Now, Old Pipes knew a good deal about Dryads, but there was one thing which, although he had heard, he had forgotten.  This was, that a kiss from a Dryad made a person ten years younger.  The people of the village knew this, and they were very careful not to let any child of ten years or younger, go into the woods where the Dryads were supposed to be; for, if they should chance to be kissed by one of these tree-nymphs, they would be set back so far that they would cease to exist.  A story was told in the village that a very bad boy of eleven once ran away into the woods, and had an adventure of this kind; and when his mother found him he was a little baby of one year old.  Taking advantage of her opportunity, she brought him up more carefully than she had done before; and he grew to be a very good boy indeed.

Now, Old Pipes had been kissed twice by the Dryad, once on each cheek, and he therefore felt as vigorous and active as when he was a hale man of fifty.  His mother noticed how much work he was doing, and told him that he need not try in that way to make up for the loss of his piping wages; for he would only tire himself out, and get sick.  But her son answered that he had not felt so well for years, and that he was quite able to work.  In the course of the afternoon, Old Pipes, for the first time that day, put his hand in his coat-pocket, and there, to his amazement, he found the little bag of money.  “Well, well!” he exclaimed, “I am stupid, indeed!  I really thought that I had seen a Dryad; but when I sat down by that big oak-tree I must have gone to sleep and dreamed it all; and then I came home thinking I had given the money to a Dryad, when it was in my pocket all the time.  But the Chief Villager shall have the money.  I shall not take it to him to-day, but to-morrow I wish to go to the village to see some of my old friends; and then I shall give up the money.”

Toward the close of the afternoon, Old Pipes, as had been his custom for so many years, took his pipes from the shelf on which they lay, and went out to the rock in front of the cottage.

“What are you going to do?” cried his mother.  “If you will not consent to be paid, why do you pipe?”

“I am going to pipe for my own pleasure,” said her son.  “I am used to it, and I do not wish to give it up.  It does not matter now whether the cattle hear me or not, and I am sure that my piping will injure no one.”

When the good man began to play upon his favorite instrument he was astonished at the sound that came from it.  The beautiful notes of the pipes sounded clear and strong down into the valley, and spread over the hills, and up the sides of the mountain beyond, while, after a little interval, an echo came back from the rocky hill on the other side of the valley.

“Ha! ha!” he cried, “what has happened to my pipes?  They must have been stopped up of late, but now they are as clear and good as ever.”

Again the merry notes went sounding far and wide.  The cattle on the mountain heard them, and those that were old enough remembered how these notes had called them from their pastures every evening, and so they started down the mountain-side, the others following.