nts.
And at last he came to where, in a filthy hollow, cold and lightless,
and oozing with dark-glistening water-drops, his brothers Thimble and
Thumb were sleeping. They were tied hand and foot with Samarak to the
thick root of a B[=o][=o]bab-tree, even their eyes bound up with sticky
leaves. Nod hobbled over and knelt down beside Thumb, and put his mouth
close to his ear. "Thumb, Thumb," says he, "it is Nod! Wake,
Mulla-mulgar; it is Nod who calls!" And he shook him by the shoulder.
Thumb stirred in his sleep and opened his mouth, so that Nod could see
the hovering flame glistening on his teeth. "Oohmah, oohmah," he
grunted, "na nasmi mutta kara theartchen!" Which means in Mulgar-royal:
"Sorry, oh sorry, don't whip me, mother dear!" And Nod knew he was
dreaming of long ago.

He shook him again, and Thumb, with a kind of groan, rolled over,
trembling, and seemed to listen. "Thumb, Thumb," Nod cried, "it's only
me; it's only Nod with the Wonderstone!" And while Nod was stripping off
the leaves and bandages which covered Thumb's eyes he told him
everything. "And don't cry out, Thumb, if Tishnar's flame burns your
shins. They've tied your legs in knots so tight with this tough Samarak,
my fingers can't undo them." So Thumb stretched out his legs, and
clenched his hands, while the flame stooped and came down, and burned
through the Samarak. He rubbed his poor singed shins where the flame had
scorched them. But now he stood up. Soon his arms were unbound, and
Thimble, too, was roused and unloosed, and they were all three ready to
tread softly out.

"Lead on, my wondrous fruit of magic!" said Nod.

The light curtsied, as it were, in the air, and glided up through the
doorway; and the three Mulla-mulgars crept out after it, Thumb and
Thimble on their fours, being too stiff to walk upright.

"Hasten, hasten, Mulla-mulgars!" said Nod softly. "The full moon is
shining; night is come. The pot is ready for the feast."

So one by one, with Nod's clear flame for guide, they trod noiselessly
up the sandy earth-run. It led them without faltering past the huddled
sleepers again; past, too, where the she-Minimuls lay cuddling their
tiny ones, and up into the big empty kitchen. Under another arch they
crept after it, along another gallery of rough steps, hollowed out of
the sandy rock, beneath great tortuous roots, through such a maze as
would have baffled a weasel.

And suddenly Thumb stopped and snuffed and snuffed again. "Immam