Almost ten years had thus elapsed since the brothers removed to the wilds of Impivaara, now transformed into a prosperous farm. But soon old Jukola too, uplifted by seven sturdy men, had risen to equal rank with it, if not to higher. And the day came when the dear home of their birth was divided into two farms. The original Jukola, their home and mother everlasting, was left in Juhani’s care, while Aapo took over the other half, which stood, in itself an excellent farm, near to their former home. Impivaara too was divided into two holdings, the masters of which, by common consent, became Tuomas and Lauri. Timo was given the croft known as Kekkuri, and Eero the one called Vuohenkalma, to be ruled and enjoyed by them and their heirs without tithes or tax until the day of their death. All married, with the exception of Simeoni, who, desiring neither wife nor farm, settled down as bachelor uncle on Juhani Jukola’s farm. One might add of them that they lived and toiled, each in his own sphere, like good men and true; and the homeless beggar praised both the farms of Jukola and Impivaara and the crofts Kekkuri and Vuohenkalma for their hospitality. And except for Simeoni and Timo, it might also be said that they had forsworn for ever the use of treacherous liquor. Simeoni, that decent fellow, sometimes strayed into the tempting paths of drunkenness, and the same happened now and again to Timo, though much more seldom, perhaps once or twice a year.

When the juryman Mäkelä died, who stepped into his shoes? Jukola’s Aapo, always a man of peace and justice. Who, when the old Sheriff’s Man left this earth, was promoted to this honour? Eero Juhani-son Vuohenkalma, a keen-witted man, skilled in reading and writing; even a newspaper came to him once a week from Turku.

Juhani took to wife Mother Pinewood’s Venla and with her enjoyed pleasant days, though faint murmurs of discord might indeed have been heard now and again from the house. For Venla, although she was a passable housewife, was a chattering and quarrelsome woman. Often she would nag and scold at her husband for hours at a stretch, at that lout, that owl, as she was wont to call him. But Juhani too could lose his temper, and then he raged furiously, telling ‘the old hag, to whom God had given a weaker brain than a man’s’, to shut up at once. Thus he would carry on, banging his fist on the table and booming like a thunderstorm. Until at last Venla would pretend to be mildly alarmed and suddenly cease answering him, grinning meanwhile in secret at her hussy of a maid. They would laugh slyly by the fireside while Juhani preached from his seat on the bench beside the table and, often with tears in his eyes, murmured against Him who had ‘given and assigned to him for ever’ such an impudent and disobedient wife. Nevertheless, a great commotion was once brought about by that Aapeli Karkkula. While Juhani again squabbled with his wife, he began, the madman, sitting somewhat drunk on the side-bench in the farmhouse, to meddle between man and wife, and held forth strongly on Juhani’s side. Juhani preached lustily, calling his Venla ‘the Devil’s own shrew’, whereupon Aapeli, the stupid fellow, believing he was acting real wisely, also began calling her a harridan, a she-tramp and beggar’s brat. But before long Juhani’s eyes narrowed and rushing up like a baited bear, he sprang upon the astonished Aapeli, who skipped out like a hare, with Juhani pounding at his heels. The door crashed, the porch thundered, and on the steps the dogs, panic-stricken and dismally howling, rushed aside with hanging tails and looked back in amazement as the men ran madly across the stony yard. Ahead galloped Aapeli Karkkula, grunting with terror, behind him Juhani tore on at a trot; but in the spacious living-room Venla and the maid laughed until the room echoed with the merrily tinkling sound. Failing to overtake Aapeli, Juhani turned back from the gate, grumbling to himself and promising to teach that impudent Karkkula puppy in the future. Entering the room, he struck his fist on the table, saying: ‘scold me but not my wife! She is a wife the like of which there is only one in the whole kingdom of Sweden.’ Thus he prattled, boasting; and indeed one could not well have belittled the woman for her house-wifery. True, she drank coffee all too copiously, of which Juhani was frequently heard to complain; but the wife cared little for this and allowed her plump-breasted coffee-pot to bubble as before. And gladly her husband too accepted a steaming cup from the plump hand of his helpmeet. Also, when away in town, he would always remember to buy his Venla a bag of coffee and a big chunk of sugar.

Venla presented her husband with sound and sturdy heirs. But in the beginning these matters did not altogether turn out as Juhani would have wished. The first fruit of his love was a sly-eyed girl-child, at which the father was much put out, and vexed because no lusty male-child had been given him. But he hoped that next time at least he would have better luck. A year went by and part of a second, and Venla gave birth to a child again. This infant, wrapped in a white cloth, the mother-in-law now bore to the grimly waiting father, smiling a honeyed smile. Believing his hope to have been fulfilled, Juhani was delighted and asked: ‘boy or wench?’ ‘Look for thyself, little son,’ the old dame answered him. He looked, only to shout: ‘take your brats to Hell!’ Being left alone, however, he muttered after a while: ‘God bless my infant, anyhow.’ Another year passed and another, and Venla gave birth to a son, the very spit of his father, a big, hulking boy. Then there was much rejoicing in the house of Jukola, and even Venla seemed dearer to Juhani than before. And now all the women fell to choosing names for the lad. One wanted him to be Frans, another Florentine, a third Erik Translatus, while Venla was for Immanuel. Then Juhani stepped forward and at Venla’s bedside uttered, pointing with his hand: ‘no, my Venla, no; Johannes is his name.’ And so the little fellow was christened after his father. Greatly did his father love him, calling him now his ‘tit’, now his ‘little crow’.

Juhani’s family life was thus for the most warm sunshine, with little interludes of wind and storm. And even when clouds did appear, they soon vanished and gave way to fine weather. But with the villagers and his neighbours his relations were not as good. Quarrels would often arise, fierce little disputes over such things as boundary-fences, straying horses, untended swine and other matters. And Juhani was ever quick to settle these quarrels with his fist, so that the face and hair of his opponent were in constant danger. Often heated lawsuits seemed imminent, but then brother Aapo would hasten between and try, in his capacity of juryman, to coax the would-be litigants to reason with his conciliatory tongue. Nor was Juhani slow to come round, especially when he perceived that he was in the wrong. In everything connected with his farm he was a good worker. His farm-folk could not have found fault with him, neither in the fields, the meadows nor in the forest, in a tussle with an unruly log.

Once at haymaking time in Vehkala meadow--a meadow ringed round with sombre spruce--Juhani showed himself a real terror before both God and Man. The wide meadow had been raked and the haymakers already crowded round the barn to enjoy their dinners. But the master viewed with dread the sweltering, flame-tinted clouds that voyaged threateningly over the sky. Behind the barn was the stump of a birch, and at the foot of this, unseen of all, Juhani fell on his knees and prayed God to spare the juicy, sweet-scented hay of his meadow. Thus in secret he prayed; but hardly was the meal over than a roaring cloud dashed forward from behind the crowns of the spruce and, enwrapped in lightning and thunder, began pouring down a devastating flood. In a twinkling the hay was wet through, before a single haycock could be raked together. Rakes in hand, the haymakers fled swiftly from the field to the shelter of the barn, but soot-black in the face with rage, Juhani remained standing in the space before the barn, cursing horribly. There, while the heavens crashed, he stood and swore, beating his right fist against the palm of his left hand. He swore furiously, bending down the depth of a span each time the word ‘Devil!’ burst from his grinding teeth. Looking up, he cried again and again in a squealing voice: ‘what have Heaven’s dung-carts to do with my hayfield?’ His wife called to him in reproach from the barn: ‘what horrors art thou uttering, thou sack of sin?’ But the man cared nothing, only shouted in a still more terrible voice at the dark gloomy clouds: ‘I ask again firmly, is this the time for Heaven to cart its dung when I am already making my hay?’ And at this the wives and maidens in the barn, hearing the wild language of the man, prayed earnestly to God on his behalf, with hands tightly crossed. They prayed; and each time the lightning flashed a prayer, sighing and heavy, issued from their lips, and their knees bent lower. The children, gentle and meek of eye, hid their faces and wept in their mother’s bosom or in the folds of her dress, wept and sighed. Many a little one, seeing the earth and heavens bathed in fire, in flashing, flaming fire, and hearing the dreadful thunder echo around, believed the Day of Judgment had come as the rain fell heavily and the forest soughed mournfully around them. But Juhani, seeing what the women were at, went on increasing the enormity of his curses; and ever louder the women raised their voices in prayer.

