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But yet again he found himself snug in bed. Twenty times he tried,
and twenty times he failed; for in fact he was not awake, only
dreaming that he was. At length in an agony of despair, fancying
he heard the goblins all over the house, he gave a great cry. Then
there came, as he thought, a hand upon the lock of his door. It
opened, and, looking up, he saw a lady with white hair, carrying a
silver box in her hand, enter the room. She came to his bed, he
thought, stroked his head and face with cool, soft hands, took the
dressing from his leg, rubbed it with something that smelt like
roses, and then waved her hands over him three times. At the last
wave of her hands everything vanished, he felt himself sinking into
the profoundest slumber, and remembered nothing more until he awoke
in earnest.
The setting moon was throwing a feeble light through the casement,
and the house was full of uproar. There was soft heavy
multitudinous stamping, a clashing and clanging of weapons, the
voices of men and the cries of women, mixed with a hideous
bellowing, which sounded victorious. The cobs were in the house!
He sprang from his bed, hurried on some of his clothes, not
forgetting his shoes, which were armed with nails; then spying an
old hunting-knife, or short sword, hanging on the wall, he caught
it, and rushed down the stairs, guided by the sounds of strife,
which grew louder and louder.
When he reached the ground floor he found the whole place swarming.
All the goblins of the mountain seemed gathered there. He rushed
amongst them, shouting:
'One, two,
Hit and hew!
Three, four,
Blast and bore!'
and with every rhyme he came down a great stamp upon a foot,
cutting at the same time their faces - executing, indeed, a sword
dance of the wildest description. Away scattered the goblins in
every direction - into closets, up stairs, into chimneys, up on
rafters, and down to the cellars. Curdie went on stamping and
slashing and singing, but saw nothing of the people of the house
until he came to the great hall, in which, the moment he entered
it, arose a great goblin shout. The last of the men-at-arms, the
captain himself, was on the floor, buried beneath a wallowing crowd
of goblins. For, while each knight was busy defending himself as
well as he could, by stabs in the thick bodies of the goblins, for
he had soon found their heads all but invulnerable, the queen had
attacked his legs and feet with her horrible granite shoe, and he
was soon down; but the captain had got his back to the wall and
stood out longer. The goblins would have torn them all to pieces,
but the king had given orders to carry them away alive, and over
each of them, in twelve groups, was standing a knot of goblins,
while as many as could find room were sitting upon their prostrate
bodies.
Curdie burst in dancing and gyrating and stamping and singing like
a small incarnate whirlwind.
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