criticism wanting.  In this instance, however, it was to their praise and honour, but that is not always the case.  It may be a painful and terrible hour for a newly-wedded pair:  if they do not please the public, or if they have something to say against the match, or the persons themselves, they are then soon made to know what is thought of them.  There is perhaps also heard some rude jest or another, accompanied by the laughter of the crowd.  We were told, that even in Stockholm the same custom was observed among the lower classes until a few years ago, so that a bridal pair, who, in order to avoid this exposure, wanted to drive off, were stopped by the crowd, the carriage-door was opened on each side, and the whole public marched through the carriage.  They would see the bride and bridegroom—­that was their right.

Here, in Fahlun, the exhibition was friendly; the bridal pair smiled, the bridesmaids also, and the assembled crowd laughed and shouted, hurra!  In the rest of the market-place and the streets around, there was dead silence and solitude.

The roseate hue of eve still shone:  it passed, changed into that of morn—­it was the Midsummer time.

WHAT THE STRAWS SAID.

* * * * *

On the lake there glided a boat, and the party within it sang Swedish and Danish songs; but by the shore, under that tall, hanging birch, sat four young girls—­so pretty—­so sylph-like! and they each plucked up from the grass four long straws, and bound these straws two and two together, at the top and the bottom.

“We shall now see if they will come together in a square,” said the girls:  “if it be so, then that which I think of will be fulfilled,” and they bound them, and they thought.

No one got to know the secret thought, the heart’s silent wish of the others.  But yet a little bird sings about it.

The thoughts of one flew over sea and land, over the high mountains, where the mule finds its way in the mists, down to Mignon’s beautiful land, where the old gods live in marble and painting.  “Thither, thither! shall I ever get there?” That was the wish, that was the thought, and she opened her hand, looked at the bound straws, and they appeared only two and two bound together.

And where were the second one’s thoughts? also in foreign lands, in the gunpowder’s smoke, amongst the glitter of arms and cannons, with him, the friend of her childhood, fighting for imperial power, against the Hungarian people.  Will he return joyful and unharmed—­return to Sweden’s peaceful, well-constituted, happy land?  The straws showed no square:  a tear dwelt in the girl’s eye.