Wednesday, October fifth.  
To-day the boy took advantage of the rest hour, when Akka was feeding apart from the other wild geese, to ask her if that which Bataki had related was true, and Akka could not deny it. The boy made the leader-goose promise that she would not the secret to Morten Goosey-Gander. The big white gander was so brave and generous that he might do something rash were he to learn of the elf's stipulations.
 
Later the boy sat on the goose-back, and silent, and hung his head.
He heard the wild geese call out to the goslings that now they were in
Dalarne, they could see Städjan in the north, and that now they were
flying over Österdal River to Horrmund Lake and were coming to Vesterdal
River. But the boy did not care even to glance at all this.
"I shall probably travel around with wild geese the rest of my life," he remarked to himself, "and I am likely to see more of this land than I wish."
 
He was quite as indifferent when the wild geese called out to him that now they had arrived in Vermland and that the stream they were following southward was Klarälven.
 
"I've seen so many rivers already," thought the boy, "why bother to look at one more?"
 
Even had he been more eager for sight-seeing, there was not very much to be seen, for northern Vermland is nothing but vast, forest , through which Klarälven winds—narrow and rich in rapids. Here and there one can see a , a forest clearing, or a few low, chimneyless huts, occupied by Finns. But the forest as a whole is so extensive one might fancy it was far up in Lapland.
 
A LITTLE HOMESTEAD
Thursday, October sixth.
 
The wild geese followed Klarälven as far as the big iron foundries at Fors. Then they proceeded to Fryksdalen. Before they got to Lake Fryken it began to grow dusky, and they lit in a little wet on a wooded hill. The morass was certainly a good night quarter for the wild geese, but the boy thought it and rough, and wished for a better sleeping place. While he was still high in the air, he had noticed that below the lay a number of farms, and with great haste he proceeded to seek them out.
 
They were farther away than he had fancied and several times he was to turn back. Presently the woods became less , and he came to a road skirting the edge of the forest. From it branched a pretty birch-bordered lane, which led down to a farm, and immediately he hastened toward it.
 
First the boy entered a farm yard as large as a city marketplace and enclosed by a long row of red houses. As he crossed the yard, he saw another farm where the -house faced a path and a wide lawn. Back of the house there was a garden thick with . The dwelling itself was small and , but the garden was edged by a row of exceedingly tall mountain-ash trees, so close together that they formed a real wall around it. It appeared to the boy as if he were coming into a great, high-vaulted , with the lovely blue sky for a ceiling. The mountain-ash were thick with clusters of red berries, the grass plots were still green, of course, but that night there was a full moon, and as the bright moonlight fell upon the grass it looked as white as silver.
 
No human being was in sight and the boy could wander freely wherever he wished. When he was in the garden he saw something which almost put him in good humour. He had climbed a mountain-ash to eat berries, but before he could reach a cluster he caught sight of a barberry bush, which was also full of berries. He slid along the ash branch and clambered up into the barberry bush, but he was no sooner there than he discovered a currant bush, on which still hung long red clusters. Next he saw that the garden was full of gooseberries and raspberries and dog-rose bushes; that there were cabbages and in the vegetable beds and berries on every bush, seeds on the herbs and grain-filled ears on every blade. And there on the path—no, of course he could not mistake it—was a big red apple which shone in the moonlight.
 
The boy sat down at the side of the path, with the big red apple in front of him, and began cutting little pieces from it with his sheath knife.
 
"It wouldn't be such a serious matter to be an elf all one's life if it were always as easy to get good food as it is here," he thought.
 
He sat and as he ate, wondering finally if it would not be as well for him to remain here and let the wild geese travel south without him.
 
"I don't know for the life of me how I can ever explain to Morten Goosey-Gander that I cannot go home," thought he. "It would be better were I to leave him altogether. I could gather provisions enough for the winter, as well as the squirrels do, and if I were to live in a dark corner of the stable or the cow shed, I shouldn't freeze to death."
 
Just as he was thinking this, he heard a light over his head, and a second later something which resembled a birch stood on the ground beside him.
 
