and air was certainly required there, as they all acknowledged. They
felt they wanted airing, and consequently they came out into the air, and
mainrna-in-law and the young couple travelled to Italy.

" Thank Heaven that we are in our own four walls again," was the
exclamation of mother and daughter when they came home a year after.

"There's no pleasure in travelling," said mamma-in-law. "To tell
the truth, it 's very wearisome I beg pardon for saying so. I found
the time hang heavy, although I had my children with me ; and it 's
expensive work, travelling, very expensive ! And all those galleries one
has to see, and the quantity of things you are obliged to run after!
You must do it for decency's sake, for you're sure to be asked when
you come back ; and then you 're sure to be told that you 've omitted
to see what was best worth seeing. I got tired at last of those endless
Madonnas : one seemed to be turning a Madonna oneself! "

" And what bad living you get ! " said Kala.

' Yes," replied mamma, " no such thing as an honest meat soup. It 's
miserable trash, their cookery."

And the travelling fatigued Kala : she was always fatigued, that was
the worst of it. Sophy was taken into the house, where her presence
was a real advantage.

Mamma-in-law acknowledged that Sophy understood both house-
wifery and art, though a knowledge of the latter could not be expected



The Bishop of Borglum and his Warriors. 517

from a person of her limited means ; and she was, moreover, an honest,
faithful girl : she showed that thoroughly while Kala lay sick fading
away.

Where the case is everything, the case should be strong, or else all is
over. And all was over with the case Kala died.

"She was beautiful," said mamma; ' ; she was quite different from the
antiques, for they are so damaged. A beauty ought to be perfect, and
Kala was a perfect beauty."

Alfred wept, and mamma wept, and both of them wore mourning.
The black dress suited mamma very well, and she wore mourning the
longest. Moreover, she had soon to experience another grief in seeing
Alfred marry again marry Sophy, who had no appearance at all.

" He 's gone to the very extreme," cried mamma-in-law ; " he has gone
from the most beautiful to the ugliest, and has forgotten his first wife.
Men have no endurance. My husband was of a different stamp, and he
died before me."

" Pygmalion received his Galatea. " said Alfred : " yes, that 's what
they said in the wedding song. I had once really fallen in love with the
beautiful statue, which awoke to life in my arms ; but the kindred soul
which Heaven sends down to us, the angel who can feel and sympathize
with and elevate us, I have not found and won till now. You came,
Sophy, not in the glory of outward beauty, though you are fair, fairer
than is needful. The chief thing remains the chief. You came to
teach the sculptor that his work is but clay and dust, only an outward
form in a fabric that passes away, and that we must seek the essence,
the internal spirit. Poor Kala ! ours was but wayfarers' life. Yonder,
where we shall know each other by sympathy, we shall be half strangers."

" That was not lovingly spoken," said Sophy, " not spoken like a true
Christian. Yonder, where there is no giving in marriage, but where,
as you say, souls attract each other by sympathy ; there where every-
thing beautiful developes itself and is elevated, her soul may acquire
such completeness that it may sound more harmoniously than mine ;
and you will then once more utter the first rapturous exclamation of
your love, ' Beautiful most beautiful ! '



THE BISHOP OF BORGLUM AND HIS WARRIORS.

OUR scene is laid in Northern Jutland, in the so-called "wild moor."
We hear what is called the " "Wester- wow- wow " the peculiar roar of
the Xorth Sea as it breaks against the western coast of Jutland. It
rolls and thunders with a sound that penetrates for miles into the land;
and we are quite near the roaring. Before us rises a great mound of
sand a mountain we have long seen, and towards which we are wend-
ing our way, driving slowly along through the deep sand. On this
mountain of sand is a lofty old building the convent of Borglum. In



518 Stories for the Household,

one of its wings (the larger one) there is still a church. And at this
convent we now arrive in the late evening hour ; but the weather is
clear in the bright June night around us, and the eye can range far, far
over field and moor to the Bay of Aalborg, over heath and meadow, and
far across the deep blue sea.

Now we are there, and roll past between barns and other farm build-
ings ; and at the left of the gate we turn aside to the old Castle Farm,
where the lime trees stand in lines along the walls, and, sheltered from
the wind and weather, grow so luxuriantly that their twigs and leaves
almost conceal the windows.

