for there were so many of those fish, that a net was
scarcely thrown into the sea before they were caught by cartloads;
there were so many, that often they were thrown back into the sea, or
left to lie on the shore.

The old man's wife and daughter, and his servants too, came
rejoicingly to meet him. There was a great pressing of hands, and
talking, and questioning. And the daughter, what a lovely face and
bright eyes she had!

The interior of the house was roomy and comfortable. Fritters that a
king would have looked upon as a dainty dish, were placed on the
table; and there was wine from the vineyard of Skjagen--that is, the
sea; for there the grapes come ashore ready pressed and prepared in
barrels and in bottles.

When the mother and daughter heard who Juergen was, and how innocently
he had suffered, they looked at him in a still more friendly way; and
the eyes of the charming Clara were the friendliest of all. Juergen
found a happy home in Old Skjagen. It did his heart good; and his
heart had been sorely tried, and had drunk the bitter goblet of love,
which softens or hardens according to circumstances. Juergen's heart
was still soft--it was young, and there was still room in it; and
therefore it was well that Mistress Clara was going in three weeks in
her father's ship to Christiansand, in Norway, to visit an aunt, and
to stay there the whole winter.

On the Sunday before her departure they all went to church, to the
holy Communion. The church was large and handsome, and had been built
centuries before by Scotchmen and Hollanders; it lay at a little
distance from the town. It was certainly somewhat ruinous, and the
road to it was heavy, through the deep sand; but the people gladly
went through the difficulties to get to the house of God, to sing
psalms and hear the sermon. The sand had heaped itself up round the
walls of the church; but the graves were kept free from it.

It was the largest church north of the Limfjord. The Virgin Mary, with
the golden crown on her head and the child Jesus in her arms, stood
life-like upon the altar; the holy Apostles had been carved in the
choir; and on the wall hung portraits of the old burgomasters and
councillors of Skjagen; the pulpit was of carved work. The sun shone
brightly into the church, and its radiance fell on the polished brass
chandelier, and on the little ship that hung from the vaulted roof.

Juergen felt as if overcome by a holy, childlike feeling, like th