At any rate, he has gone with the boys and is walking along, displeased with them and with himself. When he comes home, the birthday table is laid. The boys had wished to give a little party. Lennart had creamed some pancakes, which are now a few hours old and look like pieces of leather. They had received a little money from their mother, and with this they had bought nuts, raisins, and a bottle of soda-water. This fine feast they did not care to enjoy all by themselves, and they had been sitting and waiting for father to come home and share it with them. Now, since they and father have become friends, they cannot celebrate such a big event without him. Father understands it all, and the thought of being missed flatters him and puts him in a fairly good humor. Half full as he is, he plumps himself down at the table. Just as he is about to take his place he stumbles, clutches at the table-cloth, falls, and draws down on the floor everything on the table. As he raises himself, he sees how the soda flows out over the floor and pickles and pancakes are strewn about among bits of porcelain and broken glass. Father glances at the boys' long faces, rips out an oath, and makes a rush for the door, and he doesn't come back home until on towards morning. * * * * * One morning in February, the boys are coming up the street with their skates dangling from their shoulders. They are not quite like themselves. They have grown thin and pale and look untidy and uncared for. Their hair is uncut; they are not well washed and they have holes in both stockings and shoes. When they address each other, they use a lot of street-boy expressions, and one and another oath escapes from their lips. A change has taken place in the boys. It had its beginning on the evening when their father forgot to come home to help celebrate Hugo's birthday. It was as if until that time they had been kept up by the hope that soon their father would be a changed man. At first they had counted on his tiring of them and sending them home. Later, they had fancied that he would become fond of them and give up drinking for their sakes, and they had even imagined that mother and he might become reconciled and that all of them would be happy. But it dawned upon them that night that father was impossible. He could love nothing but drink. Even if he were kind to them for a little while, he didn't really care for them. A heavy hopelessness fell upon the boys; nothing would ever be changed for them. They should never get away from father. They felt as though they were doomed to sit shut in a dark prison all their lives. Not even their great plans for the future could comfort them. In the way that they were bound down, these plans could never be carried out. Only think, they were not learning anything! They knew enough of the histories of great men to know that he who wants to accomplish anything noteworthy must first of all have knowledge.