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There was once a merchant who had only one child, a son, that was very young, and barely able to run alone. He had two richly-laden ships then making a voyage upon the seas, in which he had embarked all his wealth, in the hope of making great gains, when the news came that both were lost. Thus from being a rich man he became all at once so very poor that nothing was left to him but one small plot of land; and there he often went in an evening to take his walk, and ease his mind of a little of his trouble.
One day, as he was roaming along in a brown study, thinking with no great comfort on what he had been, and what he now was, and was like to be, all on a sudden there stood before him a little rough-looking black dwarf. "Prithee, friend, why so sorrowful?" said he to the merchant; "what is it you take so deeply to heart?" "If you could do me any good I would willingly tell you," said the merchant. "Who knows but I may?" said the little man: "tell me what ails you, and perhaps you will find I may be of some use." Then the merchant told him how all his wealth was gone to the bottom of the sea, and how he had nothing left but that little plot of land. "Oh! trouble not yourself about that," said the dwarf; "only under-
