mud, and stopped every now
and then to rub his head with his forepaws. "Now wasn't that just what I
thought--that you were a booby, and would go and tumble into the river?"
said Smirre, contemptuously.

"I haven't acted boobyishly. You don't need to scold me," said the
marten. "I sat--all ready--on one of the lowest branches and thought how
I should manage to tear a whole lot of geese to pieces, when a little
creature, no bigger than a squirrel, jumped up and threw a stone at my
head with such force, that I fell into the water; and before I had time
to pick myself up--"

The marten didn't have to say any more. He had no audience. Smirre was
already a long way off in pursuit of the wild geese.

In the meantime Akka had flown southward in search of a new
sleeping-place. There was still a little daylight; and, beside, the
half-moon stood high in the heavens, so that she could see a little.
Luckily, she was well acquainted in these parts, because it had
happened more than once that she had been wind-driven to Blekinge when
she travelled over the East sea in the spring.

She followed the river as long as she saw it winding through the
moon-lit landscape like a black, shining snake. In this way she came way
down to Djupafors--where the river first hides itself in an underground
channel--and then clear and transparent, as though it were made of
glass, rushes down in a narrow cleft, and breaks into bits against its
bottom in glittering drops and flying foam. Below the white falls lay a
few stones, between which the water rushed away in a wild torrent
cataract. Here mother Akka alighted. This was another good
sleeping-place--especially this late in the evening, when no human
beings moved about. At sunset the geese would hardly have been able to
camp there, for Djupafors does not lie in any wilderness. On one side of
the falls is a paper factory; on the other--which is steep, and
tree-grown--is Djupadal's park, where people are always strolling about
on the steep and slippery paths to enjoy the wild stream's rushing
movement down in the ravine.

It was about the same here as at the former place; none of the
travellers thought the least little bit that they had come to a pretty
and well-known place. They thought rather that it was ghastly and
dangerous to stand and sleep on slippery, wet stones, in the middle of a
rumbling waterfall. But they had to be content, if only they were
protected from carnivorous animals.

The gee