e mechanically did the same,
but what was his surprise when he found his beard lengthened at least a
foot; on which he began to conclude that he and those around him were
all under the influence of magic or enchantment. Yet the mountain he had
descended was certainly the Kyffhaeusen--the cottages, too, with their
gardens and enclosures, were all quite familiar to him--and he heard
some boys reply to the passing questions of a traveller, that it was
Sittendorf.

His doubt and perplexity now increased every moment, and he quickened
his steps towards his own dwelling; he hardly knew it, it was so much
decayed; and before the door lay a strange goatherd's boy, with a dog
apparently at the last extreme of age, that snarled when he spoke to
him. He entered the house through an opening, which had formerly been
closed by a door. All was waste and void within; he staggered out as if
he had lost his senses, calling on his wife and children by their names;
but no one heard--none answered. Before long, a crowd of women and
children had collected around the strange old man, with the long hoary
beard, and all inquired what it was he was seeking after. This was
almost too much; to be thus questioned before his own door was more than
strange, and he felt ashamed to ask after his wife and children, or even
of himself; but to get rid of his querists he mentioned the first name
that occurred to him, "Kurt Steffen?" The people looked around in
silence, till at length an old woman said, "He has been in the
churchyard these twelve years past, and you'll not go thither to-day."--
"Velten Meier?"--"Heaven rest his soul!" replied an ancient dame,
leaning on a crutch. "Heaven rest his soul! he has lain in the house he
will never leave these fifteen years!"

The goatherd shuddered to recognise in the last speaker his next
neighbour, who seemed all at once to have grown old; but he had lost all
desire to inquire further. Suddenly a smart young woman pressed through
the surrounding gapers, with an infant in her arms, and leading a girl
about fourteen years old--all three the exact image of his wife. With
greater surprise than ever he inquired her name. "Maria!"--"And your
father's name?"--"Peter Klaus! Heaven rest his soul! It is now twenty
years since his goats returned without him, and we sought for him in
vain day and night in the Kyffhaeusen mountains--I was then hardly seven
years old."

Our goatherd could no longer contain himself. "I am P