Northern mythology

NORTH GERMAN TRADITIONS. 115
grey. On looking about him, he found he was lying
at the foot of the Hiibichenstein, with his cap full of
guilders by his side, and his pockets also full of guilders.
His adventure he related to the authorities, and bestowed
a portion of his riches on the poor, and built a
church in Grund, where there had not previously been one.
And the authorities made a law that no one should ascend
the Hiibichenstein, and no one there shoot at hawks or
buzzards or ravens. And as long as the Great Hiibichenstein
continued unimpaired the Giibich resided there, and
did much good and punished evil, and was seen by many.
But in the Thirty years^ war, the imperialists, through
wantonness, battered down the peak of the Great Hiibichenstein
with their artillery, from which time no one has
ever seen the Giibich.
III.
THE SILVER FIR-CONE.
Very very long ago there dwelt in Grund a
miner, who
in the cupboard of his room had a fir-cone of pure silver,
as natural as if it had grown on a tree. Now any one may
well ask how a miner could get such a treasure ? His
story, as he has told it to many, was as follows :—
His great-grandfather, who was also a miner, was once
sick for many weeks together, and it was a time of dearth,
and the miners in those days had no allowance during
sickness as at present ; that custom having been introduced
at a later period. He had seven childi-en living,
so that it may easily be imagined there was no superabundance
of bread for them, or, indeed, of anything else.
The miner and his wife were now quite disheartened. The
wife, as she was one day standing before the door, thinking
on what was to be done, resolved on going to the forest and
gathering a basketful of fir-cones, in the hope of selling
them, as they would at all events fetch something. She