certainly be more agreeable than staying in the smoky shop."

"I should like the drive very much," answered Siegfried;
"but I have never been to the coal-pits, and I might lose my
way in the forest."

"No danger of that," said Veliant. "Follow the road that
goes straight into the heart of the forest, and you cannot
miss your way. It will lead you to the house of Regin, the
master, the greatest charcoal-man in all Rhineland. He will
be right glad to see you for Mimer's sake, and you may lodge
with him for the night. In the morning he will fill your
cart with the choicest charcoal, and you can drive home at
your leisure; and, when our master comes again, he will find
our forges flaming, and our bellows roaring, and our anvils
ringing, as of yore."

Siegfried, after some further parley, agreed to undertake
the errand, although he felt that Veliant, in urging him to
do so, wished to work him some harm. He harnessed the donkey
to the smith's best cart, and drove merrily away along the
road which led towards the forest.[EN#5] The day was bright
and clear; and as Siegfried rode through the flowery
meadows, or betwixt the fields of corn, a thousand sights
and sounds met him, and made him glad. Now and then he would
stop to watch the reapers in the fields, or to listen to the
song of some heaven-soaring lark lost to sight in the blue
sea overhead. Once he met a company of gayly dressed youths
and maidens, carrying sheaves of golden grain, --for it was
now the harvest-time,--and singing in praise of Frey, the