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016 - Chapters 26-27 · Princess and the Goblin

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  Speaker 1: Section sixteen of The Princess and the Goblin. This is
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  Speaker 1: a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Lizzie Driver. The Princess and the Goblin by
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  Speaker 1: George mac donald, Chapter twenty six to twenty seven, Chapter
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  Speaker 1: twenty six The Goblin Miners. That same night, several of
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  Speaker 1: the servants were having a chat together before going to bed.
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  Speaker 1: What can that noise be, said one of the housemaids,
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  Speaker 1: who had been listening for a moment or two. I've
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  Speaker 1: heard it the last two nights, said the cook. If
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  Speaker 1: there were any about the place, I should have taken
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  Speaker 1: it for rats. But my Tom keeps them far enough.
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  Speaker 1: I've heard, though, said the scullery maid. The ratsmith about
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  Speaker 1: in great company. Sometimes there may be an army of
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  Speaker 1: them invading us. I've heard the noises yesterday day and
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  Speaker 1: to day too. It'll be grand fun then for my
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  Speaker 1: Tom and missus Housekeeper's Bob, said the cook. They'll be
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  Speaker 1: friends for once in their lives and fight on the
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  Speaker 1: same side. I'll engage Tom and Bob together will put
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  Speaker 1: to flight any number of rats. It seems to me,
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  Speaker 1: said the nurse, that the noises are much too loud
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  Speaker 1: for that. I've heard them all day, and my princess
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  Speaker 1: has asked me several times what they could be. Sometimes
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  Speaker 1: they sound like distant thunder, and sometimes like the noises
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  Speaker 1: you hear in the mountain from those horrid miners underneath.
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  Speaker 1: I shouldn't wonder, said the cook, if it were the miners,
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  Speaker 1: after all, they may have come on some hole in
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  Speaker 1: the mountain through which the noises reached to us. They
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  Speaker 1: are always boring and blasting and breaking, you know. As
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  Speaker 1: he spoke, there came a great rolling rumble beneath them,
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  Speaker 1: and the house quivered. They all started up in a fright,
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  Speaker 1: and rushing to the hall, found the gentlemen at arms
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  Speaker 1: in consternation. Or so they had sent to wake their captain,
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  Speaker 1: who said from their description that it must have been
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  Speaker 1: an earthquake, an occurrence which, although very rare in that country,
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  Speaker 1: had taken place almost within the century. And then went
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  Speaker 1: to bed again, strange to say, and fell fast asleep
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  Speaker 1: without once thinking of Curdie or associating the noises they
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  Speaker 1: had heard with what he had told them. He had
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  Speaker 1: not believed Curdie. If he had, he would at once
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  Speaker 1: have thought of what he had said, and would have
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  Speaker 1: taken precautions. As they heard nothing more, they concluded that
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  Speaker 1: Sir Walter was right, and that the danger was over
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  Speaker 1: for perhaps another hundred years. The fact, as discovered afterwards,
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  Speaker 1: was that the goblins had, in working up a second
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  Speaker 1: sloping face of stone, arrived at a huge block which
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  Speaker 1: lay under the cellars of the house, within the line
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  Speaker 1: of the foundations. It was so round that when they succeeded,
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  Speaker 1: after hard work, in dislodging it without blasting, it rolled
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  Speaker 1: thundering down the slope with a bounding, jarring roll which
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  Speaker 1: shook the foundations of the house. The goblins were themselves
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  Speaker 1: dismayed at the noise, for they knew, by careful spying
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  Speaker 1: and measuring, that they must be now very near, if
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  Speaker 1: not under, the King's house, and they feared giving an alarm.
