below, in the skipper's garden, the three girls were wandering idly,
looking over toward the workshop, and evidently feeling bored.

Then they caught sight of him, and at once became different beings.
Manna came toward him, thrust her body impatiently against the stone
wall, and motioned to him with her lips. She threw her head back
imperiously, and stamped with her feet--but without making a sound.
The other two were bent double with suppressed laughter.

Pelle understood perfectly what this silent speech intended, but for
a time he courageously stood his ground. At last, however, he could
endure it no longer; he threw everything aside and next moment was
with the girls.

All Pelle's dreams and unuttered longings hovered over those places
where men disported themselves. To him nothing was more ridiculous
than to run after petticoats. Women, for Pelle, were really rather
contemptible; they had no strength, and very little intelligence;
indeed, they understood nothing but the art of making themselves
ornamental. But Manna and her sisters were something apart; he was
still enough of a child to play, and they were excellent playmates.

Manna--the wild cat--was afraid of nothing; with her short skirts
and her pigtail and her skipping movements she reminded him of a
frolicsome, inquisitive young bird--Skip! out of the thicket and
back again! She could climb like a boy, and could carry Pelle all
round the garden on her back; it was really an oversight that she
should have to wear skirts. Her clothes wouldn't keep on her, and
she was always tumbling into the workshop, having torn something
or other off her shoes. Then she would turn everything upside down,