In the barn there chanced to be Seunala’s young and slender daughter, Anna of the shy glance, whose eyes shone like two stars under her pallid, gleaming brow. Often, so it was said, had this maiden seen marvellous visions, during which her spirit walked in the light-filled homes of the blest and the gloomy valley of the damned, and of these she had many wonders to relate. Often too she had foretold great desolations for the children of mankind: wars, famine, plagues, to be followed by the end of the world. She it was, a maiden always grave, silent and gentle, who suddenly, while Juhani cursed in the sodden hay, sprang out of the barn, fell on her knees on the ground, and heedless of the pouring rain and the cross-fire of lightning, prayed in a crying, almost shrill and screaming voice. She prayed to God to spare the unhappy, blinded man and to keep the flaming hammer of His wrath from striking him. So, looking up into the heights, she prayed, and a wondrous light burned in her eyes, and on her brow shone a heavenly fire. And behold: Juhani was silent, though his eyes still glared angrily sideways at the maid. Until at last, when it seemed to him that the maiden’s mission dragged on too long, he seized her by the arm and led her back to the barn, saying: ‘go in, rag, go in now, and don’t get thyself wet there without cause, for I need no one to pray for me.’ The maiden entered the barn, but immediately fell down on the hay and prayed without cease in a crying voice; and hot tears welled from the women beside her. But outside, leaning against the wall, stood Juhani, and something akin to repentance could be read in his face, though the anger still surged in his bosom.

Soon the rain and lightning moved on; and the next day the hay was gathered in Vehkala meadow, gathered in blazing sunshine. But the master of the house was no more to be seen there. Where was he now? The voice of Seunala’s daughter echoed in his ears and gave his soul no rest. And so, early in the morning, he set off for the rectory in sombre mood, and repenting, confessed his sin to the rector, his curse against God and Heaven. The rector admonished him at first in grave tones, but soon began to speak words of consolation, and Juhani returned home with his mind at peace. But after this scene in gloomy Vehkala meadow a certain change became apparent in Juhani’s character and deeds. On his head appeared a round hat like a pot, the collar of his coat rose upright, while its skirts vanished, leaving behind only the short snibs worn by Pietists in various parts of Finland. Thus clad he walked about, and to church he walked oftener than before. Awe-inspiring in his solemnity, he sat in the place kept for him beside the solemn master of Härkämäki, now and again clearing his throat in imitation of his companion. And after this the storms in Jukola farmhouse and in the fields grew rarer and at last the current of Juhani’s life flowed in an almost undisturbed stream towards its calm evening.

Simeoni lived, a bachelor, on Juhani’s farm, receiving his food and drink from the farm and toiling untiringly in its service from morning to late evening. His nature was frugal even to parsimony, and his frugality grew from year to year. With the close attention of a miser he watched over the fortunes of the farm and the work of the men and women on it. His lips first formed a saying that still lives and provokes laughter amongst the dwellers around Jukola and Toukola. One day, as he sat by the chopping-block whittling a bread-platter for Venla while the farm-folk were all at table with a heaped-up bowl of pork-stew before them, he saw fit to remind them that ‘a tiny bit of pork-stew makes heaps of bread go down’. This he said, whereat both men and women burst out laughing and even Juhani, after first laughing a little, found cause to rebuke his brother for over-great stinginess. But to this Simeoni only replied: ‘I exhorted you to temperance, warned you against making gods of your bellies, which is a sin, a mortal sin. And who is unnaturally stingy here? Not I, but that Kuninkala’s Kalle might be who brewed the spirits for his own funeral when he felt his end was nigh from a consumption. The lad knew himself to be the distiller in Toukola, the one who always got the most clear spirits with very little grain. And so it was now. In the cold bath-house porch the miserable wretch sat beside his still, coughing and sniffing, his nose sharp as a gimlet and the eyes in him like two glass balls. There he sat while the spirits were carried into the house in kettlefuls. At last he too crawled up, crawled up the steps into the porch, from the porch into the house, fell down neatly on his bed and a few hours later lay stiff and cold. That, good people, was miserliness, a miserliness that never left its man even on the edge of the grave, and that I call unnatural miserliness.’ Thus he would defend himself, and never admitted to being a miser.

Nevertheless, he retained the goodwill of both master and mistress; for he was a faithful and trustworthy guardian to have on the farm. Without anxiety they could stay away from home, if only they knew that Simeoni was in charge.

Once, on an evening in the Christmas holidays, Juhani departed with his wife and his two youngest children on a round of visits to Impivaara and to Tuomas and Lauri, and Simeoni was again left in charge of the farm. The road was good and the journey progressed pleasantly through the forests, under a cloudless sky. Little ‘tom-tit’ sat, solemn and chubby, on Juhani’s knee, while the youngest child of all, a girl fresh and gentle-mannered, rested in its wrapping of a white fleecy shawl on Venla’s breast, enjoying its warm nourishment as the sleigh slid tinkling over the snow-covered clearings, hastening from Jukola towards the fields of Impivaara. Evening fell, and the men and maid-servants at Jukola went off to the games at Toukola, leaving Simeoni to manage the household alone. Two were left in his power, the two oldest girls of the family, one nine, the other seven years old. These two had not been taken along with their mother and father, and their uncle would not permit them to go to the village with the others, at which both were mightily aggrieved. Simeoni, however, cared little for their opinion, and decided instead to make use of his power to enforce on them his own ideas of what was fitting.

It became pitch-dark, and still no fire blazed in the fireplace as usual in the evening. At this the children fretted and began clamouring fiercely for light and a fire. But their uncle paid no attention to these demands, and lay peacefully as was his habit on the top of the fireplace, his long coarse hair hanging down from its edge. He lay there speaking words of wisdom to the girls. ‘A fine thing, indeed, to be always baking these bricks. Ho, ho! we’re not, I’m thinking, in Vantta ironworks. Know, you hussies, that wood is dear; and tell me what we shall burn when the forests have all been cut. Heather, eh? Ay, that’s what’ll happen if we don’t look before us in time. Less is enough for this sinful wretched body, enough, I should say, for two idle scamps like you. Get under the rugs, there’s warmth for you. Ho indeed! A fine thing that would be.’ So spoke Simeoni; but the children, saucy minxes unused to giving way to their uncle, nagged back at him, argued quite fiercely with him, snapped and at intervals bared the white rows of their teeth at him, mocking and jibing in their anger. And when this failed to help them they at length dared to lay their claws on the old fellow’s scraggy hair, which hung over the stove-top. These locks they now seized and managed to tug fairly well before the poor man had time to climb down. But at last he was on his feet, and seizing a sooty stick from the corner, he hammered with it on the floor, threatening to sweep the legs from under them. Whereupon the scamps skipped out of the room, and Jukola’s tough-grained door sang as the little rascals ran.

