The Wonderful Adventures of Nils 1732 Studios

Swedish · The Wonderful Adventures of Nils

Åsa gåsapiga och lille Mats

Åsa the Goose Girl and Little Mats

324 sentences · 22 notes

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  1. 1

    That year, as Nils Holgersson traveled about with the wild geese, a good deal was said about a pair of children, a boy and a girl, who were wandering through the country.

    Detaen · determiner, neuter, singulardeterminer of året
    åretyearår · noun, nominative, neuter, singularhead of the phrase
    dåasdå · subordinating conjunctionintroduces the clause of vildgässen
    NilsNilsNils · proper noun, nominativepart of the phrase då
    HolgerssonHolgerssonHolgersson · proper noun, nominativedepends on Nils
    fortraveledfor · prepositionpreposition marking vildgässen

    Past tense of fara (to travel/fly, here of tomte-Nils and geese in flight); mistagged as a preposition. Translation renders it "flew"/"passing over" far more often than "traveled".

    omkringaroundomkring · adverbmodifies vildgässen
    medwithmed · prepositionpreposition marking vildgässen
    vildgässenthe wild geesevildgässe · noun, nominative, common gender, singularin apposition to året

    attested only in the plural surface vildgässen; the collective noun for the wild-goose flock.

    taladeswas saidtalaa · verb, past, indicative, passivecoordinated with året
    detitden · pronoun, neuter, singularmodifies talades
    rätta good dealrätt · adverbmodifies mycket
    mycketa good dealmycket · adverbmodifies talades
    omaboutom · prepositionpreposition marking barn
    ettaen · determiner, neuter, singulardeterminer of par
    parcouplepar · noun, nominative, neuter, singularmodifies barn
    barnchildrenbarn · noun, nominative, neuter, pluraloblique complement of talades
    enaen · determiner, common gender, singulardeterminer of gosse
    gosseboygosse · noun, nominative, common gender, singularin apposition to barn
    ochandoch · conjunctionlinks the coordination
    enaen · determiner, common gender, singulardeterminer of flicka
    flickagirlflicka · noun, nominative, common gender, singularcoordinated with gosse
    somwhosom · pronounsubject of vandrade

    Three of this key's four examples ('som om far skulle...', 'för just som han stod...', 'som de är borta') are actually the conjunctive 'as'/'while' use, not the relative pronoun 'that/which' shown by 'länstolen, som blev köpt...'. The glosser's original senses list (that/who/which) omitted the dominant 'as' reading entirely.

    vandradewanderedvandra · verb, past, indicative, activerelative clause on flicka
    genomthroughgenom · prepositionpreposition marking landet
    landetlandland · noun, nominative, neuter, singularoblique complement of vandrade

  2. They were from Småland, from Sunnerbo district, and they had once lived with their parents and four siblings in a small cottage out on a great heath of heather.

  3. When the two children were still small, a poor wanderer woman had one night late knocked at the door and asked for shelter.

  4. Although the cottage could scarcely hold the people who already lived there, she had been let in, and mother had made her a bed on the floor.

  5. During the night she had lain coughing so hard that the children had thought the whole house shook with it, and by morning she had grown so ill that she had not been able to continue her journey.

  6. 2

    Father and mother had been as good to her as it had been possible for them to be.

  7. They had given up their own bed to her and lain down on the floor themselves, and father had gone to the doctor and gotten her drops.

  8. The first days the sick woman had been like one gone wild, only demanding and requiring and never saying a word of thanks, but afterward she had softened and become humble and grateful.

  9. In the end she had only begged and pleaded that they would carry her out of the cottage onto the heather, so that she might die there.

  10. When the household would not do her this favor, she had told them that in recent years she had roamed about with a band of tinkers.

  11. She was not herself of tinker stock, but was the daughter of a landowning farmer, but she had slipped away from home and joined the wandering folk.

