Chapter II: Introduction: Golden Grain (2)

Over the whole landscape lay a repose and a peace so perfect that no one could have suspected the close proximity of the capital. When I had advanced some distance into the forest, I heard the notes of the bugle and the distant baying of hounds in full cry, which gradually ceased, till nothing but a faint echo of the bugle reached my ear. I now heard the roar of the river, which rushed wildly past at some distance on my left, but as I advanced the road seemed gradually to approach it, and soon the valley in some parts grew narrower and narrower, till I at last found myself at the bottom of a deep, gloomy gorge, the greatest part of which was taken up by the river. But the road left the river again; there were certainly twistings and turnings, as the old woman had said, for at one moment it wound hither and the next thither, and at some places it was almost imperceptible. Now it went up a steep incline, and when I had passed the brow of the hill, I saw between the fir trees a couple of twinkling tarns before me, and on the margin of one of these a dairy on a verdant slope, bathed in the golden light of the evening sun.

In the shady retreat under the hill grew clusters of luxuriant ferns; the wild French willow stood proudly with its lofty crest of red and gorgeous flowers between the pebbles, but the sedate monk's hood lifted its head still higher and looked gloomily and wickedly down on it, while it nodded and kept time to the cuckoo's song, as if it were counting how many days it had to live.

On the verdant slope and down by the edge of the water, the bird-cherry and the mountain ash displayed their flowery garb of summer. They sent a pleasant and refreshing fragrance far around, and shook sorrowfully the leaves of their white flowers over the reflected picture of the landscape in the mirror of the lake, which on all sides was surrounded by pine trees and mossy cliffs.

There was no one at home in the dairy. All doors were locked,--I knocked everywhere, but no answer,--no information as to the road. I sat down on a rock and waited awhile, but no one appeared. The evening was setting in; I thought I could not stay there any longer, and started again. It was still darker in the forest, but shortly I came to a timber-dam across a bit of river between two lakes.

I supposed this was the place where I "should bear off first to the left, and then to the right." I went across, but on the other side of the dam there were only--as it appeared to me--flat, smooth, damp rocks and no trace of a road; on the opposite side, the right side of the dam, there was a well-trodden path. I examined both sides several times, and although it appeared to be contrary to the direction I had received, I decided on choosing the broader road or path, which was continued on the right hand side of the water. As long as it followed the course of the dark lake, the road was good and passable, but suddenly it turned off in a direction which, according to my ideas, was the very opposite of the one I should take, and lost itself in a confused net of paths and cattle-tracks amid the darkness of the forest.

Inexpressibly tired of this anxious intricate search, I threw myself down on the soft moss to rest for a while, but the fatigue conquered the fears of the lonely forest, and I cannot now tell how long I dozed. On hearing a wild cry, the echo of which still resounded in my ears when I awoke, I jumped to my feet. I felt comforted by the song of the red-breast, and I thought I felt less lonely and deserted as long as I heard the merry notes of the thrush.

The sky was overcast and the darkness of the forest had increased considerably. A fine rain was falling, which imparted renewed life to the plants and trees, and filled the air with a fresh, aromatic fragrance; it also seemed to call to life all the nocturnal sounds and notes of the forest. Among the tops of the fir trees above me, I heard a hollow, metallic sound, like the croaking of the frog and a penetrating whistling and piping. Round about me was a buzzing sound, as if from a hundred spinning-wheels, but the most terrible of all these sounds was, that they at one time seemed close to your ear, and in another moment far away; now they were interrupted by frolicsome, wild cries, and a flapping of wings,--now by distant cries of distress, on which a sudden silence followed again.

I was seized by an indescribable fear; these sounds sent a chill through me, and my terror was increased by the darkness between the trees, where all objects appeared distorted, moving and alive, stretching forth thousands of hands and arms after the stray wanderer. All the fairy tales of my childhood were conjured up before my startled imagination, and appeared to be realized in the forms which surrounded me; I saw the whole forest filled with trolls, elves, and sporting dwarfs. In thoughtless and breathless fear I rushed forward to avoid this host of demons, but while flying thus still more frightful and distorted shapes appeared,--and I fancied I felt their hands clutching me. Suddenly I heard the heavy tread of some one, who moved over the crackling branches of the underwood. I saw, or fancied I saw, a dark shape, which approached me with a pair of eyes shining like glowing stars. My hair stood on an end; I believed my fate was inevitably sealed, and shouted almost unconsciously as if to give myself new courage:

"If there's anybody there, tell me the way to Stubdale!" A deep growl was the answer I received, and the bear, for such it was, walked quickly away in the same direction whence he had come. I stood for some time and listened to his heavy steps and the crackling of the branches under his feet. I mumbled to myself: "I wish it was daylight and that I had a gun with me, and you should have had a bullet, Master Bruin, for frightening me thus!"