But a moment later they had the boldness to enter again, and in fierce tones demand their supper. Simeoni let them rage and scold for long, but at last he rose and taking a splinter from the rafters split it and lit one half. In the light of this wretched torch he ladled out gruel from the pot for the girls, but not much, only two or three ladlefuls. He set the bowl on a stool and bade the children eat; meanwhile he covered the pot with the lid of the baking-trough and for further safety put the heavy chopping-block from the corner on the lid. The children, however, were dissatisfied with these rations and demanded more; they wanted at least a piece of bread; and little Venla, a sharp little puss, wept musically. Simeoni bit off a piece of bread hardly as big as a man’s thumb and handed it to the girl. But seeing its smallness, she would have none of it, and angrily thrusting out her hand, knocked the bread out of Simeoni’s hand into the corner. And now the man too lost his temper; pursing his lips tightly together, he twitched her by the hair with two fingers, saying: ‘thou baggage, dost thou mock at the dear gift of God? Ho indeed! A fine thing.’

At that the girl began to weep harder, but Simeoni at least cared little for that, but merely began at last to make a fire. With a few paltry embers he built up a wretched blaze, saying in a scolding tone: ‘hold thy tongue now, or I’ll take a stick from yon corner and thrash thee properly. The little imp, to throw God’s gift out of my hand into the corner. Oh well! Be without bread now and lap up thy gruel nicely like thy older sister is doing. And it’s quite enough for a child’s supper. We haven’t the means to feast and live like rich men do. Shut up, thou wretch. Ay, a fine thing that’d be.’ Thus he spoke, sitting on the hearth and coaxing his unwilling fire of embers; the old fellow never saw how the little minx, spoon in hand, made angry faces at him and wagged her little jaw in time to his words.

However, neither the girls’ tears nor angry words helped, and they had to be content with their uncle’s rations. And at last an overpowering sleep laid the children in bed, and soon they were sleeping soundly under the soft, sheepskin rugs. Meanwhile Simeoni’s fire let the cold into the house instead of warming it; neither would he wait for the fire to burn out. Thinking to himself: the dear wood will do for tomorrow, he began to extinguish his feeble, dispiriting evening blaze and closed the dampers tightly, despite the acrid smoke that streamed into the room from the air-hole. Relighting his skimpy torch, he ate his supper: a small piece of mouldy bread and seven dried-up sprats’ heads from an oaken bowl. Eagerly the burning eyes of the dogs watched his meal, the movements of his hand from bowl to mouth and mouth to bowl, but not a crumb was left over for them. And having eaten, he crossed his hands, fell on his knees on the hearth-stone, and weeping burning tears thanked David’s Son for having in His boundless mercy always fed him, a sack of sin. And then, rising, he opened the door and began shooing out the dogs for the night, ‘to guard the house from thieves’. He said this, although as far back as anyone could remember thieves had been unknown in Jukola. A fierce wintry wind had risen outside and the dogs were little minded to exchange the rustling straw of the room for the cold out-of-doors; and thus a tumult ensued in which the dogs, however, got the worst. Squealing, with drooping tails, they fled at length before Simeoni’s weapon, the sooty stick.

This accomplished, he carefully closed the heavy doors of the porch, a burning splinter between his grinning teeth. Coming back into the room, he held his torch to the left and looked at the girls, who dreamed sweetly in their bed under the warm rugs, cheek against cheek, glowing like two newly-blown roses on a summer night. The man gazed upon them, gazed smiling and tucked the woollen edge of the rug closer to little Venla’s throat; and as he moved away to the hearth, he uttered in a fond, mincing tone: ‘what’s to stop you from sleeping, with your bellies full of gruel.’ And having said this, he prepared for his own nightly rest. Once again he fell on his knees and clasping his hands firmly together and shedding hot tears, thanked the Lord, David’s Son, for all the good they had enjoyed, praying for His sheltering hand to be held over the farm also during the coming night. He prayed on his own behalf, on behalf of the little ones in the bed and for all on the face of this earth. Then he lay down on his beloved stove-top, and with the embers gratefully warming the soles of his feet, fell asleep.

Cold was the room, cold and cheerless, when the men and maid-servants came back from the games at Toukola to sleep somewhere about midnight, and the next day they glowered angrily at Simeoni. And when the master and mistress returned from their visits, all began fiercely complaining, both the children and the grown-ups. But Simeoni cared nothing at all, and only whittled beside his chopping-block, remarking in an idle tone: ‘we haven’t the means to live like gents, that you all know. To live like gents on this farm.’

Such was Simeoni’s life in his old home, on old Jukola: toiling diligently and always on the watch inside and outside the house. Yet days would come when nothing on earth moved him. It happened at times that he came from the village altogether drunk, came back a merry fellow, who blustered loudly and pranced backward and forward on the floor, to the amusement and laughter of all on the farm. But the next day he would be very ill in soul and body. Sighing and with hands crossed, he would lie on the sooty oven-top, and a great repentance would gnaw at his heart. Then came an event which caused these drunken hours and long days of atonement to grow much rarer. Juhani once brought him an expensive gift from town: a big, stiff-backed Bible weighing almost a stone. Simeoni’s joy and delight were great; and for this kind deed he never wearied of thanking and praising his brother. And after that he forgot the tempting glass almost entirely.

Each Sunday and week-day evening he was now seen sitting beside his Bible, studying the Word; and thus he seldom fell in with strong drink. Nevertheless, this was still to happen one All Saints’ Eve. In merry mood the man blustered, strutted and danced around, only to fall asleep at last on his stone; and the next day again knew black repentance in his bosom. And what did he do then? Standing at the head of the table with the Bible open before him, he called together the farm-folk from the eldest down to the youngest. And placing two fingers on the Book and rolling his eyes heavenward, he swore a sacred oath never more to taste strong drink, not another drop as long as he lived.

A year went by and a second and even a third, and still Simeoni held firmly by his oath. Once again, however, he was to fall into this besetting sin of his, and this fall caused a great commotion on the farm. As a perjured, soul-less worm the poor man now regarded himself, having broken a vow made with two fingers on the Book. Therefore he decided to shorten his miserable days. Swiftly, but with firm footsteps and ice-cold mind, he left the house, climbed to the stable-loft and tying the old speckled mare’s blanket-strap round his neck, fastened the other end to the highest rafter under the roof. And there he calmly set himself hanging, sleeping the sleep of death; and stiffly the man’s eyes stared before him, his cheeks swelled out with terrible speed and his hands clenched into iron fists. But the measure of his days was not yet filled.

Juhani’s mother-in-law went out to look at her hens’ nests in the loft, and seeing a man at the end of a rope she at once raised the alarm with her shouts and squeals. Juhani hastened without delay to the place of danger and saved his brother from the very jaws of death. With one jerk he snapped the strap and groaning and uttering cries of surprise, carried his brother into the house, and around them swarmed the women and children, weeping, crying out and striking their palms together. Into the chamber, onto Venla’s yielding rug, Juhani bore his brother, and soon Simeoni had come to and sat gloomily, sighing and peering at the floor, on the edge of the bed. With a smoking cob between his teeth, Juhani then hastened to Aapo, walking rapidly and groaning, to tell his brother of the awful event and to ask his advice regarding Simeoni. He himself thought a little thrashing, given secretly and in all moderation and silence by his brothers, to be followed by a few stern godly words, would be best for the man. But Aapo dismissed the hiding as unnecessary and harmful, and decided to use only the power of the word on him. And when he too had lit his pipe, the two brothers set off from Aapo-Jukola over the fields to Juhani-Jukola, to talk wisdom with Simeoni, that child of sorrow.

Aapo shook the hand of Simeoni warmly in greeting, and reloading his pipe, began with solemn mien and voice to pronounce judgment, followed soon by words of consolation. Simeoni listened for long without saying a word, only peering dismally down at the floor. But Aapo, ceaselessly relighting his cob, waving his hand and looking out of the window towards the distant horizon with eager eyes, went on increasing the power of his speech. And the words fell from his mouth like a glowing golden rain. And suddenly, bitter-sweet lines appeared round Simeoni’s mouth and the man’s throat burst into a mighty sobbing. Juhani’s jaw trembled too and hung aslant, and soon he too was weeping, and even in Aapo’s eyes a moist gleam could have been seen.