  12. Now she believed that a tinker woman, who had grown angry with her, had sent the sickness upon her.

  13. But that was not all, for the tinker woman had threatened her and said that just as badly as it had gone for her, so it would go for all those who took her in under their roof and were kind to her.

  14. This she believed, and so she now begged that they would throw her out of the cottage and never look her way again.

  15. She did not want to bring misfortune upon such good people as they were.

  16. But the parents had not done as she had asked them.

  17. It was quite possible that they had been frightened, but they were not the kind who could throw out a poor, dying woman.

  18. 3

    Shortly after she had died, and then the misfortunes had begun.

  19. Before, they had never known anything but joy in that cottage.

  20. They had been poor, of course, but not so very badly off even so.

  21. Father was a reed-maker for looms, and mother and the children had helped him with the work.

  22. Father made ready the frame itself for the reeds, mother and the eldest sister carried out the binding, and the younger children planed the teeth smooth and cut them out.

  23. They worked from morning to evening, but they were always cheerful and merry, especially when father told of the days when he had wandered far away in foreign lands selling loom-reeds.

  24. Father had had such a merry humor that mother and all the children sometimes nearly laughed themselves sick over him.

  25. 4

    The time after the poor wanderer's death stood in the children's minds like a heavy dream.

  26. They did not know whether it had been short or long, but they remembered that they had constantly had funerals at home.

  27. It was their siblings who had died and been carried to the grave, one after another.

  28. They had, after all, had no more than four siblings, so that there could not have been more than four funerals held, but the children felt that there had been many more than that.

  29. It had at last grown so silent and heavy inside the cottage.

  30. It was as if a wake were being held there every single day.

  31. 5

    Mother had somehow kept up her spirits, but father had become quite unlike himself.

  32. He could no longer either joke or work, but sat from morning to evening with his head bowed in his hands, only brooding.

  33. 6

    Once — it was after the third funeral — father had burst out in wild talk that had frightened the children to hear.

  34. He could not understand, he had said, why such misfortune should come upon them.

  35. They had, after all, done a good deed when they had helped the sick woman.

  36. Was it then so, that evil was mightier than good here in the world?

  37. Mother had tried to talk sense into father, but she had not been able to make him calm and resigned, as she herself was.

  38. 7

    A couple of days later it was all over for father.

  39. But he had not died, he had gone his own way.

  40. You see, the eldest sister had fallen ill, and her father had always loved the most.

  41. And when he saw that she too would die, he had fled from all the misery.

  42. Mother had said nothing more than that it was best for father that he was gone.

  43. She had been afraid that he would go out of his mind.

  44. He was tormenting himself half to madness over the thought that God could allow a wicked person to cause so much harm.

  45. 8

    After father had gone away, they had grown very poor.

  46. At first he had sent them money, but afterward things must have gone badly for him, for he had stopped sending anything.

  47. And on the very day the eldest sister was buried, mother had shut up the cottage and left home with the two children she still had left.

  48. She had wandered to Skåne to work in the beet fields, and she had gotten a place at Jordberga sugar refinery.

  49. Mother had been a good worker and had had a cheerful, courageous manner.

  50. Everyone had liked her very much.

  51. Many had marveled that she could be so calm after all she had gone through.

  52. But mother was a very strong and long-suffering woman.

  53. When someone spoke to her of the two fine children she had with her, she would only say: "They'll soon die too, those two."

  54. She said this without her voice trembling and without a tear coming to her eyes.

  55. She had grown used to expecting nothing else.

  56. 9

    But it had not gone as mother had thought.

  57. The sickness had instead come upon herself.

  58. It went quickly with mother, even faster than with the little ones.

  59. She had come to Skåne at the start of summer, and before autumn she had left the children alone.

  60. 10

    While mother lay sick, she said to the children many times that they should remember that she had never regretted having let the sick woman stay with them.

  61. For it was not hard to die, mother had said, when one had done right.

  62. All people must die, that one could not escape.

  63. But one could decide for oneself whether one wished to die with a good conscience or a bad one.

  64. 11

    Before mother passed away, she had tried to arrange a little for her children.

