gaily in red. At the mid-day rest, I go out and join him, with something
to drink, and we lie on the ground awhile, chatting and smoking.

"Painter? Not much of a one, and that's the truth," says he. "But if any
one comes along and asks if I can paint a bit of a wall, why, of course I
can. First-rate _Brandevin_ this you've got."

His wife and two children lived some four miles off, and he went home to
them every Saturday. There were two daughters besides, both grown up, and
one of them married. Grindhusen was a grandfather already. As soon as he'd
done painting Gunhild's cottage--two coats it was to have--he was going
off to the vicarage to dig a well. There was always work of some sort to
be had about the villages. And when winter set in, and the frost began to
bind, he would either take a turn of woodcutting in the forests or lie
idle for a spell, till something else turned up. He'd no big family to
look after now, and the morrow, no doubt, would look after itself just as
today.

"If I could only manage it," said Grindhusen, "I know what I'd do. I'd get
myself some bricklayer's tools."

"So you're a bricklayer, too?"

"Well, not much of a one, and that's the truth. But when that well's dug,
why, it'll need to be lined, that's clear...."

I sauntered about the island as usual, thinking of this and that. Peace,
peace, a heavenly peace comes to me in a voice of silence from every tree
in the wood. And now, look you, there are but few of the small birds left;
only some crows flying mutely from place to place and settling. And the