With this wish and childish threat all fear and thoughts of danger vanished, and I walked on again quite composed, on the soft mossy ground.

When after considerable trouble I had forced my way through the chaos of fallen trees, which the wind had torn up in this exposed wild region, and had ascended the other steep hillside, I had still a good distance to walk across an open wooded heath.

On the outskirt of this wood trickled a small brook, where the alder and the pine trees again sought to maintain their place, and on a small plot on the slope on the other side of a brook burned a great log-fire, which threw its red light far in between the trees. In front of the fire sat a dark figure, which, on account of its position between me and the blazing fire, appeared to me to be of supernatural proportions. The old stories about robbers and thieves in this forest came suddenly back to me, and I was on the point of running away when my eyes caught sight of a hut, made out of fir branches, close to the fire, and two other men, who sat outside it, and the many axes, which were fixed into the stump of a felled tree, and it became evident to me that they were wood-cutters.

The dark figure, an old man, was speaking,--I saw him move his lips; he held a short pipe in his hand, which he only put to his mouth now and then to keep it alight by these occasional puffs. When I approached the group, the story had either come to an end or he had been interrupted; he stooped forward, put some glowing embers in his pipe, smoked incessantly and appeared to be attentively listening to what a fourth person, who had just arrived, had to say. This person, who apparently also belonged to the party, was carrying a bucket of water from the brook. His hair was red, and he was dressed in a long jersey jacket, and had more the appearance of a tramp than a wood-cutter. He looked as if he had been frightened by something or other.

The old man had now turned round towards him, and as I had crossed the brook and was approaching the party from the side, I could now see the old man plainly in the full glare of the fire. He was a short man with a long hooked nose. A blue skull-cap with a red border scarcely covered his head of bristly grey hair, and a short-bodied but long Ringerike coat of dark grey frieze with worn velvet borders, served to make the roundness and crookedness of his back still more conspicuous.

The new-comer appeared to be speaking about a bear.

"Well, who would believe it?" said the old man, "what did he want there? It must have been some other noise you heard, for there doesn't grow anything on the dry heath hereabout which he would be after. No, not Bruin, not he" he added; "I almost think you are telling lies, Peter! There's an old saying that red hair and firs don't thrive in good soil," he continued half aloud. "If it had been down in the bear's den or in Stygdale, where Knut and I both heard him and saw him the other day--but here?--No, no! he doesn't come so near the fire, he doesn't! You have been frightening yourself!"

"Frightening myself? Oh, dear no! Didn't I hear him moving and crushing through the underwood, my canny Thor Lerberg?" answered the other, somewhat offended and chagrined at the old man's doubts and taunts.

"Well, well, my boy," continued Thor in his former tone, "I suppose it was something bigger than a squirrel, anyhow!"

I now stepped forward, and said it must have been me that he had heard, and told them how I had lost my way, and the fright I had undergone, and how hungry and tired I was. I asked whereabouts I was now, and if one of them would show me the way to Stubdale.

My appearance created considerable surprise to the party, which however was not so much apparent in their words, as in the attention with which they regarded me and heard my story. The old man, whose name I had heard was Thor Lerberg, seemed particularly interested in it; and as it appeared that he was accustomed to thinking aloud, I could on hearing some of the remarks which he now and then mumbled to himself, participate in his reflections thus:

"No, no that was the wrong way!--He should have gone over the dam there--Stubdale way--he went wrong altogether--he is too young--he isn't used to the woods--ah, that was the woodcock--and the goatsucker--yes, yes! it sounds strange to him, that hasn't heard him--oh, yes! the loon does shriek dreadfully--particularly when there's fine rain--ah, ah! yes, that must have been the bear he met--he is a brave boy after all!"

"Yes!" I said boldly, and gave vent to my awakening youthful courage in about the same words as the man who once came across a bear asleep on a sunny hillside: "If it had been daylight, and if I had been a hunter and had a loaded gun with me, and if I could have made it go off, why, by my faith, the bear should have lain dead on the spot, he should."

"Yes, of course, ha, ha, ha!" laughed old Thor, and chuckled till the others joined in the laughter; "of course he would have lain dead on the spot,--that's plain! ha, ha, ha!"

"But you are now by Storflaaten, the biggest lake in the forest here," he said, addressing himself to me, when I had finished my story; "towards morning we'll help you on your way, for we have got a boat, and when you have got across the water you haven't far to go to Stubdale then. But I suppose you would like to rest yourself a little now, and get something to eat! I have nothing but some peas-pudding and rancid bacon, and may be you are not used to that kind of food; but if you are hungry, perhaps you would like some fish? I have been out fishing, and fine fish I got too,--yes, in the lake, I mean!"

I thanked him for his offer, and he told one of his companions to take a "regular good 'un" off the string and roast it in the glowing embers of the fire.

