agon could not come nearer
than the road, and so they were obliged to carry the hay down the hill
and to pile it up in heaps. Walpurga said that she had slept enough and
had been idle for a long while, and allowed her mother to help her but
little.

Hansei returned. They loaded the wagon. Grandmother, Walpurga and child
sat on top of the load of hay, and Hansei, at last, got up, too.
Evening had set in. The lake began to assume a darker hue, and it was
only here and there that a streak of light played upon its surface.

"And now the people may say whatever they please," said Walpurga,
"here, we're far above them all."

The mother and Hansei looked at each other, and their glance meant:
"How wonderful it is that Walpurga should have such strange thoughts
about everything."

It was soon quiet in the little cottage by the lake. Its tired but
happy inmates were sleeping, and the whole house was fragrant with the
odor of the new-mown hay.

CHAPTER VII.

The folks in the cottage slept on peacefully, knowing nothing of the
whirlwind of dust, the dark clouds that overcast the sky, the mighty
storm, or the violent rain that followed. When Hansei put his head out
of the window next morning, it was still raining. He turned to Walpurga
and said: "Do you see? I was right, yesterday. The weather's changed.
Thank God! our hay's under cover."

"Yes," replied Walpurga. "What a day it was. It was all sunshine."

It rained all day. A sharp wind was blowing, the waves of the lake rose
on high and lashed themselves against the shore.

"How good it is to have a roof over one's head," said Walpurga. Hansei
again looked at his wife with surprise. Walpurga discovered everything
anew. But now she was happy, for her child clung to her. It called her
"mother," and called the grandmother "mamma."

Walpurga, with the child on her arm, was standing at the stable door
and throwing bread-crumbs to the finches, who could find no food that
day. The birds picked up the crumbs and flew away to their nests with
them.

"They've got young ones at home, too," said she. Suddenly, she
interrupted herself and said: "Burgei, we've been in the sun together,
now we'll go into the rain together." She ran out into the warm rain
with her child and then back again into the stable. She dried herself
and the child and said: "There! wasn't it lovely? and now it's raining
on our meadow and fresh grass will grow, and my chi