over the greenish-white bottom, and crowded round the lines with which
the grown-up people with their double tackle often drew up two fish at
once. In her eagerness she called me stone-blind, whenever I could not
see just the fish she meant. And short-sighted I was, too, but Susanna's
slightest movement interested me more than any fish.

The scene was indeed enchanting. The white boat rocked over its image,
as if it hung in space. Gunnar's Place, too, lay reflected in the water,
with field-patches below it, and birch-clad slopes above and around it.
The air, which had, later in the day, become misty with the heat, was
filled with the strong scent of foliage, such as is only known in the
south when it has been raining.

In less than an hour the pail was full of fish, enough for a "boiling,"
and we landed.

The minister's wife meantime had a table brought out on to the grass in
front of the house, and on the fine damask cloth she had placed several
milk-rings. She had also made _romme gröd_, [Thick cream, either sweet
or sour, boiled.] and, as far as space would permit, had loaded the
table with courses from the provision basket.

But at last the wine and good things began to confuse the sheriff's
brain a little. To the intense horror of the minister's wife, he related
how her husband, grey-haired and strict as he now was, had been an
unusually gay fellow in his youth, and how they had played many a mad
prank together.

When the sheriff found that he had made a mistake, he tried to mend
matters by a serious toast, in which he expressed a hope that, for the