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  Speaker 1: They therefore remained quiet for a while, and when they
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  Speaker 1: began to work again, they no doubt thought themselves very
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  Speaker 1: fortunate in coming upon a vein of sand which filled
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  Speaker 1: a winding fissure in the rock on which the house
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  Speaker 1: was built. By scooping this away, they came out in
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  Speaker 1: the King's wine cellar. No sooner did they find where
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  Speaker 1: they were than they scurried back again like rats into
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  Speaker 1: their holes, and running at full speed to the Goblin palace,
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  Speaker 1: announced their success. The King and Queen with shouts of triumph.
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  Speaker 1: In a moment, the Goblin royal family and the whole
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  Speaker 1: Goblin people were on their way in hot haste to
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  Speaker 1: the King's house, each eager to have a share in
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  Speaker 1: the glory of carrying off. The same night, the Princess
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  Speaker 1: Irene the Queen went stomping along in one shoe of
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  Speaker 1: stone and one of skin. This could not have been pleasant,
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  Speaker 1: and my readers may wonder that with such skillful workmen
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  Speaker 1: about her, she had not yet replaced the shoe carried
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  Speaker 1: off by Curdie. As the King, however, had more than
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  Speaker 1: one ground of objection to her stone shoes, he had
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  Speaker 1: no doubt, took advantage of the discovery of her toes
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  Speaker 1: and threatened to expose her deformity if she had another maid.
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  Speaker 1: I presume he insisted on her being content with skin shoes,
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  Speaker 1: and allowed her to wear the remaining granite one on
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  Speaker 1: the present occasion, only because she was going out to war.
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  Speaker 1: They soon arrived in the King's wine cellar, and regardless
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  Speaker 1: of its huge vessels, of which they did not know
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  Speaker 1: the use, proceeded at once, but as quietly as they could,
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  Speaker 1: to force the door that led upwards. Chapter twenty seven,
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  Speaker 1: The Goblins in the King's House. When Curdie fell asleep,
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  Speaker 1: he began at once to dream. He thought he was
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  Speaker 1: ascending the mountain side from the mouth of the mine,
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  Speaker 1: whistling and singing rod DoD bang, when he came upon
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  Speaker 1: a woman and child who had lost their way. And
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  Speaker 1: from that point he went on dreaming everything that had
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  Speaker 1: happened to him since he thus met the princess and Lootie,
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  Speaker 1: how he had watched the goblins, how he had been
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  Speaker 1: taken by them, how he had been rescued by the princess,
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  Speaker 1: everything indeed until he was wounded, captured and imprisoned by
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  Speaker 1: the men at arms. And now he thought he was
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  Speaker 1: lying wide awake where they had laid him, when suddenly
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  Speaker 1: he heard a great thundering sound. The goblins are coming,
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  Speaker 1: he said. They didn't believe a word I told them.
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  Speaker 1: The cobs will be carrying off the princess from under
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  Speaker 1: their stupid noses. But they shan't that they shan't. He
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  Speaker 1: jumped up, as he thought, began to dress, but to
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  Speaker 1: his dismay, found that he was still lying in bed. Now,
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  Speaker 1: then I will, he said, here goes. I am up now.
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  Speaker 1: But yet again he found himself snug in bed. Twenty
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  Speaker 1: times he tried, and twenty times he failed, for in
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  Speaker 1: fact he was not awake, only dreaming that he was
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  Speaker 1: at length in an agony of despair. Fancying he heard
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  Speaker 1: the goblins all over the house, he gave a great cry.
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  Speaker 1: Then there came, as he thought, a hand upon the
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  Speaker 1: lock of his door. It opened, and looking up he
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  Speaker 1: saw a lady with white hair, carrying a silver box
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  Speaker 1: in her hand, enter the room. She came to his
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  Speaker 1: betty thought, stroked his head and face with cool, soft hands,
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  Speaker 1: took the dressing from his leg, rubbed it with something
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  Speaker 1: that smelt like roses, and then waved her hands over
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  Speaker 1: him three times. At the last wave of her hands,
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  Speaker 1: everything vanished. He felt himself sinking into the profoundest slumber,
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  Speaker 1: and remembered nothing more until he awoke. In earnest. The
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  Speaker 1: setting moon was throwing a feeble light through the casement,
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  Speaker 1: and the house was full of uproar. There was soft, heavy,
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  Speaker 1: multitudinous stamping, a clashing and clanging of weapons, the voices
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  Speaker 1: of men and the cries of women mixed with the
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  Speaker 1: hideous bellowing which sounded victorious. The cobs were in the house.
