Page:Legends of Rubezahl, and Other Tales (1845).djvu/127

 off the edge of his grief; nine hundred and ninety-nine years, however, elapsed ere the wound in his heart was completely healed. At length, one day, when Rubezahl felt peculiarly hippish, a certain frolicksome sprite, who filled the post of court-buffoon to his subterranean highness, suggested a trip to the Giant Mountains, and the suggestion was forthwith adopted. In less than one minute the immense journey was accomplished, and Rubezahl stood upon the great grass plot of his erewhile garden, the which, with its palace and appurtenances, by a single act of his will, he reintegrated in all its pristine beauty; yet nought was visible to mortal eyes, the travellers who passed over the mountains seeing only a dreary wilderness. This scene of his former love, so delightful to Rubezahl when graced by the presence of the lovely Emma, made a deep impression upon him: it seemed to him but as yesterday that his mistress had deceived him; her charms were as present to his imagination as when she then walked by his side. The memory of his wrongs, thus recalled to his feelings, revived in all its bitterness the hatred he had sworn against the whole human race. “Vile earth-worms!” cried he, as he looked around him, and saw from the mountain height the towers of churches and convents, and castles and cities; “you continue, then, to flourish down there in the valley. You’ve plagued me more than enough with your