It was his twenty-first birthday, and he might not even receive
the good wishes of the day from his old playmate. It was just growing
dusk, a time when prudent bodies hurry home from the neighbourhood of
fairy rings, sprite-haunted streams, and the like, and Kind William
was beginning to quicken his pace, when a voice from behind him sang:
"Warp of woollen and woof of gold:
When seven and seven and seven are told."
Kind William felt sure that he had heard this before, though he could
not recall when or where; but suspecting that it was no mortal voice
that sang, he hurried home without looking behind him. Before he
reached the house he remembered all, and also that on this very day
his promise of secrecy expired.
Meanwhile the old weaver had been sadly preparing the loom to weave a
small stock of yarn, which he had received in payment for some work.
He had set up the warp, and was about to fill the shuttle, when his
son came in and told the story, and repeated the water sprite's song.
"Where is the lock of hair, my son?" asked the old man.
"In the teapot still, if you have not touched it," said Kind William;
"but the dust of fourteen years must have destroyed all gloss and
colour."
On searching the teapot, however, the lock of hair was found to be as
bright as ever, and it lay in the weaver's hand like a coil of gold.
"It is the song that puzzles me," said Kind William. "Seven, and
seven, and seven make twenty-one.
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