Leo watched them intently.  Once in a while one restless little sprite would turn a hose upon his companions, when the chant would stop long enough for the rest to dip him head and heels into the lake, which had a very quieting effect.  Leo noticed great numbers of pipes running up the sides of the cavern in all directions, but Knops soon opened the door of what he called “the model-room,” and here were new wonders displayed.

CHAPTER VI

The model-room of the elves’ water-work department was a grotto of salt—­glittering, dazzling, sparkling, and flashing—­divided into two equal parts, or as if a huge shelf had been placed across it.

On the top of the shelf was a tiny park or forest, with all the natural differences of the ground exactly represented by grasses, plants, flowers, rocks, and trees, living and growing, but on a scale so small that Leo was forced to use a microscope to properly enjoy its beauty.  Even the herbage was minute, and the trees no larger than small ferns, but as his eyes grew accustomed to the glass he was amazed to find the hills and dales of his home here reproduced in the most familiar manner.

It was truly an exquisite scene.  Field upon field dotted with daisies, woodland as dense and wild as untrained nature leaves it, and hill upon hill clambering over one another, all so minute and yet so real, and dashing down from the tiny mountains was a stream of foaming water, winding about and gathering in from all sides other tributary brooks, so small that they would hardly have floated a good-sized leaf.

And now Leo understood the meaning of it all, as he looked underneath the shelf where tiny pumps and rams were forcing up the water for this stream.

Knops touched a spring and set a new series of wheels in motion, when, instantly, a gushing fountain flowed up in a small stone basin beneath a rustic cross; then a little lake appeared, on which were sailing small swans; and finally a rushing, roaring flood started some mill-wheels and almost threatened destruction to the tiny buildings upon its banks.

“This,” said Knops, “shows you how we use the power of our reservoirs, but it can give you no idea of the immense trouble we have in laying pipes for great distances.  Some of our elves find it so difficult that they beg for other work, and many run off altogether and live above-ground, inhabiting the regions of springs and brooks, and so muddying them and filling them up with weeds that men let them alone, which is just what they desire.”

“Do fish ever clog your pipes?” asked Leo.

“Never.  We have none in our lakes; the water is too pure and free from vegetable matter for fish.  It is doubly distilled.  Taste it.”

Leo took the glass which Knops offered, and confessed he had never tasted anything more delicious.

“We sometimes force carbonic gas into mineral springs, but that, as well as the salts considered so beneficial, is left to our chemists to regulate.  Paz, do you know anything about this?”