Page:The Children Who Followed the Piper.djvu/32

THE CHILDREN went, and they were so entranced with the Piper's playing that they did not know that they had left the light of the sun.

And by that time the Mayor and the Council knew that they had made a great mistake in treating the Pied Piper the way they had done. Perhaps if they had known who he was they would not have treated him in such a fashion. I do not know. They might not have believed him if he had told them.

For he was the one who, born at dawn, made himself a musical instrument at noon—the first earthly musical instrument that was ever made—and in the evening went out of his mother's house and stole Apollo's cattle. He was the one who was called the Bringer of Dreams, the Watcher by Night, the Thief at the Gate. He was the one who had once possessed the Shoes of Swiftness and the Winged Hat. He was Hermes, who was also called Mercury.

But the Mayor and the Town Council might not have believed him if he had told them this.