Twilight Land by Howard Pyle

traveling that way but a rogue of a Fiddler, with his fiddle under his arm. The day was warm, and he was tired; so down he sat under the shade of the oak tree to rest his legs. By-and-by he heard a little shrill voice piping and crying, “Let me out! Let me out! Let me out!”
    The Fiddler looked up and down, but he could see nobody. “Who are you?” said he.
    “I am Ill-Luck! Let me out! Let me out!”
    “Let you out?” said the Fiddler. “Not I; if you are bottled up here it is the better for all of us;” and, so saying, he tucked his fiddle under his arm and off he marched.
    But before he had gone six steps he stopped. He was one of your peering, prying sort, and liked more than a little to know all that was to be known about this or that or the other thing that he chanced to see or hear. “I wonder where Ill-Luck can be, to be in such a tight place as he seems to be caught in,” said he to himself; and back he came again. “Where are you, Ill-Luck?” said he.
    “Here I am,” said Ill-Luck—“here in this hazelnut, under the roots of the oak tree.”
    Thereupon the Fiddler laid aside his fiddle and bow, and fell to poking and prying under the roots until he found the nut. Then he began twisting and turning it in his fingers, looking first on one side and then on the other, and all the while Ill-Luck kept crying, “Let me out! Let me out!”
    It was not long before the Fiddler found the little wooden plug, and then nothing would do but he must take a peep inside the nut to see if Ill-Luck was really there. So he picked and pulled at the wooden plug, until at last out it came; and—phst! Pop! Out came Ill-Luck along with it.
    Plague take the Fiddler! said I.
    “Listen,” said Ill-Luck. “It has been many a long day that I have been in that hazelnut, and you are the man that has let me out; for once in a way I will do a good turn to a poor human body.” Therewith, and without giving the Fiddler time to speak a word, Ill-Luck caught him up by the belt, and—whiz! Away he flew like a bullet, over hill and over valley, over moor and over mountain, so fast that not enough wind was left in the Fiddler’s stomach to say “Boo!”
    By-and-by he came to a garden, and there he let the Fiddler drop on the soft grass below. Then away he flew to attend to other matters of greater need.

    When the Fiddler had gathered his wits together, and himself to his feet, he saw that he lay in a beautiful garden of flowers and fruit trees and marble walks and what not, and that at the end of it stood a great, splendid house, all built of white marble, with a fountain in front, and peacocks strutting about on the lawn.
    Well, the Fiddler smoothed down his hair and brushed his clothes a bit, and off he went to see what was to be seen at the grand house at the end of the garden.
    He entered the door, and nobody said no to him. Then he passed through one room after another, and each was finer than the one he left behind. Many servants stood around; but they only bowed, and never asked whence he came.
    At last he came to a room where a little old man sat at a table. The table was spread with a feast that smelled so good that it brought tears to the Fiddler’s eyes and water to his mouth, and all the plates were of pure gold. The little old man sat alone, but another place was spread, as though he were expecting some one. As the Fiddler came in the little old man nodded and smiled. “Welcome!” he cried; “and have you come at last?”
    “Yes,” said the Fiddler, “I have. It was Ill-Luck that brought me.”
    “Nay,” said the little old man, “do not say that. Sit down tothe table and eat; and when I have told you all, you will say it was not Ill-Luck, but Good-Luck, that brought you.”
    The Fiddler had his own mind about that; but, all the same, down he sat at the table, and fell to with knife and fork at the good things, as though he had not had a bite to eat for a week of Sundays.
    “I am the richest man in the