salvation, and then see what she must be."--"My child shall not be other than that I will she shall be."--"Yes she shall; she shall be what God wills."--Gunlaug was silenced: "What is that to say?" she said and came nearer.--"It is, that she must learn what she is capable of by her natural abilities, for therefore has God given them."--Gunlaug now drew quite near. "Then must not I direct her, I, who am her mother?" she asked, as if she really wished to learn.--"That you must, but you must respect the advice of those who know better; you must listen to the will of God."--Gunlaug stood still a moment. "But if she learnt too much," she said; "a poor man's child!" she added and looked tenderly at her daughter.--"If she learns too much for her station, she has thereby reached a higher one."--She quickly saw his meaning, and said as if to herself, while she looked more and more anxiously at the child: "But this is dangerous."--"The question is not about that, he said mildly, but about what is right."--Her deep eyes took a strange expression; she looked again piercingly at him; but there lay so much of truth in his voice, words, countenance, that Gunlaug felt herself defeated. She went across to the child, laid her hand on her head, and could not speak.

"I shall read with her until she is confirmed," he said as if to help her; "I wish to take this child in hand."--"And you will take her away from me?"--He hesitated and looked at her inquiringly.--"You must understand it better than I," she struggled to say; "but if it was not that you named our Lord,"--she stopped; she had smoothed her daughter's hair, and now she took a handkerchief and tied round her neck. She did not say in any other way that the child should go with him, and she hastened back into the house as if she wished not to see it.

This behaviour made him feel suddenly anxious at that which in his youthful ardour he had taken upon himself. The child, too, was afraid of the one who for the first time had overcome her mother, and so with this natural fear they went to their first lesson.

From day to day, however, it seemed to him that she grew in wisdom and knowledge, and at times his conversation with her, assumed of themselves quite a peculiar tone. He often drew her attention to characters in sacred and profane history in pointing out the CALLING that God had given them. He would dwell upon Saul who was leading a wild roving life, and upon a lad like David who was tending his father's sheep, until Samuel came and laid the hand of the Lord upon them. But the greatest calling of all, was when the Lord himself was upon earth, when he stopped at the fishing village, and called, and the poor fishermen arose and went--to poverty, as to death, but always joyfully; for the feeling of a call carries through all adversities.

These thoughts followed her so, that at last she could bear these things no longer, and asked him about her own calling. He looked at her till she blushed, then answered her that we must reach our calling through work; it may be modest and simple, but it is there for all. Then she was seized with an eager zeal; it made her work with the power of a grown person, it upset her play, she grew quite thin. She got romantic longings; she would cut her hair, clothe herself like a boy, and go out to battle. But as her teacher said one day that her hair was beautiful if only it was nicely kept, she began to think much of it, and for the sake of her long hair she sacrificed the name of a hero.

Afterwards it was more to her than before to be a girl, and her studies went quietly on, canopied by changing dreams.

III.

READY FOR CONFIRMATION.

Hans Odegaard had gone out as a young man from the hamlet of Odegaard in Bergen's shire; people had taken to him, and he was now a learned man and a strict preacher. He was besides an influential man, not so much in words as in deeds; for, as it was said, he "never forgot." This man who by perseverance pushed everything through, was however stopped in a way that he least expected, and where it was most painful.

He had three daughters and one son. Hans, the son, was the light of the school, and it was his father's daily pleasure to prepare him himself. Hans had a friend whom he helped to get the second place, and who therefore, save his mother, loved him more than all the world. They went together to school and to the university; they passed the two first examinations together, and were then to study for the same profession. One day as they were going joyfully down stairs after their studies, Hans, in an outburst of high spirits and glee, threw himself upon his companion's back, thereby causing him a fall, which some days later ended in his death. When dying he begged his mother, who was a widow, and now lost her only son, to fulfil his last request and take Hans up in his place. Almost immediately after the mother died, but her very considerable fortune was left to Hans Odegaard.

It was years before Hans could recover himself after this. A long tour on the continent so far restored him, that he could resume his theological studies; but on his return home, he could not be persuaded to make use of his examinations.

The father's greatest hope had been to see him as his assistant in the ministry, but he could not now be persuaded to enter the pulpit a single time; he gave always the same reply: "he felt no calling:" this was so bitter a disappointment to the father, that it made him several years older. He had commenced late in life, and was already an old man; he had worked hard, and always with this end in view. Now the son occupied the largest part of the house, handsomely furnished, while down below in his little study, by the lamp that lightened the night of age, sat the hard-working old father.

After this disappointment, he neither could nor would take other help, neither would he give in to his son, and relinquish altogether; therefore, summer or winter, he knew no rest; but each year the son took a longer tour abroad. When he was at home he associated with no one, except that in silence, greater or less, he dined at his father's table. If any began to converse with him, they were met by a superior clearness and earnestness for the truth, that made them always feel the conversation a little embarrassing. He never went to church, but he gave more than half his income to benevolent objects, and always with the most express injunctions as to its appropriation.

This beneficence was so different in its scale from the narrow customs of the little town that it won the hearts of all. Add to this, his reserve, his frequent journey abroad, the hesitation all felt in conversing with him, and one can easily understand that he was regarded as a mysterious being to which each added all possible qualities, and his own best judgment. Therefore when he condescended to take the Fisher Girl under his daily care, she was ennobled by it.

Every one, especially women, seemed anxious to show her some favour. One day she came to him clad in all the colours of the rainbow; she had put on her presents, thinking she would now be really to his taste, as he always wished her to be neat. But he had scarcely glanced at her, before he forbade her ever to receive presents; he called her vain, foolish: her aims were shallow, she took pleasure in folly.

When she came next morning, with eyes that told a tale of weeping, he took her with him a walk above the town. He told her about David in such a manner that he took now this, now that incident, and made the well-known story anew. First, he depicted him in his youth, beautiful and rich in talent, and in