Thus was Simeoni’s heart turned once more towards life and hope. And it was with a face beaming with gratitude that he squeezed Aapo’s hand in farewell. He thanked God too for the new mercy shown him; and little by little he relapsed into his former ways on the farm. And thus pious Simeoni, never draining another glass, lived out his peaceful days, now whittling beside the chopping-block, now, pipe in mouth, hacking pine-twigs in the fresh-scented yard, now sitting by his Bible, studying the Word.

Aapo ruled over the other half of Jukola, over the farm now known as Aapo-Jukola; his farmhouse stood only a few hundred paces from his former home. He had married Hindrikka Konkkala; a mild and gentle woman in every way; a busy housewife and good-tempered helpmate. Aapo was content with her, though he deemed it best to give her now and then strict instructions and advice in the care of a household. To these she would listen in silence or laughing, her eyes twinkling, her simple merry laugh. Aapo would also instruct the maids and little servant-girls, when it chanced that their work offended his eye. The oldest maid once received a stern lesson from him while she swept the floor. For Aapo, being of the mind that she swept too stormily and left dust in the corners, suddenly lost his temper and snatching the broom from her, began anew with nimble movements to sweep the room from the rear end to the door. But halfway across the floor, he thrust the broom at her again, saying: ‘that’s how a good girl should sweep.’ Then the mistress, who had looked on from the fireplace at Aapo fussing broom in hand with the maid, laughed her guileless, melting laugh, laughed, screwing up her eyes and holding her hands on her knees. Whereas Aapo, as soon as he had left the maid to her work, cast a sternly reproving glance at her. Yet he was always fair and honest with his men and maids; this they would all admit with one mouth.

He practised the art of healing, too, as he had learned it from an old medical book which he was always studying. Very often his remedies proved successful, though many of them were of his own invention, concocted of herbs. He was especially famous at curing erysipelas, fainting-fits, mumps and the itch. At massage he was unexcelled; many were the men whom his hand had treated and who had found in it alleviation. Stomach-aches and the gripes he would often cure merely by massage. And as danger knows no laws or rules, it happened more than once that women too had to submit to treatment by Aapo’s palm, when colic pains and retchings tore ceaselessly at their stomachs.

There was one woman, the wife of the rag-gatherer, old Matti Tervakoski, who suffered from an obstinate nightmare. It rode her in the most exhausting fashion for weeks at a stretch. Sometimes when it failed to afflict her, she had hopes that she had been saved from this nightly tormentor. But then it would return and the old woman would writhe again in the grip of her persecutor. She sought help from wise women and from doctors, but always in vain. Then at last a rumour of Aapo’s great skill and power of curing diseases reached her ears, and once more she fared forth to seek relief. Bundle on arm and knitting in hand, she walked the long weary way to Jukola, but once there, she was freed for ever from her trouble.

As a juryman too, Aapo was the right man. Grave, often with his hand behind his ear, he sat on the court-room bench, carefully following the course of a law-suit. There, holding his head manfully erect, he would sit, a faint smile of self-satisfaction playing occasionally over his lips. His judgments were always wise, impartial and just. Of this the Judge was aware, and therefore he always listened patiently to his somewhat long-drawn speeches, as, spreading out his hands, he held forth on the case in point.

Thus he lived in his peaceful home, a good master, and the good father of sturdy children.

Impivaara, the part first cleared, was ruled over by Tuomas, a man broad-shouldered and strong. No brave dared preen himself in the presence of the master of Upper-Impivaara. Great was his strength, and his whole being bespoke power and security. In working his farm he never had recourse to shouting and bluster; yet he kept good order and upheld the fear of God both in his home and out in the fields. He was the most generous of all the brothers, and always treated the suffering children of hard fortune mercifully and with kindness. Not for him to question, or to probe the origin of the misery of those seeking his help. He would not upbraid the man whose own folly had brought him to the beggar’s staff. He gave to all, gave without discernment, thinking: at least thou art unhappy. Tenderest was he to little beggar-girls, who, with shy glance, walked the path of mendicancy in fear and trembling. Two such wanderers he had taken into his care, and these were brought up and cared for as lovingly as his own children, bouncing boys every one of them.

His wife was Härkämäki’s only daughter, a grave and noble woman, worthy to be the spouse of the mighty hero of Impivaara. Robust, at once quick, grave and calm, was she in countenance and character. Her bosom swelled proudly; her plait, thick and flaxen-yellow, danced pleasantly on her strong shoulders under her neckerchief, red-checkered on a white ground. Peace dwelt ever on her brow and in her heart the fear of God, strict and whole-souled. This was the mistress of Impivaara, the noble mother of the children of the farm, their own and those adopted. Often her eyes, fine and charitable, would dwell dreaming on a delicate girl-child, saved once from orphanage and destitution.

Thus the days of Tuomas’s life passed calmly by, towards the calm haven of death. The life of man is often compared to a stream. But Tuomas’s life, from the time when he took over Impivaara to the moment of his death, I would compare to a mighty river which fares majestically, calmly onward towards the boundless eternal ocean.

Two or three gunshots east of Tuomas’s farm, Lauri’s farm stood on a heath; it formed the other half of Impivaara and was called Laurila. Here dwelt a silent man, who tilled his land with energy, toiled busily in his fields, but keener still in the backwoods and bogs.

He had taken his wife from Kukkala Farm. Of the Kuokkala twins, Lauri had espoused one and the other had fallen to Timo’s lot, to be mistress of Kekkuri Croft. There was a woman for thee, Lauri’s wife: a broad-bosomed wench; short she was too. Her shrill voice carried far, like the piercing note of a clarionet, especially when, brimming over with wrath, she stormed at her husband; and at such moments her brown eyes emitted sparks.

Silent, whittling a piece of wood, Lauri would sit, heedless though his wife raged and blustered like a tempest. And this tried the woman’s patience so that her gall would rise still higher. Yet it could happen at times that the man’s patience gave out, and then it was not good to look him in the face. Even the wife would be suddenly silent and slip out best she might, to hide in some corner of the cowhouse, in some sheltered nook or cranny. There she would linger a while in hiding, peeping cautiously out at intervals to find out how the storm she had awakened was progressing. So she would stay away until the man’s wrathful mind was appeased. Yet it was seldom that quiet Lauri was thus aroused. Often, when his wife raged and fumed again, he would go out into the forests, a pipe between his teeth and an axe under his arm, and look for useful bits of timber, birch-bark for shoes, and fungoids. Gladly he lingered on these trips, searching, looking around and meditating. And not until long after sunset, when all others rested, would he trudge home in the mild half-dark of the summer nights, with a burden of roots, twisted tree-trunks and a mighty ball of birch-bark on his shoulder.

It often happened at such times that on his homeward way he would meet his sturdy bull, Hälli of the broad back, bound in passionate thoughts for the village; come face to face with him in the mists of even on the sandy road; see him approach with baleful eyes. But then steel met steel; for Lauri, roaring in his hoarse voice and brandishing his axe, would always force the obstinate brute to turn in the end. And then they would march back to Laurila, Hälli ahead and Lauri behind. Hälli tried to turn to the right, but immediately Lauri would be there, waving his axe; once more Hälli would try to the left, but again from the left Lauri’s axe threatens him. And so the bull would deem it best to march off home, even though it did shake its head angrily and blow out the mighty passion of its heart through its nostrils.