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  Speaker 1: He sprang from his bed, hurried on some of his clothes,
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  Speaker 1: not forgetting a shit, shoes which were armed with nails.
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  Speaker 1: Then spying an old hunting knife or short sword hanging
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  Speaker 1: on the wall, he caught it and rushed down the stairs,
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  Speaker 1: guided by the sounds of strife, which grew louder and louder.
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  Speaker 1: When he reached the ground floor he found the whole
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  Speaker 1: place swarming. All the goblins of the mountain seemed gathered there.
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  Speaker 1: He rushed amongst them, shouting one, two, hit and hew, three, four,
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  Speaker 1: blast and bore, and with every rhyme. He came down
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  Speaker 1: a great stamp upon a foot, cutting at the same
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  Speaker 1: time their faces, executing, indeed a sword dance of the
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  Speaker 1: wildest description. Away scattered the goblins in every direction, into closets, upstairs,
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  Speaker 1: into chimneys, up on rafters, and down to the cellars.
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  Speaker 1: Curdie went on stamping and slashing and singing, but saw
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  Speaker 1: nothing of the people of the house, until he came
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  Speaker 1: to the great hall, in which the moment he entered
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  Speaker 1: it arose a great goblin shout. The last of the
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  Speaker 1: men at arms. The captain himself was on the floor,
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  Speaker 1: buried beneath a wallowing crowd of goblins. For while each
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  Speaker 1: night was busy defending himself as well as he could
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  Speaker 1: by stabs in the thick bodies of the goblins, for
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  Speaker 1: he had soon found their heads all but invulnerable. The
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  Speaker 1: queen had attacked his legs and feet with a horrible
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  Speaker 1: granite shoe, and he was soon down, But the captain
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  Speaker 1: had got his back to the wall and stood out longer.
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  Speaker 1: The goblins would have torn them all to pieces, but
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  Speaker 1: the king had given orders to carry them away alive
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  Speaker 1: and over each of them, in twelve groups, was standing
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  Speaker 1: a knot of goblins, while as many as could find
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  Speaker 1: room was sitting upon their prostrate bodies. Curdie burst in,
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  Speaker 1: dancing and gyrating and stamping and singing like a Sma
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  Speaker 1: incarnate whirlwind. Where tis all a hole, Sir? Never can
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  Speaker 1: be holes? Why should their shoes have soles, sir, when
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  Speaker 1: they've got no soles? But she upon her foot, Sir,
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  Speaker 1: has a granite shoe, the strongest leather boot. Sir Six
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  Speaker 1: would soon be through. The Queen gave a howl of
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  Speaker 1: rage and dismay, and before she recovered her presence of mind, Curdie,
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  Speaker 1: having begun with the group nearest him, had eleven of
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  Speaker 1: the knights on their legs again stamp on their feet.
