get it?'"

Simon put his hand to his hair--involuntarily.

"'Oh! I am no Turk, gossip!' said the fiddler. 'I sha'n't scalp you. I'll gild every hair that you have on your crown; but your pate I must have, or else I can say nothing about the ducats.'

"'But what do you mean to do with it, dear ducat--dear Klaus, I mean?' asked the bewildered Mike.

"'That's my concern. I promise you not to hurt a hair; and your noddle shall be kept warm enough,' added the creature with a hideous chuckle. 'I engage myself to that, by all the Kremnitz ducats in the world!'

"Hesitation seldom prospers. It was fatal to poor Mike. He couldn't bring himself to answer. 'What,' he kept saying to himself--'what can I want with my head when I am dead? What matters who gets it?'

"'Have you settled?' enquired the Dwarf. 'Don't keep me, Mike; there are plenty of fellows who'll jump to get the ducats.'

"'Ducats! ducats!' continued Simon, still arguing with himself.--'What's a dead head in a scale with ducats? Nothing at all!--precious ducats! How many I have lost! one for a step, two for a hop. I had better close the bargain!'

"'You won't have them, then!' exclaimed the Dwarf. "'Yes! Done--agreed!' cried Simon eagerly. 'I'll consent, dear Klaus!' "'Very well!' replied the Dwarf. 'We'll to business, then!'

"'You recollect the terms, dear gossip! One for a step, two for a hop; and you are to have my head as soon as I die, and have no further use for it. Now, play a very slow waltz, there's a good Klaus--very slow, if you love me! Don't fiddle too long, and let the ducats come down prettily!'

"The Dwarf made no reply; but simply laughed like a growling bear. He cocked his fiddle under his chin, however, as quick as lightning; scraped a little by way of timing, and then broke out. Klaus Stringstriker had fiddled for a very few minutes before Simon was springing about, and cutting such capers as no professional performer had ever attempted, whilst the beams and rafters of the house quivered again. The impoverished farmer held in his hands about twenty large empty money-bags, which he grasped very tightly. It was quite wonderful to see how at every caper, at every kick of the foot, there fell at least two dozen real and true Kremnitz ducats, right down from his head straight into the pockets. Down they came faster and faster, so thick that before the dance was half over, the bags were all chokeful, and the dancer himself hardly able to bear the weight of all his treasure. But, mad with joy at the unexpected rushing back of all his wealth, he burst into the wildest laughter, flung himself about like a lunatic, and devoured with greedy gluttonous eyes the clinking, twinkling gold, that in starry showers discharged itself around him.

"At the end of a short quarter of an hour, the bags were bursting in Simon's hands. The Dwarf wriggled with delight, and played on--on--on; and the old farmer, intoxicated and insane, jumped till his hoary and fated skull struck against the ceiling. Now his joints cracked under the weight of gold that he bore; but he could not put it from him, for the bags stuck to his hands, as though they had grown to them. His strength decayed; his thoughts languished. He tried to speak; but he could not stammer out a word.

"'Gos-en-o, Kl-kl-oh-oh-oh'--

"The Dwarf kicked his feet with pleasure, and laughed again like a bear. He never played in right earnest until now. He scraped with all his might and main. Poor Twirling-stick Mike groaned, and his unhappy head dropped exhausted upon his breast. Miserable man, his last capers were cut! His dancing was no longer worth mentioning. He went up a little way, like a baby's shuttlecock, and came down again feebly and dull. The ducats poured out. The bags swelled; playing and dancing--dancing, such as it was--went forward, and one terrible hour passed away. At last the wrists of the farmer snapped asunder; his hands and the bags of gold fell to the ground together. The dancer gave one desperate and convulsive leap into the air. Klaus stopped his violin; and, in the next instant, Simon lay dead upon the floor. Will it be believed that the rascally Dwarf had fiddled every hair of the poor devil's head, and brought them all down to his feet in the shape of ducats! Simon's skull was as smooth and clean as if it had been shorn.

"The Dwarf put his fiddle up; quietly possessed himself of the money-bags, and then grinned at the corpse before him.

"'Well, you old fool!' said he. 'Have I shaved your ugly jobber-nowl clean enough? I don't want any of your tiresome barbers to do my work! Are we quits, gossip? Can we wipe off the old scores yet, friend Simon? No, no! We have something to do still! Let your boy look well to himself, and get reconciled to my people whilst there is yet time!'"

* * * * *

Early in the morning, Simon was found lying dead on the floor. The hairs of the unfortunate man, plucked out, and scattered over the boards, in part confirmed the vehement declaration of the servants; viz. that their master had wrestled with the devil, and had got the worst of the bout. Young Klaus, however, shaken as he was by the unexpected sight, at once guessed the true history. Returning home the night before, from a nocturnal visit to his sweetheart, he had passed his father's house, and here he had not only heard the playing of the fiddler, but, looking through a crevice of the garret-door, he had likewise discerned the very form of the Dwarf-spirit, and heard his laughter, as well as the noisy leaping of his unhappy parent. In his first grief at the frightful termination of his father's career, Klaus hurled the bitterest execrations at the head of the revengeful Stringstriker; cursed him over and over again, and himself no less, on account of his plaguing, ghost-seeing faculty. Raving over the handless body of Simon, he vowed at length, that if ever again the shadow of the fiend crossed his path, he would double him up in a sack, and hang him on the first tree that he came to.

This excited state of mind did not last very long with the volatile youth; for, truth to say, the sudden dereliction of mortality on the part of his quarrelsome old father, did not come altogether amiss to him. What hindered him now from wedding the girl of his heart, and leading as jolly a life as any? According to good old custom, he put on his dress and looks of mourning, donned his three-cornered hat, pulled it deep over his forehead, and walked decently and soberly up the church-path to the parson's house.

'Reverend sir!' said the precious youth to the minister, 'the Lord has been very gracious to my father, and this night he has taken him to himself. May the Lord comfort us! If you please, reverend sir, he shall be buried on Friday next; and I should like him to have a funeral oration and a parentation. He was a good man, sir, and I know I shall miss him at every turn and corner. But God's name be praised, sir, he always sends us what's best!' And so saying, Klaus wiped the tears on his eyes.

In due time old Simon was put under ground, and there was not a word to be said by his many followers against either the deceased father or the living son; for the latter gave a capital feast in honour of the occasion, which, setting aside two bloody heads, passed off in the most satisfactory manner. On the evening of the funeral, Klaus got very impatient to look over his lawful inheritance. Bethinking him of the avarice of his father, he had made up his mind to routing out no end of wealth; for as to the old man's continual complaints and grumblings, he had always looked upon them as so much flummery. To his great astonishment and dismay, however, he found every chest and coffer empty. Money-bags there were in plenty; but torn and moneyless, and the very little ready cash that remained in the house was by no means sufficient to satisfy the disappointed lawyers, whose bills, drawn out respectively to the loss which they had suffered through the sudden demise of Mike, were large enough, as you may believe.