principally on account of it that she had laughed so dreadfully. It was the worst of them, Augusta Hansen, Laura's daughter--Augusta, with whom he had eaten cherries. That is to say, they had taken them out of each other's mouths; first she out of his, as he held the stalk in his mouth close up to the fruit, and then he, in the same way from hers. Augusta, who had given him her sash to wear as a badge at the tournaments which he held ... quite alone, by the way. Augusta, to whom in return he had given his whole collection of blown eggs; he had found every one of them himself. He had been obliged to ask his mother's leave to give them away, for it could not very well have been managed without. He had come behind her to whisper in her ear, he did not wish her to look at him while he did so. His mother had asked him if he were fond of Augusta, and he had confided to her that it was especially her hair, but that she was the most good-natured of the girls, and the cleverest as well. What Augusta said was always right. His mother had agreed with him in that. She had not laughed then, but now she stood and looked on while Augusta thrashed him, for it was Augusta's hand that thumped the hardest. After such treachery--and this did not happen only once unfortunately; it happened very often--he would not speak to Augusta for several days; once he held out for three. He tried the same with his mother, but he could never contrive to keep grave when she looked at him. She always befooled him into laughing. He now essayed, by a more serious and regular manner of proceeding, to obtain a different adjustment of things for the future. This struggle really meant nothing more nor less than the right relationship between the sexes. Its depths he was truly far from having sounded, but his masculine instincts told him that it was all upside down, up there in the garden. Things must be altered. But there was never any "Hands off," as they say. It was Dean Green whom he suspected of being the cause of the worst of all this. Of one thing, at all events, he was certain. It was Dean Green's idea that he, like the girls, should learn to play the piano. No other boy had to strum like that. Tomas hated the long-coated parson, with his aquiline nose and bushy eyebrows; who was always about, and who smiled when he saw him. He hated him to that extent that, when he shot at a mark, he always tried to draw a picture of the Dean to shoot at, and then to hit his coat, his nose, or his eye. But, hit him as much as he would, no change took place; the piano-playing went on, the girls remained, and even if any day he brought some boys into the garden, they could never be alone--oh no! The detestable little girls were always hanging about, and then all the stories afterwards; any little thing that a boy might have said or done was used against him; he was done for, he never came again.