quick as a pulse-beat, the
third toe of the fourth water nymph, and immediately from a secret
cavity in the knob a curious little golden key was shot forth. This the
shepherd boy seized, flew down the steps, and scaled over the town wall.
He ran to the great well and stooped over the lid. He could hear the
Seven Sisters twisting and worming and striving beneath it, little cries
of pain breaking from them. Overhead the moon was shining down on the
well.

"O Seven Sisters," said the Shepherd boy, "I have come to give you to
your lover."

He could hear a great cry of joy down in the well. He put the key in the
lock, turned it, and immediately there was the gliding and slipping of
one steel bar after another into an oil bath. The great lid slowly
revolved, moving away from over the well. The Seven Sisters did the
rest. They sprang with a peal of the most delirious laughter--laughter
that was of the underground, the cavern, the deep secret places of the
earth, laughter of elfs and hidden rivers--to the light of the moon. The
shepherd boy could see seven distinct spiral issues of sparkling water
and they took the shape of nymphs, more exquisite than anything he had
ever seen even in his dreams. Something seemed to happen in the very
heavens above; the moon reached down from the sky, swiftly and tenderly,
and was so dazzling that the shepherd boy had to turn his face away. He
knew that in the blue spaces of the firmament overhead the moon was
embracing the Seven Sisters. Then he ran, ran like the wind, for already
the water was shrieking down the streets of the town. As he went he
could see lights begin to jump in dark windows and sleepy people in
their night attire coming to peer out into the strange radiance outside.

As he reached the drawbridge he saw that the men had already lowered it,
and there was a great rustling noise and squealing; and what he took to
be a drift of thick dust driven by the wind was gushing over it, making
from the town. A few more yards and he saw that it was not thick brown
dust, but great squads of rats flying the place. The trumpets were all
blowing loud blasts when he reached the mansion of the Keeper of the
Key, the guards with their spears pressing out under the arch of the
courtyard, and servants coming out the doors. The great oak door flew
open and he saw the Keeper of the Key, a candle in his quaking hand. A
great crying could now be heard coming up from the population of the
town. The