XI

“A safe stronghold our God is still,

A trusty shield and wea—pon;

He’ll help us clear from all the ill

That hath us now o’erta—ken.

The ancient prince of hell

Hath risen with purpose fell;

Strong mail of craft and power

He weareth in this hour;

On earth is not his fel—low.”

The whole school sat swaying backward and forward in time to the

rhythm, grinding out hymns in endless succession. Fris, the master, was

walking up and down the middle passage, smoking his pipe; he was taking

exercise after an hour’s reading of the paper. He was using the cane to

beat time with, now and then letting it descend upon the back of an

offender, but always only at the end of a line—as a kind of note of

admiration. Fris could not bear to have the rhythm broken. The children

who did not know the hymn were carried along by the crowd, some of them

contenting themselves with moving their lips, while others made up

words of their own. When the latter were too dreadful, their neighbors

laughed, and then the cane descended.

When one verse came to an end, Fris quickly started the next; for the

mill was hard to set in motion again when once it had come to a

standstill. “With for—!” and the half-hundred children carried it on—

“With force of arms we nothing can,

Full soon were we downrid—den;”

Then Fris had another breathing-space in which to enjoy his pipe and be

lulled by this noise that spoke of great and industrious activity. When

things went as they were now going, his exasperation calmed down for a

time, and he could smile at his thoughts as he paced up and down, and,

old though he was, look at the bright side of life. People in passing

stopped to rejoice over the diligence displayed, and Fris beat more

briskly with the cane, and felt a long-forgotten ideal stirring within

him; he had this whole flock of children to educate for life, he was

engaged in creating the coming generation.

When the hymn came to an end, he got them, without a pause, turned on

to “Who puts his trust in God alone,” and from that again to “We all,

we all have faith in God.” They had had them all three the whole winter

through, and now at last, after tremendous labor, he had brought them

so far that they could say them more or less together.

The hymn-book was the business of Fris’s life, and his forty years as

parish-clerk had led to his knowing the whole of it by heart. In

addition to this he had a natural gift. As a child Fris had been

intended for the ministry, and his studies as a young man were in

accordance with that intention. Bible words came with effect from his

lips, and his prospects were of the best, when an ill-natured bird came

all the way from the Faroe Islands to bring trouble upon him. Fris fell

down two flights from spiritual guide to parish-clerk and

child-whipper. The latter office he looked upon as almost too

transparent a punishment from Heaven, and arranged his school as a

miniature clerical charge.

The whole village bore traces of his work. There was not much knowledge

of reading and writing, but when it was a question of hymns and Bible

texts, these fishermen and little artisans were bad to beat. Fris took

to himself the credit for the fairly good circumstances of the adults,

and the receipt of proper wages by the young men. He followed each one

of them with something of a father’s eyes, and considered them all to

be practically a success. And he was on friendly terms with them once

they had left school. They would come to the old bachelor and have a

chat, and relieve their minds of some difficulty or other.

But it was always another matter with the confounded brood that sat

upon the school benches for the time being; it resisted learning with

might and main, and Fris prophesied it no good in the future.

Fris hated the children. But he loved these squarely built hymns, which

seemed to wear out the whole class, while he himself could give them

without relaxing a muscle. And when it went as it was doing to-day, he

could quite forget that there were such things as children, and give

himself up to this endless procession, in which column after column

filed past him, in the foot-fall of the rhythm. It was not hymns,

either; it was a mighty march-past of the strong things of life, in

which there stretched, in one endless tone, all that Fris himself had

failed to attain. That was why he nodded so happily, and why the loud

tramp of feet rose around him like the acclamations of armies, an _Ave

Cæsar_.

He was sitting with the third supplement of his newspaper before him,

but was not reading; his eyes were closed, and his head moved gently to

the rhythm.

The children babbled on ceaselessly, almost without stopping for

breath; they were hypnotized by the monotonous flow of words. They were

like the geese that had been given leave by the fox to say a prayer

before they were eaten, and now went on praying and praying forever and

ever. When they came to the end of the three hymns, they began again by

themselves. The mill kept getting louder, they kept the time with their

feet, and it was like the stroke of a mighty piston, a boom! Fris

nodded with them, and a long tuft of hair flapped in his face; he fell

into an ecstasy, and could not sit still upon his chair.

