"Pera, you do remember me, don't you? Oh, you nice old dog!" Anders threw his arms around the neck of a small shaggy yellow dog that was wriggling almost out of his skin with joy. You could not have told which was the happier, the dog or the boy.

"Just think! I haven't seen you for six months, Pera!" The two playmates romped across grandmother's lawn to the porch, where Erik was sitting on the steps with a tennis racket, waiting for his father.

"Sigrid has been hunting everywhere for you, Anders," said Erik.

"Here you are," exclaimed Sigrid a minute later, as she spied Anders. "Larsson says there is a baby calf over in the barn, and he will show it to us if we will go now."

Anders jumped up quickly, and followed by the dog, the children ran toward the group of barns and stables, at some distance from the house.

"Look at all those wild strawberries in this field," said Anders.

"I had forgotten that it was time for them. I must ask grandmother if we can pick all we want," said Sigrid.

"I want to see father's new sailboat. Have you been down to the lake yet?" asked Anders.

"No," said Sigrid. "Let's go around and see everything. Mother says we shall stay all summer, because poor grandmother is so old and feeble she doesn't like to leave her. Larsson, Larsson, where are you?"

The old farmer, who had taken care of the grounds and farm for many years, hobbled out to the barn door to welcome the children and to show them the new calf, the little pigs, and the chickens.

No place in the world is quite so interesting as grandmother's old house, whether you are a Swedish or an American girl.

Sigrid's grandmother lived in a fine old house on a hilltop which overlooked Lake MÄlar. It was only a short journey of two or three hours from Stockholm, yet it was quite out in the country, several miles from any village. As you drove through the avenue of huge beech-trees, you would be curious to know why so many small, low-lying buildings were grouped near the house. They were placed to form three sides of a square, after the fashion of many Swedish country places.

Off in the distance were the barns, which the children visited, and another group of red cottages, where the farm-helpers and their families lived. These people lived in a little world by themselves, with everything they needed right on the grounds. If Mrs. Lund wished fish for dinner, she could not send a maid to market to buy a live fish from a tank of water, as she did in Stockholm. Instead, one of the servants caught the fish in the lake, or she ordered smoked fish from the storehouse.

On each side of the family residence were houses for the servants. Some of the small separate sheds were used for washing, baking, tools, and provisions. But you would enjoy a peep into some of these buildings with the children.

The new sailboat was anchored at the wharf near the bath-house. "Father has promised to teach Erik how to sail this summer," said Sigrid. They were clinging to the wharf railing, so that they could get a glimpse of the little cabin, with its two bunks and red cushions. "I am glad you learned to swim last summer, for now we can have such sport when Karin and Elsa get here."

Sigrid had learned to swim when she was very small. Look in your geography and you will see that almost one-tenth of the whole surface of Sweden is covered with lakes and rivers. There is water, water everywhere. Just fancy how miserable a Swedish mother would be if her little daughter could not swim!

The door of the storehouse stood open when the children climbed the hill from the lake, so they slipped in after Svea. On the outside, it was just a mound of grassy earth, with a door cut in the grass, but no windows.

"Isn't it cool in here!" exclaimed Anders. "Svea, aren't you going to skim the milk?"

"Later in the day, Anders," said the maid, who held her lantern up over her head while she hunted for the sausages.

From above, hung long strings of sausages, smoked hams, and fish. In the dim light of the lantern, the children could see the big round cheeses and the bins of potatoes. The pans of milk were set to cool in another room of this queer storehouse.

"I wish you would give us some lingon jam," said Sigrid. "The kind we had last year, Svea."

"Wait till I open a new jar. Now, run ahead, for I want to lock the door," replied Svea. She had not forgotten how the children had teased her the summer before for their favourite jam of red Swedish berries.

"Next week will be the time for washing. Perhaps mother will let us ride down to the lake when the clothes are carried there," said Sigrid. She tried to lift herself up on the window-sill to look into the wash-house, where the huge copper kettle was ready to boil the clothes, but she was not tall enough.

"Never mind," she said. "We can get into the bake-house, I am sure. Sometime, Svea says, I may help her bake bread. It must be almost time now, for she hasn't made any for several months."

In the city, Sigrid's mother bought her rye bread from a baker, but grandmother had her bread baked three or four times a year in this little house. Most of the room was filled by the huge stone fireplace, which was heated to a high temperature. Then the coals were raked off and the rye bread cooked on the hot stones.

"What does she do with this flat round piece of wood with a short handle?" asked Anders, who was exploring.

"Oh," said Sigrid, "it is a great lark to watch her. She rolls out the batter quite thin, and slips that wooden shovel beneath each cake. Then she takes this other wooden spade with a long handle, shakes the cake from the little spade to that one, and thrusts it on the hot stones. Svea does it very quickly, but she laughed when I asked if it was hard, so I don't believe it is as easy as it looks."

"Don't you think it is time for dinner? I am so hungry," said Anders.

"Guess what we are going to have to-day," said Sigrid.

"Pancakes and jelly," Anders replied promptly.

"No, sour milk, with powdered ginger on top."

"Let's run, then," said Anders, "because I don't want to be late and have father say I cannot have any."

But they arrived in season and ate their full share of the white curds, which they always enjoyed.

Inside of the old house, you would be amazed at the size of the rooms. Though they were simply furnished, there was much choice old carved furniture, lovely plants, and vines, so that the rooms were very cheery. The floors were scrubbed beautifully clean and covered with rugs. Everywhere was exquisite order and neatness.

As in the city home, the children had a large nursery, where they always played during the little time they were indoors. A trapeze hung between the nursery and an adjoining room; a large cushion rested beneath. On rainy days, the children hung from this indoor swing and climbed the ropes like young monkeys.

"One, two, three, four, five," counted Sigrid, as she sat on the porch a few days after their arrival. "Why, are all those old women going to help with the washing to-morrow, mother?"

"Yes; we shall need them all. Larsson has arranged for them to sleep at some of the servants' houses, so they will be ready to begin very early in the morning."

The queer procession of old women, with coloured kerchiefs tied over their heads, slowly filed down the road. Long before the children were awake the next morning, a fire had been lighted in the wash-house beneath the monster kettle, and the women were at work.

Wasn't that a lively week, though! Sigrid's mother was an excellent housekeeper, but she never had all the clothes and linen of the family washed but three times a year! Such scores and scores of garments went into that copper kettle—enough to clothe a whole village. Even if her family had been quite poor, Sigrid would still have had many more dresses and aprons than her American cousin.

By the time the oxen were harnessed to a long, low wagon with latticed sides, Sigrid and Anders were ready to climb in and ride to the lake with the old women and the tubs of clothes which had boiled in the kettle.

As soon as they arrived at a clean, sandy beach near the wharf, the children hopped out of the wagon.

"Let's sit in the rowboat at the end of the wharf," said Anders. "Then we can play we are pirates and watch the women on the shore."

The washerwomen took off their shoes and stockings, pinned up their skirts, and waded into the water. Then there was such a splashing and rinsing of clothes, and bobbing of kerchiefed heads, and swinging of long arms!

"They are bad children. We must beat them very hard," one wrinkled old woman explained to Anders. She had carried her pile of dripping clothes from the water's edge to a big stone, where she pounded them with a flat wooden beater. "But they will be as white as a lily when I am done."

Later all the garden bushes were spread with garments. You needed only to half-close your eyes to fancy a summer snow-squall had whitened the green grass over a large area.

"Everything in the house will be fresh and sweet for Midsummer's Day," sighed Mrs. Lund, when the last washerwoman had returned to the country district where she lived.