m firm, and did all they could to disentangle his
beard from the line; but in vain, beard and line were in a hopeless
muddle. Nothing remained but to produce the scissors and cut the beard,
by which a small part of it was sacrificed.

When the dwarf perceived what they were about he yelled to them: "Do
you call that manners, you toad-stools! to disfigure a fellow's face? It
wasn't enough that you shortened my beard before, but you must now
needs cut off the best bit of it. I can't appear like this before my own
people. I wish you'd been in Jericho first." Then he fetched a sack of
pearls that lay among the rushes, and without saying another word he
dragged it away and disappeared behind a stone.

It happened that soon after this the mother sent the two girls to the
town to buy needles, thread, laces, and ribbons. Their road led over a
heath where huge boulders of rock lay scattered here and there. While
trudging along they saw a big bird hovering in the air, circling slowly
above them, but always descending lower, till at last it settled on
a rock not far from them. Immediately afterward they heard a sharp,
piercing cry. They ran forward, and saw with horror that the eagle had
pounced on their old friend the dwarf, and was about to carry him off.
The tender-hearted children seized hold of the little man, and struggled
so long with the bird that at last he let go his prey. When the dwarf
had recovered from the first shock he screamed in his screeching voice:
"Couldn't you have treated me more carefully? You have torn my thin
little coat all to shreds, useless, awkward hussies that you are!" Then
he took a bag of precious stones and vanished under the rocks into his
cave. The girls were accustomed to his ingratitude, and went on their
way and did their business in town. On their way home, as they were
again passing the heath, they surprised the dwarf pouring out his
precious stones on an open space, for he had thought no one would pass
by at so late an hour. The evening sun shone on the glittering stones,
and they glanced and gleamed so beautifully that the children stood
still and gazed on them. "What are you standing there gaping for?"
screamed the dwarf, and his ashen-gray face became scarlet with rage.
He was about to go off with these angry words when a sudden growl was
heard, and a black bear trotted out of the wood. The dwarf jumped up in
great fright, but he hadn't time to reach his place of retreat, for the
bear