In the meantime the old man asked a number of questions about myself, and by the time I had answered all these the fish was ready, and I began my meal with great appetite. He now asked one of his companions to tell us something about what he once said had happened to his father, when he was out cutting timber.

"That was in the spring, just before Easter 1815, when father lived at Oppen-Eie--the snow wasn't gone yet, but he had to set out for the forest to cut and drag home some wood. He went up in the Helling hill, where he found a withered fir which he commenced cutting down at once. While cutting away at it, he thought he saw withered firs all around him, but while he was staring and wondering at this, up came a procession of eleven horses,--all of a mouse-gray color; it appeared to him to be a wedding-party.

"What people are these, who are coming this way over the hill?" he asked.

"Oh, we are from Osthalla," says one of them, "we are going to the Veien dairy to keep the wedding; the one who drives in front is the parson, next are the bride and bridegroom, and I am his father-in-law. You had better stand behind on my sledge and come along."

"When they had traveled some distance, the father-in-law said: 'Will you take these two bags with you and go to the Veien farm and get two barrels of potatoes in them by the time we go home?'

"My father promised to do this. They came soon to a place which he thought he knew, and so it was. It was just north of the Kill hill, where the old dairy stood; but there was no dairy there then, but a great fine building, and here they all entered. Some one met them on the steps to give the guests a glass of welcome, and they gave father a glass also, but he said, 'No, thanks!' he would not have anything he said, for he had only his old clothes on, and would not intrude on such fine folks. 'Never mind this man,' said one of them, 'take a horse and see him on his way home,' which they did; they put him in a sledge with a mouse-gray horse before it, and one of them sat up and drove the horse.

When they got as far as the little valley north of Oppenhagen--where the land-slip took place--he thought he sat between the ears of a bucket; but shortly this vanished also, and it was only then he really came to himself again. He began looking for his axe, and found it sticking in the same withered fir-tree he had begun to cut down. When he came home, he was so confused and queer, that he could not tell how many days he had been away; but he was only away from the morning to the evening,--and for some time afterwards he was not himself----"

"Yes, many a queer thing happens hereabout," said old Thor; "and I for my part have also seen a little--well, witchcraft I mean,--and if you like to sit up a little longer, I'll tell you what has happened to me,--in this here forest I mean."

"Yes, they would all like to hear it;--to-morrow was Sunday, and it didn't much matter if they went to bed late.

"Well, it might be about ten or twelve years ago," he answered, "I was burning charcoal over in the Kampenhaug forest. In the winter I had two horses there to cart the coals to the Bærum works. One day I happened to stop too long at the works, for I met some old friends from Ringerike there, and we had a good talk about one thing or another, and a little drop to drink, too,--yes, brandy I mean--and so I did not come back to the kiln before ten o'clock in the evening.

I made a fire, so I could see loading the sledges, for it was terribly dark, and I had to get the carts loaded in the evening, for I had to be off at three o'clock next morning, if I was to get to the works and back again the same day while it was light,--back to the kiln I mean. When I had got the fire to burn up, I began loading the sledges. But just as I was turning round to the fire again a drift of snow came sweeping down upon it and put it out entirely,--the fire I mean. So I thought to myself: 'Why, bless me, the old witch in the hill here is vexed to-night, because I come home so late and disturb her.' I struck a light and made a new fire. But, strange to say, the shovel would not drop all the coals into the basket,--more than half went over the sides. At last I got the sledges loaded, and I was going to put the ropes round them, but will you believe me, every one of them broke, the one after the other,--the ropes I mean. So I had to get new ropes, and at last got the sledges ready, gave the horses their fodder, and went to bed. But do you think I awoke at three? No, not till long after the sun had risen, and still I felt heavy and queer, both in my head and my body.

Well, I had something to eat and went then to look to the horses, but the shed was empty and the horses were gone. I got rather out of temper at this, and I am afraid I swore a little into the bargain, but I thought I had better try and find some tracks of them. During the night there had fallen a little fresh snow, and I could see they had not gone off in the direction of the valley or the works. I found, however, the track of two horses and of a couple of broad large feet in a northerly direction; I followed these for two or three miles, when the tracks parted, and the foot-marks vanished altogether; one horse had gone to the east, and the other to the west, and after following up one first for five or six miles, I came upon him at last. I had to take him home to the hut and tie him up, before I could start looking for the other horse. By the time I got hold of him it was near upon noon, and so there was no use going to the works that day. But I promised I should never disturb the old witch any more,--in the evening I mean.

