bathing-place. There Barbara wheeled the perambulator with the two
children in it along the shore, and more than once the Veyergangs were
flattered by the exclamations of passers-by: "What a fine-looking
nurse!"

But there were difficulties with her, too--fits of melancholy to which
she completely gave way. She would sit by the cradle, her eyes red with
weeping, longing for her child, and would neither eat nor drink.

This was a matter of no little importance. A nurse must be kept in good
spirits; her frame of mind has such an immense influence on her health,
and that again on the health of the child.

Mrs. Veyergang had all sorts of good things brought in from the
pastry-cook's to enliven her; silk handkerchiefs and aprons abounded,
and the servants at home received injunctions to inquire after Barbara's
boy at the tinsmith's.

There was praise and nothing but praise to be given every time the
Consul-General's Lars stopped there in driving past, and when Barbara
only received a message of that kind, she could be happy and contented
the whole month.

She was made much of, as she very soon felt. If she said or wanted
anything, she was obeyed as if she were the mistress herself. And
handsome clothes with constant change of fine underclothing, not to
mention meat and drink--hardly anything of what she was accustomed to
call work, her hands had already become quite soft and supple. And she
felt that she was beginning to be attached to the two little ones whom
she tended day and night.