empty hands and overflowing spirits. But the most interesting people
were those who had put their boxes on a wheelbarrow, or were carrying
them by both handles. These had flushed faces, and were feverish in
their movements; they were people who had torn themselves away from
their own country-side, and their accustomed way of life, and had
chosen the town, as he himself had done.

There was one man, a cottager, with a little green chest on his
wheelbarrow; this latter was broad in the beam, and it was neatly
adorned with flowers painted by his own hand. Beside him walked his
daughter; her cheeks were red, and her eyes were gazing into the
unknown future. The father was speaking to her, but she did not look
as though she heard him. "Yes--now you must take it on you to look
out for yourself; you must think about it, and not throw yourself
away. The town is quite a good place for those who go right ahead
and think of their own advantage, but it thinks nothing of who gets
trodden underfoot. So don't be too trusting, for the people there
are wonderful clever in all sorts of tricks to take you in and trip
you up. At the same time you want to be soft-spoken and friendly."
She did not reply to this; she was apparently more taken up with
the problem of putting down her feet in their new shoes so that the
heels should not turn over.

There was a stream of people coming up from the town too. All the
forenoon Pelle had been meeting Swedes who had come that morning
in the steamer, and were now looking for a job on the land. There
were old folk, worn out with labor, and little children; there were
maidens as pretty as yellow-haired Marie, and young laborers who had
the strength of the whole world in their loins and muscles. And this
current of life was setting hither to fill up the gaps left by the