They would pass the home of Tuomas, where the maid would hear in her bed the thud of footsteps, swishings and tappings, from the sandy road. ‘Who is out so late?’ she would think, and rising up sleep-befuddled in her shift, she would go to the window, peep out and see her neighbour’s bull go marching gravely and solemnly by with its master. In front the bull, unwilling, behind it the master, every now and again brandishing his axe and carrying on his shoulder a bundle of wood and a ball of birch-bark. So they would vanish at last from the maid’s sight. Then the bull would open its throat and sing in its wrath a fearsome, screaming song, and the heath would quake and heaven and earth echo. But then Lauri would say: ‘ay, I’ll give it to thee. Art thou angry? Aha! rascal, march nicely home now; even Kaura-Matti’s tricks wouldn’t help thee here. As thou knowest.’ So he would say as he strode on, with the bull marching before him and blowing a proud triumphant march, which echoed in the silent night to far distant villages.

Lauri would shut up Hälli firmly in the yard to keep the farm’s own cows company, and then enter the house, where a supper grown cold awaited him. In the house all slept already; only the mistress lay fretfully awake in her bed in the chamber, waiting for her husband. When he had eaten Lauri would at last enter the chamber, and at once a sharp gale would blow to meet him. His wife screamed and babbled passionately at him from her bed, crackling with fury like fire in a dry juniper bush at her husband, at ‘that lout’s accursed idling in the depths of the forest’. Silently the man would sit, undressing himself, and then, lighting his cob, lie down at last beside his wife, who still scolded and flared up at him. But when the pipe had been smoked to the end, Lauri would place it carefully on the floor, twitch the coverlet a little higher and then utter in a firm tone: ‘Be quiet now, bless thyself and sleep in God’s name while the weather’s good: mind that, while the weather’s good.’ And at that the nagging wife would be still, though her heart still heaved in her bosom; until, having angrily jerked the coverlet more to her own side, she would fall asleep like the man beside her.

Thus until the dark nights came Lauri lingered in the forests on these pleasant outings. And of all that he saw there worth noting, marvelling at or thinking over, he seldom said a word to anyone during the week. Only on Sundays and generally at the breakfast table would he relate a thing or two to his farm-hands.

Once when he returned from the forest, his mind worked harder than ever, thinking, meditating; but what it was he pondered over so deeply no one knew. Silent and increasingly morose from day to day he moved in his yard, snapping viciously at both men and women, which had seldom been his habit earlier. A cloud of deep or vexing thoughts hid his brow without cease and cast dark shadows in the hollows of his eyes. Such was his appearance a whole long week. Came Sunday at last, and Lauri sat at table with his men, but in complete silence. At last however he opened his lips and said to the others: ‘Men, I have one thing to ask you; explain it if you can. Five days ago when I walked over the smooth rise in Koivisto meadow, in the new snow that hid the ground thinly with its woolly garment as it does now, I saw tracks that my brain cannot make out. Curse! for days and nights already my thoughts have coursed hither and thither, in all directions, seeking an explanation to this matter. But listen: in the meadow I saw tracks, the tracks of a full-grown man, which I followed, idly walking. But suddenly these tracks broke off, and from this point, continuing over the rise and down into the thicket, the tracks of a fox began, clear fox-tracks, of which there had been none on the ground up to now, not one. Where had the man got to? He had not turned back, either to the right or the left, no, but he must have gone up to Heaven and a fox come down from there to continue his tracks in the snow. Or can the man have carried a fox on his back, and then at the spot where his own tracks ended have climbed on to Reynard’s back and ridden him through the thicket on to the church road? Impossible; yet I can see no other way of explaining this matter. What do you say, men? Are there still magicians in our village? Had the man changed himself with the Devil’s help into a fox?’ Thus he spoke, and the farm-folk listened in astonishment, nor could any of them explain the riddle; one and all ended in believing that a wizard must have walked in Koivisto meadow.

But in Lauri’s heart there was no peace; having eaten, he set off tramping again towards Koivisto meadow. Reaching the rounded rise he noticed the same phenomenon again: human tracks changing into those of a fox in the newly-fallen snow. Beside himself, he shouted in an angry voice: ‘Is the very Devil at his tricks here?’ And shouting, thus with twisted lips, he kicked at a dung-hill that showed faintly through the snow, whereupon the gleam of bright steel flashed from it. In one instant fine dung and chaff flew into the air, while at the same time the shining arcs of a wicked fox-trap closed on his legs, squeezing them mercilessly. And at this Lauri’s eyes opened wide; he bent down hurriedly to release his aching, swelling calves from the obstinate irons, and with a shrieked curse cast them from him to the ground. Now he knew what kind of traps had been set in his meadow, but of the puzzling change in the tracks he could still make nothing. He began wrathfully walking homeward, limping badly and clenching his teeth each time he put his foot to the ground. And soon he felt the need of some prop to help him on his way and began seeking a likely staff in the thicket by the church road. In a bush he saw two birchwood poles, and when he had dragged these from their hiding-place he found them to be two stilts, both of which had exceedingly natural fox-paws carved at their lower ends. And now his face brightened and all was clear to him. He understood now that some trapper, wishing to avoid anything that might breed suspicion in a fox, had used these stilts each time he had been to examine his traps. By this means he left behind him not human tracks, which the cunning Michael of the hills would naturally avoid, but those of a fox. The matter was now clear to Lauri; and with a lighter heart, albeit with aching calf, he limped away, using one of the wooden legs as a crutch.

And now it chanced that Kolistin, the crusty old fogey, visiting the squirrel-snares which he had set between the hay-poles in the meadow and in the fences of the fields, saw Lauri’s tracks in the open meadow and began to ponder deeply. ‘Here’s a man and a dog gone by, but--what am I to think of such wonders?--a one-legged dog. The Devil and a marvel! A one-legged dog has hopped beside its master across this stump-besprinkled, God’s own meadow. What in damnation am I to make of such a marvel? Are wizards and Lapps about? Eh?’ Thus he pondered as he stood on the clearing, tearing his rough black looks, rolling a quid between his front teeth and knitting his grey eyebrows in a terrible frown. Soon, however, he walked on, but still without comprehending the miracle on the clearing: a one-legged dog that hopped beside its master. He brooded over the matter long and deeply without a word to anybody until on his deathbed, when he asked his gentle daughter-in-law what she thought of this marvel, which gave him no peace even in the jaws of death. But the woman, with tears in her eyes, only shouted in his ear an entreaty to dismiss all such thoughts from his mind and to think only of his everlasting soul. To this the old man made no answer, but continued to stare before him; and thus he took the strange mystery of the heath with him to the grave unanswered.

Lauri’s leg soon healed of its bite and he toiled on his farm as before, now in the forests, now in his roomy farmhouse. Such was the life he led with his sturdy wife and children. And as long as they remained in their mother’s care, his children never lacked a shirt or stockings, their daily bread or the whip.

Timo ruled over Kekkuri Croft, and his wife was the second of the Kuokkala twins. Both in character and outward appearance she was the spit of her sister: a plump-bosomed, tilt-nosed, brown-skinned woman. She was said, however, to possess a somewhat softer heart than her sister, the wife of brother Lauri. Greatly did Timo love her, even though his hair sometimes flew in the lusty grip of his hot-tempered mate; for it was not good to oppose her in anything. Timo always tried, too, to do his wife’s will in every way, and life went on well on the farm. One matter only would now and then disturb the peace of their household. Timo had the habit, a deeply-rooted habit, of drinking himself into a rowdy state of intoxication once a year, about the Feast of Hallowe’en, on which occasions he would linger in the village for a day or two in the company of his boon friends. But then a rare commotion would arise when at last he saw fit to return home.

