to bed at nine o'clock every evening ; which was true enough, as the cook told Stine later, but then the master and all his apprentices and journeymen were up every morning at three o'clock, and hammered away and made a terrible noise all day. Since that day they never saw the brownie any more at the captain's. He seemed to feel quite at home at the tinman's, although they were hammering and tapping away there all day, but people said that the gudewife put a dish of porridge up in the garret for him every Thursday evening ; and it's no wonder that they got on well and became rich when they had a brownie in the house. Stine believed he brought things to them. Whether it was the brownie or not who really helped them, I cannot say," said Mother Skau, in conclusion, and got a fit of coughing and choking after the exertion of telling this, for her, unusually long story. When she had taken a pinch of snuflf she felt better, and became quite cheerful again, and began : — " My mother, who, by the by, was a truthful woman, told a story, which happened here in the town one Christmas Eve. I know it is true, for an untrue word never passed her lips."
- ' Let us hear it. Madam Skau," said I.
" Yes, tell, tell. Mother Skau," cried the children. She coughed a little, took another pinch of snuff, and pro- ceeded : — •• When my mother still was in her teens, she used sometimes to visit a widow whom she knew, and whose name was,— dear mc, what was her name.' — Madam, — yes, Madame Evensen, of course. She was a woman who had seen the best part of her life, but whether she lived up in Mill Street, or down in the corner by Little Church Hill, I cannot say for certain. Well, one Christ- mas Eve, just like to-night, she thought she would go to the morning service on the Christmas Day, for she was a great church- goer, and so she left out some coffee with the girl before she went to bed, that she might get a cup next morning — she was sure a cup of warm coffee would do her a great deal of good at that early hour ! When she woke the moon was shining into the room, but when she got up to look at the clock she found it had stopped
