ell her the
story of the Bridal March. The little eight year old girl understood
it well enough, and what she did not understand then became clear to
her later. It had an influence on her child-life, and especially on
her conduct towards her parents, that nothing else had or could have
had.

She had always noticed that they liked quietness. It was no hardship
to her to please them in this; they were so gentle, and talked so much
and so sweetly to her of the children's great Friend in heaven, that
it cast a sort of charm over the whole house. The story of the Bridal
March affected her deeply, and gave her an understanding of all that
they had gone through. She carefully avoided recalling to them any
painful memories, and showed them the tenderest affection, sharing
with them their love of God, their truthfulness, their quietness,
their industry. And she taught Beret to do the same.

In their grandfather's house the life that had to be suppressed at
home got leave to expand. Here there was singing and dancing and play
and story-telling. So the sisters' young days passed between devotion
to their melancholy parents in the quiet house, and the glad life they
were allowed to take part in at their grandfather's. The families
lived in perfect understanding. It was the parents who told them to go
to the old people and enjoy themselves, and the old people who told
them to go back again, "and be sure to be good girls."

When a girl between the age of twelve and sixteen takes a sister
between seven and eleven into her full confidence, the confidence is
rewarded by great devotion. But the little one is apt to become too
old for her years. This happened with Beret, while Mildrid only gained
by being forbearing and kind and sympathetic--and she made her parents
and grandparents happy.

There is no more to tell till Mildrid was in her fifteenth year; then
old Knut died, suddenly and easily. There seemed almost no time
between the day when he sat joking in the chimney-corner and the day
when he lay in his coffin.

After this, grandmother's greatest pleasure was to have Mildrid
sitting on a stool at her feet, as she had done ever since she was a
little child, and to tell her stories about Knut, or else to get her
to hum the Bridal March. As Astrid sat listening to it, she saw Knut's
handsome dark head as she used to see it in her young days; she
followed him out to the mountain-side, where he blew the March on his
herd-boy's horn