Once there were two brothers.  One was rich, and one was poor; the rich one was rather mean.  When the Poor Brother used to come to ask for things it annoyed him, and finally one day he said, “There, I’ll give it to you this time, but the next time you want anything, you can go Below for it!”

Presently the Poor Brother did want something, and he knew it wasn’t any use to go to his brother; he must go Below for it.  So he went, and he went, and he went, till he came Below.

It was the queerest place!  There were red and yellow fires burning all around, and kettles of boiling oil hanging over them, and a queer sort of men standing round, poking the fires.  There was a Chief Man; he had a long curly tail that curled up behind, and two ugly little horns just over his ears; and one foot was very queer indeed.  And as soon as anyone came in the door, these men would catch him up and put him over one of the fires, and turn him on a spit.  And then the Chief Man, who was the worst of all, would come and say, “Eh, how do you feel now?  How do you feel now?” And of course the poor people screamed and screeched and said, “Let us out!  Let us out!” That was just what the Chief Man wanted.

When the Poor Brother came in, they picked him up at once, and put him over one of the hottest fires, and began to turn him round and round like the rest; and of course the Chief Man came up to him and said, “Eh, how do you feel now?  How do you feel now?” But the Poor Brother did not say, “Let me out!  Let me out!” He said, “Pretty well, thank you.”

The Chief Man grunted and said to the other men, “Make the fire hotter.”  But the next time he asked the Poor Brother how he felt, the Poor Brother smiled and said, “Much better now, thank you.”  The Chief Man did not like this at all, because, of course, the whole object in life of the people Below was to make their victims uncomfortable.  So he piled on more fuel and made the fire hotter still.  But every time he asked the Poor Brother how he felt, the Poor Brother would say, “Very much better”; and at last he said, “Perfectly comfortable, thank you; couldn’t be better.”

You see when the Poor Brother was on earth he had never once had money enough to buy coal enough to keep him warm; so he liked the heat.

At last the Chief Man could stand it no longer.

“Oh, look here,” he said, “you can go home.”

“Oh no, thank you,” said the Poor Brother, “I like it here.”

“You must go home,” said the Chief Man.

“But I won’t go home,” said the Poor Brother.

The Chief Man went away and talked with the other men; but no matter what they did they could not make the Poor Brother uncomfortable; so at last the Chief Man came back and said,—­

“What’ll you take to go home?”

“What have you got?” said the Poor Brother.

“Well,” said the Chief Man, “if you’ll go home quietly I’ll give you the Little Mill that stands behind my door.”