Wise old Louhi, grim and toothless, rose quickly and hastened to the door, chattering and mumbling and grumbling. She paused and listened, but the sound seemed very faint. She ran down to the landing-place before the house, and there she listened again. Soon the sound came to her ears, louder and more distinct, and yet hard to make out. Once, twice, thrice she heard the call; and then she knew what it meant.
“It is a man’s voice,” she said. “Some hero has been shipwrecked near our shore. He is in distress; he calls for help.”
She leaped nimbly into her boat. She pushed it from the shore and rowed with speed out of the little inlet and around the rocky point which jutted far into the sea. The cries grew [[5]]louder, the calls were more frequent as she urged her boat forward over the sullen, icy-cold waves.
Soon she saw the shipwrecked man. He was not fighting the waves as she had supposed, but was clinging to the branches of a tree that had been uprooted and carried to sea. Ah, the sad plight of the poor man! He seemed wounded and helpless; his face was gaunt and pale; his eyes were filled with sadness and salt-water; he was shivering with cold and deep despair.
Shouting words of cheer, the Mistress hurried to him. She lifted him from the place of danger and seated him in her boat. Then with steady arms and mighty strokes she rowed homeward, nor did she pause until the boat’s keel grated on the beach before her door.
She carried the stranger into the house; she placed him by the warm fire; she bathed his limbs, his face, his head in tepid water and wrapped him up in soft skins of the reindeer. For three long days—yes, for four summer days—she tended him as though he were her son, and no questions did she ask. Then, to her great joy, he sat up and soon grew well and strong.
“Now, friend and fellow of the sea,” said the [[6]]gray woman, “tell me your name. Tell me why and how you have come to our lovely land and to Pohyola, the sweetest of homes.”
The stranger, who also was old and gray, answered, “My name is Wainamoinen, and all the world knows me; for I am the first of minstrels, the prince of wizards, the man whom other men delight to honor. Luckless was the hour when I embarked on a ship to go fishing; still more luckless was it when a storm overturned the vessel. Nine days did the sea toss me—yes, ten days did the waves buffet me—ere I was cast upon these shores.”
“I welcome you, Wainamoinen!” cried the grim Mistress. “Welcome, welcome to this northern land! Your name is well known to me, and long have I honored it. Men call you the sweet singer of Hero Land, and they say that no other songs cheer the dreary hours of winter as yours do. You shall stay here in Pohyola and sing to me and my people. My house shall be your home and this delightful land shall be your country.”
The gray-bearded Minstrel shook his head and sighed. He looked out and saw the lonely meadows and the snowy mountains and the [[7]]cold gray sea. Then his eyes filled with tears and he wept.