We mount the winding staircase of stone, and march through the
long passages under the heavy roof-beams. The wind moans very
strangely here, both within and without. It is hardly known how, but
the people say yes, people say a great many things when they are
frightened or want to frighten others they say that the old dead
choir-men glide silently past us into the church, where mass is sung.
They can be heard in the rushing of the storm, and their singing brings
up strange thoughts in the hearers thoughts of the old times into
which we are carried back.

On the coast a ship is stranded ; and the bishop's warriors are there,
and spare not those whom the sea has spared. The sea washes away
the blood that has flowed from the cloven skulls. The stranded goods
belong to the bishop, and there is a store of goods here. The sea casts
up tubs and barrels filled with costly wine for the convent cellar, and
in the convent is already good store of beer and mead. There is plenty
in the kitchen dead game and poultry, hams and sausages ; and fat fish
swim in the ponds without.

The Bishop of Borglum is a mighty lord. He has great possessions,
but still he longs for more everything must bow before the mighty
Olaf Grlob. His rich cousin at Thyland is dead, and his widow is to
have the rich inheritance. But how comes it that one relation is always
harder towards another than even strangers would be ? The widow's
husband had possessed all Tbyland, with the exception of the Church
property. Her son was not at home. In his boyhood he had already
started on a journey, for his desire was to see foreign lands and strange
people. For years there had been no news of him. Perhaps he had
long been laid in the grave, and would never come back to his home, to
rule where his mother then ruled.

" What has a woman to do with rule ? " said the bishop.

He summoned the widow before a law court ; but what did he gain
thereby ? The widow had never been disobedient to the law, and was
strong in her just rights.

Bishop Olaf of Borglum, what dost thou purpose ? What writest
"ihou on yonder smooth parchment, sealing it with thy seal, and intrust-
ing it to the horsemen and servants, who ride away far away to the
city of the Pope ?

_It is the time of falling leaves and of stranded ships, and soon icy
winter will come.




JE-NS GLOB MtEIS HIS



Twice had icy winter returned before the bishop welcomed the horse-
men and servants back to their home. They came from Eome with a
papal decree a ban, or bull, against the widow who had dared to offend
the pious bishop. " Cursed be she and all that belongs to her. Let
her be expelled from the congregation and the Church. Let no man
stretch forth a helping hand to her, and let friends and relations avoid
her as a plague and a pestilence ! "

"What will not bend must break," said the Bishop of Burglum.



520 Stories for the Household.

And all forsake the widow ; but she holds fast to her God. He is
her helper and defender.

One servant only an old niaid remained faithful to her; and,
with the old servant, the widow herself followed the plough ; and the
crop grew, although the land had been cursed by the Pope and by the
bishop.

"Thou child of perdition, I will yet carry out my purpose!" cried
the Bishop of Borgluni. " Now will I lay the hand of the Pope upon
thee, to summon thee before the tribunal that shall condemn thee !

Then did the widow yoke the two last oxen that remained to her to a
waggon, and mounted up on the waggon, with her old servant, and
travelled away across the heath out of the Danish land. As a stranger
she came into a foreign country, where a strange tongue was spoken
and where new customs prevailed. Farther and farther she journeyed,
to where green hills rise into mountains, and the vine clothes their sides.
Strange merchants drive by her, and they look anxiously after their
waggons laden with merchandise. They fear an attack from the armed
followers of the robber-knights. The two poor women, in their humble
vehicle drawn by two black oxen, travel fearlessly through the dangerous
sunken road and through the darksome forest. And now they were in
Franconia. And there met them a stalwart knight, with a train of
twelve armed followers. He paused, gazed at the strange vehicle, and
questioned the women as to the goal of their journey and the place
whence they came. Then one of them mentioned Thyland in Denmark;
and spoke of her sorrows of her woes which were soon to cease,
for so Divine Providence had willed it. For the stranger knight is the
widow's son ! He seized her hand, he embraced her, and the mother
wept. For years she had not been able to weep, but had only bitten
her lips till the blood started.

It is the time of falling leaves and of stranded ships, and soon will
icy winter come.

" The sea rolled wine-tubs to the shore for the bishop's cellar. In the
kitchen the deer roasted on the spit before the fire. At Borgluni it was
warm and cheerful in the heated rooms, while cold winter raged without,
when a piece of news was brought to the bishop : " Jens Glob, of Thy-
land, has come back, and his mother with him." Jens Glob laid a com-
plaint against the bishop, and summoned him before the temporal and
the spiritual court.

