n a new style, and wearing a new hat and a white lace
neckerchief over her red dress! Magnhild had already felt embarrassed at
the change, and now her embarrassment increased. But the genuine,
hearty applause that arose from many voices speedily set her at her
ease, and she returned home in a frame of mind similar to that of a
public officer whose rank had been raised one degree.

The weather was fine as on the preceding day. A little excursion was
therefore decided on for the afternoon. In the forenoon Tande played.
All the windows in the neighborhood were open, and Fru Bang sat in hers
and wept. Passers-by stared at her; but she heeded them not. There was
something passionately intense and at times full of anguish in his
playing to-day. Magnhild had never before heard him give vent to such a
mood. Perhaps he, too, felt it to be a strange bewilderment; for rousing
himself he now conjured up a wealth of bright, glittering bits of
imagery which blended into the sunshine without and the buzzing of the
insects. This dewy summer day became all at once teeming with
discoveries; in the street, now parched and dry, the particles of dust
glittered, over the meadows quivered the varied tints of green where the
aftermath had sprung up, and of yellow and brown where it had not yet
made its appearance. There was everywhere an intermingling of gold, red,
brown, and green in the play of the forest hues. The loftiest pinnacle
of the mighty mountain chair had never been more completely bathed in
blue. It stood out in bold relief against the glowing grayish tone in
the jagged cliffs about the fjord. The music grew more calm; pain was
uppermost again, but it was like an echo, or rather it seemed as though
it were dissolved into drops which ever and anon trickled down into the
sunny vigor of the new mood. The lady opposite bowed forward until her
head rested on her arm, and her shoulders quivered convulsively.
Magnhild beheld this, and drew back. She did not like such an exposure.

On the excursion that afternoon it again fell to Magnhild's lot to take
the lead with the child; the other two came whispering after them. They
found to-day a new tarrying-place, a short distance farther up the
mountain than where they had assembled the previous day;--the lady had
been weeping; Tande was silent, but he appeared even more spiritual than
usual.

The conversation this time centred in the fjord scenery of Norway, and
the depressing influence it m