But Claes would take one round the waist and kiss her cheeks or her neck, according to which fresh skin was nearest his mouth, then he would say:
“Ask your lovers, darlings, ask your lovers for the rest.”
Then they would go off in bursts of laughter.
The boys knew Claes by his big voice and the clatter of his shoes. Running to him they would say:
“Good evening, coalman.”
“God give you the like, my cherublings,” Claes would answer, “but don’t come too close, or I shall turn you into blackamoors.”
The little fellows, being bold, would come close all the same; and then he would seize one by the tunic, and rubbing his soft little muzzle with his smutty hands, would send him back like that, laughing in spite of it, to the great delight of all the others.
Soetkin, Claes’s wife, was a good helpmeet, early as the dawn and diligent as the ant.
She and Claes tilled their field together, yoking themselves like oxen to the plough. Hard and toilsome was the dragging, but harder still the harrowing when that rustic engine must tear the stiff earth with its wooden teeth. Yet always they worked light-hearted, singing some ballad song.
And in vain was the earth stony hard; in vain did the sun dart his hottest beams upon them: dragging the harrow, bending at the knees, it was as naught that they must strain their loins cruelly; when they would pause, and Soetkin turn toward Claes her gentle face, and Claes kiss that mirror of a tender heart, then, ah, then, they would forget their utter weariness.