Erik shook his head. "They could not move the forest, with the rivers and mountains and wild birds," he said. "Without them it is not a real Lapland home."
His whole face said so plainly, "It is only an imitation," that Birger could not help laughing.
"There is no museum in all Europe like Skansen," he said at last, quite proudly; "and there are many people who come here to see it, because they cannot travel, as Gerda and I did, and see the real homes in the country."
"I am one of them," said Karen. "This is the only way I shall ever see a
Laplander's tent and reindeer."
"I will show you a house that is just like my grandmother's home in Rättvik," suggested Gerda, and they walked slowly through the woodland paths, so that Karen would not get tired with her crutch.
In a few minutes they came upon a place where some peasants, dressed in their native costumes, were dancing folk-dances; for that is one of the pleasant Skansen ways of saving the old customs.
"Oh, let us stop and look at the dancers!" cried Karen in delight. "I wonder what they are doing," she added, watching their graceful movements forward and back and in and out.
"They are 'reaping the flax,'" said Gerda, who knew all the different dances because she often went to Skansen with her mother and father on sunny summer evenings.
After the flax dance was finished, a company of boys took the platform, and made everyone laugh with a queer, half-comical, half-serious dance which Gerda called the "ox-dance."
"I should like to dance with them," said Erik suddenly.