was a strange sensation for Johannes. Everything about him was changed.
He saw everything now, he thought, much better and more exactly. The moon looked more friendly, too, and he saw that the water-lilies had faces, and were gazing at him pensively.
Suddenly he understood why the gnats were all the time dancing so merrily around one another, back and forth and up and down, till their long legs touched the water. Once he had thought a good deal about it, but now he understood perfectly.
He knew, also, what the reeds were whispering, and he heard the trees on the bank softly complaining because the sun had set.
"Oh, Windekind, I thank you! This is delightful. Yes, indeed, we will have nice times together!"
"Give me your hand," said Windekind, spreading his many-colored wings. Then he drew Johannes in the boat, over the water, through the lily leaves which were glistening in the moonlight.
Here and there, a frog was sitting on a leaf. But now he did not jump into the water when Johannes came. He only made a little bow, and said: "Quack." Johannes returned the bow politely. Above everything, he did not wish to appear conceited.
Then they came to the rushes. They were wide-spread, and the boat entirely disappeared in them without having touched the shore. But Johannes held fast to his guide, and they scrambled through the high stalks to land.
Johannes thought he had become smaller and lighter, but perhaps that was imagination. Still, he could not remember ever having been able to climb up a grass stalk.
"Now be ready," said Windekind, "you are going to see something funny."
They walked on through the high grass, beneath the dark undergrowth which here and there let through a small, shining moonbeam.
"Did you ever hear the crickets evenings in the dunes? It is just as if they were having a concert. Is it not? But you can never tell where the sound comes from. Now they never sing for the pleasure of it; but the sound comes from the cricket-school where hundreds of little crickets are learning their lessons by heart. Keep still, for we are close to them."
Chirp! Chirp!
The bushes became less dense, and when Windekind pushed apart the grass blades with his flower, Johannes saw a brightly lighted, open spot in the thin, spindling dune-grass, where the crickets were busily learning their lessons.
Chirp! Chirp!
A big fat cricket was teacher, and heard the lessons. One by one the pupils sprang up to him; always with one spring forward, and one spring back again, to their places. The one that made a bad spring was obliged to take his stand upon a toadstool.
"Pay good attention, Johannes. Perhaps you too can learn something," said Windekind.
Johannes understood very well what the little crickets answered. But it was not in the least like that which the teacher of his school taught. First came geography. They knew nothing of the parts of the world. They were only obliged to learn twenty-six dunes and two ponds. No one could know anything about what lay beyond, said the teacher, and whatever might be told about it was nothing but idle fancy.
Then botany had its turn. They were all very clever at that, and there were many prizes distributed: selected grass blades of various lengths—tender and juicy. But the zoology astonished Johannes the most. There were springing, flying, and creeping creatures. The crickets could spring and fly, and therefore stood at the head. Then followed the frogs. The birds were mentioned, with every token of aversion, as most harmful and dangerous. Finally, human beings were discussed. They were great, useless, dangerous creatures that stood very low, since they could neither fly nor spring; but luckily they were very scarce. A wee little cricket who had never yet seen a human being got three hits with a wisp because he numbered human beings, by mistake, among the harmless animals.
Johannes had never heard anything like this before.
Suddenly, the teacher called out: "Silence. The springing exercise!" Instantly all the little crickets stopped studying their lessons and began to play leap-frog. They played with skill and zeal, and the fat teacher took the lead.
It was such a merry sight that Johannes clapped his hands with joy.
At the sound, the entire school rushed off in a twinkling to the dunes; and the little grass plot was as still as death.
"See what you have done, Johannes!" cried Windekind. "You must not be so rude—one can very well see that you were born among human beings."
"I am sorry. I will try my best to behave. But it was so funny!"
"It is going to be funnier still," said Windekind. They cut across the grass plot and ascended the dunes on the other side.
Ah, me! It was hard work in the deep sand, but Johannes caught hold of Windekind's light blue garment, and then he sped quickly and lightly up the slope. Half-way to the top was a rabbit-hole.
The rabbit whose home it was lay with his head and forepaws out of the entrance. The sweet-briar was still in flower, and its faint, delicate fragrance mingled with that of the wild thyme which was growing near.
Johannes had often seen rabbits disappear into their holes. He wondered what it was like inside them, and about how many could sit together there, and if it would not be very stifling. So he was very glad when he heard his companion ask the rabbit if they might take a peep inside.
"Willingly, so far as I am concerned," said the rabbit, "but unfortunately, it just happens that I have resigned my dwelling this evening for the giving of a charity-festival. So, really, I am not master in my own house."
"Ah, indeed! Has there been an accident?"
"Alas, yes!" said the rabbit, sorrowfully. "A great calamity. We shall not recover from it in years. A thousand jumps from here a house for human beings has been built-a big, big house—and there those creatures with dogs have come to live. Fully seven members of my family have perished through their deeds, and three times as many more have been bereft of their homes. And matters are still worse with the Mouse and the Mole families. And the Toads have suffered heavily. So we have gotten up a festival for the benefit of the surviving relatives. Everybody does what he can. I gave my hole. One ought to have something to spare for his fellow-creatures."
The compassionate rabbit sighed and, pulling a long ear over his head with his right forepaw, wiped a tear out of his eye. His ear was his handkerchief.
Then something rustled in the grass, and a stout, clumsy figure came scrabbling up to the hole.
"Look!" said Windekind. "Here comes Father Toad—hopping along."
Then followed a pun at the toad's expense.
But the toad paid no attention to the jest. His name furnished occasion for frequent jokes. Composedly he laid down by the entrance a full ear of corn, neatly folded in a dry leaf, and then he climbed dexterously over the back of the rabbit into the hole.
"May we go in?" asked Johannes, who was full of curiosity. "I will give something, too!"
He remembered that he still had a biscuit in his pocket-a little round biscuit of Huntley and Palmer's. As he pulled it out he noticed for the first time how small he had become.