But these promises are strange things sometimes,--if you keep a promise to Christmas you are pretty sure to break it before next Michaelmas. The year after I made a trip to Christiania late in the autumn,--the roads were in a fearful bad condition and it was already very late in the afternoon before I left town, but I wanted to get home that night. I was on horseback and took the road by Bokstad, which is the shortest, as you know,--to Ausfjerdingen, I mean. The weather was wet and ugly, and it was beginning to grow dark when I started. But when I came over the bridge by Heggelie I saw a man coming towards me,--he wasn't very tall, but terribly big; he was as broad as a barn-door across his shoulders, and his hands were nearly a foot across the knuckles. He carried a leather bag in one hand, and seemed to be talking to himself. When I came nearer to him, his eyes glistened like burning cinders, and they were as big as saucers. His hair stood out like bristles, and his beard was no better; I thought he was a terrible, ugly brute, and I prayed for myself the little I could, and just as I came to the end, down he sank,--in the ground I mean.

"I rode on, humming an old psalm, but suddenly I met him again coming down a hill; his eyes and hair and beard, too, sparkled with fire this time. I began praying again, and had no sooner finished than he was gone. But I had scarcely ridden a mile before I met him once more as I was crossing a small bridge. His eyes flashed like lightning and sparks flew out of his hair and beard, and so he shook his bag, till you could see blue and yellow and red tongues of fire shooting out of it. But then I lost my temper right out, and instead of praying I swore at him, and he vanished on the spot. But as I rode on, I began to be afraid that I should meet this brute again, so when I came to Lovlie, I knocked at the door, and asked for lodgings till daylight, but do you think they would let me in? No. I could travel by day, like other folks, they said, and then I needn't ask for lodgings!--So I guessed the brute had been there before me and frightened them, and I had to set out again. But then I started another old psalm, till the mountains rang with it, and I came at last safe to Stubdale, where I got lodgings--but it was almost morning then."

The manner in which he told these stories, was like his speech, slow and expressive, and he had the custom of repeating single words, or part of his sentences at the end of these, or adding one or another superfluous explanation. He generally applied these remarks after one of his many exertions to keep his pipe alight, and they had such a comical effect on me, that I had great difficulty to refrain from laughing outright. I was in a merry mood after having safely got through my nocturnal expedition, and to this I must ascribe the fact that his stories did not make the impression upon me which, after what I had gone through, might have been expected.

The dawn of the day was now appearing, and old Thor told one of his companions to row me across the lake, and put me on my right road.

TWO LITTLE KITTENS.

Two little kittens, one stormy night,
Began to quarrel and then to fight,
One had a mouse, the other had none,
And that was the way the quarrel begun.

"_I'll_ have that mouse," said the biggest cat,
"_You'll_ have that mouse, we'll see about that,"
"I _will_ have the mouse" said the eldest son.
"You _shan't_ have that mouse," said the little one.

I told you before 'twas a stormy night,
When these two little kittens began to fight;
The old woman seized her sweeping broom,
And swept the two kittens right out of the room.

The ground was covered with frost and snow,
And the two little kittens had nowhere to go,
So they laid them down on the mat at the door,
While the old woman finished sweeping the floor.

Then they both crept in as quiet as mice,
All wet with snow and cold as ice;
For they found it was better, that stormy night,
To lie down and sleep, than to quarrel and fight.

THE LABOR OF AUTHORSHIP.

David Livingstone said: "Those who have never carried a book through the press can form no idea of the amount of toil it involves. The process has increased my respect for authors a thousand-fold. I think I would rather cross the African continent again than undertake to write another book."

"For the statistics of the negro population of South America alone," says Robert Dale Owen, "I examined more than a hundred and fifty volumes."

Another author tells us that he wrote paragraphs and whole pages of his book as many as fifty times.

It is said of one of Longfellow's poems that it was written in four weeks, but that he spent six months in correcting and cutting it down.

Bulwer declared that he had rewritten some of his briefer productions as many as eight or nine times before their publication. One of Tennyson's pieces was rewritten fifty times. John Owen was twenty years on his "Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews;" Gibbon on his "Decline and Fall," twenty years; and Adam Clark on his "Commentary," twenty-six years. Carlyle spent fifteen years on his "Frederick the Great."

A great deal of time is consumed in reading before some books are prepared. George Eliot read one thousand books before she wrote "Daniel Deronda." Alison read two thousand before he completed his history. It is said of another that he read twenty thousand and wrote only two books.

"SHE WAS SOMEBODY'S MOTHER."