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  Speaker 1: He cried as each man rose, and in a few
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  Speaker 1: minutes the hall was nearly empty, the goblins running from
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  Speaker 1: it as fast as they could, howling and shrieking and
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  Speaker 1: limping and cowering every now and then as they ran
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  Speaker 1: to cuddle their wounded feet in their hard hands, or
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  Speaker 1: to protect them from the frightful stamp stamp of the
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  Speaker 1: armed men. And now Curdie approached the group, which, intrusting
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  Speaker 1: in the Queen and her shoe, kept their guard over
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  Speaker 1: the prostrate captain. The king sat on the captain's head,
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  Speaker 1: but the Queen stood in front like an infuriated cat,
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  Speaker 1: with her perpendicular eyes gleaming green, and her hair standing
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  Speaker 1: half up from her horrid head. Her heart was quaking, however,
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  Speaker 1: and she kept moving about her skin shod foot with
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  Speaker 1: nervous apprehension. When Curdie was within a few paces she
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  Speaker 1: rushed at him, made one tremendous stamp at his supposing foot,
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  Speaker 1: which happily he withdrew in time, and caught him round
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  Speaker 1: the waist to dash him on the marble floor. But
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  Speaker 1: just as she caught him, he came down with all
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  Speaker 1: the weight of his iron shod shoe upon a skin
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  Speaker 1: shod foot, and with a hideous howl, she dropped him,
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  Speaker 1: squatted on the floor, and took her foot in both
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  Speaker 1: her hands. Meanwhile, the rest rushed on the king, and
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  Speaker 1: the bodyguard sent them flying, and lifted the prostrate captain,
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  Speaker 1: who was all but pressed to death. It was some
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  Speaker 1: moments before he recovered breath and consciousness. Where is the princess?
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  Speaker 1: Cried Curdie again and again no one knew, and off
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  Speaker 1: they all rushed in search of her. Through every room
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  Speaker 1: in the house they went, but nowhere was she to
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  Speaker 1: be found. Neither was one of the servants to be seen.
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  Speaker 1: But Curdie, who had kept to the lower part of
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  Speaker 1: the house, which was now quiet enough, began to hear
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  Speaker 1: a confused sound as a sort of distant hubbub, and
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  Speaker 1: set out to find where it came from. The noise
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  Speaker 1: grew as his sharp ears guided him to a stair,
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  Speaker 1: and so to the wine cellar. It was full of goblins,
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  Speaker 1: whom the butler was supplying with wine as fast as
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  Speaker 1: he could draw it. While the Queen and her party
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  Speaker 1: had encountered the men at arms, Harelip with another company,
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  Speaker 1: had gone off to search the house. They captured every
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  Speaker 1: one they met, and when they could find no more,
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  Speaker 1: they hurried away to carry them safe to the caverns below.
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  Speaker 1: But when the butler, who was amongst them, found that
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  Speaker 1: their path lay through the wine cellar, he bethought himself
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  Speaker 1: of persuading them to taste the wine, and as he
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  Speaker 1: had hoped, they no sooner tasted than they wanted more.
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  Speaker 1: The rooted goblins on their way below joined them, and
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  Speaker 1: when Curdie entered, they were all with outstretched hands, in
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  Speaker 1: which were vessels of every description, from saucepan to silver cup,
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  Speaker 1: pressing around the butler, who sat at the tap of
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  Speaker 1: a huge cask, filling and filling. Curdie cast one glance
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  Speaker 1: around the place before commencing his attack, and saw in
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  Speaker 1: the farthest corner a terrified group of the domestics, unwatched
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  Speaker 1: but cowering without courage to attempt their escape. Amongst them
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  Speaker 1: was the terror stricken face of Lutie, But nowhere could
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  Speaker 1: he see them. Princess seized with the horrible conviction that
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  Speaker 1: Harelip had already carried her off, he rushed amongst them,
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  Speaker 1: unable for wrath to sing any more, but stamping and
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  Speaker 1: cut him with greater fury than ever. Stamp on their feet.