" That will avail him little," said the bishop. " Best leave off thy
efforts, knight Jens."

Again it is the time of falling leaves, of stranded ships icy winter
comes again, and the " white bees" are swarming, and sting the traveller's
face till they melt.

" Keen weather to-day !" say the people, as they step in.

Jens Glob stands so deeply wrapped in thought that he singes the
skirt of his wide garment.



The Bishop of Borglum and his Warriors. 521

" Thou Borglum bishop," he exclaims, " I shall subdue thee after all !
Under the shield of the Pope, the law cannot reach thee ; but Jens
Glob shall reach thee ! "

Then he writes a letter to his brother-in-law, Olaf Hase, in Sailing-
land, and prays that knight to meet him on Christmas-eve, at mass, in
the church at Widberg. The bishop himself is to read the mass, and
consequently will journey from Borglum to Thyland ; and this is known
to Jens Glob.

Moorland and meadow are covered with ice and snow. The marsh
will bear horse and rider, the bishop with his priests and armed men.
They ride the shortest way, through the waving reeds, where the wind
moans sadly.

Blow thy brazen trumpet, thou trumpeter clad in fox-skin ! it sounds
merrily in the clear air. So they ride on over heath and moorland -
over what is the garden of Fata Morgana in the hot summer, though
now icy, like all the country towards the church of Widberg.

The wind is blowing his trumpet too blowing it harder and harder.
He blows up a storm a terrible storm that increases more and
more. Towards the church they ride, as fast as they may through the
storm. The church stands firm, but the storm careers on over field and
moorland, over land and sea.

Borglum's bishop reaches the church ; but Olaf Hase will scarce do
so, hard as he may ride. He journeys with his warriors on the farther
side of the bay, to help Jens Glob, now that the bishop is to be sum-
moned before the judgment seat of the Highest.

The church is the judgment hall ; the altar is the council table. The
lights burn clear in the heavy brass candelabra. The storm reads out
the accusation and the sentence, roaming in the air over moor and
heath, and over the rolling waters. JS^o ferry-boat can sail over the bay
in such weather as this.

Olaf Hase makes halt at Ottesworde. There he dismisses his warriors,
presents them with their horses and harness, and gives them leave to
ride home and greet his wife. He intends to risk his life alone in the
roaring waters ; but they are to bear witness for him that it is not his
fault if Jens Glob stands without reinforcement in the church at "Wid-
berg. The faithful warriors will not leave him, but follow him out into
the deep waters. Ten of them are carried away ; but Olaf Hase and
two of the youngest men reach the farther side. They have still four
miles to ride.

It is past midnight. It is Christmas. The wind has abated. Tht
church is lighted up ; the gleaming radiance shines through the window-
frames, and pours out over meadow and heath. The mass has long been
finished, silence reigns in the church, and the wax is heard dropping
from the candles to the stone pavement. And now Olaf Hase arrives.

In the forecourt Jens Glob greets him kindly, and says,

" I have just made an agreement with the bishop."

" Sayest thou so_? " replied Olaf Hase. " Then neither thou nor the
bishop shall quit this church alive."



522 Stories for the Household.

And the sword leaps from the scabbard, and Olaf Hase deals a blow
that makes the panel of the church door, which Jens Glob hastily closes
between them, fly in fragments.

" Hold, brother ! First hear what the agreement was that I made.
I have slain the bishop and his warriors and priests. They will have no
word more to say in the matter, nor will I speak again of all the wrong
that my mother has endured."

The long wicks of the altar lights glimmer red ; but there is a redder
gleam upon the pavement, where the bishop lies with cloven skull, and
his dead warriors around him, in the quiet of the holy Christmas night.

