Page:A Picture-book without Pictures and Other Stories (1848).djvu/145

 had he laid his hand upon his heart, and said this to himself. The sun burnt hotly, and therefore he had turned the woolly side of his sheepskin outwards; his silver white hair hung around his characteristic brown countenance. He had got a new piece of linen, a shirt, and he was now preparing it for wear, according to his own fashion, which was this: he rubbed the fat of a piece of bacon into it; by this means it would keep clean so much the longer, and he could turn it first on one side and then on the other.

His grandson, a healthy-looking lad, whose long black hair was smoothed with the same kind of pomatum which the old man used to his shirt, stood just by, leaning on a staff. A long leathern bag hung on his shoulder. He also was a swineherd, and this very evening was going on board a vessel, which, towed by the steamboat Eros, was taking a freight of pigs to the imperial city of Vienna.

“You will be there in five days,” said the old man. “When I was a young fellow, like you, it used to take six weeks for the journey. Step by step we went on through marshy roads, through forests, and over rocks. The