hands, and temper and heart lively, good, affectionate! Oh! she was in short an angel of God! The little chamber, which Susanna inhabited with her little Hulda, and which she herself had changed from an unused lumber-room into a pretty chamber, and whose walls she herself painted, she painted now from memory yet once more for Harald; and the bed of the little Hulda was surrounded with a light-blue muslin curtain, and how a sunbeam stole into the chamber in the morning, in order to shine on the pillow of the child, and to kiss her little curly head. How roguish was the little one when Susanna came in late at night to go to bed, and cast her first glance on the bed in which her darling lay. But she saw her not, for Hulda drew her little head under the coverlet to hide herself from her sister. Susanna then would pretend to seek for the little one; but she needed only to say with an anxious voice, "where—ah, where is my little Hulda?" in order to decoy forth the head of the little one, to see her arms stretched out, and to hear her say, "here I am, Sanna! here is thy little Hulda!" And she had then her little darling in her arms, and pressed her to her heart; then was Susanna happy, and forgot all the cares and the fatigues of the day.

At the remembrance of these hours Susanna's tears often flowed, and prevented her remarking the tearful glow which sometimes lit up Harald's eyes.

Harald, however, had also his relations; not, it is true, of so tender a nature, but yet interesting enough to lay claim to all Susanna's attention, and to give us occasion to commence a new chapter.

EVENING HOURS.

I like the life, where rule and line appeareth,
In the mill's clapping and the hammer's blow;
I give to him the path who burthens beareth,
He worketh for a useful end I know.
But he, who for the klip-klap never heareth
The call of bells to feeling's holiday—
Hath but sham-life, mechanically moving,
Soul-less he is, unconscious and unloving.
Fly agile arrow, rattling in thy speeding
Over the busy emmet's roof of clay,
And waken spiritual life!
Foss.

Harald related willingly, and related uncommonly well;—an entertaining and a happy gift, which one often meets with in Norway among all classes, both in men and women, and which they appear to have inherited from their ancestors the Scalds; and besides this, he was well acquainted with the natural wonders and legends of the mountain region.

And it is precisely in mountain regions where the most beautiful blossoms of the people's poetry have sprung as if from her heart. The ages of the Sagas and the heathens have left behind their giant traces. River and mountain have their traditions of spectres and transformations; giant "cauldrons" resound in the mountains, and monumental stones are erected over warriors, who "buckled on their belts," and fell in single combat. From Hallingdal went forth the national Polska (the Halling), and only the Hardanger-fela (the Hallingdal fiddle) can rightly give its wild, extraordinary melody. Most beautiful are the flowers of remembrance which the Christian antiquity exhibits, and the eternal snow upon the crowns of the ancient mountains is not more imperishable than these innocent roses at their feet. So long as Gausta stands, and the Rjukan sings his thunder-song, will the memory of Mari-Stien live, and his tales of joy and sorrow be told; so long as the ice-sea of Folgefond rests over his silent, dark secrets,[1] so long will the little island become green, of which it is said, that it is eternally wetted with the tears of true love.

Be it who it may—they who write with their own life, song and legend, who express the depths of being by the silent but mighty language of deeds—they are the real authors, the first poets of the earth. In the second rank stand those who relate that which the others have lived.

When the day's work was over, and Mrs. Astrid had again betaken herself to her chamber after her slight evening meal, it gave Harald great pleasure to read aloud or to relate histories to Susanna, whilst she sewed, or her spinning-wheel hummed often in lively emulation of Larina and Karina, and whilst the flames of the fire danced up the chimney, and threw their warm joyous gleams over the assembled company. It pleased Harald infinitely to have Susanna for his auditor, to hear her exclamation of childish terror and astonishment, or also her hearty laughter, or to see her tears over his now merry and now sorrowful tales.

How deeply was Susanna's heart touched by the relation of Mari-Stien, whose path over the mountain on the edge of the abyss of Rjukan-force, which in these days the traveller treads with dread, was discovered by a young girl guided by the courage of love. It was by this path that the beautiful Mary of Vestfjordal went with light and firm foot to meet the friend of her childhood and her beloved, Ejstein Halfvordsen. But the avarice of her father separated them, and Mary's tears and prayers obliged Ejstein to fly, in order to escape the schemes of a treacherous rival against his life. Years passed on, and Mary remained steadfast in her faith. Her father died. Ejstein had, by his bravery and his magnanimity, made his former enemy his friend, and the lovers were now about to meet after a long separation, never again to be divided. Ejstein hastened by the shorter road of the Mari-Stien to meet his beloved. Long had she awaited him. She saw him coming, and his name escaped her with a cry of joy. He saw her—stretched forth his arms, as his whole soul, eagerly towards her, and he forgot—that he had no pinions. He fell, and the Rjukan swallowed him in its foaming depths. For many years after this there wandered daily upon Mari-Stien, a pale figure, whose beautiful features spoke of silent insanity, and stood bent down over the stream, and seemed to talk with some one down in its depths. With melancholy joy in her countenance returned she ever from her wandering, and said to her people in the cottage, "I have spoken with him, and he besought me to come to him every day, and to tell him how I love. It would be wrong to refuse him this; he is so good and loves me so truly."

Thus went she, even when the wind blew her silver hair around her wrinkled cheeks; thus she went until a merciful voice called the weary wanderer to ascend the path of heaven to rest and joy, in the arms of the beloved.

Less mournful, but not the less interesting for Susanna, was the old legend of Halgrim.

Stormannadauen (the Black Death) had raged through Norway, and cut off more than two-thirds of its population, and desolated whole extents of country and large populous districts. In Uldvig's Valley, in Hardanger, a young peasant of the name of Halgrim alone, of all the people who had died there, remained alive. He raised himself from the sick bed on which he lay surrounded by the dead, and went out in order to seek for living people.

It was spring, and the larks sang loud in the blue clear air; the birch-wood clothed itself in tender green; the stream, with its melting snow-drifts, wound down the mountains singing on its way; but no plough furrowed the loosened earth, and from the heights was heard no wood-horn calling the cattle at feeding time. All was still and dead in the habitations of men. Halgrim