And four days afterwards the bells toll for a funeral in the convent of
Borglum. The murdered bishop and the slain warriors and priests are
displayed under a black canopy, surrounded by candelabra decked with
crape. There lies the dead man, in the black cloak wrought with silver ;
the crosier in the powerless hand that was once so mighty. The incense
rises in clouds, and the monks chant the funeral hymn. It sounds like a
wail it sounds like a sentence of wrath and condemnation that must
be heard far over the land, carried by the wind sung by the wind
the wail that sometimes is silent, but never dies ; for ever again it rises
in song, singiug even into our own time this legend of the Bishop of'
Borglum and his hard nephew. It is heard in the dark night by the
frightened husbandman, driving by in the heavy sandy road past the
convent of Borglum. It is heard by the sleepless listener in the thickly-
walled rooms at Borglum. And not only to the ear of superstition is
the sighing and the tread of hurrying feet audible in the long echoing
passages leading to the convent door that has long been locked. The
door still seems to open, and the lights seem to flame in the brazen
candlesticks ; the fragrance of incense arises ; the church gleams in its
ancient splendour ; and the monks sing and say the mass over the slain
bishop, who lies there in the black silver-embroidered mantle, with the
crozier in his powerless hand ; and on his pale proud forehead gleams
the red wound like fire, and there burn the worldly mind and the wicked
thoughts.

Sink down into his grave into oblivion ye terrible shapes of the
times of old !

Hark to the raging of the angry wind, sounding above the rolling
sea ! A storm approaches without, calling aloud for human lives. The
sea has not put on a new mind with the new time. This night it is a
horrible pit to devour up lives, and to-morrow, perhaps, it may be a
glassy mirror even as in the old time that we have buried. Sleep
sweetly, if thou canst sleep !

Xow it is morning.

The new time flings sunshine into the room. The wind still keeps up
mightily. A wreck is announced as in the old time.

During the night, down yonder by Lokken, the little fishing village
with the red-tiled roofs we can see it up here from the window a
ship has come ashore. It has struck, and is fast imbedded in the sand ;



Tkt Butterfly. 523

but the rocket apparatus has thrown a rope on board, and formed a
bridge from the wreck to the mainland ; and all on board are saved, and
reach the land, and are wrapped in warm blankets ; and to-day they are
invited to the farm at the convent of Borglum. In comfortable rooms
they encounter hospitality and friendly faces. They are addressed in thu
language of their country, and the piano sounds for them with melodies
of their native land ; and before these have died away, the chord has
been struck, the wire of thought that reaches to the land of the suft'erers
announces that they are rescued. Then their anxieties are dispelled ;
and at even they join in the dance at the feast given in the great hall
at Borglum. Waltzes and Styrian dances are given, and Danish popular
songs, and melodies of foreign lands in these modern times.

Blessed be thou, new time ! Speak thou of summer and of purer
gales ! Send thy sunbeams gleaming into our hearts and thoughts !
On thy glowing canvas let them be painted the dark legends of the
rough hard times that are past !



THE BUTTERFLY.

THE Butterfly wished for a bride ; and, as may well be imagined, he
wanted to select a very pretty one from among the flowers ; therefore
he threw a critical glance at all the flower-beds, and found that every
flower sat quietly and demurely on her stalk, just as a maiden ought to
sit before she is engaged ; but there were a great many of them, and
the choice threatened to become wearisome. The Butterfly did not care
to take much trouble, and consequently he flew off" on a visit to the
daisies. The French call this floweret " Marguerite," and they know
that Marguerite can prophecy, when lovers pluck off its leaves, and
ask of every leaf they pluck some question concerning their lovers.
" Heartily ? Painfully ? Loves me much ? A little ? Not at all ? "
and so on. Every one asks in his own language. The Butterfly came
to Marguerite too, to inquire ; but he did not pluck off her leaves : he
kissed each of them, for he considered that most is to be done with
kindness.

"Darling Marguerite daisy!" he said to her, "you are the wisest
woman among the flowers. Pray, pray tell me, shall I get this one or
that ? Which will be my bride ? When I know that, I will directly
fly to her and propose for her."

But Marguerite did not answer him. She was angry that he had
called her a " woman," when she was yet a girl ; and there is a great
difference. He asked for the second and for the third time, and when
she remained dumb, and answered him not a word, he would wait no
longer, but flew away to begin his wooing at once.

It was in the beginning of spring ; the crocus and the snowdrop were
blooming around.



524



Stories for the Household.



" They are very pretty," thought the Butterfly. " Charming little
lasses, but a little too much of the schoolgirl about them." Like all
young lads, he looked out for the elder girls.

