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leathern glove set with pearls, which formed wonderful figures. He then subjoined this prophecy: "So long as these things remain unseparated in good preservation in your family, so long will your entire race flourish, and their good fortune continually increase; but if these presents are divided, lost, or wasted, your race will decrease and sink." And when he perceived that the master appeared to set no particular value on the present, he continued: "I fear that you do not much esteem these things, and will let them go out of your hands; I therefore counsel you to give them in charge to your sisters Anne and Catherine, who will take better care of them."

He accordingly gave the gifts to his sisters, who took them and kept them carefully, and never showed them to any but most particular friends. After their death they reverted to their brother, who took them to himself, and with him they remained so long as he lived. He showed them to the minister Feldmann, at his earnest request, during a confidential conversation. When he died, they came to his only daughter Adelaide, who was married to L. von H., along with the rest of the inheritance, and they remained for some time in her possession. The son of the minister Feldmann made several inquiries about what had afterwards become of the House-spirit's presents, and he learned that the straw-hat was given to the emperor Ferdinand II., who regarded it as something wonderful. The leathern glove was still in his time in the possession of a nobleman. It was short, and just exactly reached above the hand, and there was a snail worked with pearls on the part that came above the hand. What became of the little cross was never known.

The spirit departed of his own accord, after he had staid four years, from 1584 to 1588, at Hudemühlen. He said, before he went away, that he would return once more when the family would be declined, and that it would then flourish anew and increase in consequence.*

The feats of House-spirits, it is plain, may in general be ascribed to ventriloquism and to contrivances of servants and others.

Hödeken.

ANOTHER Kobold or House-spirit took up his abode in the palace of the bishop of Hildesheim. He was named Hödeken or Hütchen, that is Hatekin or Little Hat, from his always wearing a little felt hat very much down upon his face. He was of a kind and obliging disposition, often told the bishop and others of what was to happen, and he took good care that the watchmen should not go to sleep on their post. It was, however, dangerous to affront him. One of the scullions in the bishop's kitchen used to fling dirt on him and splash him with foul water. Hödeken complained to the head cook, who only laughed at him, and said, " Are you a spirit and afraid of a little boy?" "Since you won't punish the boy," replied Hödeken, "I will, in a few days, let you see how much afraid of him I am," and he went off in high dudgeon. But very soon after he got the boy asleep at the fire-side, and he strangled him, cut him up, and put him into the pot on the fire. When the cook abused him for what he had done, he squeezed toads all over the meat that was at the fire, and he soon after tumbled the cook from the bridge into the deep moat. At last people grew so much afraid of his setting fire to the town and palace, that the bishop had him exorcised and banished.

The following was one of Hödeken's principal exploits. There was a man in Hildesheim who had a light sort of wife, and one time when he was going on a journey he spoke to Hödeken and said, "My good fellow, just keep an eye on my wife while I am away, and see that all goes on right." Hödeken agreed to do so; and when the wife, after the departure of her husband, made her gallants come to her, and was going to make merry with them, Hödeken always threw himself in the middle and drove them away by assuming terrific forms; or, when any one had gone to bed, he invisibly flung him so roughly out on the floor as to crack his ribs. Thus they fared, one after another, as the light-o'-love dame

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introduced them into her chamber, so that no one ventured to come near her. At length, when the husband had returned home, the honest guardian of his honour presented himself before him full of joy, and said, "Your return is most grateful to me, that I may escape the trouble and disquiet that you had imposed upon me.' "Who are you, pray?" said the man. "I am Hödeken," replied he, "to whom, at your departure, you gave your wife in charge. To gratify you I have guarded her this time, and kept her from adultery, though with great and incessant toil. But I beg of you never more to commit her to my keeping; for I would sooner take charge of, and be accountable for, all the swine in Saxony than for one such woman, so many were the artifices and plots she devised to blink me."

King Goldemar.

