Pelle the Conqueror — Volume 01

When the first part of “Pelle Erobreren” (Pelle the Conqueror) appeared in 1906, its author, Martin Andersen Nexö, was practically unknown even in his native country, save to a...

The boy nodded gravely, and they made straight for the farmer. But when he had heard that they were to go together, he would not take them; the boy was far too little to earn hi...

When Lasse and Pelle came to Stone Farm, the older cottagers still remembered the farmer of their childhood, Janus Köller, the one who did more to improve things than any one el...

The mistress now appeared, with the farmer, and a maid ran down in front to the carriage with a little stepladder, and helped her in. The farmer stood at the top of the steps un...

“I came back to Stone Farm again at Martinmas, but the mistress wouldn’t take me on again, for she preferred my room to my company. But Kongstrup got his way by making me dairym...

It was one of two cows that had been turned out of the dairy-herd on account of their dryness. They were ill-tempered creatures, always discontented and doing some mischief or o...

But what did it look like in Farmer Kongstrup’s big rooms? Money lay upon the floor there, of course, the gold in one place and the silver in another; and in the middle of each...

There was something comical about the two brothers. “Here are the twins, the twelvins!” cried the whole flock in greeting, the first morning they appeared. “Well, how many times...

“Yes, I’ve no doubt you will,” said Lasse, laughing. Not that he also did not expect something great of the boy, if not exactly a large farmer. There was no saying, however. Per...

“Grandmother’s got to have her face blacked!” cried the children. She begged to be let off, as she was just washed for the night; but the children blacked a cork in the stove an...

Pelle went and peered into the machine to find out what there was so voracious about it. Between two of the teeth lay something like a peg, and when he moved the roller, the gre...

At last it was really to be! In the evening Lasse and Pelle had been to the shop and bought a slate and pencil, and Pelle was now standing at the stable-door with a beating hear...

The girls always kept together in one corner of the playground, told tittle-tattle and ate their lunch, but the boys ran all over the place like swallows in aimless flight. A bi...

At last it let him come close up to it, so that he could stroke it. It stood still for a little and was sulky, but yielded at last, ate the green food and snuffed in his face by...

Lasse was silent, and stumbled about for a little while. Then he came up to Pelle. “Now, see here! Here’s a piece of steel I’ve found, and you must remember always to have it ab...

One Sunday morning late in the autumn, a messenger came running from the town to Stone Farm to say that now herring was to be had. The bailiff came down into the servants’ room...

“She must have had right on her side, for he never said a cross word when she started off with her complaints and reproaches, and them so loud that you could hear them right thr...

This invisible something reached out after the others, too. Fru Kongstrup never interfered unkindly in anything, either directly or in a roundabout way; and yet everything becam...

There was no time to think. The line began to be alive, glided out into the sea, and drew the rope after it. Yard after yard it unrolled itself and glided slowly into the sea li...

Karl Johan led the expedition; it was one of a head man’s duties to know the way about the Common. Fair Maria kept faithfully by his side, and every one could see how proud she...

They found out on inquiry that Mons and Lively Sara were down in one of the dancing-booths, and accordingly went down there. “Now you stay here!” said Karl Johan sternly, and we...

The worst of it all, however, was the desire to work once more for himself. He was always sighing for this, and his hands were sore with longing to feel what it was like to take...

The old woman turned round again, and felt for her daughter’s hand on the quilt. “And you must make rather a soft pillow for my old head, for it’s become so difficult to find re...

It was wrong to lay a hand upon one’s own father, but now Pelle was compelled to set aside all such scruples. He took a firm hold of the old man’s collar. “Now you come with me!...

“It’s a good thing you came,” said Pelle, as they drove up to the church, and found themselves among so many people. Lasse had almost had to give up thought of coming, for the m...