And these three new settlers
were folks from another district; men with some sense in their heads,
by the look of things. They didn't begin by borrowing money to build
a house; no, they came up one year and did their spade work and went
away again; vanished as if they were dead. That was the proper way;
ditching first, then plough and sow. Axel Stroem was nearest to Isak's
land now, his next-door neighbour. A clever fellow, unmarried, he came
from Helgeland. He had borrowed Isak's new harrow to break up his
soil, and not till the second year had he set up a hayshed and a turf
hut for himself and a couple of animals. He had called his place
Maaneland, because it looked nice in the moonlight. He had no
womenfolk himself, and found it difficult to get help in the summer,
lying so far out, but he managed things the right way, no doubt about
that. Not as Brede Olsen did, building a house first, and then coming
up with a big family and little ones and all, with neither soil nor
stock to feed them. What did Brede Olsen know of draining moorland and
breaking new soil?
He knew how to waste his time idling, did Brede.
Pages:
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246