should be alive to these
considerations I can more or less understand--it's in a way his duty;
but for a sensitive, womanly heart, in the heyday of sentiment!--No, no,
Marie; for heaven's sake, don't let these sordid money-questions darken
your happiness."

"Oh, no!" cried Miss Louisa.

"And, besides," Mrs. Olsen chimed in, "your _fiance_ is by no means so
badly off. My husband and I began life on much less.--I know you'll say
that times were different then. Good heavens, we all know that! What I
can't understand is that you don't get tired of telling us so. Don't you
think that we old people, who have gone through the transition period,
have the best means of comparing the requirements of to-day with those
of our youth? You can surely understand that with my experience of
house-keeping, I'm not likely to disregard the altered conditions of
life; and yet I assure you that the salary your intended receives
from my husband, with what he can easily earn by extra work, is quite
sufficient to set up house upon."

Mrs. Olsen had become quite eager in her argument, though no one thought
of contradicting her. She had so often, in conversations of this sort,
been irritated to hear people, and especially young married women,
enlarging on the ridiculous cheapness of everything thirty years ago.
She felt as though they wanted to make light of the exemplary fashion in
which she had conducted her household.

This conversation made a deep impression on the _fiancee_, for she had
great confidence in Mrs. Olsen's shrewdness and experience. Since Marie
had become engaged to the Sheriff's clerk, the Sheriff's wife had taken
a keen interest in her. She was an energetic woman, and, as her own
children were already grown up and married, she found a welcome outlet
for her activity in busying herself with the concerns of the young
couple.

Marie's mother, on the other hand, was a very retiring woman. Her
husband, a subordinate government official, had died so early that her
pension extremely scanty. She came of a good family, and had learned
nothing in her girlhood except to Play the piano. This accomplishment
she had long ceased to practise, and in the course of time had become
exceedingly religious.----"Look here, now, my dear fellow, aren't you
thinking of getting married?" asked the Sheriff, in his genial way.

"Oh yes," answered Soeren, with some hesitation, "when I can afford it.

"Afford it!" the Sheriff repeated; "Why, you're b