in
the field and on the mountain-side. The only child born of the
marriage, little Astrid, was rocked and sung to sleep with it by
mother, by father, and by servants, and it was one of the first things
she herself learned. There was music in the race, and this bright
little one had her full share of it, and soon could hum her parent's
triumphal march, the talisman of her family, in quite a masterly way.

It was hardly to be wondered at that when she grew up, she too wished
to choose her lover. Many came to woo, but at the age of twenty-three
the rich and gifted girl was still single. The reason came out at
last. In the house lived a quick-witted youth, whom Aslaug had taken
in out of pity. He went by the name of the tramp or gipsy, though he
was neither. But Aslaug was ready enough to call him so when she
heard that Astrid and he were betrothed. They had pledged faith to
each other in all secrecy out on the hill pastures, and had sung the
bridal march together, she on the height, he answering from below.

The lad was sent away at once. No one could now show more pride of
race than Aslaug, the poor cottar's daughter. Astrid's father called
to mind what was prophesied when he broke the tradition of his family.
Had it now come to a husband being taken in from the wayside? Where
would it end? And the neighbours said much the same.

"The tramp," Knut by name, soon became well known to every one, as he
took to dealing in cattle on his own account. He was the first in that
part of the country to do it to any extent, and his enterprise had
begun to benefit the whole district, raising prices, and bringing in
capital. But he was apt to bring drinking bouts, and often fighting,
in his train; and this was all that people talked of as yet; they had
not begun to understand his capabilities as a business man.

Astrid was determined, and she was twenty-three, and her parents came
to see that either the farm must go out of the family or Knut must
come into it; through their own marriage they had lost the moral
authority that might have stood them in good stead now. So Astrid had
her way. One fine day the handsome, merry Knut drove with her to
church. The strains of the family bridal march, her grandfather's
masterpiece, were wafted back over the great procession, and the two
seemed to be sitting humming it quietly, and very happy they looked.
And every one wondered how the parents looked so happy too, for they
had opposed the marri