Then Windekind sprang lightly into the boat, which did not rock under his weight, and kissed Johannes on the forehead. What a strange change then came over Johannes! Everything about him seemed different. He saw everything better and more clearly, as he fancied. He saw the moon look down with a kinder glance, and he saw that the water-lilies had faces, and gazed at him in pensive amazement. He now suddenly understood why the gnats danced so merrily up and down, and round and round each other, touching the water with the tips of their long legs. He had often wondered and thought about it, but now he understood it at once. He heard too what the reeds whispered to the trees on the bank, softly complaining that the sun had gone down. 'Oh! Windekind, thank you, this is glorious. Yes; we shall be very happy together!' 'Give me your hand,' said Windekind, spreading his many-coloured wings. Then he drew Johannes in the boat over the pool through the splashing leaves which glistened in the moonlight. Here and there a frog was sitting on a leaf; but he did not now leap into the water when Johannes came by. He only made a little bow and said, 'Quaak.' Johannes politely bowed in return; above all, he would not seem ill-bred. Then they came to the reeds; they grew so far out into the water that the whole boat was swallowed up in them without touching the shore. But Johannes held fast to his leader and they scrambled to land between the tall stems. It seemed to Johannes that he had grown quite small and light, but perhaps that was fancy. Still, he could not remember that he had ever before been able to climb up a sedge. 'Now, keep your eyes open,' said Windekind, 'and you shall see something pretty.' They walked on among the tall grass and under dark brushwood which here and there let through a bright narrow streak of moonlight. 'Did you ever hear the crickets of an evening out on the sand-hills, Johannes? It is as if they were giving a concert, isn't it? And you can never find out exactly where the sound comes from. Now they do not sing for pleasure: the voices come from the crickets' school, where hundreds of little crickets are learning their lessons. Be quite still, for we are near them now.' Shurr! Shurr! The bushes were thinner here, and when Windekind pushed the grass stems aside with his flower, Johannes saw a beautiful open glade where, among the fine spiky grass of the down, the crickets were busy reading their lessons. A great stout cricket was master and teacher. One after another the pupils skipped up to him with one leap forward and one leap back again. The cricket who missed his leap had to stand on a toadstool. 'Now listen, Johannes,' said Windekind; 'you too may perhaps learn something.'