in the room, an old cup-board, full of carvings; there
were nut-crackers, knives, spoons, and boxes with delicate foliage,
and leaping chamois; there was everything, which could rejoice a merry
child's eye, but this little fellow, (he was named Rudy) looked at and
desired only the old gun under the rafters. His grandfather had said,
that he should have it some day, but that he must first grow big and
strong enough to use it.

Small as the boy was, he was obliged to take care of the goats, and if
he who can climb with them is a good guardian, well then indeed was
Rudy. Why he climbed even higher than they! He loved to take the
bird's nests from the trees, high in the air, for he was bold and
daring; and he only smiled when he stood by the roaring water-fall, or
when he heard a rolling avalanche.

He never played with the other children; he only met them, when his
grandfather sent him out to sell his carvings, and Rudy took but
little interest in this; he much preferred to wander about the rocks,
or to sit and listen to his grandfather relate about old times and
about the inhabitants of Meiringen, where he came from. He said that
these people had not been there since the beginning of the world; they
had come from the far North, where the race called Swedes, dwelt. To
know this, was indeed great wisdom, and Rudy knew this; but he became
still wiser, through the intercourse which he had with the other
occupants of the house--belonging to the animal race. There was a
large dog, Ajola, an heir-loom from Rudy's father; and a cat, and she
was of great importance to Rudy, for she had taught him to climb.
"Come out on the roof!" said the cat, quite plain and distinctly, for
when one is a child, and can not yet speak, one understands the hens
and ducks, the cats and dogs remarkably well; they speak for us as
intelligibly as father or mother. One needs but to be little, and then
even grandfather's stick can neigh, and become a horse, with head,
legs and tail. With some children, this knowledge slips away later
than with others, and people say of these, that they are very
backward, that they remain children fearfully long.--People say so
many things!

"Come with me, little Rudy, out on the roof!" was about the first
thing that the cat said, that Rudy understood. "It is all imagination
about falling; one does not fall, when one does not fear to do so.
Come, place your one paw so, and your other so! Take care of your
fore-paws! L