The woman was old, ragged and gray,
And bent with the chill of the winter's day;
The street was wet with the winter's snow,
And the woman's feet were aged and slow.
She stood at the crossing and waited long,
Alone, uncared for, amid a throng
Of human beings who passed her by;
None heeded the glance of her anxious eye.
Down the street with laughter and shout,
Glad in the freedom of school let out,
Came the boys like a flock of sheep,
Hailing the snow, piled white and deep.
Past the woman so old and gray,
Hastened the children on their way,
Nor offered a helping hand to her,
So meek, so timid, afraid to stir,
Lest the carriage wheels or the horses' feet
Should crowd her down on the slippery street.
At last came one of the merry troop,
The gayest laddie of all the group.
He paused beside her and whispered low,
"I'll help you across if you wish to go."
Her aged hand on his strong young arm
She placed, and without hurt or harm,
He guided the trembling feet along,
Proud that his own were firm and strong.
Then back again to his friends he went,
His young heart happy and well content.
"She is somebody's mother, boys, you know,
For she is old, and poor, and slow;
And I hope some fellow will lend a hand
To help my mother, you understand,
If she's old, and poor, and gray,
When her own dear boy is far away."
And "somebody's mother" bowed low her head
In her home that night, and the prayer she said
Was: "God be kind to the noble boy
Who is somebody's son, and pride, and joy."

DOT LAMBS WHAT MARY HAF GOT.

Mary haf got a leetle lambs already;
Dose vool was vite like shnow;
Und efery times dot Mary did vend oud,
Dot lambs vent also out, mit Mary.

Dot lambs did follow Mary von day of der school-house,
Vich was obbosition to der rules of der school-master;
Also, vich it did cause dose schilden to schmile out loud,
Ven dey did saw dose lambs on der insides of der school-house.

Und so dot school-master dit kick der lamb gwick oud;
Likewise dot lambs dit loaf around on der outside;
Und did shov der flies mit his tail off patiently aboud,--
Until Mary did come also from dot school-house oud.

Und den dot lambs did run away gwick to Mary,
Und dit make his het gwick on Mary's arms,
Like he would said, "I don't was schared,
Mary would kept me from droubles enahow."

"Vot vos der reason aboud it, of dot lambs und Mary?"
Dose schildren did ask it dot school-master;
"Vell, don'd you know it, dot Mary lofe dose lambs, already,"
Dot school-master did said.

Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small,
Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all.
--LONGFELLOW.

BOB CRATCHIT'S CHRISTMAS.

CHARLES DICKENS.

Then up rose Mrs. Cratchit, Cratchit's wife, dressed out but poorly in a twice-turned gown, but brave in ribbons, which are cheap and make a goodly show for six-pence; and she laid the cloth, assisted by Belinda Cratchit, second of her daughters, also brave in ribbons; while master Peter Cratchit plunged a fork into the saucepan of potatoes, and getting the corners of his monstrous shirt-collar (his father's private property, conferred upon his son and heir in honor of the day,) into his mouth, rejoiced to find himself so gallantly attired, and yearned to show his linen in the fashionable parks.

And now two smaller Cratchits, boy and girl, came tearing in, screaming that outside the baker's they had smelt the goose, and known it for their own; and basking in luxurious thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchits danced about the table, and exalted master Peter Cratchit to the skies, while he, (not proud, although his collars nearly choked him,) blew the fire, until the slow potatoes bubbling up, knocked loudly at the saucepan-lid to be let out and peeled.

"What has ever got your precious father, then?" said Mrs. Cratchit, "and your brother, Tiny Tim! and Martha warn't as late last Christmas Day by half-an-hour!"

"Here's Martha, mother!" said a girl, appearing as she spoke.

"Here's Martha, mother!" cried the two young Cratchits.

"Hurrah! there's such a goose, Martha!"

"Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are!" said Mrs. Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off her shawl and bonnet for her with officious zeal.

"We'd a deal of work to finish up last night," replied the girl, "and had to clear away this morning, mother."

"Well, never mind, so long as you are come," said Mrs. Cratchit, "sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm, Lord bless ye!"

"No, no, there's father coming," cried the two young Cratchits, who were everywhere at once. "Hide, Martha, hide!"

"So Martha hid herself, and in came little Bob, the father, with at least three feet of comforter besides the fringe hanging down before him; and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed, to look seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon his shoulder.

Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a little crutch, and had his limbs supported by an iron frame!

"Why, where's our Martha," cried Bob Cratchit, looking round.

"Not coming," said Mrs. Cratchit.

"Not coming!" said Bob, with a sudden falling in his high spirits; for he had been Tim's blood horse all the way from church, and had come home rampant. "Not coming upon Christmas day!"

Martha did not like to see him disappointed, if it were only in joke; so she came out from behind the closet door, and ran into his arms, while the two young Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off to the wash-house, that he might hear the pudding singing in the copper.

"And how did little Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit, after Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content.

"As good as gold," said Bob, "and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas day, who made lame beggars walk and blind men see."

Bob's voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more and more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty.

His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back came Tiny Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister to his stool beside the fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs--as if, poor fellow, they were capable of being made more shabby--mixed some hot mixture in a jug, with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and put it on the hob to simmer; master Peter and the two young Cratchits went to fetch the goose, with which they soon returned in high procession.

Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; and in truth it was something very like it in that house.

Mrs. Cratchit made the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; master Peter mashed the potatoes with wonderful vigor; Miss Belinda sweetened the apple-sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for everybody, not forgetting themselves, and mounting guard, upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped.

