This being the season of the year for merit raises, and given the current controversies regarding the procedure used at the administrative level, it seemed appropriate to search the gnome literature in hopes of gaining insight into the topic. Evidently, Wunderlich's 1580 volume is silent on this matter. Nuygen and Pootvliet, however, do seem to touch on it briefly. The following excerpt will, hopefully, give us an intimate behind-the-scences insight as to what happens during the procedure itself: "A hilarious sight is a gnome busy filling his storeroom while behind his back a hamster is busy emptying it. Naturally, when this is detected, a lot of bickering follows."

And that, my friends, is a Gnome Fact!

Source of this Information:  One of the chief sources of information is Wilhelm J. Wunderlich's bulky treatsie De Hominibus Parvissimis (Concerning the Wee People) published in in 1580. That information has been included in the book by Wil Nuygen (writer) and Rien Poortvliet's (illustrator) entitled Gnomes (Harry N. Abrams, Publisher, 1977) from which most, but not all, of these Gnome Facts are taken.