  65. She had asked that they be allowed to keep the room where all three of them had lived during the summer.

  66. If the children only had a home, they would not become a burden to anyone.

  67. They would support themselves, that she knew.

  68. 12

    The children had been allowed to keep the room on the condition that they had promised to herd the geese, for it is always hard to find children willing to take on that task.

  69. It really did turn out as mother had said, that they supported themselves.

  70. The girl could boil sweets, and the boy could carve wooden toys, which they sold at the farms.

  71. They had a gift for trade, and they soon began buying up eggs and butter from the farmers, which they sold to the sugar-refinery workers.

  72. There was such order and reliability about them that one could entrust them with anything.

  73. The girl was the elder, and when she was thirteen, she was already as dependable as a grown person.

  74. She was quiet and earnest, but the boy was talkative and merry, and his sister used to say of him that he cackled in competition with the geese out in the fields.

  75. 13

    When the children had been at Jordberga a couple of years, a lecture was held one evening in the schoolhouse.

  76. It was really meant for adults, but the two Småland children sat among the listeners.

  77. They did not count themselves as children, and scarcely anyone else did either.

  78. The lecturer had spoken about the serious disease tuberculosis, which kills so many people in Sweden every year.

  79. He had spoken very clearly and plainly, and the children had understood every single word.

  80. 14

    After the lecture they had stationed themselves to wait outside the schoolhouse.

  81. When the lecturer came out, they took each other's hand, walked up to him quite solemnly, and asked if they might speak with him.

  82. 15

    The stranger had no doubt wondered at the two who stood there with round, rosy child-faces and spoke with a gravity that would have suited them if they had been three times as old, but he listened to them very kindly.

  83. 16

    The children told what had happened at home, and they now asked the lecturer whether he believed their mother and siblings had died of the disease he had described.

  84. It was quite likely, he answered.

  85. It could hardly have been any other disease.

  86. 17

    But if mother and father had known this, which the children had gotten to hear that evening, so that they could have been on their guard; if they had burned up the wanderer's clothes, if they had scrubbed the cottage thoroughly clean and not used the bedding — might they perhaps have lived, all those the children now grieved for?

  87. And the lecturer had said that no one could answer that with complete certainty, but he would well believe that none of their nearest need have fallen ill, if they had known how to guard against the infection.

  88. 18

    Now the children delayed a while with the next question, but they did not move from the spot, for what they were now to be answered was the most important thing of all.

  89. Was it not true, then, that the tinker woman had sent the sickness upon them because they had helped the one she was angry with?

  90. Had it not been something particular that had struck only them?

  91. — No, the lecturer could assure them confidently that it was not.

  92. No human being had the power to send sickness upon another in that way.

  93. And they knew, after all, that the disease existed all over the country.

  94. It had paid its visit in nearly every home, even though it had not everywhere carried off so many as it had with them.

  95. 19

    With that the children thanked him and went home to their own place.

  96. They talked for a very long time with each other that evening.

  97. 20

    The next day they went and gave notice.

  98. They could not tend the geese that year — they had to set off in another direction.

  99. — Where would they go, then?

  100. — Why, they would go and seek out father.

  101. They were now free to tell him that mother and the siblings had died of an ordinary sickness, and that it had not been anything special sent upon them by an evil person.

  102. They were so glad to have learned this.

  103. And now it was their duty to tell father of it, for he surely still went about brooding over that riddle to this day.

  104. 21

    The children betook themselves first to their little home on the heath in Sunnerbo, and to their great astonishment they found the cottage ablaze.

  105. Then they had wandered to the parsonage, and there they had learned that a man, who had been a railway worker, had seen their father at Malmberget far up in Lapland.

  106. He had worked in the mine, and he might still be at it, but one could not be sure of that.

  107. When the priest heard that the children wanted to seek out their father, he brought out a map, showed them how far it was to Malmberget, and tried to talk them out of the journey.