At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving-knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long-expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight rose all round the board, and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried "Hurrah!"

There never was such a goose! Bob said he didn't believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small atom of a bone upon the dish), they hadn't ate it all at last! Yet every one had had enough, and the youngest Cratchits in particular, were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows.

But now, the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs. Cratchit left the room alone--too nervous to bear witnesses--to take the pudding up and bring it in.

Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should break in turning out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the backyard and stolen it, while they were merry with the goose--a supposition at which the two young Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors were supposed.

Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the copper. A smell like a wash-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastry cook's next door to each other, with a laundress's next door to that! That was the pudding!

In half-a-minute Mrs. Cratchit entered--flushed, but smiling proudly,--with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that now the weight was off her mind, she would confess she had her doubts about the quantity of flour.

Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a thing.

At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth swept, and the fire made up. The compound being tasted, (the gin and lemons) and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovel full of chestnuts on the fire.

Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass,--two tumblers and a custard cup without a handle.

These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily.

Then Bob proposed "A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears, God bless us!" which all the family re-echoed.

"God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear,
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

THOMAS GRAY: 'ELEGY'

"A SNUG LITTLE ISLAND."

If you examine a map of Europe you will notice, not without difficulty, a little speck in the North Sea some thirty-six miles northwest of the mouth of the river Elbe. This little almost invisible speck is an island called Heligoland.

It belongs to Great Britain, having been ceded to this country by the Danes in 1814. Denmark in an evil hour identified herself with the cause of the first Napoleon, and the loss of Heligoland was only one of the results of her misguided policy. The island is to-day known chiefly as the favorite seaside resort of the Hamburghers, and though it is a British possession no English is spoken by the natives. Its name is supposed to mean the Holy Island, tradition affirming that at one period of its existence--many centuries ago--the isle was covered with temples for pagan worship that have long since disappeared.

Hel-i-go-land is one mile in length, about half a mile broad, and triangular in shape. It consists of an Upper and Lower Town, and is surrounded on all sides by steep red cliffs, except at the part upon which the Lower Town is built. Nearly a quarter of a mile east of the main island is a long, low-lying, sandy hill or "dune," which affords splendid bathing. Access from the Lower to the Upper Town, on the Cliffs above, is obtained by means of a wooden stair of 190 steps. Naturally enough, since there is constant need to travel between the two "Towns," this stair is a prominent feature in Heligoland existence. It is the test alike of youthful vigour and of failing strength.

The island children cannot conceive of a country without a stair, and the lads of the colony--like boys all the world over--often adopt the dangerous practice of accomplishing the descent by sliding down the balusters, a pastime that is sometimes indulged in by people of maturer years. The flat-topped rock is occupied by a lighthouse, a battery, a powder magazine, and pasture for 200 sheep. From one end to the other there runs a footpath called the "Highway," or "Potato Lane."

The streets, clean and paved with red brick, are excessively narrow, the only vehicles being perambulators and wheelbarrows, while horse or ass is never--or scarcely ever--seen in the island. The two or three cows which supply the milk during the season duly retire with the last of the visitors to Hamburg, 100 miles distant. The houses of the poorer folk resemble ship cabins, the beds being nailed against the wall like berths, or built in recesses in the walls.

The inhabitants love liberty and independence. They are proud of their "right little, tight little" island, and when business calls them away from it, they always weary to get back home. The rhyme which finds most favor amongst the people is one which, being interpreted, asserts that--

"Green is the land,
Red is the strand,
White is the sand,
These are the colors of Heligoland."

This rhyme indeed, Dr. Robert Brown suggests, may be regarded as their "national anthem."

The Heligolanders earn their livelihood from the harvest of the sea, though a fair amount of business is done by letting lodgings during "the season." From June to October hundreds of visitors besiege it, and during this period it may be described as a suburb of Hamburg, the bulk of the strangers hailing from that prosperous city. In winter the natives have the little island all to themselves.

The Heligoland men are tall, strong, with regular features and are superior in build to their relatives on the mainland. The women are rather handsome, with small feet, well-shaped slender hands, and long hair, for which, indeed, they are famous. As compared with the German or Dutch peasant women, they easily bear the palm.

In their dress they rather affect gay colors, the younger ones especially, like the "Rose" whom the artist has depicted on this page. The dress consists of a scarlet skirt, with a "body" and apron, generally of some light brown "stuff." The bonnet is a product peculiar to the island. It is a piece of pasteboard bent in the shape of a bonnet, over which is fastened a square piece of silk, satin or poplin, occasionally embroidered behind with lace.

