But when occasionally, in her own
innocent way, she put both his patience and his
orthodoxy to the test by her exceedingly puzzling
questions, then he could not, in the depth
of his heart, restrain the wish that she might
have been more like other young girls, and less
ardently solicitous about the fate of her kind.
Affectionate and indulgent, however, as the pastor
was, he would often, in the next moment, do
penance for his unregenerate thought, and thank
God for having made her so fair to behold, so
pure, and so noble-hearted.
Toward Arnfinn, Augusta had, although of
his own age, early assumed a kind of elder-sisterly
relation; she had been his comforter during
all the trials of his boyhood; had yielded
him her sympathy with that eager impulse which
lay so deep in her nature, and had felt forlorn
when life had called him away to where her
words of comfort could not reach him. But
when once she had hinted this to her father, he
had pedantically convinced her that her feeling
was unchristian, and Inga had playfully remarked
that the hope that some one might soon
find the open Polar Sea would go far toward
consoling her for her loss; for Augusta had
glorious visions at that time of the open Polar Sea.
Now, the Polar Sea, and many other things, far
nearer and dearer, had been forced into uneasy
forgetfulness; and Arnfinn was once more with
her, no longer a child, and no longer appealing
to her for aid and sympathy; man enough, ap-
parently, to have outgrown his boyish needs
and still boy enough to be ashamed of having
ever had them.
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