On the afternoon on which, after so long an interval, the sound of the pipes was heard on the echo hills, this dwarf was fast asleep behind a rock.  As soon as the first notes reached them, some of his companions ran to wake him.  Rolling to his feet, he echoed back the merry tune of Old Pipes.  Naturally, he was very much annoyed and indignant at being thus obliged to give up his life of comfortable leisure, and he hoped very much that this pipe-playing would not occur again.  The next afternoon he was awake and listening, and, sure enough, at the usual hour, along came the notes of the pipes as clear and strong as they ever had been; and he was obliged to work as long as Old Pipes played.  The Echo-dwarf was very angry.  He had supposed, of course, that the pipe-playing had ceased forever, and he felt that he had a right to be indignant at being thus deceived.  He was so much disturbed that he made up his mind to go and try to find out whether this was to be a temporary matter or not.  He had plenty of time, as the pipes were played but once a day, and he set off early in the morning for the hill on which Old Pipes lived.  It was hard work for the fat little fellow, and when he had crossed the valley and had gone some distance into the woods on the hill-side, he stopped to rest, and, in a few minutes, the Dryad came tripping along.

“Ho, ho!” exclaimed the dwarf; “what are you doing here? and how did you get out of your tree?”

“Doing!” cried the Dryad; “I am being happy; that’s what I am doing.  And I was let out of my tree by the good old man who plays the pipes to call the cattle down from the mountain.  And it makes me happier to think that I have been of service to him.  I gave him two kisses of gratitude, and now he is young enough to play his pipes as well as ever.”

The Echo-dwarf stepped forward, his face pale with passion.  “Am I to believe,” he said, “that you are the cause of this great evil that has come upon me? and that you are the wicked creature who has again started this old man upon his career of pipe-playing?  What have I ever done to you that you should have condemned me for years and years to echo back the notes of those wretched pipes?”

At this the Dryad laughed loudly.

“What a funny little fellow you are!” she said.  “Any one would think you had been condemned to toil from morning till night; while what you really have to do is merely to imitate for half an hour every day the merry notes of Old Pipes’s piping.  Fie upon you, Echo-dwarf!  You are lazy and selfish; and that is what is the matter with you.  Instead of grumbling at being obliged to do a little wholesome work, which is less, I am sure, than that of any other echo-dwarf upon the rocky hill-side, you should rejoice at the good fortune of the old man who has regained so much of his strength and vigor.  Go home and learn to be just and generous; and then, perhaps, you may be happy.  Good-by.”

“Insolent creature!” shouted the dwarf, as he shook his fat little fist at her.  “I’ll make you suffer for this.  You shall find out what it is to heap injury and insult upon one like me, and to snatch from him the repose that he has earned by long years of toil.”  And, shaking his head savagely, he hurried back to the rocky hill-side.