The population numbers about 3,000 souls. As already noted, the men are fishers and pilots. The yearly value of the fisheries--which comprise mainly lobsters, crabs, herring, cod, and flat fish--amounts to upwards of $25,000. Trade is carried on by barter, the fish being exchanged with the merchants of Hamburg and Bremen for the goods which the Heligolanders require. The natives are keen, shrewd and honest.

Theft is practically unknown, and the few cases with which the magistrate is troubled arise from the street brawls which now and then take place. The men are usually serious, and rarely joke among themselves or with strangers, and, oddly enough, all the young men are particularly reserved.

Of course the women are not nearly so grave. They are all more lively as well as talkative. Though they are rather good-looking, they get aged and weatherbeaten early, owing to the anxiety of household affairs and other causes. For the men are addicted to the vile habit--common among all uncivilized and too many civilized races--of allowing the women to do very nearly the whole of the manual labor of the house, field and garden. Accordingly we find that the females have to pay in premature age the penalty of their lords' laziness.

The climate is very bracing, but the winters are wet and stormy. The air is so saturated with saline spray that the rain will leave a slight deposit of salt after it has evaporated. During the winter, communication with the mainland is maintained by boat once a week, though the island is often completely isolated for a considerable period by rough weather, drift ice, and various other causes.

Rats and mice are found in Heligoland in plenty, but the oft-quoted story about the rabbits, and the ruin which their burrowing was fast bringing upon the doomed isle is declared by a competent authority to be pure romance. The sea is making rapid inroads upon parts of the Holy Isle, and it is not unlikely that at some far-distant period all that will remain of this out-of-the-world spot will be a wave-lashed rock, the haunt of the gull and the cormorant.

DON'T CROWD.

CHAS. DICKENS.

Don't crowd; the world is large enough
For you as well as me;
The doors of all are open wide--
The realm of thought is free.
In all earth's places you are right
To chase the best you can--
Provided that you do not try
To crowd some other man.

Don't crowd the good from out your heart
By fostering all that's bad,
But give to every virtue room--
The best that may be had:
To each day's record such a one
That you might well be proud:
Give each his right--give each his room,
And never try to crowd.

"THE BOYS."

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

You hear that boy laughing?--You think he's all fun;
But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done.
The children laugh loud as they troop to his call,
And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all!

Yes, we're boys,--always playing with tongue or with pen,--
And I sometimes have asked,--Shall we ever be men?
Shall we always be youthful, and laughing, and gay,
Till the last dear companion drops smiling away?

Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its gray!
The stars of its winter, the dews of its May!
And when we have done with our life-lasting toys,
Dear Father, take care of thy children, THE BOYS!

THE QUARREL BETWEEN THE MOUNTAIN AND THE SQUIRREL.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

The mountain and the squirrel
Had a quarrel,
And the former called the latter "Little prig;"
Bun replied,
"You are doubtless very big,
But all sorts of things and weather
Must be taken in together
To make a year.
And a sphere:
And I think it no disgrace
To occupy my place.

If I'm not so large as you,
You are not so small as I,
And not half so spry;
I'll not deny you make
A very pretty squirrel track.
Talents differ: all is well and wisely put;
If I cannot carry forests on my back,
Neither can you crack a nut.

FOR FATHER'S SAKE,

OR, RIGHT AND MIGHT.

T'was many years ago. The marsh-mallow was bursting into bloom by the river's side, the river itself shimmering and singing of I know not what of joy, the March winds romping everywhere, like a free, happy child. Oh, yes, all the earth seemed glad, though a poor weakling of a lamb lay on the sunny hillside, among its fellows, panting and sighing, as if it would fain sob out its wee life and be at rest. It had been born late; its mother was dead; none of the other ewes took kindly to it: what could the shepherd do but lay it aside in hopeless despair, and attend to the robust and hardy among his large family?

"With powers of tending, I think he'd pull through," said Jasper, his son--or Jep, as he was called--bending over the lamb in boyish pity, and speaking more to himself than to his companions. These were the squire, his master, and John Sharp, his father--both bathed in the radiance of a fair March day.

"Think you so, my lad? Then give the creature powers of tending, and if it pulls through it shall be yours." So spoke Squire Barlow.

"Do ye mean it, squire?"

"Mean it, yes! Did you ever hear me say what I didn't mean?"

Ah! true; squires were great men in those days, and a very great man was Squire Barlow in the village; his word was law. So Jep gathered up the little outcast, and scudded down to the little cottage he called home, where wee Margaret, his sister, and his gentle-faced mother gave him and his charge a warm welcome; lavished their care and love upon the lamb, until, at last, even the shepherd himself said he would live.

"Spottie"--that was the name the children gave him, because of a mark on his forehead--soon learnt to know his master and mistress, and, oh! their life flowed on, as the fair spring days lengthened, like a happy dream. He was such a dear little romp, and yet so gentle, gamboling in the small orchard behind the house among the pink apple-blossoms, as they drifted down on the sunlit air, going and coming as the young folk called him, and never seemingly wishing to join his kind, as they went down from the high pastures to the green meadows. The squire's son, master Ru, as he was called, came to see "Jep's wonder," so he expressed himself.

