He had spread his table on the fresh green grass. There lay the bread and the peaches and beside them stood the flask of wine; but before he began to eat, he invited his guests to take their food. The lizard had all the little snails; the dove ate grain from Anton's one hand, while the chamois licked salt from the other; but the little squirrel sat above in the chestnut-tree and stuffed himself up to his throat with nuts, throwing all the shells down upon little Anton's head.
—Helena Nyblom.
THE FOREST WITCH
It was in the earliest springtime. In the shade the air was still quite cold; but where the clear and strong sunshine streamed down, one could see that spring had come, for there the blossoms were beginning to stretch upward on their tiny stalks.
A couple of children were walking through the forest: a ten-year-old girl, named Nina, and her little brother Johannes.
They were seeking flowers. Nina had to find them because the flowers were too tiny and too much hidden for so small a child as Johannes to discover them for himself, but she always let him have the pleasure of picking them.
It was such a joyous spring walk that Nina did not notice how far they were straying away from their grandmother's hut, back of the hill. This little hut had been their home only for a short time. When their dear father and mother died, their grandmother had kindly taken them to live with her; and this was their first walk in the forest.
At last Nina thought they ought to go back, but just as she turned around with Johannes by the hand, who should stand before them but a hideous old creature, more glaring and frightful than you can imagine!