The sea roars from the distance like rumbling thunder; the house rocks in the gale; the hail is heard clattering in the chimney. Roar, tempest! Blow, sea gale! Drop, both snow and hail! Ah! How good it feels to hear the ice-laden blast thunder, when one sees his family merrily gathered in the house around a blazing fireplace! And then, the young lads and their sister whisper things to one another that make them shiver and smile at once. For it does, indeed, look as if during the last century all the hobgoblins and all the fairies of Gaul have taken refuge in Britanny. Is it not a positive pleasure to hear tell during a tempest and by the fire those wonders to which one gives a lingering credence if one has not seen them himself, and more so if one has seen them?
This is what the young folks are saying to one another. My grandson Kervan starts the ball rolling as he shakes his head:
"The traveler who has lost his way and who should happen to pass to-night by the cavern of Pen-March will hear the hammers clang--"
"Yes, the hammers that beat in time while the devilish hammerers themselves sing their song, the burden of which ever is: 'One, two, three, four, five, six, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday--'"
"And it is said they even add 'Thursday,' 'Friday' and 'Saturday,' but never 'Sunday,' the day of the mass--of the Christians."
"And the traveler may prize himself happy if the little Dus do not drop their false coiners' hammers and start to dance, compelling him to join in their reel until death closes upon him."
"What dangerous demons those Dus must be, dwarfs no taller than barely two feet high! Meseems I see them, with their hairy and shriveled faces, their cats' claws, their goats' hoofs and their eyes flashing fire. The bare thought of them is enough to make one shiver."
"Look out, Roselyk! There is one under the bin. Look out!"
"How imprudent you are, brother Karadeucq, to sport in that way over the Dus! Those hobgoblins are spiteful things. I tremble when I think of them."
"As for me, were I to come across a band of these customers, I would capture two or three brace of them, I would tie them together by the legs like partridges--and off I would make with them--"
"Oh! You, Karadeucq, are not afraid of anything."