  108. But the children said that they were bound to go and seek out father.

  109. He had left home because he had believed something that was not true.

  110. They had to go and tell him that he had been mistaken.

  111. 22

    They had earned a little money from their trading, but they did not want to spend it on railway tickets, and instead resolved to walk the whole way on foot.

  112. And this they had never regretted.

  113. They had come to make so remarkably beautiful a journey.

  114. 23

    Before they had even gotten out of Småland, they had one day gone into a farmhouse to buy themselves a little food.

  115. The housewife had been cheerful and talkative.

  116. She had asked the children who they were and where they came from, and they had told her their whole story.

  117. "Oh no!

  118. Oh no!"

  119. the wife had said several times, while they talked.

  120. Afterward the children had been treated to a great deal of good food, and were not allowed to leave any payment for it at all.

  121. When they had risen to give thanks and go, the wife had asked whether they would not like to stay with her brother in the next parish, and she told them what he was called and where he lived.

  122. Why, the children were of course glad to do that.

  123. "Give him my greetings and tell him what has happened to you," said the farmer's wife.

  124. 24

    The children did so, and they were well looked after at the brother's place too.

  125. He let them ride with him to a place in the next parish, and there too they were well received.

  126. Every time afterward that they wandered away from a farm, it was always the same: "If you should happen that way, go in there and there, and tell what has happened to you!"

  127. 25

    In the farms to which the children were directed, there was always someone with consumption.

  128. And without knowing it themselves, the two children went through the country teaching people what a dangerous disease it was that had crept into their homes, and how best to fight it.

  129. 26

    Long, long ago in the world, when the great plague called the Black Death ravaged the land, it was told that a boy and a girl were seen wandering from farm to farm.

  130. The boy carried a rake in his hand, and if he came and raked outside a house, it meant that many within would die, but not all, for a rake has widely spaced teeth and does not gather up everything.

  131. The girl carried a broom in her hand, and if she came and swept before a door, it meant that all who lived within that door must die, for a broom is a tool that sweeps a house entirely clean.

  132. 27

    It was indeed remarkable that in our own day a pair of children should come to wander through the land on account of a grave and dangerous disease.

  133. But those children did not frighten people with rake and broom — instead they said: "We are not going to be satisfied with just raking the yard and sweeping the floors.

  134. We are also going to take to the washcloth and the brush and the soft soap and the soap bar.

  135. We are going to keep it clean outside our door, clean inside it, and we ourselves are going to be clean.

  136. That way we shall at last become masters over the disease."

  137. 28

    LITTLE MATS'S FUNERAL.

  138. 29

    Little Mats was dead.

  139. It seemed unbelievable to all who had seen him healthy and cheerful only a few hours before, but so it was nonetheless.

  140. Little Mats was dead and was to be buried.

  141. 30

    Little Mats had died early one morning, and no one but his sister Åsa had been in the room to see him die.

  142. "Don't go for anyone else!"

  143. little Mats had said, as the end drew near, and his sister had obeyed him.

  144. "I'm glad I'm not dying of 'the sickness,' Åsa," said little Mats.

  145. "Aren't you glad too?"

  146. And when Åsa answered nothing, he went on: "I don't think it matters at all to die, so long as I don't have to die the same way as mother and the others.

  147. If I had done that, you would surely never have managed to make father believe it was only an ordinary sickness that took them, but now it will work out, you'll see."

  148. 31

    When it was all over, Åsa sat for a long while thinking of what her brother, little Mats, had had to go through while he had lived here in the world.

  149. She felt that he had borne every misfortune with the same courage as a grown man.

  150. She thought of his last words.

  151. He had always been just as brave.

  152. And it became clear to her that, since little Mats now had to go down into the earth, he ought to be buried with the same honor as a grown person.

  153. 32

    She well understood that this would be hard to carry out, but she wanted it so very much.

  154. She had to do her utmost for little Mats's sake.

  155. 33

    Åsa the goose girl was at that time far up in Lapland, at the great mining field called Malmberget.

