and the big walnuts; and everybody got out of the way. And day and night Eoc's cry was, 'Save me from these big walnuts!'

He grew thin and pale and sad, and all the folk said Eoc would die: and they wondered whether the big walnuts would be quiet, when he did.

How many times Eoc wished that he had never seen them!

At last he thought within himself that he would go to the old woman to whom they belonged, and beg her to take them back. So he set out for her hut by the river side with the big walnuts jumping round him; and as he went along they jumped higher and higher in the air, and somehow his heart grew lighter.

But when he reached the spot where the hut had been, it was gone, and there was a big walnut in its place.

Eoc sat down on the bank and wept his only hope was gone.

'Oh!' he cried, 'will no one save me from these big walnuts!'

He had hardly spoken, when the walnut which stood in the place of the hut opened, and Eoc saw a little dinky woman sitting in it. She said to him-

'I will save you from these big walnuts.' 'Will you? oh, will you?' cried Eoc.

'On one condition,' she answered.

'Anything!' exclaimed Eoc.

'You must be shut up in a walnut yourself,' said

the little woman.

'Must I?' said Eoc. 'Is there no other way?' 'None,' she replied.

'O dear!' said Eoc, trembling. 'How can I? Will it hurt? Shall I jump too?'

'Ask no questions,' said the little woman.

no time to lose. Will you, or will you not?'

'I have

'I will!' cried Eoc. Only save me from these big walnuts!'

Then the little woman sprang out of the walnut, and grew suddenly bigger, and Eoc knew that she was the very same old woman whom he had seen sitting at the door of the hut. She seized Eoc, and doubling him up, squeezed him into the big walnut, and shut him in.

Then taking it in her hand, she whirled it thrice round, and threw it into the air; and it went up, up, up, and fell into the moon, where it jumped and hopped about, to the great astonishment of the little moon-men who dwell in the hill-sides there. How they laughed and shrieked, these little elves, as they came trooping by dozens out of their caves, to see the strange sight!

Eoc heard their cries, and wondered where he had

come.

'Aoh! Aoh!' they cried, 'let us catch it! Aoh!

Aoh!' The strange beast!' and they began to run after the big walnut, as it went jumping along. When it came to the ground, they shouted, 'Now!' and made a rush at it; but just as they reached it, with arms outstretched to seize it, up it popped again, and down they all went on their faces, shrieking 'Aoh! Aoh !'

This happened a great many times, and the little moon-men got very angry at being so baffled. At last, with a loud shout, they rushed at it and threw themselves upon it, scrambling over each other's heads to get to the top of it, and keep it down.

'We have it!--hurrah!' they cried. 'Aoh! Aoh! the wicked beast!'

But up it went again in the air, with the little moonmen on it, and they tumbled off head over heels in all directions, spluttering, and crying 'Aoh! Aoh!' more fiercely than ever.

In a great rage they got up again, and ran after the big walnut very fast indeed. They chased it all over the face of the moon, and at last caught it just as it came down on the slope of a hill, and overpowering it with their numbers they rolled it into a deep pit in the hill-side, which had been there ever since the moon had the small-pox.

Up to this part of Edmund's story there had been wonderful quiet; but when it came to the moon's