A HAPPY BOY.



CHAPTER I.


His name was Oyvind, and he cried when he was born. But no sooner did
he sit up on his mother's lap than he laughed, and when the candle was
lit in the evening the room rang with his laughter, but he cried when
he was not allowed to reach it.

"Something remarkable will come of that boy!" said the mother.

A barren cliff, not a very high one, though, overhung the house where
he was born; fir and birch looked down upon the roof, the bird-cherry
strewed flowers over it. And on the roof was a little goat belonging
to Oyvind; it was kept there that it might not wander away, and Oyvind
bore leaves and grass up to it. One fine day the goat leaped down and
was off to the cliff; it went straight up and soon stood where it had
never been before. Oyvind did not see the goat when he came out in the
afternoon, and thought at once of the fox. He grew hot all over, and
gazing about him, cried,--

"Killy-killy-killy-killy-goat!"

"Ba-a-a-a!" answered the goat, from the brow of the hill, putting its
head on one side and peering down.