Good evening. Welcome to the Just Sleep podcast. I'm Tasia, your host.

Every week, I will read you an old story to help you relax, put the stressful day behind you,

and drift off to sleep.

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Tonight, I will be continuing the story,

The Princess and the Goblin, by George MacDonald.

So lie down, close your eyes,

and let me read you a story.

Chapter 8 The Goblins

For some time, Kurti worked away briskly, throwing all the oar he had disengaged on one side behind him, to be ready for carrying

out in the morning. He heard a good deal of goblin tapping, but it all sounded far away in the hill,

and he paid a little heed. Towards midnight, he began to feel rather hungry. So he dropped his pickax,

got out a lump of bread, which in the morning he had laid

in a damp hole in the rock, sat down on a heap of ore, and ate his supper. Then he leaned

back for five minutes' rest before beginning his work again and laid his head against the rock.

He had not kept the position for one minute before he heard something which made

him sharp in his ears. It sounded like a voice inside the rock. After a while he heard it again.

It was a goblin voice. It could be no doubt about that. And this time he could make out the words.

Hadn't we better be moving, it said.

...