And then she came to where another old woman sat on a rock, around which the milky waters were foaming, and mists and vapors rose above and behind her. To this old woman she also spoke, and asked her the same question which she had asked before,--where Aster was. And in reply she was told that still farther down the river, at the Cascade of Rocks, was where the Toad-Woman lived, and that perhaps she might tell Eva what it was that she wished to know. “But,” the Mist-Woman added, “my sister will not always answer those who speak to her, and I cannot tell you how to make her.” And, as she spoke, the vapors thickened and gathered around her for a moment, and then melted away, and the Mist-Woman had vanished with them, and nothing was left except the bare rock. The child began to think that the wonders of the river would never cease, and that her journey down it would be endless. Yet, tired as she was, she persevered, and went on until all the water was gone, and only stones and rocks lay in its former bed. But, strange to say, as Eva walked among the stones and rocks, she found they were only shadows. Then, all at once, a loud noise, as of falling stones, met her ear, and on coming to a sudden turn in the river, she saw that the noise was caused by what she at once knew was the Cascade of Rocks; for from a high precipice crossing the river’s bed fell an endless stream of huge stones, and seated in a sort of cavern, just behind the fall, there was a third old woman, with a head like that of a toad, fanning herself with a fan made of peacock’s feathers. Eva was at first afraid to go near the woman, lest the stones should fall and crush her. But at last she ventured to go near, and she saw that at her approach the stones parted, as though to make room for her; and summoning all her courage, she went close to the cascade, and finding that none of the stones touched her, but rather got out of her way, she walked into the grotto. The Toad-Woman stopped fanning and looked at her. Then she took a pair of spectacles out of her pocket and put them on, and Eva thought she looked funnier than ever. And then she asked: “What do you want?” And Eva answered, “I am looking for Aster.” “I’ve not got him,” the old woman said. “I know,” Eva replied; “but I was told that you might be able to tell me where he was.” “Hum!” the Toad-Woman said. “You have, then, come down the Enchanted River, and seen my sister, the Mist-Woman. But even that won’t help you, though she did let you pass her, and though the stones did not trouble you. I do know where Aster is, but I promised my cousin that I would only tell it to the person who would bring me back the two feathers that her servant the jackdaw stole out of my fan.”