two o'clock
It began as follows : `` Keeper of wealth in the forest of pine , Hundreds of years are surely thine : Thine is the tall pine 's dwelling place -- '' But he might tax his memory as much as he pleased , he could remember no more of it . He often thought of asking some aged person what the whole verse was . However , a certain fear of betraying his thoughts kept him back , and moreover he concluded that the legend of the glass-mannikin could not be very generally known , and that but few were acquainted with the incantation , since there were not many rich persons in the Wald ; -- if it were generally known , why had not his father , and other poor people , tried their luck ? At length , however , he one day got his mother to talk about the mannikin , and she told him what he knew already , as she herself remembered only the first line of the verse , but she added , that the sprite would show himself only to those who had been born on a Sunday , between eleven and two o'clock . He was , she said , quite fit for evoking him , as he was born at twelve o'clock at noon ; if he but knew the verse . When Peter Munk heard this he was almost beside himself with joy and desire to try the adventure . It appeared to him enough to know part of the verse , and to be born on a Sunday , for the glass-mannikin to show himself .