uch
as ground a plowshare.

"I believe I have managed this farm as well as any one who has
borne the name of Ingmar Ingmarsson," he mused. "I can get more for
my hay than father ever got for his, and I'm not satisfied to let
the weed-choked ditches which crossed the farm in his time remain.
What's more, no one can say that I misuse the woodlands as he did
by converting them into burn-beaten land.

"There are times when all this seems hard to bear," said the young
man. "I can't always take it as lightly as I do to-day. When father
and grandfather lived, folks used to say that the Ingmarssons had
been on earth such a long time that they must know what was
pleasing to our Lord. Therefore the people fairly begged them to
rule over the parish. They appointed both parson and sexton; they
determined when the river should be dredged, and where gaols should
be built. But me no one consults, nor have I a say in anything.

"It's wonderful, all the same, that troubles can be so easily borne
on a morning like this. I could almost laugh at them. And still I
fear that matters will be worse than ever for me in the fall. If I
should do what I'm now thinking of doing, neither the parson nor
the judge will shake hands with me when we meet at the church on a
Sunday, which is something they have always done up to the present.
I could never hope to be made a guardian of the poor, nor could I
even think of becoming a churchwarden."

Thinking is never so easy as when one follows a plow up a furrow
and down a furrow. You are quite alone, and there is nothing to
distract you but the crows hopping about picking up worms. The
thoughts seemed to come to the man as readily as if some one had
whispered them into his ear. Only on rare occasions had he been
able to think as quickly and clearly as on that day, and the
thought of it gladdened and encouraged him. It occurred to him that
he was giving himself needless anxiety; that no one expected him to
plunge headlong into misery. He thought that if his father were
only living now, he would ask his advice in this matter, as he had
always done in the old days when grave questions had come up.

"If I only knew the way, I'd go to him," he said, quite pleased at
the idea. "I wonder what big Ingmar would say if some fine day I
should come wandering up to him? I fancy him settled on a big farm,
with many fields and meadows, a large house and barns galore, with
lots of red cattle and not a black or spott