  156. It was a strange place, but it was perhaps good for her that it was as it was.

  157. 34

    Little Mats and she had walked through great, endless forest tracts before they had gotten there.

  158. For several days they had seen neither fields nor farms, only a few poor coaching-stations, until they had suddenly come out at Gällivare's great church village.

  159. It lay with its church and railway station and courthouse and bank and pharmacy and hotel at the foot of a tall mountain, which was still streaked with snow at midsummer, when the children had come wandering by.

  160. Almost all the houses in Gällivare were new and well and solidly built.

  161. If they had not seen the patches of snow up on the mountain and noticed that the birches had not yet leafed out, the children would not have thought that it lay far up in Lapland.

  162. But it was not in Gällivare that they had to seek father, but in Malmberget, which lay a stretch further north, and there things had not looked so orderly.

  163. 35

    You see, it had been the case that although people had long known that there was a great iron-ore field near Gällivare, mining had only really gotten under way a few years before, when the railway had been finished.

  164. Then several thousand people had streamed up there all at once, and there had been work enough for them, but not lodgings — those they had had to fix up for themselves as best they could.

  165. Some had built themselves huts of unbarked logs, others had put up shacks from crates and empty dynamite boxes, which they had stacked on one another like bricks.

  166. By now people had managed to build many proper houses, but the whole place still looked remarkable nonetheless.

  167. There were whole blocks of bright, handsome houses, but right among them one came upon uncleared forest ground with stumps and stones.

  168. There were great, handsome villas for the manager and the engineers, and there were low, odd shacks that still stood from the earliest days.

  169. There was a railway and electric light and great engine-houses, and one could ride a tramway deep into the mountains through a tunnel lit by small glow-lamps.

  170. There was the most tremendous bustle everywhere, and one ore train after another was dispatched from the station.

  171. But all around lay the great wilderness, where no field was plowed and no house was timbered, where there was nothing but Lapps roaming about with their reindeer.

  172. 36

    Now Åsa sat thinking that it was the same with life here as with the place itself.

  173. It went along orderly and peacefully enough for the most part, but she had also seen a thing or two that was wild and strange.

  174. She sensed that it might perhaps be easier here than in other places to carry through something that was not quite ordinary.

  175. 37

    She thought about how it had gone when they had come to Malmberget and asked after a worker named Jon Assarsson, who had eyebrows grown together.

  176. The joined eyebrows were the most notable thing about father's appearance.

  177. They made it easy for people to remember him.

  178. The children learned at once, too, that father had worked several years at Malmberget, but that he was now away wandering.

  179. It was usual for him to go off now and then, whenever the restlessness came over him.

  180. Where he had gone, no one knew, but everyone was certain that he would come back within a few weeks.

  181. And since they were Jon Assarsson's children, they were welcome to stay in the shack he had lived in while they waited for him.

  182. A woman had found the door key under the threshold and let the children in.

  183. No one had wondered that they had come there, and no one seemed to wonder that father went off into the wilderness like that now and then.

  184. It

  185. 38

    was not so very unusual up here for everyone to go by their own mind.

  186. 39

    Åsa had no trouble deciding for herself how she wanted things done about the funeral.

  187. She had seen how one of the mine foremen had been buried the previous Sunday.

  188. He had been drawn to the church at Gällivare by the manager's own horses, and a long procession of mine workers had followed the coffin.

  189. At the grave a band had played, and a choir had sung.

  190. And after the burial service, everyone who had been at the church had been treated to coffee at the schoolhouse.

  191. It was something along those lines that Åsa the goose girl wished for her brother, little Mats.

  192. 40

    She had already pictured it all so eagerly that she almost saw the whole funeral procession before her eyes, but then she grew discouraged again and told herself that it probably could not be as she wished.

  193. Not because it would be too costly.

  194. They had saved up so much money, little Mats and she, that she could give him as splendid a funeral as she could ever wish.

