The moon had risen above the lake, and only the broken fragments of its orb were reflected in the water. Bee still slept. The dwarf who had examined her came back on his crow. This time he was followed by a troop of little men. They were very little men. They had white beards reaching down to their knees. They were the size of children, but they had old faces. The leather aprons and the hammers which they carried hanging at their belts made it evident they were metal-workers. They moved in a strange way by jumping to a great height and turning wonderful somersaults; this incredible nimbleness made them less like men than spirits. But in their wildest antics their faces remained unalterably grave, so that it was impossible to make out their real character.

They placed themselves in a circle round the sleeper.

"Well," said the smallest of the dwarfs from the height of his feathered mount; "well, I did not deceive you when I warned you that the prettiest of princesses was sleeping on the edge of the lake, and do you not thank me for having shown her to you?"

"We thank you, Bob," answered one of the dwarfs, who looked like an old poet; "truly, there is nothing in the world as pretty as this maiden. Her complexion is rosier than the dawn upon the mountains, and the gold of our smithies is not as bright as that of her tresses."

"It is true, Pic; Pic, nothing could be more true!" answered the dwarfs; "but what shall we do with this pretty maid?"

Pic, who resembled an old poet, did not answer this question of the dwarfs, because he did not know more than they did what to do with the pretty maid.

A dwarf, named Rug, said to them:

"Let us build a large cage and we will shut her in it."

Another dwarf, named Dig, opposed this suggestion of Rug. According to Dig, only wild beasts were put in cages, and as yet there was nothing to indicate that the pretty maiden was one of them.

But Rug was taken with his own idea, for want of another to put in its place. He ingeniously defended it:

"If this person," he said, "is not wild, she will doubtlessly become so by being shut in the cage, which will consequently become useful, and even indispensable."

This argument displeased the dwarfs, and one of them, named Tad, denounced it indignantly. He was a dwarf of utmost goodness. He proposed taking back the beautiful girl to her parents, whom he thought to be powerful lords.

This view of the good Tad was rejected as contrary to the custom of the dwarfs.

"Justice should prevail," Tad went on to say, "and not custom."