"They sailed from the mouths of the Elbe and the Weser--and here is the Weser. The mouths are pretty near together. Now, between the Elbe and the Weser were--which Saxons, Ditto?" "Towards the Elbe and beyond it were the Eastphalians; those our story belongs to, among whom Landolf went." "Well, here is the Aller, Ditto! they lived _there_, you know; that is pretty far west. And here is Hermannsburg! Oh, I am glad we have found that. And here is Lüneburg--all over here, I suppose. I suppose we couldn't find the stone-houses, Ditto?" "I suppose not. But here is Verden on the Aller, Maggie, where Charlemagne had those 4500 Saxons hewed to pieces. And here are Osnabrück and Detmold, where the Saxons beat him again, and took the 4000 captives that they slew at the stone-houses." "Horrid Charlemagne!" "It was all horrid, what concerned the fighting. But here is Minden, Maggie, from which good Landolf set out in his little boat, and dropped down the Weser to go to the East Saxons." "And, then, when he got to the Aller he went up _that_; then he had to row hard, I guess." "I guess he did a good deal of hard rowing, first and last, Maggie." "Then to get to the stone-houses he went further up the Aller and turned into the Oerze. Here is the Oerze! Then the stone-houses must be somewhere hereabouts, Ditto; for they are not very far from Hermannsburg." "There is the little river Wieze, Maggie; and here, where it flows into the Oerze, was that oak wood, sacred to Thor, where the village of Müden now is. And here is the village of Munster where Freija was honoured. All over the land, then, it was wild country, woods and morasses. And now--think what Germany is!" "What is it, Ditto?" "It is the land of Thought, and Art, and Learning, and Criticism." "Look here!" broke in a lively voice behind them. "Do you know the sun is getting up in the sky? and we have settled nothing. And here are two heads over a map!" "It would not hurt a third head," said Meredith. "And Maggie and I have settled a good deal, thank you." "But where are we going to-day?" "Yes," added Esther behind, "where are we going? I think it is time to be getting ready, because it takes us a good while." "Esther," said Maggie, "Fairbairn and the men are going over to the pine terrace to cut down some trees papa wants cut; let us go there and have a big bonfire, and then Ditto will have plenty of coals for his friar's omelet." "Betsey is making us a chicken pie." "Well, the omelet will do no harm besides." "No. It is a good way over to the pine terrace." "I don't care how far it is. So much the better. It is nice walking. Do you care, Flora?" "She don't care," said Meredith. "Come, let us load up. If we have a journey before us, best be about it." "And then, Esther," Maggie went on, "we can go to the Lookout rock to read." "It will be sunny there." "Well, it's all nice on the pine terrace, and we can find plenty of shade. Now, then, Ditto--if you'll bring up the waggon."