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  Speaker 1: Stamp on their feet, he shouted, and in a moment
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  Speaker 1: the goblins were disappearing through the hole in the floor
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  Speaker 1: like rats and mice. They could not vanish so fast, however,
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  Speaker 1: but that many more goblin feet had to go limping
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  Speaker 1: back over the underground ways of the mountain. That morning. Presently, however,
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  Speaker 1: they were reinforced from above by the King and his party,
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  Speaker 1: with the redoubtable Queen at their head. Finding Curdie again
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  Speaker 1: busy amongst her unfortunate subjects, she rushed him once more
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  Speaker 1: with the rage of despair, and this time gave him
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  Speaker 1: a bad bruise on the foot. Then a regular stamping
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  Speaker 1: fight got up between them, Curdie with the point of
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  Speaker 1: his hunt knife keeping her from clasping her mighty arms
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  Speaker 1: about him, as he watched his opportunity of getting once
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  Speaker 1: more a good stamp at her skin shod foot, but
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  Speaker 1: the Queen was more wary as well as more agile
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  Speaker 1: than hitherto the rest. Meantime, finding their adversary thus matched
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  Speaker 1: for the moment, paused in their head along hurry and
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  Speaker 1: turned to the shivering group of women in the corner,
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  Speaker 1: as if determined to emulate his father and have a
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  Speaker 1: sun woman of some sort to share his future throne.
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  Speaker 1: Harelip rushed at them, caught up Lootie and sped with
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  Speaker 1: her to the hole. She gave a great shriek, and
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  Speaker 1: Curdie heard her and saw the plight she was in.
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  Speaker 1: Gathering all his strength, he gave the queen a sudden
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  Speaker 1: cut across the face with his weapon, came down as
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  Speaker 1: she started back with all his weight on the proper foot,
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  Speaker 1: and sprung to Lootie's rescue. The prince had two defenseless feet,
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  Speaker 1: and on both of them Curdie stamped. Just as he
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  Speaker 1: reached the hole, he dropped his burden and rolled, shrieking
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  Speaker 1: into the earth. Curdie made one stab at him as
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  Speaker 1: he disappeared, caught hold of the senseless Lootie, and having
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  Speaker 1: dragged her back to the corner, there, mounted guard over her,
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  Speaker 1: preparing once more to encounter the queen, her face streaming
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  Speaker 1: with blood and her eyes flashing green lightning through it.
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  Speaker 1: She came on with her mouth open and her teeth
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  Speaker 1: grilling like a tiger's, followed by the King and her
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  Speaker 1: bodyguard of the thickest goblins. But at the same moment
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  Speaker 1: in rushed the captain and his men and ran at them,
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  Speaker 1: stamping furiously. They dared not encounter such an onset away,
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  Speaker 1: they scurried the queen. Foremost, of course, the right thing
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  Speaker 1: would have been to take the King and queen prisoners
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  Speaker 1: and hold them hostages for the princess, but they were
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  Speaker 1: so anxious to find her that no one thought of
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  Speaker 1: detaining them until it was too late. Having thus rescued
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  Speaker 1: the servants, they set about searching the house once more.
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  Speaker 1: None of them could give the least information concerning the princess.
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  Speaker 1: Lootie was almost silly with terror, and, although scarcely able
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  Speaker 1: to walk, would not leave Curdie's side for a single
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  Speaker 1: moment again. He allowed the others to search the rest
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  Speaker 1: of the house, where except a dismayed goblin lurking here
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  Speaker 1: and there, they found no one. While he requested Lootie
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  Speaker 1: to take him to the princess's room. She was as
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  Speaker 1: submissive and obedient as if he had been the king.
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  Speaker 1: He found the bedclothes tossed about, and most of them
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  Speaker 1: on the floor, while the princess's garments were scattered all
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  Speaker 1: over the room, which was in the greatest confusion. It
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  Speaker 1: was only too evident that the goblins had been there,
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  Speaker 1: and Curdie had no longer any doubt that she had
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  Speaker 1: been carried off at the very first of the inroad.
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  Speaker 1: With a pang of despair, he saw how wrong they
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  Speaker 1: had been in not securing the king and Queen and prince.
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  Speaker 1: But he determined to find and rescue the princess as
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  Speaker 1: she had found and rescued him, or meet the worst
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  Speaker 1: fate which the goblins could doom him. End of Section sixteen.