And she had much to tell, and among other things this: that, on the previous night, she had seen the old homestead of Hånger for the first time rise up in all its ancient grandeur. She had seen the old woman sitting at the window, and the gatepost, and all the rest. Then, suddenly, she saw the old woman lift her hands to Heaven, and her face shone with joy. And a voice was heard declaring: "The trollfolk of Hånger are loosed from the curse." And at the same moment, the old woman who had watched so long sank into dust and vanished, and the gatepost fell, and house after house collapsed, and Lotta Hedman knew that deliverance had come at last, and that she would never see that vision again. UNG-JOEL EVERYONE knows how strange thoughts can be. It is as if they were sown about the earth by an unseen hand. And one can go about fancying one has found something rare and fine, and be glad and proud of it, until one day it appears that the same had grown up in hundreds of other minds as well. So it was with Pastor Rhånge's thought of the sacredness of life. He was by no means the only one who had found it.... It was in the month of June, the time of year when people in Bohuslän, or, rather, in the coast tract of Bohuslän and on the islands near, made ready for the coming of visitors. There had been a great to-do everywhere in making preparations. Houses and boats were newly painted, rooms swept out, gardens tidied up, bathing-huts warmed, and refuse cleared away. And now the trains began to come in, laden with visitors from all parts of the country. Invalids and the overworked, loads of children and loads of aged folk, those seeking rest and those in search of amusement. It seemed as if all Sweden were on the road to the cool reef-belts and the boisterous sea. But the visitors for whose sake all this was done were to come from the eastward, from up inland. From the west, from the sea, no visitors were looked for. No preparations had been made for any coming from there; No orders, no instructions, had come regarding visitors from the sea. And so, when visitors did come from the sea, naturally enough, their reception could not be the same as in the case of those from inland. Also, they brought with them horror and confusion and gloom, but no pleasure at all. One week of the month of June, 1916, had passed when Sven Elversson was constrained to make a journey to Applum, all for the sake of those same visitors. His brother, Ung-Joel, who had been at sea the last few years, sailing between Holland and the Swedish ports, had come home to Knapefiord, sick and strange in mind after having met with some of those strangers out at sea, while they were yet on their way. And he had told his young wife she must send for his brother to come and see him.