ook altogether, and made
them forget their plans.

CHAPTER VI

THE KNIFE-GRINDER

One afternoon, when the children were playing outside in the
sunshine, Ditte stood just inside the open kitchen door, washing up
after dinner. Suddenly soft music was heard a short distance away--a
run of notes; even the sunshine seemed to join in. The little ones
lifted their heads and gazed out into space; Ditte came out with a
plate and a dishcloth in her hands.

Up on the road just where the track to the Crow's Nest turned off
stood a man with a wonderful-looking machine; he blew, to draw
attention--on a flute or clarionet, whatever it might be--and looked
towards the house. When no-one appeared in answer to his call, he
began moving towards the house, pushing the machine in front of him.
The little ones rushed indoors. The man left his machine beside the
pump and came up to the kitchen door. Ditte stood barring the way.

"Anything want grinding, rivetting or soldering, anything to mend?"
he gabbled off, lifting his cap an inch from his forehead. "I
sharpen knives, scissors, razors, pitchforks or plowshares! Cut
your corns, stick pigs, flirt with the mistress, kiss the maids--and
never say no to a glass and a crust of bread!" Then he screwed up
his mouth and finished off with a song.

"Knives to grind, knives to grind!
Any scissors and knives to grind?
Knives and scissors to gri-i-ind!"

he sang at the top of his voice.

Ditte stood in the doorway and laughed, with the children hanging on
to her skirt. "I've got a bread-knife that won't cut," said she.

The man wheeled his machine up to the door. It was a big thing:
water-tank, grindstone, a table for rivetting, a little anvil and a
big wheel--all built upon a barrow. The children forgot their fear
in their desire to see this funny machine. He handled the
bread-knife with many flourishes, whistled over the edge to see how
blunt it was, pretended the blade was loose, and put it on the anvil
to rivet it. "It must have been used to cut paving-stories with,"
said he. But this was absurd; the blade was neither loose nor had it
been misused. He was evidently a mountebank.

He was quite young; thin, and quick in his movements; he rambled on
all the time. And such nonsense he talked! But how handsome he was!
He had black eyes and black hair, which looked quite blue in the
sunshine.

Lars Peter came out from the barn yawning; he had been having an
after-dinn