“And were this world all devils o’er,

And watching to devour—us,

We lay it not to heart so sore;

Not they can overpower us.”

It sounded like a stamping-mill; some were beating their slates upon

the tables, and others thumping with their elbows. Fris did not hear

it; he heard only the mighty tramp of advancing hosts.

“And let the prince of ill

Look grim as e’er he will,”—

Suddenly, at a preconcerted signal, the whole school stopped singing.

Fris was brought to earth again with a shock. He opened his eyes, and

saw that he had once more allowed himself to be taken by surprise. “You

little devils! You confounded brats!” he roared, diving into their

midst with his cane. In a moment the whole school was in a tumult, the

boys fighting and the girls screaming. Fris began hitting about him.

He tried to bring them back to the patter. “Who puts his trust in God

alone!” he shouted in a voice that drowned the clamor; but they did not

take it up—the little devils! Then he hit indiscriminately. He knew

quite well that one was just as good as another, and was not particular

where the strokes fell. He took the long-haired ones by the hair and

dragged them to the table, and thrashed them until the cane began to

split. The boys had been waiting for this; they had themselves rubbed

onion into the cane that morning, and the most defiant of them had on

several pairs of trousers for the occasion.

When the cracked sound proclaimed that the cane was in process of

disintegration, the whole school burst into deafening cheers. Fris had

thrown up the game, and let them go on. He walked up and down the

middle passage like a suffering animal, his gall rising. “You little

devils!” he hissed; “You infernal brats!” And then, “Do sit still,

children!” This last was so ridiculously touching in the midst of all

the rest, that it had to be imitated.

Pelle sat farthest away, in the corner. He was fairly new at this sort

of thing, but did his best. Suddenly he jumped on to the table, and

danced there in his stockinged feet. Fris gazed at him so strangely,

Pelle thought; he was like Father Lasse when everything went wrong; and

he slid down, ashamed. Nobody had noticed his action, however; it was

far too ordinary.

It was a deafening uproar, and now and then an ill-natured remark was

hurled out of the seething tumult. Where they came from it was

difficult to say; but every one of them hit Fris and made him cower.

False steps made in his youth on the other side of the water fifty

years ago, were brought up again here on the lips of these ignorant

children, as well as some of his best actions, that had been so

unselfish that the district put the very worst interpretation upon

them. And as if that were not enough—but hush! He was sobbing.

“Sh—sh! Sh—sh!” It was Henry Bodker, the biggest boy in the school, and

he was standing on a bench and sh—ing threateningly. The girls adored

him, and became quiet directly; but some of the boys would not obey the

order; but when Henry held his clenched fist up to one eye, they too

became quiet.

Fris walked up and down the middle passage like a pardoned offender. He

did not dare to raise his eyes, but they could all see that he was

crying. “It’s a shame!” said a voice in an undertone. All eyes were

turned upon him, and there was perfect silence in the room.

“Play-time!” cried a boy’s voice in a tone of command: it was Nilen’s.

Fris nodded feebly, and they rushed out.

Fris remained behind to collect himself. He walked up and down with his

hands behind his back, swallowing hard. He was going to send in his

resignation. Every time things went quite wrong, Fris sent in his

resignation, and when he had come to himself a little, he put it off

until the spring examinations were over. He would not leave in this

way, as a kind of failure. This very winter he had worked as he had

never done before, in order that his resignation might have somewhat

the effect of a bomb, and that they might really feel it as a loss when

he had gone. When the examination was held, he would take the hymn-book

for repetition in chorus—right from the beginning. Some of the children

would quickly drop behind, but there were some of them, into whom, in

the course of time, he had hammered most of its contents. Long before

they had run out, the clergyman would lift his hand to stop them, and

say: “That’s enough, my dear clerk! That’s enough!” and would thank him

in a voice of emotion; while the school committee and the parents would

whisper together in awed admiration.

And then would be the time to resign!

