Produced by David S. Miller
The present edition of Bjornstjerne Bjornson's works is published byspecial arrangement with the author. Mr. Bjornson has designated Prof.Rasmus B. Anderson as his American translator, cooperates with him, andrevises each work before it is translated, thus giving his personalattention to this edition.
"A Happy Boy" was written in 1859 and 1860. It is, in my estimation,Bjornson's best story of peasant life. In it the author has succeededin drawing the characters with remarkable distinctness, while hisprofound psychological insight, his perfectly artless simplicity ofstyle, and his thorough sympathy with the hero and his surroundings arenowhere more apparent. This view is sustained by the great popularityof "A Happy Boy" throughout Scandinavia.
It is proper to add, that in the present edition of Bjornson's stories,previous translations have been consulted, and that in this manner afew happy words and phrases have been found and adopted.
This volume will be followed by "The Fisher Maiden," in which Bjornsonmakes a new departure, and exhibits his powers in a somewhat differentvein of story-telling.
ASGARD, MADISON, WISCONSIN,
November, 1881.
His name was Oyvind, and he cried when he was born. But no sooner didhe sit up on his mother's lap than he laughed, and when the candle waslit in the evening the room rang with his laughter, but he cried whenhe was not allowed to reach it.
"Something remarkable will come of that boy!" said the mother.
A barren cliff, not a very high one, though, overhung the house wherehe was born; fir and birch looked down upon the roof, the bird-cherrystrewed flowers over it. And on the roof was a little goat belongingto Oyvind; it was kept there that it might not wander away, and Oyvindbore leaves and grass up to it. One fine day the goat leaped down andwas off to the cliff; it went straight up and soon stood where it hadnever been before. Oyvind did not see the goat when he came out in theafternoon, and thought at once of the fox. He grew hot all over, andgazing about him, cried,—
"Killy-killy-killy-killy-goat!"
"Ba-a-a-a!" answered the goat, from the brow of the hill, putting itshead on one side and peering down.
At the side of the goat there was kneeling a little girl.
"Is this goat yours?" asked she.
Oyvind opened wide his mouth and eyes, thrust both hands into his pantsand said,—
"Who are you?"
"I am Marit, mother's young one, father's fiddle, the hulder of thehouse, granddaughter to Ola Nordistuen of the Heidegards, four yearsold in the autumn, two days after the frost nights—I am!"
"Is that who you are?" cried he, drawing a long breath, for he had notventured to take one while she was speaking.
"Is this goat yours?" she again inquired.
"Ye-e