be beside his betrothed,
after a perilous absence.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note 1. When it is desired to send a summons or other message over a
district in Norway where the dwellings are scattered, the budstick is
sent round by running messengers. It is a stick, made hollow, to hold
the magistrate's order, and a screw at one end to secure the paper in
its place. Each messenger runs a certain distance, and then delivers it
to another, who must carry it forward. If any one is absent, the
budstick must be laid upon the "house-father's great chair, by the
fire-side;" and if the house is locked, it must be fastened outside the
door, so as to be seen as soon as the host returns. Upon great
occasions it was formerly found that a whole region could be raised in a
very short time. The method is still in use for appointments on public
business.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

MIDNIGHT.

This was the day when the first cheese of the season was found to be
perfect and complete. Frolich, Stiorna, and Erica examined it
carefully, and pronounced it a well-pressed, excellent Gammel cheese,
such as they should not be ashamed to set before the bishop, and
therefore one which ought to satisfy the demon. It now only remained to
carry it to its destination,--to the ridge where the first cheese of the
season was always laid for the demon, and where, it appeared, he
regularly came for his offering, as no vestige of the gift was ever to
be found the next morning,--only the round place in the grass where it
had lain, and the marks of some feet which had trodden the herbage.

"Help me up with it upon my head, Stiorna," said Erica. "If Frolich
looks at it any longer, she will grudge such a cheese going where it
ought. Is not that the thought that is in your mind at this moment,
Frolich, dear?"

"No. I do not grudge it," replied Frolich. "My mother says it is right
freely to give whatever the feelings of those who help us require."

"And you do thus freely give,--my mistress and all who belong to her,
without a sign of grudging," declared Erica. "But, would you not be
better pleased if the gift required was a bunch of mossflowers, or a
basket of cloud-berries?"

"Perhaps so;--yet, no; I think not. Our good cheeses are not wasted.
They do not lie and rot in the sun and the mists. Somebody has the
benefit of them, whether it be the demon or not."

"Who else should it be?" asked S