The school lay on the outskirts of the fishing-village, and the

playground was the shore. When the boys were let out after a few hours’

lessons, they were like young cattle out for the first time after the

long winter. They darted, like flitting swallows, in all directions,

threw themselves upon the fresh rampart of sea-wrack and beat one

another about the ears with the salt wet weeds. Pelle was not fond of

this game; the sharp weed stung, and sometimes there were stones

hanging to it, grown right in.

But he dared not hold himself aloof, for that would attract attention

at once. The thing was to join in it and yet not be in it, to make

himself little and big according to the requirements of the moment, so

as to be at one time unseen, and at another to exert a terrifying

effect. He had his work cut out in twisting and turning, and slipping

in and out.

The girls always kept together in one corner of the playground, told

tittle-tattle and ate their lunch, but the boys ran all over the place

like swallows in aimless flight. A big boy was standing crouching close

to the gymnastic apparatus, with his arm hiding his face, and munching.

They whirled about him excitedly, now one and now another making the

circle narrower and narrower. Peter Kofod —Howling Peter—looked as if

the world were sailing under him; he clung to the climbing-pole and hid

his face. When they came close up to him, they kicked up behind with a

roar, and the boy screamed with terror, turned up his face and broke

into a long-drawn howl. Afterward he was given all the food that the

others could not eat.

Howling Peter was always eating and always howling. He was a pauper

child and an orphan; he was big for his age, but had a strangely blue

and frozen look. His frightened eyes stood half out of his head, and

beneath them the flesh was swollen and puffy with crying. He started at

the least sound, and there was always an expression of fear on his

face. The boys never really did him any harm, but they screamed and

crouched down whenever they passed him—they could not resist it. Then

he would scream too, and cower with fear. The girls would sometimes run

up and tap him on the back, and then he screamed in terror. Afterward

all the children gave him some of their food. He ate it all, roared,

and was as famished as ever.

No one could understand what was wrong with him. Twice he had made an

attempt to hang himself, and nobody could give any reason for it, not

even he himself. And yet he was not altogether stupid. Lasse believed

that he was a visionary, and saw things that others could not see, so

that the very fact of living and drawing breath frightened him. But

however that might be, Pelle must on no account do anything to him, not

for all the world.

The crowd of boys had retired to the shore, and there, with little

Nilen at their head, suddenly threw themselves upon Henry Bodker. He

was knocked down and buried beneath the swarm, which lay in a sprawling

heap upon the top of him, pounding down with clenched fists wherever

there was an opening. But then a pair of fists began to push upward,

tchew, tchew, like steam punches, the boys rolled off on all sides with

their hands to their faces, and Henry Bodker emerged from the heap,

kicking at random. Nilen was still hanging like a leech to the back of

his neck, and Henry tore his blouse in getting him thrown off. To Pelle

he seemed to be tremendously big as he stood there, only breathing a

little quickly. And now the girls came up, and fastened his blouse

together with pins, and gave him sweets; and he, by way of thanking

them, seized them by their pigtails and tied them together, four or

five of them, so that they could not get away from one another. They

stood still and bore it patiently, only gazing at him with eyes of

devotion.

Pelle had ventured into the battle and had received a kick, but he bore

no malice. If he had had a sweet, he, like the girls, would have given

it to Henry Bodker, and would have put up with ungentle treatment too.

He worshipped him. But he measured himself by Nilen —the little

bloodthirsty Nilen, who had no knowledge of fear, and attacked so

recklessly that the others got out of his way! He was always in the

thickest of the crowd, jumped right into the worst of everything, and

came safely out of it all. Pelle examined himself critically to find

points of resemblance, and found them—in his defence of Father Lasse

the first summer, when he kicked a big boy, and in his relations with

the mad bull, of which he was not in the least afraid. But in other

points it failed. He was afraid of the dark, and he could not stand a

thrashing, while Nilen could take his with his hands in his pockets. It

was Pelle’s first attempt at obtaining a general survey of himself.

Fris had gone inland, probably to the church, so it would be a playtime

of some hours. The boys began to look about for some more lasting ways

of passing the time. The “bulls” went into the schoolroom, and began to

play about on the tables and benches, but the “blennies” kept to the

shore. “Bulls” and “blennies” were the land and the sea in conflict;

the division came naturally on every more or less serious occasion, and

sometimes gave rise to regular battles.

