"Does she still loll around the house, or does she take hold with the housekeeping?" asked Johannes.
"She doesn't do much work and isn't in the kitchen very often; but she can knit finely and makes all sorts of pretty things with beads. But if she gets the farm some time we could afford a cook. If she only looks after things now and then, she doesn't need to do everything herself," said Uli.
"Ye-up, but to look after things you have to know how yourself; it's foolish to think that if a woman just looks at something, that's all that's necessary. For instance, a woman can sit all day in a drug-store with her knitting, but that won't keep the apprentices from doing as they please. And I thought she looked rather ugly and scowled at a person instead of giving him a friendly word."
"She does have failings," said Uli, "and is mighty sensitive too. But if she once has a good husband and has enough to do to keep her busy, so that she could forget herself now and then, she'd surely improve. Not that she can't ever be friendly. She can act very prettily at times; and if the farm's properly worked one can get at least ten thousand sheaves from it, not counting rye and wheat."
"That's a lot," said Johannes, "and there aren't many more such farms in the canton. But if you gave me the choice between a good farm and a bad wife, or neither, I'd take the latter a hundred times over. To be rich is nice, but riches aren't happiness; and to have a hateful sour woman at home, that either turns up her nose or bawls at everything, would make a home for the devil to live in. And if a man has to look for his pleasure outside his house, he's badly off."
"But master," said Uli, "you always told me to save and be thrifty, and then I'd be somebody; that the man who had nothing was nothing."
"Quite right, Uli," said the master, "that's what I said and what I still say. A man is happier when thrifty than when extravagant, and he's no man if he can't provide for his old age while he's young and single. If a man doesn't begin well while he's young he'll come to a bad end. A good lad with some money can marry more easily than a vagabond, and should look for a good wife; but the richest isn't always the best. Some women I'd rather take without a farthing than others with a hundred francs. Everything depends on the person. Do as you will, but consider it well."
"To be sure, Elsie's a wretched creature," said Uli, "but she can improve; many a girl has been thin when young, and has grown stout in old age; and she's not really bad tempered, especially when she's contented. When she's angry—then, to be sure, she doesn't know just what she's saying, and throws my position in my face, and twits me about other girls; but when she's contented again she can be quite amusing, and has the best heart in the world. She's given me presents, Lord knows how many, and would have given me lots more if I hadn't kept stopping her." "Do as you will," said Johannes, "but I tell you again: consider it well. It seldom turns out well when such different folks come together, and it has rarely turned out well when a servant has married his master's daughter. I set great store by you; to another man I wouldn't have said so much. Now I must go home; come and see us some time when you have the leisure; then we'll talk the matter over some more, if it's not too late."
Uli looked discontentedly after his master. "I shouldn't have thought," he reflected, "that he would grudge me my good fortune. But that's the way with these cursed farmers; they're all alike; they don't want to see a servant get hold of a farm. Johannes is one of the best of 'em; but he can't stand it either to see his servant get to be richer than he is and own a finer farm. Why else should it have mattered to him whether Elsie's pretty or ugly? He didn't just lookout for a pretty one when he married. They seem to think it's almost a sin when the like of us thinks of a farmer's daughter, and still many a one might be glad if she got a mannerly servant for a husband and didn't have to live like a dog on the farm all her life." But he said to himself that he wouldn't let himself be dissuaded so easily; the thing had gone on too long and there had been too much talk about it for him to back out that way. But the affair must be brought to a conclusion, he thought; he wanted to know where he stood, once and for all; he was tired of hanging between door and hinge. He'd tell Elsie that she must speak with her parents; by autumn the banns must be published, or he'd leave at Christmas; he wouldn't be made a fool of any longer.