ghts and corresponding obligations as one of the village poor. On
board the ship, before it sailed out into the wide ocean, he would have
to sign a paper, attesting his embarkation, and not until then would the
money be paid.

The brother and sister returned sorrowfully to the village. Damie had
been seized with a fit of his old despondency, because a thing had now
to be carried out which he himself had wished. And Barefoot herself felt
deeply grieved at the thought that her brother was, in a way, to be
expelled from his native land. At the boundary-line Damie said aloud to
the sign-post, on which the name of the village and of the district were
painted:

"You there! I don't belong to you any longer, and all the people who
live here are no more to me than you are."

Barefoot started to cry; but she resolved within herself that this
should be the last time until her brother's departure, and until he was
fairly gone. And she kept her word to herself.

The people in the village said that Barefoot had no heart, because her
eyes were not wet when her brother went away. People like to see tears
actually shed--for what do they care about those that are shed in
secret? But Barefoot was calm and brave.

Only during the last days before Damie set out did she for the first
time fail in her duty; for she neglected her work by being with Damie
all the time. She let Rose upbraid her for it, and merely said: "You are
right." But still she ran after her brother everywhere--she did not want
to lose a minute of his company as long as he was there. She very likely
felt that she might be able to do something special for him at any
moment, or say something special that would be of use to him all his
life; and she was vexed with herself for finding nothing but quite
ordinary things to say, and for even quarreling with him sometimes.

Oh, these hours of parting! How they oppress the heart! How all the past
and all the future seem crowded together into one moment, and one knows
not how to set about anything rightly, and only a look or a touch must
tell all that is felt!

Still Amrei found good words to speak. When she counted out her
brother's stock of linen she said:

"These are good, respectable shirts--keep yourself respectable and good
in them."

And when she packed everything into the big sack, on which her father's
name was still to be seen, she said:

"Bring this back full of glittering gold; then you shall see how glad
the