you all on my Hill, by Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, and by the
Hammer of Asa Thor" - again Puck made that curious double-
cut in the air - '"that you may leave me out of all your counts and
reckonings." Then I went out'- he snapped his fingers -'like the
puff of a candle, and though they called and cried, they made
nothing by it. I didn't promise not to keep an eye on the Boy,
though. I watched him close - close - close!

'When he found what his people had forced me to do, he gave
them a piece of his mind, but they all kissed and cried round him,
and being only a boy, he came over to their way of thinking (I
don't blame him), and called himself unkind and ungrateful; and
it all ended in fresh shows and plays, and magics to distract him
from folk in housen. Dear heart alive! How he used to call and call
on me, and I couldn't answer, or even let him know that I was
near!'

'Not even once?' said Una. 'If he was very lonely?'
'No, he couldn't,' said Dan, who had been thinking. 'Didn't
you swear by the Hammer of Thor that you wouldn't, Puck?'

'By that Hammer!' was the deep rumbled reply. Then he came
back to his soft speaking voice. 'And the Boy was lonely, when he
couldn't see me any more. He began to try to learn all learning (he
had good teachers), but I saw him lift his eyes from the big black
books towards folk in housen all the time. He studied song-
making (good teachers he had too!), but he sang those songs with
his back toward the Hill, and his face toward folk. I know! I have
sat and grieved over him grieving within a rabbit's jump of him.
Then he studied the High, Low, and Middle Magic. He had