Master Woodsman had not been idle. None of his people was used to
warfare, yet now that they were called upon to face the hosts of evil
they willingly prepared for the fray.

Ak had commanded them to assemble in the Laughing Valley, where Claus,
ignorant of the terrible battle that was to be waged on his account,
was quietly making his toys.

Soon the entire Valley, from hill to hill, was filled with the little
immortals. The Master Woodsman stood first, bearing a gleaming ax
that shone like burnished silver. Next came the Ryls, armed with
sharp thorns from bramblebushes. Then the Knooks, bearing the spears
they used when they were forced to prod their savage beasts into
submission. The Fairies, dressed in white gauze with rainbow-hued
wings, bore golden wands, and the Wood-nymphs, in their uniforms of
oak-leaf green, carried switches from ash trees as weapons.

Loud laughed the Awgwa King when he beheld the size and the arms of
his foes. To be sure the mighty ax of the Woodsman was to be dreaded,
but the sweet-faced Nymphs and pretty Fairies, the gentle Ryls and
crooked Knooks were such harmless folk that he almost felt shame at
having called such a terrible host to oppose them.

"Since these fools dare fight," he said to the leader of the Tatary
Giants, "I will overwhelm them with our evil powers!"

To begin the battle he poised a great stone in his left hand and cast
it full against the sturdy form of the Master Woodsman, who turned it
aside with his ax. Then rushed the three-eyed Giants of Tatary upon
the Knooks, and the Goozzle-Goblins upon the Ryls, and the