“‘They’ll come back again,’ said the mother-eel.”
“‘Oh, no,’ exclaimed the daughters, ‘for he skinned them, cut them in two, and fried them.’”
“‘Oh, they’ll come again,’ the mother-eel persisted.”
“‘No,’ replied the daughters, ‘for he ate them up.’”
“‘They’ll come again,’ repeated the mother-eel.”
“‘But he drank brandy after them,’ continued the daughters.”
“‘Ah, then they’ll never come back,’ said the mother, and she burst out crying, ‘It’s the brandy that buries the eels.’”
“‘And, therefore,’ said the eel-breeder, in conclusion, ‘it is always right to take brandy after eating eels.’”
And this story was the most humorous recollection, the tinsel thread, that wound itself through the story of Jurgen’s life. He also wanted to go a little way outside the entrance, and up the bay, that is to say, out into the world in a ship; and his mother said, like the eel-mother, “There are so many bad people, eel-spearers out there.” But he did wish to go a little way beyond the sand-hills—a little way into the dunes, and he got his wish at last. Four delightful days, the happiest of his childhood, fell to his lot. For the whole beauty and splendour of Jutland, all the joy and sunshine of his home seemed concentrated in these four days. He was to go on a visit, a festival to him, though it was certainly a burial ceremony. A wealthy relative of the fisherman died. His farm lay far inland, and a little towards the north-east. Jurgen’s foster-parents were going, and he was to accompany them from the sand-hills, across heath and moor. They passed the green meadows, through which the river Skjäm rolls its course, a river that contains many eels—where mother-eels dwell with their daughters, who are caught and eaten up by wicked people. But men sometimes act quite as wickedly towards their own fellow-man; for had not the knight Sir Bugge been murdered by wicked people? and though he was well spoken of, did he not want to kill the architect, as the legend tells us, who had built the castle with its thick walls and towers, by which Jurgen’s parents now stood, just where the river falls into the bay? The wall and the ramparts still remained, but the rest was in red, crumbling ruins. The story says that Sir Bugge, after the architect had left him, said to one of his men, “Go after him and say, ‘Master, the tower shakes.’ If he turns round, you are to kill him, and take from him the money I have just paid him; but if he does not turn round, let him depart in peace.” The man obeyed, but the architect did not turn round; he called back to the man, “The tower does not shake in the least, but one day there will come a man from the west, in a blue cloak, who will cause it to shake in reality;” and, indeed, so it happened, a hundred years after, for the North Sea broke in and cast down the tower. The man who then lived in the castle built a new one higher up at the end of the meadow, and that one is standing to this day, and is called Nörre Vosburg.
Past this castle went Jurgen and his foster-parents. They had told him the story during the long winter evenings, and how he saw the lordly castle, with its double moat and trees and shrubs. A wall, covered with ferns,