Pelle kept with the shore boys; Henry Bodker and Nilen were among them,

and they were something new! They did not care about the land and

animals, but the sea, of which he was afraid, was like a cradle to

them. They played about on the water as they would in their mother’s

parlor, and had much of its easy movement. They were quicker than

Pelle, but not so enduring; and they had a freer manner, and made less

of the spot to which they belonged. They spoke of England in the most

ordinary way and brought things to school that their fathers and

brothers had brought home with them from the other side of the world,

from Africa and China. They spent nights on the sea on an open boat,

and when they played truant it was always to go fishing. The cleverest

of them had their own fishing-tackle and little flat-bottomed prams,

that they had built themselves and caulked with oakum. They fished on

their own account and caught pike, eels, and tench, which they sold to

the wealthier people in the district.

Pelle thought he knew the stream thoroughly, but now he was brought to

see it from a new side. Here were boys who in March and April—in the

holidays—were up at three in the morning, wading barefoot at the mouth

of the stream to catch the pike and perch that went up into the fresh

water to spawn. And nobody told the boys to do it; they did it because

they liked it!

They had strange pleasures! Now they were standing “before the sea” —in

a long, jubilant row. They ran out with the receding wave to the larger

stones out in the water, and then stood on the stones and jumped when

the water came up again, like a flock of sea birds. The art consisted

in keeping yourself dryshod, and yet it was the quickest boys who got

wettest. There was of course a limit to the time you could keep

yourself hovering. When wave followed wave in quick succession, you had

to come down in the middle of it, and then sometimes it went over your

head. Or an unusually large wave would come and catch all the legs as

they were drawn up in the middle of the jump, when the whole row turned

beautifully, and fell splash into the water. Then with, a deafening

noise they went up to the schoolroom to turn the “bulls” away from the

stove.

Farther along the shore, there were generally some boys sitting with a

hammer and a large nail, boring holes in the stones there. They were

sons of stone-masons from beyond the quarries. Pelle’s cousin Anton was

among them. When the holes were deep enough, powder was pressed into

them, and the whole school was present at the explosion.

In the morning, when they were waiting for the master, the big boys

would stand up by the school wall with their hands in their pockets,

discussing the amount of canvas and the home ports of vessels passing

far out at sea. Pelle listened to them open-mouthed. It was always the

sea and what belonged to the sea that they talked about, and most of it

he did not understand. All these boys wanted the same thing when they

were confirmed—to go to sea. But Pelle had had enough of it when he

crossed from Sweden; he could not understand them.

How carefully he had always shut his eyes and put his fingers in his

ears, so that his head should not get filled with water when he dived

in the stream! But these boys swam down under the water like proper

fish, and from what they said he understood that they could dive down

in deep water and pick up stones from the bottom.

“Can you see down there, then?” he asked, in wonder.

“Yes, of course! How else would the fish be able to keep away from the

nets? If it’s only moonlight, they keep far outside, the whole shoal!”

“And the water doesn’t run into your head when you take your fingers

out of your ears?”

“Take your fingers out of your ears?”

“Yes, to pick up the stone.”

A burst of scornful laughter greeted this remark, and they began to

question him craftily; he was splendid—a regular country bumpkin! He

had the funniest ideas about everything, and it very soon came out that

he had never bathed in the sea. He was afraid of the water —a

“blue-bag”; the stream could not do away with that.

After that he was called Blue-bag, notwithstanding that he one day took

the cattle-whip to school with him and showed them how he could cut

three-cornered holes in a pair of trousers with the long lash, hit a

small stone so that it disappeared into the air, and make those loud

reports. It was all excellent, but the name stuck to him all the same;

and all his little personality smarted under it.