The stump twisted and turned, and two bright dots on top of it glowed like coals of fire. It looked like some . However, the boy soon remarked that the stump had a hooked and big feather wreaths around its glowing eyes. Then he knew that this was no enchantment.
 
"It is a real pleasure to meet a living creature," remarked the boy.
"Perhaps you will be good enough to tell me the name of this place, Mrs.
Brown , and what sort of folk live here."
That evening, as on all other evenings, the owl had perched on a rung of the big ladder against the roof, from which she had looked down toward the gravel walks and grass plots, watching for rats. Very much to her surprise, not a single grayskin had appeared. She saw instead something that looked like a human being, but much, much smaller, moving about in the garden.
 
"That's the one who is scaring away the rats!" thought the owl. "What in the world can it be? It's not a squirrel, nor a kitten, nor a weasel," she observed. "I suppose that a bird who has lived on an old place like this as long as I have ought to know about everything in the world; but this is beyond my comprehension," she concluded.
 
She had been staring at the object that moved on the gravel path until her eyes burned. Finally curiosity got the better of her and she flew down to the ground to have a closer view of the stranger.
 
When the boy began to speak, the owl forward and looked him up and down.
 
"He has neither claws nor horns," she remarked to herself, "yet who knows but he may have a poisonous or some even more dangerous weapon. I must try to find out what he passes for before I venture to touch him."
 
"The place is called Mårbacka," said the owl, "and gentlefolk lived here once upon a time. But you, yourself, who are you?"
 
"I think of moving in here," volunteered the boy without answering the owl's question. "Would it be possible, do you think?"
 
"Oh, yes—but it's not much of a place now compared to what it was once," said the owl. "You can weather it here I dare say. It all depends upon what you expect to live on. Do you intend to take up the rat chase?"
 
"Oh, by no means!" declared the boy. "There is more fear of the rats eating me than that I shall do them any harm."
 
"It can't be that he is as harmless as he says," thought the brown owl. "All the same I believe I'll make an attempt…." She rose into the air, and in a second her claws were fastened in Nils Holgersson's shoulder and she was trying to at his eyes.
 
The boy shielded both eyes with one hand and tried to free himself with the other, at the same time calling with all his might for help. He realized that he was in deadly and thought that this time, surely, it was all over with him!
 
Now I must tell you of a strange coincidence: The very year that Nils Holgersson travelled with the wild geese there was a woman who thought of writing a book about Sweden, which would be suitable for children to read in the schools. She had thought of this from Christmas time until the following autumn; but not a line of the book had she written. At last she became so tired of the whole thing that she said to herself: "You are not fitted for such work. Sit down and compose stories and legends, as usual, and let another write this book, which has got to be serious and instructive, and in which there must not be one untruthful word."
 
It was as good as settled that she would abandon the idea. But she thought, very naturally, it would have been agreeable to write something beautiful about Sweden, and it was hard for her to her work. Finally, it occurred to her that maybe it was because she lived in a city, with only gray streets and house walls around her, that she could make no headway with the writing. Perhaps if she were to go into the country, where she could see woods and fields, that it might go better.
 
She was from Vermland, and it was clear to her that she wished to begin the book with that province. First of all she would write about the place where she had grown up. It was a little homestead, far removed from the great world, where many old-time habits and customs were retained. She thought that it would be entertaining for children to hear of the manifold duties which had succeeded one another the year around. She wanted to tell them how they Christmas and New Year and Easter and Midsummer Day in her home; what kind of house furnishings they had; what the kitchen and were like, and how the cow shed, stable, , and bath house had looked. But when she was to write about it the pen would not move. Why this was she could not in the least understand; nevertheless it was so.
 
True, she remembered it all just as distinctly as if she were still living in the midst of it. She argued with herself that since she was going into the country anyway, perhaps she ought to make a little trip to the old homestead that she might see it again before writing about it. She had not been there in many years and did not think it half bad to have a reason for the journey. In fact she had always longed to be there, no matter in what part of the world she happened to be. She had seen many places that were more and prettier. But nowhere could she find such comfort and protection as in the home of her childhood.
 
It was not such an easy matter for her to go home as one might think, for the estate had been sold to people she did not know. She felt, to be sure, that they would receive her well, but she did not care to go to the old place to sit and............