One Sunday on the confines of October and November the man had again strayed from the straight path and joined in a merry carouse with Kyösti Tammisto and Karkkula’s Aapeli. In the cool attic at Tammisto they drank from a black, shining bottle, talking with great gravity, singing and embracing each other lovingly. Thus they spent two days and two nights, cheering and singing and staring carelessly with bemused eyes out of the windy windows of their eyrie. They stared over the dung-covered yard, over the straw-littered cowhouse, over a stony hill, over fields and meadows right to the distant bog called Lemmilä, over which, high under the clouds, the wild swans flashed, wheeling hither and thither on their migration to the lands of the south. Unheedingly they stared, gazed with watery goat’s eyes, prattled foolishly and wagged their heads, in which a delicious heat and giddiness made themselves felt: far away were the cares and sorrows of ordinary wretched mortals.

But at last the third day dawned, and the friends awoke with aching heads from their chilly couches. Finished were both money and drink, and no way was left of inducing housewives to tap their casks. Silent and with disordered countenance, Timo finally started to trudge homeward; with lagging footsteps he passed along the lane, walked mournfully up the hill, his thoughts dwelling on the hot-tempered mistress of Kekkuri. His homespun trousers had a miserable droop to them, and between his trousers and the red-striped waistcoat he affected his shirt stuck vacantly out; his eyes bulged, little and bloodshot, as, with his hair in a thousand tangles, he marched on towards Kekkuri; and the open breast of the man, gleaming and red as the scoured side of a copper kettle, glowed afar. In gloomy humour he walked, and the forests, hills and valleys glared angrily at him. Yonder the yellowed birch bore stern witness to his sin; the dark-hued spruce loudly proclaimed it, and like a black, vicious imp, a tarry stump, stood by the roadside; Nature, formerly so loving, now turned a strict step-motherly countenance upon him. Yet on trees, rocks and stumps, he looked but little, but kept his gaze directed ahead, remembering the hot-tempered mistress of Kekkuri. On those who chanced to meet him on the road, young or old, man or woman, he hardly deigned to cast a glance, and indeed he would have been hard put to do more now, even if the Grand Duke of Finland himself had walked past him. Silent, brooding with a faint smile over his home, his wife, the farm-folk and his children, he marched on, and every now and again a sudden but soundless sigh would burst forth from his breast.

Finally he reached his yard, and here he halted to consider whether he dared enter the house, and whether there were any means left under the sun by which he could appease even slightly his infuriated mate. There he now held his head, held it a long time, looking hither and thither, until at last an idea flashed into his brain and he said to himself: ‘I have found a way.’ And at once he began piling up an armful of cordwood from the pile. And then, with a mighty load of wood in his embrace, he staggered towards the house, hoping by this trick to please his firm-willed wife. With a great scraping he mounted the steps and entered the porch and from there shouted in an innocent tone: ‘open the door ... open the door, you children there, the boy or the girl.’ And presently his son, little milk-bearded Jooseppi, came and opened the door, and in stepped Timo with his load, looking straight and unwaveringly before him. And when he had dropped his load with a great clatter in the corner, he said: ‘the cordwood pile seems to be going down a lot; but what of it; there’s plenty of forest on Jukola.’ And having said this, he made bold to cast a swift glance at his wife; but there a thunderstorm, threatening and heavy with wrath to come, met his gaze.

It was a dreadful moment. Hardly had the wife shrieked out the question: ‘where hast thou been, thou devil-possessed?’ before a slap fell on Timo’s cheeks, a fiery slap right and left. But soon the sound of slaps ceased and an awful silence followed, during which Timo’s hair was in a fiery mill, so that the world span round before his eyes. At last he lost his temper, and seizing his wife’s arms in his brawny fists, he thrust her down on a stool and there held her quietly for a while. And with his hair terribly tousled, red as a turkey-cock in the face, Timo then spoke to the furious woman: ‘what now, if I were to give it thee from a real man’s fist, thou slut, thou she-ass’s colt. Dost think thou canst dare to treat me like that? Oho! that’s where thou art mistaken. There aren’t many fellows I’d let touch my hair, let alone any old woman. For, devil take me, I’m a proper hot-blooded fellow, as, more’s the pity, is not so often seen and heard nowadays. Ay, ay, take care I do not wallop thee a little even now.’ Thus he threatened, without however fulfilling his threat. Perhaps he had not the heart for it. For he still loved his wife greatly. But in a black rage his wife screamed: ‘let go, thou accursed man, let go this minute!’ At this interruption Timo was taken aback and pondered for a moment whether to let go his hold, or to restrain his mate a little longer. Once again the woman shrieked and louder; and Timo loosened his grasp; but at once the man’s hair was in a mill again. Whereupon he lost his temper again and completely this time, and deciding to leave his wife to the Devil, began marching proudly out. Slow, however, and difficult was his progress from the room; for the woman flapped at his neck like a little brown hawk on the back of a ruddy male capercaillie, with the feathers flying all around. But without heeding this, he tore his way out of the room, tore himself out by force, but not until the porch steps were reached did his wife release her hold, promising to give her husband a good lesson yet: and down the steps Timo came gravely, saying as he went: ‘that’s how I teach ’em, women!’ He strode away from the house and disappeared behind the hops, but once there, he grinned cunningly to himself and returned quickly to the stables, where he climbed into the loft. He thrust down a couple of armfuls of hay to the horses in their stalls, dropped down on his yielding, rustling couch, and having pondered a while over his wife’s ‘violent heart’, fell into a heavy sleep.

Night came, a cold and frosty night, but of Timo nothing more was heard. Greatly anxious, the mistress lay down on her bed, thinking gloomily of her husband’s fate. ‘He had gone, maybe, the wild fellow, and hung himself; or perhaps thrown himself in a temper into the bottomless well in Nummenniittu meadow; or had fallen asleep in the forest, and was sure to freeze the nose, nails and limbs of him, the poor lad.’ Fancying these things, she soon burst into a fit of passionate weeping as she lay there on her bed without her beloved husband. She sighed and sobbed for an agonized hour or two, her restless ear ever alert for sounds in the gateway or porch. But the night wore on and on, and there was no sound of approaching footsteps. Finally she rose, dressed herself, and lit a richly-decorated tin lantern with the intention of going out to seek the lost one. She dared not, however, face the night alone; she had always been much afraid of gnomes, ghosts and all kinds of spooks. Their own bath-house had a special terror for her, for had not recently the old pensioned soldier, foam-bearded Iisakki Honkamäki, died there? She aroused, therefore, her maid Taava for company on her search. Taava rose and dressed herself, but it was in peevish and irritable mood that she followed her mistress into the cold, dismal night. They searched first the bath-house, then the barn, but without result. They came back into the yard, and there on the edge of the field the wife fell to weeping and calling loudly on her husband by name. She shouted lustily, and the forest and the barn on the open clearing echoed. At length they heard from the loft a kind of rough, hoarse growling in answer, and to this spot the women now hastened. Up into the loft, lantern in hand, the wife climbed and there found Timo; raising himself sleep-drunken on his rustling couch, he stared bewildered at her, as an old goat bewitched out of its sense by wolves might stare. He stops not, the crazy animal, to seek shelter with the man who has saved him from the wolves, but suddenly, unexpectedly, sets off at a run after the wolves, stopping now and then, stamping his feet and looking quite ferociously around him. So Timo too now stared at his own wife without recognizing her; some influence of the after-effects of drink still worked perhaps in his brain.

WIFE. Why dost thou sit here? Come in; God’s creation, thou hast no need to scorch thyself here in the grip of the frost; that I will say. Come in, Timo.

TIMO. Who art thou then?

WIFE. Good Lord preserve us! Art thou so far gone as not to know me? Ho-hoo! There now, that’s how sin and the Devil lead poor souls astray. Ho-hoo, ay!

TIMO. What art blubbering for there? Who are you anyway?

WIFE. Ah indeed, ah, oh! Timo, Timo!