In the course of the winter, some strong young men came home to the

village in blue clothes and white neck-cloths. They had laid up, as it

was called, and some of them drew wages all through the winter without

doing anything. They always came over to the school to see the master;

they came in the middle of lessons, but it did not matter; Fris was joy

personified. They generally brought something or other for him—a cigar

of such fine quality that it was enclosed in glass, or some other

remarkable thing. And they talked to Fris as they would to a comrade,

told him what they had gone through, so that the listening youngsters

hugged themselves with delight, and quite unconcernedly smoked their

clay pipes in the class—with the bowl turned nonchalantly downward

without losing its tobacco. They had been engaged as cook’s boys and

ordinary seamen, on the Spanish main and the Mediterranean and many

other wonderful places. One of them had ridden up a fire-spouting

mountain on a donkey. And they brought home with them lucifer matches

that were as big, almost, as Pomeranian logs, and were to be struck on

the teeth.

The boys worshipped them and talked of nothing else; it was a great

honor to be seen in the company of such a man. For Pelle it was not to

be thought of.

And then it came about that the village was awaiting the return of one

such lad as this, and he did not come. And one day word came that bark

so-and-so had gone to the bottom with all on board. It was the winter

storms, said the boys, spitting like grown men. The brothers and

sisters were kept away from school for a week, and when they came back

Pelle eyed them curiously: it must be strange to have a brother lying

at the bottom of the sea, quite young! “Then you won’t want to go to

sea?” he asked them. Oh, yes, they wanted to go to sea, too!

Another time Fris came back after an unusually long playtime in low

spirits. He kept on blowing his nose hard, and now and then dried his

eyes behind his spectacles. The boys nudged one another. He cleared his

throat loudly, but could not make himself heard, and then beat a few

strokes on his desk with the cane.

“Have you heard, children?” he asked, when they had become more or less

quiet.

“No! Yes! What?” they cried in chorus; and one boy said: “That the

sun’s fallen into the sea and set it on fire!”

The master quietly took up his hymn-book. “Shall we sing ‘How blessed

are they’?” he said; and they knew that something must have happened,

and sang the hymn seriously with him.

But at the fifth verse Fris stopped; he could not go on any longer.

“Peter Funck is drowned!” he said, in a voice that broke on the last

word. A horrified whisper passed through the class, and they looked at

one another with uncomprehending eyes. Peter Funck was the most active

boy in the village, the best swimmer, and the greatest scamp the school

had ever had—and he was drowned!

Fris walked up and down, struggling to control himself. The children

dropped into softly whispered conversation about Peter Funck, and all

their faces had grown old with gravity. “Where did it happen?” asked a

big boy.

Fris awoke with a sigh. He had been thinking about this boy, who had

shirked everything, and had then become the best sailor in the village;

about all the thrashings he had given him, and the pleasant hours they

had spent together on winter evenings when the lad was home from a

voyage and had looked in to see his old master. There had been much to

correct, and things of grave importance that Fris had had to patch up

for the lad in all secrecy, so that they should not affect his whole

life, and—

“It was in the North Sea,” he said. “I think they’d been in England.”

“To Spain with dried fish,” said a boy. “And from there they went to

England with oranges, and were bringing a cargo of coal home.”

“Yes, I think that was it,” said Fris. “They were in the North Sea, and

were surprised by a storm; and Peter had to go aloft.”

“Yes, for the _Trokkadej_ is such a crazy old hulk. As soon as there’s

a little wind, they have to go aloft and take in sail,” said another

boy.

“And he fell down,” Fris went on, “and struck the rail and fell into

the sea. There were the marks of his sea-boots on the rail. They

braced—or whatever it’s called—and managed to turn; but it took them

half-an-hour to get up to the place. And just as they got there, he

sank before their eyes. He had been struggling in the icy water for

half-an-hour—with sea-boots and oilskins on—and yet—”

A long sigh passed through the class. “He was the best swimmer on the

whole shore!” said Henry. “He dived backward off the gunwale of a bark

that was lying in the roads here taking in water, and came up on the

other side of the vessel. He got ten rye rusks from the captain himself

for it.”

“He must have suffered terribly,” said Fris. “It would almost have been

better for him if he hadn’t been able to swim.”

“That’s what my father says!” said a little boy. “He can’t swim, for he

says it’s better for a sailor not to be able to; it only keeps you in

torture.”