  195. The hard part lay in the fact that she knew great folk never care to accommodate a child.

  196. She was no more than a year older than little Mats, who looked so small and frail as he lay dead before her.

  197. She herself was only a child too.

  198. Perhaps the grown-ups would oppose her wishes simply because she was nothing but a child.

  199. 41

    The first person Åsa spoke with about the funeral was the nurse.

  200. Sister Hilma had come to the cabin a while after little Mats had died, and she had known, even before she opened the door, that it must be over for him by then.

  201. Little Mats had, the previous afternoon, been walking about out in the mining district.

  202. He had stood too close to a large open pit when the mine blasts had gone off, and a couple of flying stones had struck him.

  203. He had been alone, and he had lain unconscious on the ground a long while, without anyone knowing of the accident.

  204. At last a few men working at the open pit had gotten word of it in a strange way.

  205. They claimed that a little gnome, no bigger than a hand's breadth, had come to the rim of the mine and called to them to hurry and help little Mats, who lay up there above the mine bleeding to death.

  206. After this little Mats had been carried home and bandaged, but it had been too late.

  207. He had lost so much blood that he could not live.

  208. 42

    When the nurse stepped into the cabin, she thought not so much of little Mats as of his sister.

  209. "What am I to do with the poor child?"

  210. she said to herself.

  211. "She must be quite inconsolable."

  212. 43

    But she noticed that Åsa neither wept nor complained, but quite calmly helped her with what needed to be done.

  213. The sister was greatly astonished, but she got her explanation when Åsa began to speak to her about the funeral.

  214. 44

    "When one has had to do with someone like little Mats," said Åsa, for she liked to put her words a little solemnly and old-fashioned, "then one must first and foremost think of honoring him while one still can.

  215. There will be time enough to grieve afterward."

  216. 45

    And so she asked the sister to help her secure little Mats a proper and honorable funeral.

  217. No one could deserve it better than he.

  218. 46

    The nurse thought that if the poor lonely child could find comfort in thinking about the funeral, that was a real blessing.

  219. She promised she would help her, and this was a great thing for Åsa.

  220. Now she felt her goal was almost achieved, for Sister Hilma was very powerful.

  221. At the great mining field, where blasting went on every day, every worker knew that he might at any moment be struck by a flying stone or have a loosened rock face come down on him, and so everyone was glad to stay on good terms with the nurse.

  222. 47

    So when the sister and Åsa went around asking the mine workers to follow little Mats to the grave the next Sunday, there were not many who refused.

  223. "We'll do that, since sister asks us to," they said.

  224. 48

    The sister also managed happily to arrange the brass quartet that was to play at the grave, and the little choir.

  225. She did not try to get the schoolhouse made available, but since it was still warm, settled summer weather, it was decided that the funeral guests would drink coffee out in the open.

  226. They got to borrow benches and tables from the temperance hall, and cups and plates from the shops.

  227. A couple of mine workers' wives, who had lying in their chests things they did not use while living here in the wilderness, brought out fine tablecloths for the sister's sake, to be spread on the coffee tables.

  228. 49

    So rusks and pretzel-cakes were ordered from a baker in Boden, and dark and light candies from a confectioner in Luleå.

  229. 50

    There was such a stir about the funeral Åsa wanted to give her brother, little Mats, that it was talked of throughout Malmberget.

  230. And at last the manager himself got to hear what was afoot.

  231. 51

    When the manager heard that fifty mine workers were to follow to the grave a twelve-year-old boy who, for all he knew, was nothing but a wandering beggar, he thought it sounded utterly senseless.

  232. And there was to be singing and music and a coffee party, and the grave dressed with fir branches, and candy from Luleå!

  233. He sent for the nurse and asked her to put a stop to all of it.

  234. "It's a shame to let the poor girl waste her money this way," he said.

  235. "It won't do for great folk to go along with a child's whim like that.

  236. You're all making fools of yourselves."

  237. 52

    The manager was not unkind or hot-tempered.

