The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-09-16

aAouB Lu6 lTUleu lace OF LDc uGlQ- now anu
then rubbing his hands gleefully or toss
ing his large head rollickingly, until he
finally disappeared up the frozen banks
into the painless space beyond.
Inc cows had come home, were MIXED,
and were budding sleepily beneath the
shed behind the cabin before Lars ana
haslne, IN their loving cOncourse, had
noticed the professors absence.
Then they sped 10 the point where they
had last seen him bounding over the banks
Of snow. At last they found him just at
the edge OF what seemed q great ice-waye
heId back by few projecting, black and.
plnnacled rocks. Here he was seen pac-
ing back and forth as If calculating meas
uremeuts.
Soon they saw him begin hacking the
Ice win piece Of jagged rock. he
worked furiously in the long and linger-
ing twilight like some Attic gnOme or
trostsprite delving for buried treasure.
When they came softly TO his side he
scarcely noticed them. Finally he placed
the splintered rock like a rude stone
monument above the center Of the little
oritice he had effected and laughed glee-
fully,
"Ha, ha, hap
The straugeness of the sight caused
Lars and Hansine to respond with,
"Ha, ha, ha"
The professor looked up with a changed
countenance and pitying glance.
An, poor ignorant children he sighed
commlseratingly. you can never under
stand the pleasure I experience in at last
beginning my great experiment TO prove
to the scientific world beyond cavil, the
correctness of my theory of the viscosity
of glacier ice"
Lars and Hansine in turn now looked
upon Prof. Detrius Moraine with plying
commlseration, and gently led him to his
couch, with Lars beside that of beautiful
Hansine, Just as the sturdy herbergerer
OF the little inn at Ormeim said it would
surely be.
Lars should have set out on his return
TO Ormelm the next morning, but the pro-
lessor lmpetuous earueStness kept him.
Scarcely without their knowing how,
certainly without their knowing why, the
brother and sister found themselves with
their strange companion working valor-
ously upon tunnel into the heart of the
ice mountain.
The professor labored heroically with
them. In the one day the three had dug
horizontal excavation, something like a
miners diminutive drift. wide and high
enough for scant passage and nearly forty
feet in length, the entrance to which the
professor carefully covered with skins
and blankets.
Lars departure the next morning and
abandonment of the saeter, only nerved
the professor to greater eXertions; and
MS boundless enthusiasm seemed like
wine to Hansine. Unquestioning she
worked beside him for two DAYS more
caroling her strange mountain airs,
while they toiled or rested together.
Her splendid energy her winsome face,
her grandly developed figure, her unerr-
ing stroke as she swung the stout ice-ax,
with numbers of which every saeter is
provided, and her gladstone eagerness in
her blind obedience to the professors
slightest command, must have wrought
upon the scientist strangely. For,
when at last they mad fash
Toned a little chamber fully eight feet
square and as high as their axes could
reach, had removed all the chipping and
debris, and had brought in a little bench
from the saeter upon which he scould sit,
wrapped in skins and blankets, to make
his curious observations, the strange old
woman-hater that he was drew the glow
ing girl beside him, and, caressing her
abstractedly as he would have petted a
faithful horse or dog, said with radiant
citation:
"Ah, Hansine, Hansine I shall achieve
victory here through your grand and no.
BILE aid. If you could always be with
me. what could I not ACCOMPLISH"
And yet Prof. Detrius Moraine meant
nothing by this; nothing more than he
would have meant to faithful horse or
dog and it was nothing more than audi
BILE thought of gladness for grateful force
full aid which had overcome resisting
other force that lay in the way of his OBJ
servations and experiment.
But this one saying had instantly stilled
the songs of pretty Hansine..
Thencetorth she went mutely about her
tasks at the hut. She watched her COM
panion for meaning in slightest gesture or
look. She quietly warned him that he
must make haste in his strange task, and
went on silently and soddenly preparing
for the coming of the farmer, his helpers
and the ponies for the TASKS, the kegs, the
bundles and the herds. She even moved
her couch from the common room to the
dairy, and slept beside the piles of cheese
and the cavernOus cauldrons there.
All unnoticing, the professor grew in
cheerineSs as Hansine became respondent.
He prattled and glowed and worked I'M
| ceasingly. Night after night, on his re-
turn to the saeter, he sat and wrote and
| figured and calculated and muttered be-
side his sputtering candle; and then read
pages of his scientific thunderings upon
the viscosity of glacial ice' to Hansine,
who listened wordless and motionless in
the far shadows of the room, and, when
he was done, whispered a tremulous
N4ON hdV, tNlOOu nlSnO) duu buGu III
silence stole away.
One CRAVING morning Hansine came
stoutly In front of the professor and urged
him to remain at the Saeter.
They will be here at once, am sure -
she pleadingly said. "All is in readiness
TO go. If we stay behind but one day, we
may never reach Ormeim !"
But he put her aside as he would have
done foolish child, and petulanJly went
his way TO the ice cavern and his tasks.
She stood at the hut door until she had
seen him disappear behind the frowning
rocks. Then she wrung her hands pite-
ously and looked shudderingly at the
close, dark sky. She had scarcely re-
entered the cabin door, when the farmer
with his pack-ponies and helpers had
come.
You are i'll, Hansine,' - they said. I'VE
will do the work. Get the student fool
and follow quickly; for the first wild
storms are even now upon u.s.
She ran tieetly TO the T ield and burst
into the ice cavern, calling loudly.
Come! Come! They are here Do
you not know that dreadful storms are
! coming Can yoT not believe Hansine2"
But Prof. Detrius Moraine was surely
science-mad in his glittering cell.
Tell them" he distractedly returned
as he came to the entrance, "to remain
for but two days; for but one. / will
pay them well; whatever they may wish
They must wait, Hansine For all Nor