In mid-winter about four years since, says Miss Martineau, in her Norway
and the Norwegians, a young man named Hund, was sent by his master on an
errand about twenty miles, to carry provisions to a village in the upper
country. The village people asked him for charity, to carry three orphan
children on his sledge a few miles on his way to Bergen, and to leave
them at a house on the road, when they would be taken care of until they
could be brought from Bergen. He took the little things, and saw that
the two elder were well wrapped up from the cold. The third he took
within his arms and on his knee, as he drove, clasping it warm against
his breast--so those say who saw them set off, and it is confirmed by
one who met the sledge on the road, and heard the children prattling to
Hund, and Hund laughing merrily at their little talk. Before they got
half way, however, a pack of hungry wolves, burst out upon them from a
hollow in the thicket to the right of the wood. The beasts followed
close to the back of the sledge. Closer and closer the wolves pressed.
Hund saw one about to spring at his throat. It was impossible for the
horse to go faster than he did, for he went like the wind--so did the
wolves. Hund in desperation, snatched up one of the children behind him,
and threw it over the back of the sledge. This stopped the pack a
little. On galloped the horse. But the wolves were soon crowded around
again, with the blood freezing to their muzzles. It was easier to throw
over the second child than the first--and Hund did it. But on came again
the infuriated beasts--gaunt with hunger, and raging like fiends for the
prey. It was harder to give up the third--the dumb infant that nestled
in his breast, but Hund was in mortal terror. Again the hot breath of
the wolves was upon him. He threw a way the infant and saved himself.
Away over the snow flew the sledge, the village was reached, and Hund
just escaped after all the sacrifice he had made. But he was unsettled
and wild, and his talk, for some time whenever he did speak, night or
day, was of wolves--so fearful had been the effect upon his imagination.
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