  238. He spoke quite calmly and asked the nurse to call off the singing and the music and the long procession.

  239. It would be quite enough if some nine or ten people followed to the grave.

  240. And the nurse did not say a word against the manager, partly out of respect and partly because she had to admit to herself that he was right.

  241. There was too much fuss being made over a beggar boy.

  242. She had let her pity for the poor girl run away with her good sense.

  243. 53

    The nurse went from the manager's villa down to the shack town to tell Åsa that she could not have it arranged as she wished, but it was not with a light heart, for she knew better than anyone what that funeral meant to the poor child.

  244. On the way she met a couple of workers' wives and talked with them about her troubles.

  245. They said at once that they thought the manager was right.

  246. It would not do to make such a grand show over a beggar boy.

  247. It was a pity for the girl, of course, but it was too much that a child should be allowed to arrange and order things that way.

  248. It was really just as well that nothing had come of the whole affair.

  249. 54

    The wives then went their separate ways and spread the news further.

  250. Soon it was known from the shack town all the way to the mine shafts that there would be no grand funeral for little Mats.

  251. And everyone at once agreed that this was the only right thing.

  252. 55

    There was probably only one person in the whole of Malmberget who was of another mind, and that was Åsa the goose girl.

  253. 56

    The nurse really had a hard time of it with her.

  254. Åsa had not wept or complained, but she had not been willing to bend.

  255. She said that since she had not asked the manager for any help, he had nothing at all to do with the matter.

  256. Surely he could not forbid her to bury her brother as she wished.

  257. 57

    It was only when several women had explained to her that none of them would come to the funeral now that the manager did not wish to hear of it, that she understood she must have his permission.

  258. 58

    Åsa the goose girl sat silent for a while.

  259. Then she rose abruptly.

  260. "Where are you off to?"

  261. asked the nurse.

  262. — "I suppose I'll have to go and speak to the manager," said Åsa.

  263. — "You can't possibly believe he'll accommodate you," said the women.

  264. — "I believe little Mats wants me to go," said Åsa.

  265. "The manager has perhaps never heard what sort of person he was."

  266. 59

    Åsa the goose girl got herself ready quickly and was soon on her way to the manager.

  267. But one must understand that it seemed altogether unbelievable that a child like her should try to move the manager, the most powerful man in Malmberget, from what he had once declared to be his will.

  268. And both the nurse and the other women could not help following after her at some distance, to see whether she would have the courage to go all the way through with it.

  269. 60

    Åsa the goose girl walked in the middle of the road, and there was something about her that made people turn to look after her.

  270. She came walking so grave and dignified, just like a young maiden going through the church to her first communion.

  271. On her head she wore a large black silk kerchief she had inherited from her mother; in one hand she held a rolled-up handkerchief, and in the other a basket with wooden toys that little Mats had made.

  272. 61

    When the children who were playing on the road saw her coming along in that manner, they ran up and called out: "Where are you going, Åsa?

  273. Where are you going?"

  274. But Åsa did not answer.

  275. She had not even heard that they had spoken to her.

  276. She only walked on.

  277. And when the children asked over and over and ran to catch up with her, the women following behind took hold of their arms and held them back.

  278. "Let her go!"

  279. they said.

  280. "She's going up to the manager to beg leave to give her brother, little Mats, a grand funeral."

  281. Then the children too were seized with awe at her daring to attempt something so bold, and a small group of them followed along to see how it would turn out.

  282. 62

    This was around six o'clock in the evening, when work let out at the mines, and by the time Åsa had walked some way, several hundred workers came striding along with long, hurried steps.

  283. They otherwise looked neither right nor left as they walked home from work, but when they met Åsa, a few of them noticed that something unusual was afoot, and they asked her what was going on.

  284. Åsa did not answer a word, but the other children shouted out at the top of their voices where she was headed.

  285. Then a few of the workers thought this so bold an act for a child that they came along to see how it would go for her.