“My father can’t swim, either!” exclaimed another. “Nor mine, either!”

said a third. “He could easily learn, but he won’t.” And they went on

in this way, holding up their hands. They could all swim themselves,

but it appeared that hardly any of their fathers could; they had a

superstitious feeling against it. “Father says you oughtn’t to tempt

Providence if you’re wrecked,” one boy added.

“Why, but then you’d not be doing your best!” objected a little

faltering voice. Fris turned quickly toward the corner where Pelle sat

blushing to the tips of his ears.

“Look at that little man!” said Fris, impressed. “And I declare if he

isn’t right and all the rest of us wrong! God helps those that help

themselves!”

“Perhaps,” said a voice. It was Henry Bodker’s.

“Well, well, I know He didn’t help here, but still we ought always to

do what we can in all the circumstances of life. Peter did his best—and

he was the cleverest boy I ever had.”

The children smiled at one another, remembering various things. Peter

Funck had once gone so far as to wrestle with the master himself, but

they had not the heart to bring this up. One of the bigger boys,

however, said, half for the purpose of teasing: “He never got any

farther than the twenty-seventh hymn!”

“Didn’t he, indeed?” snarled Fris. “Didn’t he, indeed? And you think

perhaps you’re clever, do you? Let’s see how far you’ve got, then!” And

he took up the hymn-book with a trembling hand. He could not stand

anything being said against boys that had left.

The name Blue-bag continued to stick to Pelle, and nothing had ever

stung him so much; and there was no chance of his getting rid of it

before the summer came, and that was a long way off.

One day the fisher-boys ran out on to the breakwater in playtime. A

boat had just come in through the pack-ice with a gruesome cargo —five

frozen men, one of whom was dead and lay in the fire-engine house,

while the four others had been taken into various cottages, where they

were being rubbed with ice to draw the frost out of them. The

farmer-boys were allowed no share in all this excitement, for the

fisher-boys, who went in and out and saw everything, drove them away if

they approached—and sold meagre information at extortionate prices.

The boat had met a Finnish schooner drifting in the sea, covered with

ice, and with frozen rudder. She was too heavily laden, so that the

waves went right over her and froze; and the ice had made her sink

still deeper. When she was found, her deck was just on a level with the

water, ropes of the thickness of a finger had become as thick as an arm

with ice, and the men who were lashed to the rigging were shapeless

masses of ice. They were like knights in armor with closed visor when

they were taken down, and their clothes had to be hacked off their

bodies. Three boats had gone out now to try and save the vessel; there

would be a large sum of money to divide if they were successful.

Pelle was determined not to be left out of all this, even if he got his

shins kicked in, and so kept near and listened. The boys were talking

gravely and looked gloomy. What those men had put up with! And perhaps

their hands or feet would mortify and have to be cut off. Each boy

behaved as if he were bearing his share of their sufferings, and they

talked in a manly way and in gruff voices. “Be off with you, bull!”

they called to Pelle. They were not fond of Blue-bags for the moment.

The tears came to Pelle’s eyes, but he would not give in, and wandered

away along the wharf.

“Be off with you!” they shouted again, picking up stones in a menacing

way. “Be off to the other bumpkins, will you!” They came up and hit at

him. “What are you standing there and staring into the water for? You

might turn giddy and fall in head first! Be off to the other yokels,

will you! Blue-bag!”

Pelle turned literally giddy, with the strength of the determination

that seized upon his little brain. “I’m no more a blue-bag than you

are!” he said. “Why, you wouldn’t even dare to jump into the water!”

“Just listen to him! He thinks you jump into the water for fun in the

middle of winter, and get cramp!”

Pelle just heard their exultant laughter as he sprang off the

breakwater, and the water, thick with ground-up ice, closed above his

head. The top of his head appeared again, he made two or three strokes

with his arms like a dog, and sank.

The boys ran in confusion up and down and shouted, and one of them got

hold of a boat-hook. Then Henry Bodker came running up, sprang in head

first without stopping, and disappeared, while a piece of ice that he

had struck with his forehead made ducks and drakes over the water.

Twice his head appeared above the ice-filled water, to snatch a breath

of air, and then he came up with Pelle. They got him hoisted up on to

the breakwater, and Henry set to work to give him a good thrashing.

