Then in every quarter of the sky appeared the birds of souls, the dear swallows. When they were come, the light appeared stronger. Flower-maids, princes of the stones, emperors of the mines, men of the woods, spirits of the water, of fire, and of the earth all cried out in unison: "Light! Sap! Glory to King Springtide!"
Although the sound of their unanimous outcry was greater than that of the raging sea, the thunder, and the unleashed tempest, it sounded as solemn music in the ears of Nele and of Ulenspiegel, who, silent and motionless, remained huddled together behind the rugged trunk of an oak tree.
But they were still more affrighted when the spirits, thousands upon thousands, took their places upon seats that were immense spiders, toads with elephants, trunks, interlacing serpents, crocodiles standing up on their tails and holding a band of spirits in their jaws, serpents carrying more than thirty dwarfs, both men and women, seated astraddle on their undulating bodies, and full a hundred thousand insects bigger than Goliaths, armed with swords, spears, jagged scythes, forks with seven tines, and every other kind of dreadful murdering implements. They fought together with tremendous din, the strong devouring the weak, growing fat upon them, and showing thus that Death is made from Life and that Life is made from Death.
And from among this crowd of spirits, swarming, shifting, dense, confused, there arose a noise like low thunder and a hundred weavers' looms, fullers and locksmiths all working together.
Suddenly appeared the spirits of the sap, short, squat, round about the loins as big as the great Heidelberg tun, with thighs as big as hogsheads, and muscles so marvellously strong and powerful that one would have said their bodies were made up of large eggs and small eggs joined to one another and covered with a red, oily skin, shining like their sparse beard and their red hair; and they carried enormous tankards filled with a strange liquor.
When the other spirits beheld them coming, a great tremor of joy ran among them; trees and plants moved and shook, and the earth opened up in cracks to drink.
And the spirits of the sap poured out the wine: and all things incontinently budded, were green, flourished; the sward was full of whispering insects, and the sky of birds and butterflies; the spirits poured on and on, and those below received the wine as best they might: the flower-maids, opening their mouths or leaping up upon their red cupbearers, and kissing them to have more; some, clasping their hands in sign of entreaty; others who, in ecstasy, let it rain over them; but all greedy or parched, flying, standing, running or motionless, seeking to have the wine, and more intensely alive with every drop they attained to receiving. And there were no oldsters there, but ugly or goodly, all were full of prime strength and keenest youth.