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24 "I thought of setting off to-morrow—I have some other little business with the storekeeper as well."

It was now the middle of the week, and mother knew very well that the other business could very well wait till Saturday, but she did not say anything now either, but, "the sooner the better," thought she.

And that same evening father brought in from the storehouse the big travelling chest in which grandfather, in his time, had stowed his provisions when he came from Uleaborg, and bade mother fill it with hay and lay a little cotton-wool in the middle of it. We children asked why they put nothing in the box but hay and a little wool in the middle, but she bade us hold our tongues, the whole lot of us. Father was in a better humor, and explained that he was going to bring a lamp from the storekeeper, and that it was of glass, and might be broken to bits if he stumbled or if the sledge bumped too much.

That evening we children lay awake a long time and thought of the new lamp; but old scullery-Pekka, the man who used to split up all the päreä, began to snore as soon as ever the evening päre was put out. And he did n't once ask what sort of a thing the lamp was, although we talked about it ever so much.

The journey took father all day, and a very