d happiness for his
father and mother, or something in that line. But, though he wished his
father and mother well, he could not make up his mind to forego his own
precious chances on their account. Moreover, he consoled himself with
the reflection that if he attained the goal of his own desires he could
easily bestow upon them, of his bounty, a reasonable prospect of long
life and happiness.

You see Nils was by no means so good yet as he ought to be. He was
clever enough to perceive that he had small chance of seeing the Hulder,
as long as his heart was full of selfishness and envy and greed.

For, strive as he might, he could not help feeling envious of the
parson's Thorwald, with his elaborate combination pocket-knife and his
silver watch-chain, which he unfeelingly flaunted in the face of an
admiring community. It was small consolation for Nils to know that there
was no watch but only a key attached to it; for a silver watch-chain,
even without a watch, was a sufficiently splendid possession to justify
a boy in fording it over his less fortunate comrades.

Nils's father, who was a poor charcoal-burner, could never afford to
make his son such a present, even if he worked until he was as black as
a chimney-sweep. For what little money he earned was needed at once for
food and clothes for the family; and there were times when they were
obliged to mix ground birch-bark with their flour in order to make it
last longer.

It was easy enough for a rich man's son to be good, Nils thought.

It was small credit to him if he was not envious, having never known
want and never gone to bed on birch-bark porridge. But for a poor boy
not to covet all the nice things which would make life so pleasant, if
he had them, seemed next to impossible.

Still Nils kept on making good resolutions and breaking them, and then
piecing them together again and breaking them anew.

If it had not been for his desire to see the Hulder and the Nixy, and
making them promise the fulfilment of the three wishes, he would have
given up the struggle, and resigned himself to being a bad boy because
he was born so. But those teasing glimpses of the Hulder's scarlet
bodice and golden hair, and the vague snatches of wondrous melody that
rose from the cataract in the silent summer nights, filled his soul with
an intense desire to see the whole Hulder, with her radiant smile and
melancholy eyes, and to hear the whole melody plainly enough to be
written do