TIMO. Eh?

WIFE. Dost thou not know me? I am thy wife Ulla.

TIMO. Ah! Ay, so you are.

WIFE. Come in and don’t hang about here in the cold stable loft. Oh, thou miserable man!

TIMO. Ay, a fine fuss because the master sleeps in his loft. Shut up and don’t talk so childishly there. What’s harming a man here?

MAID. They won’t, drat them, let a poor maid rest her nights in peace, but here she has to be nosing round corners looking for a drunken swine.

WIFE. Hurry now. Give me thy hand and come down nicely.

MAID. Give me thy hand! I’d drag him down by the leg like a sack of chaff.

TIMO. What’s Taava snapping at down there? Shut up, wench, there’s nothing the matter with any of us.

MAID. I’d matter him.

WIFE. Hold thy jaw thou, and take this lantern. Canst thou not get down from there?

TIMO. I’ll be down in my own time; go on ahead to the house, you two.

They entered the house, the mistress ahead and the maid behind, and last of all came Timo. Muttering wrathfully to herself the maid hastened to her bed, while the mistress began nimbly preparing supper for her man. On the table she set out butter, round loaves, beef-stew and big potatoes in their skins; and with pleasure Timo tackled his meal. But sore of heart, his wife tearfully watched him from the other end of the table.

WIFE. I will say; why canst thou not stop properly at home, strange fellow, when thou knowest what a hot-tempered Gypsy-Kaisa I am? Now I’ve been at thy hair again. What came over my claws, what came over an old woman’s claws? I’ve been tearing at thee again.

TIMO. Ay, to be sure, a fine to-do for pulling the master’s hair. What art thou blubbering for so childishly when there’s nothing the matter with anybody? But it was a hot tussle, all the same, and thou gavest it me with a man’s hand. He-he! The Devil anyhow! Go and pour out some beer.

WIFE. What cause hast thou to hang about the villages and village taverns night and day, night and day? Is this a right state of things?

TIMO. Well, I won’t say that it mightn’t have happened about once a year; ay, it has, it can’t be denied.

WIFE. Where hast thou frolicked now, and with whom? Say? Who were the rascals?

TIMO. Ay, I had my companions, that I had.

WIFE. Where hast thou wallowed and with whom? Tell me at once.

TIMO. Why, with Tammisto’s Kyösti and Karkkula’s Aapeli in Tammisto attic yonder.

WIFE. What did you drink?

TIMO. Only spirits, nothing dearer. Ay, where would the likes of us get rum, rum and liquors?

WIFE. Godless man! If death were to strike thee now, thou’dst sink down to the lowest hell without help or mercy.

TIMO. It isn’t often, God knows, that anyone is ready. But what’s to kill us here, in our best years. Shut up about dying and draw me some beer.

The wife drew brown, foaming beer for her husband from the cask, and having eaten a meal suited to a full-grown man, Timo emptied almost the whole tankard. Whereafter both withdrew to their beds.

But another side of the mistress’s nature should also be shown. Each Sunday or holiday morning, before setting off to Communion Service with her husband, she always wept stinging tears and begged each member of the family for forgiveness, beginning with her husband and passing down to the shepherd boy. And with his mouth in a contented simper, Timo would go out to hurry on the harnessing of the horse, walk there happily, his shirt collar high up his neck, raised there by the nimble hand of his own wife. And with his farmhand, who harnessed the horse in the yard, he would speak thus: ‘Eh, but that wife of ours is a good wife, that she truly is, no one could deny it. Where should I be, poor beggar, with all my brats without her, the wife of wives? Dog take it, three hundred roubles wouldn’t pay all I’d lose if this woman were to die; even four hundred wouldn’t do it. Believe me, Kaapolad.’ Thus he spoke, and with all that he said the wily Kaapo was quick to agree, although each time he was on the other side of the brown gelding, a roguish grin spread over his countenance. But at last the mistress would come out in her new rustling skirt and gleaming linen, her eyes swollen by weeping; she would approach the cart, climb gravely into it and sit down sighing in her seat. And behind her on her right, reins in hand, Timo would seat himself, glowing like the full moon in late summer, glowing, smiling and happy, full of blood, health and vitality. He would jerk slightly at the reins, smack his lips once, and immediately the swift gelding would be trotting along the church road. Soon they would be lost in the shadowy opening of the birch-wood, and for a brief while a sandy smoke would glitter over the sunlit road.

Eero, youngest of the brothers, lived and toiled on Vuohenkalma Croft, on a stony hill beside the church road. He was the wise and active Sheriff’s Man of the parish, who caused many a wolf, glutton and bear to lose its life in a well-baited trap. He was much in demand by the Sheriff as an assistant, for all the matters entrusted to his care were wont to turn out exceeding well. His skill in writing and reckoning also brought him much work, and likewise income. Yet these never tempted him to neglect the tilling of his land, and his farm was ruled with discipline and a fiery energy; no one was allowed to dawdle in his yards. Ever his eye swept searchingly around him, like the sharp eye of a hook-beaked hawk that spies out the land from the branch of a withered birch in a clearing in the bright summer sunshine.

On Sundays or holidays he either studied his newspaper, or wrote the news or described parochial happenings from his own parish for the same newspaper. And gladly the editor accepted these writings of his, whose contents were always to the point, their style pithy and clear, often showing genius. And with these interests his outlook on life and the world broadened. The country of his birth was to him no longer a vague part of a vague world, of which he knew neither the site nor the character. He knew well where lay the country, that dear corner of the earth, where the Finns dwelt in toil and struggle, and in whose bosom the bones of his fathers rested. He knew its frontiers, its seas, its secretly-smiling lakes and the pine-clad ridges that run like stake-fences throughout its breadth. The whole picture of the land of his birth, its friendly mother-face, had sunk for ever into the depths of his heart. And from it was born in him a desire to help the happiness and prosperity of his country. Through his sturdy and unresting endeavours a kind of elementary school was built in the parish, one of the first in Finland. And other useful institutions, too, he brought into the district. And in all his work in the house his eye dwelt constantly on his eldest son, whom he had decided to educate into a man of knowledge and skill.

His wife was Sunala’s slender daughter, the flaxen-haired, shy-eyed Anna, she who had seen the wonderous visions and in delirium prophesied many miracles. She was now mistress of Vuohenkalma, a free and prosperous croft; yet her dominion was not over wide. Much more than on her did the care and guidance of the household rest on the master’s shoulders. In his pocket clinked the keys of the flour-bin; he it was who settled and measured out the rations for man and beast and paid both serving-maids and men. Often the little mistress would walk dejectedly, stand near the fireplace beside her cauldron, silently meditating. But when she bent down to the baby in its cot, her eyes beamed with a wondrous light. She rejoiced when the infant tumbled and gambolled sturdily in her lap. And to nourish him with the milk of her breasts, to nurse him, clothe him, and, as she would say to herself, ‘make of him an heir to the city of peace of the blest’, was all she needed for her modest glance to glow.

