for no light of the sun ever came into those gloomy regions. Some
who had thus remained behind during the night, although certain
there were none of their companions at work, would declare the next
morning that they heard, every time they halted for a moment to
take breath, a tap-tapping all about them, as if the mountain were
then more full of miners than ever it was during the day; and some
in consequence would never stay overnight, for all knew those were
the sounds of the goblins. They worked only at night, for the
miners' night was the goblins' day. Indeed, the greater number of
the miners were afraid of the goblins; for there were strange
stories well known amongst them of the treatment some had received
whom the goblins had surprised at their work during the night. The
more courageous of them, however, amongst them Peter Peterson and
Curdie, who in this took after his father, had stayed in the mine
all night again and again, and although they had several times
encountered a few stray goblins, had never yet failed in driving
them away. As I have indicated already, the chief defence against
them was verse, for they hated verse of every kind, and some kinds
they could not endure at all. I suspect they could not make any
themselves, and that was why they disliked it so much. At all
events, those who were most afraid of them were those who could
neither make verses themselves nor remember the verses that other
people made for them; while those who were never afraid were those
who could make verses for themselves; for although there were
certain old rhymes which were very effectual, yet it was well known
that a new rhyme, if of the right sort, was even more distasteful
to them, and therefore more effectual in putting them to flight.

Perhaps my readers may be wondering what the goblins could be
about, working all night long, seeing they never carried up the ore