she motioned to
him to stand still, and herself bent forward in an attitude of surprise
and eager observation. On the ground, some fifty steps from where she
was stationed, she saw a man stretched out full length, with a knapsack
under his head, and surrounded by a flock of downy, half-grown birds,
which responded with a low, anxious piping to his alluring cluck, then
scattered with sudden alarm, only to return again in the same curious,
cautious fashion as before. Now and then there was a great flapping of
wings in the trees overhead, and a heavy brown and black speckled
mountain-hen alighted close to the man's head, stretched out her neck
toward him, cocked her head, called her scattered brood together, and
departed with slow and deliberate wing-beats.

Again there was a frightened flutter overhead, a shrill anxious whistle
rose in the air, and all was silence. Augusta had stepped on a dry
branch--it had broken under her weight--hence the sudden confusion and
flight. The unknown man had sprung up, and his eye, after a moment's
search, had found the dark, beautiful face peering forth behind the red
fir-trunk. He did not speak or salute her; he greeted her with silent
joy, as one greets a wondrous vision which is too frail and bright for
consciousness to grasp, which is lost the very instant one is conscious
of seeing. But, while to the girl the sight, as it were, hung trembling
in the range of mere physical perception, while its suddenness held it
aloof from moral reflection, there came a great shout from behind, and
Arnfinn, whom in her surprise she had quite forgotten, came bounding
forward, grasping the stranger by the hand with much vigor,
laughing heartily, and pouring forth a confused stream of delighted
interjections, borrowed from all manner of classical and unclassical
tongues.

"Strand! Strand!" he cried, when the first tumult of excitement had
subsided; "you most marvelous and incomprehensible Strand! From
what region of heaven or earth did you jump down into our prosaic
neighborhood? And what in the world possessed you to choose our barns
as the centre of your operations, and nearly put me to the necessity of
having you arrested for vagrancy? How I do regret that Cousin Augusta's
entreaties mollified my heart toward you. Pardon me, I have not
introduced you. This is my cousin, Miss Oddson, and this is my
miraculous friend, the world-renowned author, vagrant, and naturalist,
Mr. Marcus Strand."

Strand s