maintained that they had had a pleasant expedition. A Norwegian
question, which had accidentally come up between them, had
made them forget all about Alfred de Musset."

Finally, a story may be given that is told by Bjornson himself.

"I had a pair of old boots that I wanted to give to a beggar.
But just as I was going to give them to him, I began to wonder
whether Karoline had not some use for them, since she usually
gave such things to beggars. So I took the boots in my hand,
and went downstairs to ask her, but on the way I got a little
worked up because I did not quite dare to give them to the beggar
myself. And the further I went down the steps, the more wrathful
I got, until I stood over her. And then I was so angry that I had
to bluster at her as if she had done me a grievous wrong. But
she could not understand a word of what I said, and looked at me
with such amazement, that I could not keep from bursting into laughter."

From his early years, Bjornson kept in touch with the modern
intellectual movement by mingling with the people of other lands
than his own. Besides his visits to Denmark, Sweden, and Finland,
he made many lengthy sojourns in the chief continental centres
of civilization, in Munich, Rome, and Paris. The longest of
his foreign journeys was that which brought him to the United
States in the winter of 1880-81, for the purpose of addressing
his fellow countrymen in the Northwest. His home for the last
thirty years and more has been his estate of Aulestad in the
Gausdal, a region of Southern Norway. Here he has been a
model farmer, and here, surrounded by his family,--wife,
children, and grandchildren,--his patriarchal presence has