  286. 63

    Åsa went to the office building, where the manager was in the habit of sitting at his work until this hour.

  287. When she came into the entryway, the door was flung open, and the manager stood before her with his hat on his head and his cane in his hand, ready to go up to his dinner at the manager's residence.

  288. "Who do you wish to speak with?"

  289. he asked, when he saw the little girl who had come so solemnly with a silk kerchief and a rolled-up handkerchief.

  290. — "I wanted to speak with the manager himself," said Åsa.

  291. — "Well then, come in!"

  292. said the manager, drawing back into the room.

  293. He let the door stand open, for he could not believe the girl had any lengthy business.

  294. In that way it happened that those who had followed Åsa the goose girl and now stood in the entryway and on the steps got to hear what was said inside the office.

  295. 64

    When Åsa the goose girl had come in there, she first drew herself up, pushed back her headscarf, and looked up at the manager with her round child's eyes, which gazed so gravely that it cut one to the heart.

  296. "It's like this — little Mats is dead," she said, and her voice trembled so that she could get no further.

  297. But now the manager understood whom he was dealing with.

  298. "I see, so you're the girl who wants to arrange the grand funeral," he said kindly.

  299. "You needn't trouble yourself over that, child.

  300. It will be too costly for you.

  301. If I had only heard of it sooner, I would have put a stop to it at once."

  302. 65

    Something twitched in the girl's face, and the manager thought she was about to cry, but instead she said: "I wanted to ask if I might tell the manager something about little Mats."

  303. 66

    "I've already heard your whole story," said the manager in his usual calm and kindly way.

  304. "You mustn't think I don't feel it's a pity for you.

  305. I only want what is best for you."

  306. 67

    Then Åsa the goose girl drew herself up even more and said in a high, clear voice: "Ever since little Mats was nine years old, he has had neither father nor mother, but has had to support himself entirely like a grown man.

  307. He has always held himself too proud to beg so much as a single meal, but has always wanted to pay his way.

  308. He always said that it wasn't right for a man to beg.

  309. He has gone about the countryside buying up eggs and butter, and he managed the buying as well as an old merchant.

  310. He never squandered anything, and he never hid away a coin, but gave it all to me.

  311. Little Mats had his work with him out in the fields when he went herding with the geese, and was just as diligent as if he had been a grown man.

  312. The farmers down in Skåne used to send large sums of money with little Mats when he went between the farms, because they knew they could trust him just as they trusted themselves, so it isn't right to say that little Mats was only a child, for there aren't many grown men — — —

  313. 68

    The manager stood looking at the floor, without a muscle moving in his face, and Åsa the goose girl fell silent, for she believed her words had had no effect on him at all.

  314. When she had been at home, she had felt she had so much to say about little Mats, but now it seemed to her so little.

  315. How was she to make the manager understand that little Mats deserved to be buried with the same honor as a grown person?

  316. 69

    "You see, since I now want to pay for the whole funeral myself — — —," said Åsa, and then she fell silent again.

  317. 70

    Then the manager raised his eyes and looked Åsa the goose girl in the eye.

  318. He measured her and weighed her, as one must who has many people under him.

  319. He thought of how she had gone through the loss of home and parents and siblings, and yet she stood there unbroken still, and she would surely grow into a fine person.

  320. But he grew afraid of laying added weight on the burden she already had to carry, for it might well be the straw that broke her.

  321. He understood what it meant that she had come to speak with him.

  322. She had surely loved that brother of hers more than anything else.

  323. It would not do to answer such love with a refusal.

  324. 71

    "You shall have it as you wish, then," said the manager.

The particulars

The text
Nils Holgerssons underbara resa genom Sverige, Selma Lagerlöf. The Wonderful Adventures of Nils.
Translation
Public-domain Swedish (Lagerlöf, d. 1940; published 1906–07). English translation © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC.
Words
Every word of the text, by letter.
Data
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Two whoopie pies and a pine. An inside joke.