It was a close-fitting jacket, which when fastened looked like a dress with a bodice; but now she fastened only two of the lower hooks, because she was so hot. Her fine linen bodice had a little turned-down collar, and was fastened with a silver stud in the shape of a bird with spread wings. Just such a one, Nils, the tailor, wore the first time Margit danced with him. "A pretty stud," she said, looking at it. "Mother gave it me." "Ah, I thought so," Margit said, helping her with the jacket. They walked onwards over the fields. The hay was lying in heaps; and Margit took up a handful, smelled it, and thought it was very good. She asked about the cattle at the parsonage, and this led her to ask also about the live stock at Böen, and then she told how much they had at Kampen. "The farm has improved very much these last few years, and it can still be made twice as large. He keeps twelve milch-cows now, and he could keep several more, but he reads so many books and manages according to them, and so he will have the cows fed in such a first-rate way." Eli, as might be expected, said nothing to all this; and Margit then asked her age. She was above twenty. "Have you helped in the house-work? Not much, I dare say--you look so spruce." Yes, she had helped a good deal, especially of late. "Well, it's best to use one's self to do a little of everything; when one gets a large house of one's own, there's a great deal to be done. But, of course, when one finds good help already in the house before her, why, it doesn't matter so much." Now Eli thought she must go back; for they had gone a long way beyond the grounds of the parsonage. "It still wants some hours to sunset; it would be kind it you would chat a little longer with me." And Eli went on. Then Margit began to talk about Arne. "I don't know if you know much of him. He could teach you something about everything, he could; dear me, what a deal he has read!" Eli owned she knew he had read a great deal. "Yes; and that's only the least thing that can be said of him; but the way he has behaved to his mother all his days, that's something more, that is. If the old saying is true, that he who's good to his mother is good to his wife, the one Arne chooses won't have much to complain of." Eli asked why they had painted the house before them with grey paint. "Ah, I suppose they had no other; I only wish Arne may sometime be rewarded for all his kindness to his mother. When he has a wife, she ought to be kind-hearted as well as a good scholar. What are you looking for, child?" "I only dropped a little twig I had." "Dear me! I think of a many things, you may be sure, while I sit alone in yonder wood. If ever he takes home a wife who brings blessings to house and man, then I know many a poor soul will be glad that day." They were both silent, and walked on without looking at each other; but soon Eli stopped. "What's the matter?" "One of my shoe-strings has come down."