eat high with expectation.

This condition of course increased tenfold when he saw the men cast off
more or less of their upper garments and spring to the work with the
energy of lunatics. In his own small way he carried logs and branches
and mud and stones till he was as dirty and dishevelled as the best of
them; and when Gudrid looked horrified at him, and said that it would be
next to impossible to clean him, he burst into such a fit of laughter
that he lost his balance, fell head over heels into the river, which was
only knee-deep at the place, and came out more than half-washed in a
moment!

"You see it won't be so difficult as you think," he cried, laughing and
gasping when he emerged; "another plunge like that would make me quite
clean, aunty."

"Ho! Olaf, were you after a salmon?" cried Swend, as he passed with a
large log on his shoulder.

"Not I, Swend; it was a whale I was after."

"You don't say that, boy?" cried Krake, in a tone of admiration. "Was
he a big one?"

"Oh! frightful--so big that--that--I couldn't see him all."

"Couldn't see him _at all_? Ah, then, he _was_ a big one, sure. The
things we can't see at all are always the most wonderful."

"Foolish boy," said Gudrid; "come, I will wring the water out of your
clothes."

"'Tis hardly worth while, aunty," said Olaf, coming on shore; "I'll be
as wet, as ever in a few minutes."

The careful Gudrid nevertheless wrung as much water out of his dripping
garments as was possible without taking them off. By the time this was
done the dam had been completed, and the men stood on the banks of the
river wiping off and wringing out the superabundant mud and water from
their clothes, besides getting ready hooks, nets, and staves. Some of
the nets were several fathoms in length. Others were small bags
fastened to wooden rings at the end of long poles.

Presently a shout was heard from the men at the lower end of the pool,
and they were seen to use their staves smartly several times, as some of
the fish, alarmed no doubt at the strange doings above, endeavoured to
shoot down the river. Ere long the stony ground on which these men
stood became a rippling shallow, and, soon afterwards, a neck of land
connecting the lower end of the island with the shore. They therefore
abandoned it and rejoined their comrades higher up. The fish were now
imprisoned in a pool, retreat having been effectually cut off above and
below, and the whole river diverte