1. The folk-song style is apparent throughout this poem, the first distinctive mark being the superfluous use of the pronoun immediately after its antecedent, a manner of speech borrowed from the vernacular and incorporated with numerous popular ballads. Cf. lines 18, 19, 22.
8. hemsk uti sitt mod, apprehensive of danger; till mods is the idiomatic phrase.
10. tänkte stygga tankar, thought of grewsome things.
II. vilsegick, usually not compounded.
12. kär, properly kära.
13. Gud nåde mig, som liten är, a paraphrase of the second line from a common children's prayer beginning, Gud, som haver barnen kär; the poet also seems to have copied from this the irregular form kär, in line 12.
13. The home is so clearly in the lad's mind that the idea is adequately expressed by där.
18. trollena, a vernacular def. pl. form for trollen. This form in -a has been exploited by recent metropolitan writers, as also by Selma Lagerlöf, but without gaining general favor among the best stylists of Sweden.
22. vidan hed, archaic for vida heden. Cf. grönan ö (gröna ön), 45.
25. så, frequently thus interpolated in careless speech and here lending a savor of the common tongue.