Page:Stories by Foreign Authors (Scandinavian).djvu/42

34 now see by a single light, let them be never so many.

When mother observed that the lesser chandelier in church scarcely gave a better light, father bade me take my ABC book, and go to the door to see if I could read it there. I went and began to read: "Our Father." But then they all said: "The lad knows that by heart." Mother then stuck a hymn-book in my hand, and I set off with "By the Waters of Babylon."

"Yes; it is perfectly marvellous!" was the testimony of the townsfolk.

Then said father: "Now if any one had a needle, you might throw it on the floor and you would see that it would be found at once."

The magistrate's step-daughter had a needle in her bosom, but when she threw it on the floor, it fell into a crack, and we could n't find it at all—it was so small.

It was only after the townsfolk had gone that Pekka came in.

He blinked a bit at first at the unusual lamp-light, but then calmly proceeded to take off his jacket and rag boots.

"What's that twinkling in the roof there enough to put your eyes out?" he asked at last, when he had hung his stockings up on the rafters.

"Come now, guess what it is," said father, and he winked at mother and us.