ANOTHER celebrated House-spirit was King Goldemar, who lived in great intimacy with Neveling von Hardenberg, on the Hardenstein at the Ruhr, and often slept in the same bed with him. He played most beautifully on the harp, and he was in the habit of staking great sums of money at dice. He used to call Neveling brother-in-law, and often gave him warning of various things. He talked with all kinds of people, and used to make the clergy blush by discovering their secret transgressions. His hands were thin like those of a frog, cold and soft to the feel; he let himself be felt, but no one could see him. After remaining there for three years, he went away without offending any one. Some call him King Vollmar, and the chamber in which he lived is still said to be called Vollmar's Chamber. He insisted on having a place at the table for himself, and a stall in the stable for his horse; the food, the hay, and the oats were consumed, but of man or horse nothing more than the shadow ever was seen. When one time a curious person had strewed ashes and tares in his way to make him fall, that his foot-prints might be seen, he came behind him as he was lighting the

fire and hewed him to pieces, which he put on the spit and roasted, and he began to boil the head and legs. As soon as the meat was ready it was brought to Vollmar's chamber, and people heard great cries of joy as it was consumed. After this there was no trace of King Vollmar; but over the door of his chamber was found written, that in future the house would be as unfortunate as it had hitherto been fortunate; the scattered property would not be brought together again till the time when three Hardenbergs of Hardenstein should be living at the same time. The spit and the roast meat were preserved for a long time; but they disappeared in the Lorrain war in 1651. The pot still remains built into the wall of the kitchen.*

The Heinzelmanchen.

Ir is not over fifty years since the Heinzelmänchen, as they are called, used to live and perform their exploits in Cologne. They were little naked mannikins, who used to do all sorts of work; bake bread, wash, and such like house-work. So it is said, but no one ever saw them.

In the time that the Heinzelmänchen were still there, there was in Cologne many a baker, who kept no man, for the little people used always to make over-night, as much black and white bread as the baker wanted for his shop. In many houses they used to wash and do all their work for the maids.

Now, about this time, there was an expert tailor to whom they appeared to have taken a great fancy, for when he married he found in his house, on the wedding-day, the finest victuals and the most beautiful vessels and utensils, which the little folk had stolen elsewhere and brought to their favourite. When, with time, his family increased, the little ones used to give the tailor's wife considerable aid in her household affairs; they washed for her, and on holidays

* Von Steinen, Westfäl. Gesch. ap. Grimm, Deut. Mythol., p. 477

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and festival times they scoured the copper and tin, and the house from the garret to the cellar. If at any time the tailor had a press of work, he was sure to find it all ready done for him in the morning by the Heinzelmänchen. But curiosity began now to torment the tailor's wife, and she was dying to get one sight of the Heinzelmänchen, but do what she would she could never compass it. She one time strewed peas all down the stairs that they might fall and hurt themselves, and that so she might see them next morning. But this project missed, and since that time the Heinzelmänchen have totally disappeared, as has been everywhere the case, owing to the curiosity of people, which has at all times been the destruction of so much of what was beautiful in the world. The Heinzelmänchen, in consequence of this, went off all in a body out of the town with music playing, but people could only hear the music, for no one could see the mannikins themselves, who forthwith got into a boat and went away, whither no one knows. The good times, however, are said to have disappeared from Cologne along with the Heinzelmänchen.*

NIXES.

Kennt ihr der Nixen, munt're Schaar?
Von Auge schwarz und grün von Haar
Sie lauscht am Schilfgestade.

MATTHISSON.

Know you the Nixes, gay and fair?

Their eyes are black, and green their hair-
They lurk in sedgy shores.

THE Nixes, or Water-people, inhabit lakes and rivers. The man is like any other man, only he has green teeth. He also wears a green hat. The female Nixes appear like beautiful maidens. On fine sunny days they may be seen sitting on the banks, or on the branches of the trees, combing their

*Oral. Cölns Vorzeit. Cöln. 1826.

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