I sat down to the table, and began to help myself to the good things
before me with confidence. And now I found, as in many instances before,
how true the fairy tales are; for I was waited on, all the time of my
meal, by invisible hands. I had scarcely to do more than look towards
anything I wanted, when it was brought me, just as if it had come to me
of itself. My glass was kept filled with the wine I had chosen, until
I looked towards another bottle or decanter; when a fresh glass was
substituted, and the other wine supplied. When I had eaten and drank
more heartily and joyfully than ever since I entered Fairy Land, the
whole was removed by several attendants, of whom some were male and some
female, as I thought I could distinguish from the way the dishes were
lifted from the table, and the motion with which they were carried out
of the room. As soon as they were all taken away, I heard a sound as of
the shutting of a door, and knew that I was left alone. I sat long by
the fire, meditating, and wondering how it would all end; and when at
length, wearied with thinking, I betook myself to my own bed, it was
half with a hope that, when I awoke in the morning, I should awake not
only in my own room, but in my own castle also; and that I should walk,
out upon my own native soil, and find that Fairy Land was, after all,
only a vision of the night. The sound of the falling waters of the
fountain floated me into oblivion.