Nils helped some of the older boys to build a boat. He had his first lesson in rowing in that very boat too. [Illustration: NILS HELPING THE BOYS TO BUILD A BOAT] But both Martha and Nils liked best the foot races which the girls and boys of the camp ran every day. Martha was the best runner of the girls and Nils had a good record too even though he ran with boys larger than himself. 3. AT SCHOOL IN DENMARK If you were to see a group of school children in a Danish town you would find that they look very much like the Norwegian children and the Swedish children. They look much like girls and boys in America too. Those children study about the same subjects that the Norwegian and Swedish girls and boys study. They study from books written in Danish. Danish words and Norwegian words are alike in print, but the Danes and the Norwegians do not pronounce them alike. Since an island is a small body of land with water all around it, and Denmark has so many islands, many girls and boys in Denmark live near water. Since there is so much water in Denmark almost all Danish pupils learn to swim at school. They begin swimming lessons when they first enter school. In Copenhagen, which is Denmark’s largest city, the schools have swimming contests. On the day of the contests classes from different schools gather at the water front. A high board wall has been built around a part of the water so that the place for the contests looks much like a pool. Mothers and fathers sit on the platform near the walls and watch the contests. Danish flags fly in the breeze. Everybody is excited when the contest begins. [Illustration: A SWIMMING CONTEST IN COPENHAGEN] The older girls and boys in the schools in Copenhagen, like those in Oslo, study English. One day each month a librarian visits each school in the city to take books to the pupils. She takes story books written in Danish to the younger pupils. But to the older pupils she takes books written in other languages which they have studied. Some of the books are written in French, some in German, and some in English. Those Danish pupils read some of the same stories that American pupils read in their libraries. In an Open-Air Museum Girls and boys always listen when grandfather begins a tale with, “When I was a boy.” But many times the girls and boys who listen to grandfather’s tales find it hard to make pictures in their minds of the houses grandfather tells about, of the games he played, or of the dances he and grandmother danced. And it is much, much harder to understand when grandfather and grandmother tell the tales that their grandfathers and grandmothers have told them!