Pelle had lost consciousness, but the thrashing had the effect of

bringing him to. He suddenly opened his eyes, was on his legs in a

trice, and darted away like a sandpiper.

“Run home!” the boys roared after him. “Run as hard as ever you can, or

you’ll be ill! Only tell your father you fell in!” And Pelle ran. He

needed no persuasion. When he reached Stone Farm, his clothes were

frozen quite stiff, and his trousers could stand alone when he got out

of them; but he himself was as warm as a toast.

He would not lie to his father, but told him just what had happened.

Lasse was angry, angrier than the boy had ever seen him before.

Lasse knew how to treat a horse to keep it from catching cold, and

began to rub Pelle’s naked body with a wisp of straw, while the boy lay

on the bed, tossing about under the rough handling. His father took no

notice of his groans, but scolded him. “You mad little devil, to jump

straight into the sea in the middle of winter like a lovesick woman!

You ought to have a whipping, that’s what you ought to have—a good

sound whipping! But I’ll let you off this time if you’ll go to sleep

and try to sweat so that we can get that nasty salt water out of your

body. I wonder if it wouldn’t be a good thing to bleed you.”

Pelle did not want to be bled; he was very comfortable lying there, now

that he had been sick. But his thoughts were very serious. “Supposing

I’d been drowned!” he said solemnly.

“If you had, I’d have thrashed you to within an inch of your life,”

said Lasse angrily.

Pelle laughed.

“Oh, you may laugh, you word-catcher!” snapped Lasse. “But it’s no joke

being father to a little ne’er-do-weel of a cub like you!” Saying which

he went angrily out into the stable. He kept on listening, however, and

coming up to peep in and see whether fever or any other devilry had

come of it.

But Pelle slept quietly with his head under the quilt, and dreamed that

he was no less a person than Henry Bodker.

Pelle did not learn to read much that winter, but he learned twenty and

odd hymns by heart only by using his ears, and he got the name

Blue-bag, as applied to himself, completely banished. He had gained

ground, and strengthened his position by several bold strokes; and the

school began to take account of him as a brave boy. And Henry, who as a

rule took no notice of anybody, took him several times under his wing.

Now and then he had a bad conscience, especially when his father in his

newly-awakened thirst for knowledge, came to him for the solution of

some problem or other, and he was at a loss for an answer.

“But it’s you who ought to have the learning,” Lasse would then say

reproachfully.

As the winter drew to an end, and the examination approached, Pelle

became nervous. Many uncomfortable reports were current of the severity

of the examination among the boys—of putting into lower classes and

complete dismissal from the school.

Pelle had the misfortune not to be heard independently in a single

hymn. He had to give an account of the Fall. The theft of the apple was

easy to get through, but the curse—! “And God said unto the serpent:

Upon thy belly shalt thou go, upon thy belly shalt thou go, upon thy

belly shalt thou go!” He could get no further.

“Does it still do that, then?” asked the clergyman kindly.

“Yes—for it has no limbs.”

“And can you explain to me what a limb is?” The priest was known to be

the best examiner on the island; he could begin in a gutter and end in

heaven, people said.

“A limb is—is a hand.”

“Yes, that is one. But can’t you tell me something that distinguishes

all limbs from other parts of the body? A limb is—well?—a?—a part of

the body that can move by itself, for instance? Well!”

“The ears!” said Pelle, perhaps because his own were burning.

“O-oh? Can you move your ears, then?”

“Yes.” By dint of great perseverance, Pelle had acquired that art in

the course of the previous summer, so as not to be outdone by Rud.

“Then, upon my word, I should like to see it!” exclaimed the clergyman.

So Pelle worked his ears industriously backward and forward, and the

priest and the school committee and the parents all laughed. Pelle got

“excellent” in religion.

“So it was your ears after all that saved you,” said Lasse, delighted.

“Didn’t I tell you to use your ears well? Highest marks in religion

only for moving your ears! Why, I should think you might become a

parson if you liked!”

And he went on for a long time. But wasn’t he the devil of a laddie to

be able to answer like that!