Once in the summer, on a Sunday evening, when the sun drooped to the northwest and air and forest were still, she sat alone with her child, sat on a bench at the end of the table. Eero paced his fields and meadows, and all the servants had gone to the village. A rapturous peace reigned without and within the croft’s Sunday-swept room, and decked with leaves the floor smiled up at her. Peace and silence prevailed; only the distant tinkle of cattle-bells was heard now and again from the birch-clad hill. On a bench sat the young mistress and talked to the child who like a radiant morn looked up at her from her lap. ‘Tell me; my little one,’ she said, humming between speech and song, ‘tell me, my little one, how didst thou know thy way home?--I came along the Turku road, tripped o’er the ox-paths of Häme.--But how didst thou know thy home, little one?--By the grey dog beside the gate; I knew the house by its precious well, and were there not the rector’s horses in the shed and a barrel of ale in the barn?--How didst thou know thy darling mother, how thy father?--Mother poured out wort by the blazing fire, she poured and sang in a ringing voice, a shawl at her throat, a shawl like snow and the bow of Heaven. How did I know my father? He carved away at the shaft of an axe, whittled beside the golden window.--So thou foundest thy way, so thou knewest thy home, knewest thy father and mother. But where is thy father now, say where, and whether he thinks of us?--Surely he thinks of us, and should he forget thee, I will never forget thee, not in the tides of time, not in death, thee, the bright sunshine of my soul and its languishing eve, my joy and sorrow tender. But why my sorrow? Ah! this world is false and stormy, and many a sailor has sunk for good in the eternal depths of its seas. Tell me, my child, my summer-bright, tell me: wouldst thou not sail away from here to a haven of everlasting peace, while the white pennant of childhood still flies clean? On the shore of a misty, tideless lake stands the dark manor of Tuoni; there in the heart of a shadowy grove, in the bosom of a dewy thicket a cradle is prepared for thee with snowy linen and wrappings. Hear therefore my song; it wafts thee to the land of the Prince of Tuoni. O hear the song of my heart!

‘Grove of Tuoni, grove of night! There thy bed of sand is light. Thither my baby I lead.

Mirth and joy each long hour yields In the Prince of Tuoni’s fields Tending the Tuoncla cattle.

Mirth and joy my babe will know, Lulled to sleep at evening glow By the pale Tuoncla maiden.

Surely joy the hours will hold, Lying in thy cot of gold, Hearing the nightjar singing.

Grove of Tuoni, grove of peace! There all strife and passion cease. Distant the treacherous world.’

So she sang to her child; and the harp rings not as sweet as her voice rang then in the Sunday-swept room. But when she had ceased singing she gazed for long in silence at the heavens; up into the holy, giddy heights she looked; and pure and clear was the sky, not a single wisp of cloud chowed under Heaven’s curving dome; only a summer swallow, scarce visible to the eye, glittered there, flying hither and thither, light and happy as the thoughts of a Sunday-child. So she sat, and her cheek, tanned by the sun, drooped to the drowsy infant’s temple; but the blue eyes still stared upward into the blue heights, and peace shone on her brow.

Her husband returned from the woods and in the yard heard his wife’s song, and never before had it echoed so divinely in his ears. He entered, and striding across the room, sat down beside his wife; it was a mark of friendship he seldom showed her. Swiftly the woman turned to him, laid the child in his lap and, pressing her forehead against his breast, burst into passionate weeping. But at that the man threw his arm round her and stroked a lock of her flaxen-yellow hair that had fallen behind her ear. There in the calm Sunday evening they sat on the white bench at the white table.

So lived and laboured Eero, youngest of the brothers, on his croft; and I have now related a fragment of the life of each brother, from the eldest down to the youngest. And I have yet to relate of a Christmas gathering at the house of Juhani Jukola. For the brothers had decided to fore-gather once again on the Christmas straw in their former home.

All arrived with their wives and children; and there was a great hubbub in Jukola’s spacious living-room as the numerous host of children tumbled and rolled in the rustling straw. There, round the fireplace, sat the group of wives in cheery conversation, and Kekkuri’s buxom mistress, the doughty wife of Timo, stood meekly stirring Venla’s gruel-cauldron, which for very fullness boiled over in white foam. There also, at the foot of the blaze, hymn-book on knee, Simeoni was to be seen, ready to begin the common Christmas hymn. But at the back of the room, round the table sat the other brothers, talking of by-gone times, of days in the night of the forests and on Impivaara’s stump-besprinkled clearing, under the crannied, roaring fell. And memories of past dangers, battles and toil, merged pleasantly together in their minds, as the forests, valleys, mountains and high heaths all merge together in the misty blue of distance. All was blended in a dark, delicious dream that awakened a faint repining in their bosoms. Thus they gazed back on days that had fled. So, on an autumn evening, when Nature has lain down to rest and the friendly grove stands yellow, may a cow-herd look from afar at the cherished clearing where he had laboured through the summer, grumbling, bathed in sweat. The day was hot and sultry, thunder rolled in the distance, and gnats and gadflies befogged the air, driving the cattle to a galloping frenzy. But before night had fallen he had gathered together his herds and marched merrily home with them to the tinkle of bells. Such days he now remembers and smiles. So also a mariner growing grey on shores recalls to mind ancient storms at sea. Clouds wrapped the vessel in darkness, the foaming waves threatened death; but before night the wind had died and the wave was stilled and slept, and from the brightening west the sun shone out again, pointing the road to heaven. This storm the sailor now remembers with silent joy. Thus the brothers too remembered departed days, sitting round Jukola’s table on a pleasant Christmas Eve and speaking amongst themselves.

But the cauldron was lifted from the fire, a cheery blaze built up of cordwood, and now in its flaming light a solemn chanting began. And at once a hush fell over the babbling children; the brothers too round the table ceased talking as Simeoni struck up a beautiful hymn and the women, hymnbooks in lap, joined their voices to his. Sweetly the song echoed in the roaring of the fire, and sweeter than any other, the pure and gentle voice of the modest Anna could ever be heard amongst the rest. And when at last they ceased singing, they gathered round the supper-table, and presently sank down amidst the straw on the floor to their nightly repose. Early the following morning they awoke, awoke to set out to the transfigured church, which with its thousands of burning candles glittered like the starry heavens. Then when the day had fully dawned, they came back racing amongst themselves and spent a merry Christmas in Old Jukola.

But here my story ends. And I have now told of seven brothers in the backwoods of Finland; and what more could I relate of the day of their life and its fortunes here on earth? It rose steadily to its noontide height and sank steadily downward to evening rest amidst the passing of many thousands of golden suns.

THE END

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The period which coincides with the life of Alexis Kivi, was for Finland a time of powerful national awakening. Having formed a part of Sweden for 600 years, Finland, after the war of 1809, was united to Russia, but nevertheless retained a unique position. She enjoyed her own form of constitutional government, which the Tsar of Russia, at the same time Grand Duke of Finland, confirmed by special oath on accession to the throne. During the liberal rule of Alexander II, these special rights were steadily enlarged and increased. In 1863, representatives of the four Estates of Finland--clergy, nobility, middle classes and peasants--were summoned to sit in the Diet, which thenceforth assembled regularly. Finland was granted her own financial administration, her own customs and postal services; in addition she possessed her own army, solely detailed for the protection of her frontiers.

Shortly after separation from Sweden, Finland awoke to consciousness of her individuality as a nation. The cry of these times was: ‘Swedes we are not, Russians we do not wish to become, Finns therefore let us be!’ Out of this national consciousness gradually arose a powerful national movement, the aim of which was to elevate the language of the great majority of the people to its rightful status. Hitherto all higher education had been given in Swedish, although the speakers of Swedish represented only eight per cent. of the entire population. A great factor in the awakening of this national feeling was the publication of the _Kalevala_, which Professor Elias Lönnrot had woven together out of a collection of the national folk-songs and combined into one great epic. The work thus created was a noble monument, testifying to the creative and poetic genius of the Finnish Nation as a whole.

An important section of Finland’s intelligentsia, whose mother tongue was Swedish, now voluntarily adopted Finnish as their language. They were joined by an ever-increasing tide of young enthusiasts, drawn from the lower classes, who had received higher education.

After long and stubborn efforts the Finnish language was finally accorded equal status with Swedish in the official, social and intellectual life of the country.

[2] Maiden’s Height

Transcriber’s Notes

Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.

Inconsistent punctuation has been retained as it appears in the original publication.

Perceived typographical errors have been silently corrected.

Footnotes have been moved to the end of the text.