ls, and were put to bed in the movable wooden
bed-places, on beds of hay covered with sheepskins and blankets. All
were asleep before dark, for at that season the night lasted only two or
three hours. The last thing that Thorolf heard was a happy little pipe
from the five-year-old Ellida,--

"Now we shall live in Asgard forever and ever."

For all it had to do with the experience of many of the children the
saeter might really have been Asgard, the Norse paradise. The youngest
had never before been outside the narrow valley where they were born.
Ellida and Margit, Didrik and little Peder, could not be convinced that
they were anywhere but in Asgard the Blest.

Norway had long since become Christian, but the old faith was not
forgotten. The legends, songs and customs of the people were full of it.
In the sagas Asgard was described as being on a mountain at the top of
the world. Around the base of this mountain lay Midgard, the abode of
mankind. Beyond the great seas, in Utgard, the giants lived. Hel was the
under-world, the home of evil ghosts and spirits. Tales were told in the
long winter evenings, of Baldur the god of spring, Loki the crafty, Odin
the old one-eyed beggar in a hooded cloak, with his two ravens and his
two tame wolves, Freya the lovely lady of flowers, Elle-folk dancing in
the moonlight, and little rascally Trolls.

The songs and legends repeated by the old people or chanted by minstrels
or skalds were more than idle stories--they were the history of a race.
Children heard over and over again the family records telling in rude
rhyme the story of centuries. In distant Iceland, Greenland, the
Shetlands, the Faroes or the Orkneys, a Norseman could tell exactly what
might be his udall right, or right of inheritance, in the land of his
fathers.

On Nils and Thorolf, Anders, Olof, Nikolina, Karen and Lovisa, who were
all over ten years old, rested great responsibility. Mother Elle always
managed to solve her own problems and expected them to attend to theirs
without constant direction from her. She told them what there was to be
done and left them to attend to it.

All were hardy, active youngsters who took to fending for themselves as
naturally as a day-old chick takes to scratching. In ordinary seasons
the work at the saeter was heavy, for the maidens must not only follow
the herds over miles of pasture land, but make butter and cheese for the
winter from their milking. The few cows that were here now