Then he flew off to tlie anemones. These were a little too bitter for
his taste ; the violet somewhat too sentimental ; the lime blossoms were
too small, and, moreover, they had too many relations ; the apple
blossoms they looked like roses, but they bloomed to-day, to fall oft"
to-morrow, to fall beneath the first wind that blew ; and he thought
that a marriage with them would last too short a time. The Pease
Blossom pleased him best of all : she was white and red, and graceful
and delicate, and belonged to the domestic maidens who look well, and
at the same time are useful in the kitchen. He was just about to make




THE BUTTERFLY IN SEARCH OF A BRIDE.



his offer, when close by the maiden he saw a pod at whose end hung a
withered flower.

"Who is that?" he asked.

" That is my sister," replied the Pease Blossom.

" Oh, indeed ; and you will get to look like her ! " he said.

And away he flew, for he felt quite shocked.

The honeysuckle hung forth blooming from the hedge, but there was
a number of girls like that, with long faces and sallow complexions.
No, he did not like her.

But which one did he like ?

The spring went by, and the summer drew towards its close ; it was
autumn, but he was still undecided.

And now the flowers appeared in their most gorgeous robes, but in
vain they had lost the fresh fragrant air of youth. But the heart
demands fragrance, even when it is no longer young, and there is very
little of that to be found among the dahlias and dry chrysanthemums,
therefore the Butterfly turned to the Mint on the ground.



Anne Lisbeth. 525

You see, this plant has no blossom ; but indeed it is blossom all over,
full of fragrance from head to foot, with flower scent in every leaf.
" I shall take her," said the Butterfly.
And he made an offer for her.

But the Mint stood silent and stiff, listening to him. At last she said,
" Friendship, if you please, but nothing more. I am old, and you are
old, but we may very well live for one another ; but as to marrying no
don't let us appear ridiculous at our age."

And thus it happened that the Butterfly had no wife at all. He had
been too long choosing, and that is a bad plan. So the Butterfly became
what we call an old bachelor.

It was late in autumn, with rain and cloudy weather. The wind blew
cold over the backs of the old willow trees, so that they creaked again.
It was no weather to be flying about in summer clothes, nor, indeed, was
the Butterfly in the open air. He had got under shelter by chance,
where there was fire in the stove and the heat of summer. He could
live well enough, but he said,

" It 's not enough merely to live. One must have freedom, sunshine,
and a little flower."

And he flew against the window-frame, and was seen and admired, and
then stuck upon a pin and placed in the box of curiosities ; they could
not do more for him.

"Now I am perched on a stalk, like the flowers," said the Butterfly.
"It certainly is not very pleasant. It must be something like being
married, for one is stuck fast."

And he consoled himself in some measure with the thought.
"That 's very poor comfort," said the potted Plants in the room.
"But," thought the Butterfly, "one cannot well trust these potted
Plants. They 've had too much to do with mankind."



ANNE LISBETH.

LISBETH had a colour like milk and blood ; young, fresh, and
merry, she looked beautiful, with gleaming white teeth and clear eyes ;
her footstep was light in the dance, and her mind was lighter still. And
what came of it all ? Her son was an ugly brat ! Yes, he was not
pretty ; so he was put out to be nursed by the labourer's wife. Anne
Lisbeth was taken into the count's castle, and sat there in the splendid
room arrayed in silks and velvets ; not a breath of wind might blow
upon her, and no one was allowed to speak a harsh word to her. No,
that might not be, for she was nurse to the count's child, which was
delicate and fair as a prince, and beautiful as an angel ; and how she
loved this child ! Her own boy was provided for at the labourer's, where
the mouth boiled over more frequently than the pot, and where, in
general, no one was at home to take care of the child. Then he would



526 Stories for the Household.

cry; but what nooody knows, that nobody cares for; and he would cry
till he was tired, and then he fell asleep ; and in sleep one feels neither
hunger nor thirst. A capital invention is sleep.

With years, just as weeds shoot up, Anne Lisbeth's child grew, but
yet they said his growth was stunted ; but he had quite become a mem-
ber of the family in which he dwelt ; they had received money to keep
him. Aune Lisbeth was rid of him for good. She had become a town
lady, and had a comfortable home of her own ; and out of doors she wore
a bonnet when she went out for a walk ; but she never walked out to
see the labourer that was too far from the town ; and indeed she had
nothing to go for : the boy belonged to the labouring people, and she said
he could eat his food, and he should do something to earn his food, and
consequently he kept Matz's red cow. He could already tend cattle
and make himself useful.

The big dog, by the yard gate of the nobleman's mansion, sits proudly