But, in the midst of all their gleeful folly, the ground they stood upon began to shake under them, and an enormous darkness grew between them and the sky. Then the dwarfs stopped their rejoicing as if a spell had fallen upon them, dropping their weapons, huddling close to one another, cowering, whispering. Giant Suttung, son of that Gilling whom they had just slain, was coming upon them in great fury to avenge his father's death. They were dreadfully frightened; Giant Gilling asleep had been easy to manage, but a giant awake, a giant angry--they were not the same dwarfs that they had seemed half an hour ago--and so it happened that they quite easily let Suttung carry them all off to a low rock in the sea which was dry just then, but would be washed over by the morning tide. "There you are," said Suttung as he threw them all down upon the rock, "and there you shall stay until the hungry grey wave comes." "But then we shall be drowned," they all screeched at once, and the seamews started from their nests ashore and swooped round the lonely rock, and screeched as well. Suttung strode back to the shore and sat on the high rocks over the seamews' nests, and poked his fingers into the nests and played with the grey-winged birds, and paddled his feet in the breakers, and laughed and echoed the dwarfs and the seamews. "Drowned, drowned, yes, then you will be drowned." Then the dwarfs whispered together and consulted, they all talked at once, and every one of them said a different thing, for they were in fact a little intoxicated still by the sips they had taken of Odhærir. At last Fialar and Galar said the same same thing over so often that the others began to listen to them. "The sky is getting quite grey," they said, "and the stars are going out, and Skinfaxi is coming, and the waves are gathering and gathering and gathering; hoarse are the voices of the Seaking's daughters; but why do we all sit chattering here instead of getting away as we might easily do if we did but bribe the giant Suttung with a gift." "Yes, yes, yes," shouted the silly little people, "shall we give him our cap jewels, or our swords, or our pick-axes, or our lanterns, or shall we promise to make him a necklace out of the fire of the sun and the flowers of the earth, or shall we build him a ship of ships?" [Illustration: GIANT SUTTUNG AND THE DWARFS.] "Nonsense," said Fialar and Galar; "How should a giant care for such things as these? Our swords could not help him; he does not want pick-axes nor lanterns who lives amongst the mountain snows, nor ships who can stride across the sea, nor necklaces--Bah! A giant loves life, he drinks blood, he is greedy besides and longs to taste the gold mead of the gods." Then all the dwarfs shouted together, "Let us give him our gold mead, our wondrous drink, Odhærir, our Kvasir's blood in the three stone jars."