neath him. It was a peat moor.

It was encircled with farms on the heights around; but on the low
plain--it must have been over a mile [Note: One Norwegian mile is equal
to seven English miles.] long--there was no trace of human meddling;
only a few stacks of peat on the outskirts, with black hummocks and
gleaming water-holes between them.

"Bonjour, madame!" cried the old raven, and began to wheel in great
circles over the moor. It looked so inviting that he settled downward,
slowly and warily, and alighted upon a tree-root in the midst of it.

Here it was just as in the old days-a silent wilderness. On some
scattered patches of drier soil there grew a little short heather and a
few clumps of rushes. They were withered; but on their stiff stems there
still hung one or two tufts--black, and sodden by the autumn rain. For
the most part the soil was fine, black, and crumbling--wet and full of
water-holes. Gray and twisted tree-roots stuck up above the surface,
interlaced like a gnarled net-work.

The old raven well understood all that he saw. There had been trees here
in the old times, before even his day.

The wood had disappeared; branches, leaves, everything was gone. Only
the tangled roots remained, deep down in the soft mass of black fibres
and water.

But further than this, change could not possibly go; so it must endure,
and here, at any rate, men would have to stint their meddling.

The old bird held himself erect. The farms lay so far away that he
felt securely at home, here in the middle of the bottomless morass. One
relic, at least, of antiquity must remain undisturbed. He smoothed his
glossy black feathers, and said several times, "Bonjour, madame!"

But down from the nearest farm came a couple of men with a horse and
cart; two small boys ran behind. They took a crooked course among the
hummocks, but made as though to cross the morass.

"They must soon stop," thought the raven.

But they drew nearer and nearer; the old bird turned his head uneasily
from side to side; it was strange that they should venture so far out.

At last they stopped, and the men set to work with spades and axes. The
raven could see that they were struggling with a huge root which they
wanted to loosen.

"They will soon tire of that," thought the raven.

But they did not tire, they hacked with their axes--the sharpest the
raven had ever seen--they dug and hauled, and at last they actually got
the huge stem turned over on i