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[Illustration: LISBETH LONGFROCK]




LISBETH LONGFROCK

TRANSLATED FROM THE NORWEGIAN OF HANS AANRUD



BY

LAURA E. POULSSON



ILLUSTRATED BY

OTHAR HOLMBOE



GINN AND COMPANY
BOSTON. NEW YORK. CHICAGO. LONDON
ATLANTA. DALLAS. COLUMBUS. SAN FRANCISCO

COPYRIGHT, 1907, BY
LAURA E. POULSSON

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

The Athenaeum Press
GINN AND COMPANY. PROPRIETORS.
BOSTON. U.S.A.




PREFACE


Hans Aanrud's short stories are considered by his own countrymen as
belonging to the most original and artistically finished life pictures
that have been produced by the younger _literati_ of Norway. They
are generally concerned with peasant character, and present in true
balance the coarse and fine in peasant nature. The style of speech is
occasionally over-concrete for sophisticated ears, but it is not
unwholesome. Of weak or cloying sweetness--so abhorrent to Norwegian
taste--there is never a trace.

_Sidsel Sidsaerk_ was dedicated to the author's daughter on her eighth
birthday, and is doubtless largely reminiscent of Aanrud's own
childhood. If I have been able to give a rendering at all worthy of the
original, readers of _Lisbeth Longfrock_ will find that the whole story
breathes a spirit of unaffected poetry not inconsistent with the common
life which it depicts. This fine blending of the poetic and commonplace
is another characteristic of Aanrud's writings.

While translating the book I was living in the region where the scenes
of the story are laid, and had the benefit of local knowledge
concerning terms used, customs referred to, etc. No pains were spared
in verifying particulars, especially through elderly people on the
farms, who could best explain the old-fashioned terms and who had a