CHAPTER XI.
"Tu vas faire un beau reve, Et t'enivrer d'un plaisir dangereux.
Sur ton chemin l'etoile qui se leve Longtemps encore eblouira les yeux!" DE MUSSET.
A fortnight passed.

The first excursion in the _Eulalie_ had been followed by others of a similar kind, and Errington's acquaintance with the Gueldmars was fast ripening into a pleasant intimacy.

It had grown customary for the young men to spend that part of the day which, in spite of persistent sunshine, they still called evening, in the comfortable, quaint parlor of the old farmhouse,--looking at the view through the rose-wreathed windows,--listening to the fantastic legends of Norway as told by Olaf Gueldmar,--or watching Thelma's picturesque figure, as she sat pensively apart in her shadowed corner spinning.

They had fraternized with Sigurd too--that is, as far as he would permit them--for the unhappy dwarf was uncertain of temper, and if at one hour he were docile and yielding as a child, the next he would be found excited and furious at some imaginary slight that he fancied had been inflicted upon him.

Sometimes, if good-humored, he would talk almost rationally,--only allowing his fancy to play with poetical ideas concerning the sea, the flowers, or the sunlight,--but he was far more often sullen and silent.