Master Ru was a spoilt lad of about Jep's age, (eleven years), overbearing and not very generous; still he was prankish, and full of boyish frolics.

"Well, he's more mine than yours, after all, Jep," said he, one day, an envious sneer on his lips, "as t'was my father's lamb in the first place." But Jep replied, "No, he's mine; the squire gave the little chap to me, and I mean to keep him, Master Ru;" to which speech the young gentleman made no reply, but turned on his heel.

One fine day in autumn, Ru strayed away to the sheep-folds; he often visited them, to have some fun with Jep--to run races with him over the downs, or hunt for squirrels and dormice in the old plantation. Then, hard by this miniature wood, there were some old ruins, with a wonderful echo chamber, where all they uttered was wafted hither and thither as by many weird voices. This was a never-failing source of amusement to them. More than once they had decoyed Jep's father across the downs thereby, thinking he was called, and that urgently.

On that day John Sharp was elsewhere; only Jep and Nip, their dog, were left in trust.

"Let's go and have a round with the old echoes this morning, Jep," proposed the young gentleman, a merry twinkle in his eyes.

"Nay, Master Ru, I must mind the sheep."

"Pooh! what minding do they want, gorging themselves with clover as they are?"

"Ay, that's where 'tis, Master Ru; father's afraid they'll gorge too much; he's told me to watch 'em."

"Well, and what will watching do?"

"I must turn 'em into t'other fold in an hour's time--see, he gave me his watch to reckon by," and Jep held up a bumping, old-fashioned ticker, in his pride of possession.

"Well, an hour is a long time; we could have lots of fun in an hour." Ah! there was mighty persuasion in the boy's tone and dark, handsome face, and Jep, like many another before, faltered between duty and his love of fun.

"Come, your father need never know."

It was very plausible, all that Master Ru said that morning, and Jep never divined the half of what lay in the depths of his prankish, perhaps deceitful, heart.

He hung the watch on a hurdle stake, lest he might smash it in his games, by the side of Nip, sitting a pattern of fidelity and wary watchfulness there; then he accompanied his companion up the sunny hillside, and away to the ruins. Who could estimate the length of an hour, amid the excitement of fun and frolics? Not those two lads. Oh! high revel they held that morning; and when the echoes in the weird old chamber seemed furious at the noise they made, what did Ru do but step outside, shoot the rusty springbolt across the door, thus shutting in poor Jep.

"Upon my word I didn't half intend it," he protested; then Jep cried, with sudden compunction, "Oh! master Ru, how could ye; and the sheep there feedin' and feedin'? What shall I do?

"Do--why climb out of the window, like a man of sense," returned the other with selfish coolness.

"You know I can't do it--I'd break my neck."

"Nonsense! try it on."

As well tell poor Jep to fly as to scale a perpendicular wall, and that his tormenter knew. Oh! it was fun to him to hear the poor lad run about and rave, the echoes catching every sorrowful tone, and tossing them out to him, a legion of words. What a strange waywardness is in the half of us, to find amusement in that which is another's suffering! When at last master Ru let his prisoner out, with much ado, pretended or real, the sun was past its meridian, and the sheep--ah! the sheep--one, two, many of them were beyond the shepherd's tending and doctoring.

"They must e'en die," said he before sundown, with tears in his eyes--and that night Jep wept in the dewy orchard, one hand in wee Margaret's, the other stroking Spottie, with a sore smarting back and the squire's angry dismissal making his heart equally sore and smarting. Master Ru received a reprimand, but then he was a spoilt only son, and a gentleman, while Jep was a poor lad, and should have stuck to duty--so said the squire.

This escapade was but the beginning of troubles, for, as the winter deepened, Jep's father fell ill, and the squire frowned and fumed, and never spoke civilly to Jep when he called at the cottage, where the lad hung about in disgraced idleness.

"We shall have to sell Spottie!" said his mother, in her downheartedness at the expense and poverty falling on her, and the words hung like a weight at her son's heart. Sell Spottie! the children's souls clung to him.

"Father, that pet lamb of Jep Sharp's is more mine than his, you know," is what the squire's son said to him about that time.

"No my son, I gave it to him, and a gift is a gift," spoke the squire in his justice.

"Then buy him for me, father."

"I doubt if the lad would sell it," said the squire.

"Yes, he would; you could make him." His son was importunate; this was his cry, morning, noon, and night; and, at last, his indulgent parent walked to the cottage, to see what could be done.

"I want to buy your son's lamb for mine," said the great man, loftily, to Jep's mother.

"I doubt if he'd sell it, squire; 'twould go hard with him if he did," returned she, her motherly heart throbbing fast.