"Only look into it yourself," continued the other: "all sorts of stories about ghosts and spectres; clews for finding out the places over there in the high mountains, where one meets with gold and diamonds at the bottom of caves and sand pits in spots which mortal man has seldom set foot in. There are a number of marks, they say, which in ages of yore were carved on the hard rocks or written on the banks of the brooks: certain knowing Italians notcht and scored the places some two or three hundred years ago, and stuck in pieces of tin and pebbles which they laid after a fashion of their own: now however, the old man tells me, they are hard to find; for the mountain-spirits and goblins, who hate being disturbed, have shoved away many of the stones that might have served for signposts, and have utterly deranged their order." Edward laught as he turned over the leaves of the strange book. "None of your scoffing, young gentleman!" cried the old man: "so you too are one of their super-clever new-fangled wiseacres. But if you were once to see what I have seen, when all alone far down underground, cut off from the heavens and the whole world, with no light but my lamp, and no sound but my own hammer within hearing, and the terrible tall spirit of the mountain came to me; I'd wager you would twist your face into some other look, and would not laugh as you do here where the merry morning sun is shining on you. Everybody can grin; but seeing is the lot of few; and still fewer can behave like men, when their eyes are thrown open." "I will pay you for the book, my good old man," replied Edward kindly, "and keep it for our William till he comes back again." "Ha ha!" cried the miner, laughing heartily and putting up the money; "and read it too, and pore over it by yourself, and go on Sundays and holidays to look out for the marks and the secret passages. Only don't let them befool you, young man, or cajole, or frighten you; and when you have found anything, keep a fast hold. Look you, the lord of these hills, or the old man of the mountain, as many choose to call him, knows all about the matter: he has thrust his hands into the pockets of all the richest ghosts and elves and goblins; and they have been forced to empty them out for him." "Whom do you mean?" asked Edward a good deal surprised; and at the same time he wanted to give the besmeared book back again to the old man, saying with some irritation: "since you cannot trust me, or rather hold me to be such a fool, keep the treasure-casket yourself for our friend, and only give the master miner his money."