Page:Tales from the Fjeld.djvu/402

380 had a baby, and he took it and carried it off as soon as ever it came into the world. Then she got more and more dull, and begged she might have leave to go home and see her parents. Well, there were nothing to stop that; but first, she had to give her word that she would listen to what her father said, but not do what her mother wished. So she went home; and when they were alone with her, and she had told how she was treated, her mother wanted to give her a light to take back that she might see what kind of man he was.

But her father said, "No, she mustn't do that, for it will lead to harm, and not to gain."

But however it happened, so it happened; she got a bit of a candle-end to take with her when she started.

So the first thing she did when he was sound asleep was to light the candle-end and throw a light on him; and he was so lovely, she never though she could gaze enough at him; but as she held the candle over him, a hot drop of tallow dropped on his forehead, and he woke up.

"What is this you have done?" he said. "Now you have made us both unlucky; there was no more than a month left, and had you lasted it out, I should have been saved; for a hag of the Trolls has bewitched me, and I am a white bear by day. But now it is all over between us, for now I must go to her and take her to wife."

She wept and bemoaned herself; but he must set off, and he would set off. Then she asked if she might not go with him. "No," he said, "there was no way of doing that." But for all that, when he set off in his