and had a good figure. Her eyes, beneath strongly marked, black
eyebrows, were as black as coal; and when she was angry, they could
flash fire. She was in love with the silent Jens, and was extremely
jealous, without the slightest cause. It was said that these two would
make a match when he had been on two or three more fishing expeditions,
but the matter was not officially announced at any rate, I think because
Jens made a passive resistance as long as he could, and never actually
proposed to her. French Martina was, by birth, one of the illegitimate
children of those fishing districts, whose fathers are foreign skippers
or sailors. Her father was said to have been a French sailor.

I was strictly forbidden by my father to go into the servants' hall in
the evening; he knew very well that a good many things were said there
that were not fit for children's ears. But then, on the other hand, it
was just down there that the most interesting things in the world were
talked about. The consequence was that I used to steal down secretly. I
remember how, one dark autumn evening, when I had slipped in, I
listened, while Komag-Nils--the man with the yellow hair and
death's-head grin when he laughed--told a dreadful ghost story from
Erlandsen's predecessor's time.

At that time there stood an old store-house not far from the parsonage.
One Christmas Eve they sat drinking and merry-making in the warehouse.
At eleven o'clock the ale gave out, and a man named Rasmus, who was a
strong, courageous fellow, was sent to the store-house, where the
beer-cask lay, to fill a large pewter jug, which he took with him. When
he got there, Rasmus set the lantern on the cask, and began to draw.
When the jug was full, and he was just meditating putting it to his
lips, he saw, over the beer barrel, lying with its body in the shadow,
where all the barrels stood in a row, a terribly big, broad, dark form,