"It looks more like the mast of one of the big ships in the harbour than anything else," said Erik. He and his father were standing beside the huge May-pole which lay flat on the green grass in grandmother's front lawn. Near by several men were hammering away on a large wooden platform, in the centre of which the pole was to be hoisted.

"Yes, my son, I have often thought so. This pole is not more than fifty feet high. I have seen them twice as tall. But if we are going to cover all these cross-bars with birch boughs and wreaths, we must hitch up old Maja and drive into the woods soon."

"Indeed, you must," said Mrs. Lund, as she hurried across the lawn with a huge wreath of daisies over her arm and a basket of nodding bluebells. "You will find us under that clump of beeches, making our wreaths, when you return. Oh! there is plenty for every one to do before the pole is trimmed for to-night."

"Mother, you do make wreaths so fast," said Sigrid. She was sitting in the midst of a group of friends and relatives, who had gathered at grandmother's to celebrate Midsummer's Eve and the day following. As she talked, she sorted daisies, or "priests'-ruffs," as she called them, into bunches for her mother.

"Just hand me a clump of those white daisies, so I can tie their long stems to this rope, and you will soon see how I do it," said Mrs. Lund.

"To-night will be the longest of the whole year," said Miss Eklund, while her fingers plaited birch leaves. "How I love these long days of sunshine! Why, last night I read in my room without a lamp till almost eleven o'clock!"

"Please tell Karin and me about how you made pancakes on Midsummer's Eve when you were a little girl, Miss Eklund," begged Sigrid, who, with her cousin, was sitting near the governess.

"Oh! the young girls out in the country where I used to live will have a merry time of it to-night. I wonder if they still make pancakes. I was about sixteen years old the night I tried it with two other girls, for the charm would not work unless there were three. Together we took the bowl from the cupboard, beat the eggs, and added the flour. All three of us stirred it at once and threw in the salt at the same time. Of course, we got in too much salt. Not one of us must speak or laugh the whole time. That was the hardest of all. Dear me, I hadn't thought of that night for years." Miss Eklund delayed her tale to laugh as heartily as if she was making up for lost time.

"After we had poured out the batter and cooked it, each of us ate a third of the very salt cake. But we couldn't drink before we went to bed. During our dreams, the older girls told us that a young man would appear to each of us and offer us a glass of water."

Karin interrupted the story by exclaiming, "What is that coming down the road? I believe it is the boys with our green boughs. Old Maja doesn't look as though he liked those branches thrust behind his ears. Why, the wagon is all one bower of birch-trees!"

As the wagon drove into the yard, Erik spied his newly-arrived cousin and sung out:

The children all laughed merrily at the new turn to the familiar old song.

"How pretty we shall make the May-pole!" exclaimed Sigrid.

She called it a "May-pole," though it was the middle of June. The Swedish word for "May" means green leaf. And a "green-leaf pole" it certainly was when they had draped the cross-bars with leaves and garlands and added scores of the yellow and blue flags of Sweden.

Toward the close of the afternoon, the pole in its gala-dress was swung into place by means of huge ropes. Then a great shout went up from the little crowd of relatives and working people who lived on the grounds.

"Strike up a dance, Per," cried Major Lund to the fiddler. In a twinkling, the children had caught hold of hands and were dancing around the pole. Old and young, servants and all, shared in the merrymaking.

As Sigrid ran about in a gay costume, you would scarcely have recognized her. Instead of her plain city clothes, she wore a pretty peasant dress. Many fashionable Swedish mammas let their children wear this dress on holidays in the country. Over her dark blue woolen skirt, Sigrid wore a bright apron, striped in red, blue, yellow, black, and white. The waist was white, with a red silk bodice and shoulder-straps. An embroidered kerchief was folded quaintly about her throat. On her yellow braids rested a tall pointed blue cap, with red pipings and tassels in back. Several other little girls at the dance wore similar dresses.

"Erik," said Sigrid, quite late in the evening, as the fiddler stopped to tune up for the next dance, "several times to-night I have seen some one over by the well-sweep. I thought perhaps he was one of the farmers' children. But he hides there as though he was afraid to come out."

"Suppose we go over and speak to him," said Erik.

When they reached the well-sweep, no one was there.

"I know that I saw him only a minute ago. There, I think he is behind that elm-tree. You run this side and I will go the other," said Sigrid.

All escape was cut off this time, and Erik dragged the cowering child from his hiding-place.

"If he isn't a chimney-sweep!" exclaimed Erik when he saw the boy away from the shadow of the tree.

"You needn't be afraid of us, little boy," said Sigrid, kindly. "You can't help it because you have to go down into the chimneys and your face is always black with soot. Don't you want something to eat?"

The sooty youngster grinned and shifted his coil of rope from one shoulder to the other. He managed to murmur, "Thank you." Sigrid ran ahead to the kitchen to get some salt herring, rye bread, and coffee. The little sweep left his long broom and rope on the grass, and began to eat greedily.

"Aren't you ever afraid to go down inside of a pitch-black chimney?" asked Sigrid. Her interest in the dances had waned for a few minutes, for she had never talked with one of these forlorn little creatures before.

The boy shook his head in reply. He was too busy with his salt herring to waste any words.

"I am going to ask mother if she will let him stay here all night," said Sigrid. She did not know that this outcast, who was so shy with her, could take very good care of himself. All summer, he wandered through the country, cleaning chimneys. At night, he slept in strange barns or haymows and was very happy and comfortable.

Mrs. Lund talked to the lad and told him that he could spend the night in one of the outhouses. The next day was a holiday and no one would want a chimney swept.

Sigrid's tender heart was at ease again, and she returned to the dancers. The older people stayed up far into the bright night, but the children soon went to bed. From her chamber window, Sigrid could see the huge bonfires on the hillsides far away. The witches are abroad on Midsummer's Eve, and these fires drive them away.

Every one goes to church on Midsummer's Day, which is also called St. John's Day. So the next morning, the Lund family drove several miles to a little country church. Before they started, Sigrid went to find the sweep. But the little wanderer had started on his travels again.

"Larsson says all the school-children will sing carols, this morning," said Mrs. Lund. "I am sure we shall have a beautiful service."

As they drove along the road, they met many country people on their way to church. The women all carried their hymn-books wrapped neatly in a silk handkerchief.

"Why do the men all sit on one side and the women on the other?" whispered Anders. His family sat in a little gallery of the church. Down below, the altar and the square box pews with doors were banked with lilacs.

"Hush, dear," replied his mother. "You must remember the country people are used to it, so it is not strange to them."

The ride home and the noonday meal seemed endless. As soon as ever they had thanked their parents for their food, the children were out-of-doors again. A big wagon, trimmed with birches and filled with hay, was ready at the door. Midsummer's Day without a picnic in the woods is almost as bad as Christmas without presents.

"Don't forget the nets for the crayfish, Erik," said Major Lund, who was stowing away luncheon baskets in the wagon.

"They are in all right, father. The big kettle in which to boil them and the coffee-pot are under the seat," said Erik.

Even a plain every-day picnic, where you eat sandwiches and cakes under a tree, is fun. But on this picnic, the children were going to help catch crayfish, which look like small lobsters. Then they were planning to cook them over a camp-fire.

The last child nestled into the hay and they were off.