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At about fifteen, Hamsun had an experience which is rarely mentioned as part of the scant biographical material made available by his reserve concerning his own personality. He returned to the old home of his parents in the Gudbrand Valley and worked for a few months as clerk in a country store a store just like any one of those that figure so conspicuously in almost every one of his novels.
Run out, child, and put up the goat. 'Nay, but I haven't got the goat either', said Gudbrand, 'for a little farther on I swopped it away, and got a fine sheep instead. 'You don't say so! cried his wife; 'why, you do everything to please me, just as if I had been with you; what do we want with a goat? If I had it I should lose half my time in climbing up the hills to get it down.
We shall, too, gain something, for I shall then have only to look after one cow, instead of having to litter and feed two." This Gudbrand thought was right and reasonable, so he took the cow, and set off to town to sell it. When he arrived there he could find no one who would buy the beast. "Well, well," said he, "I can go home again with the cow.
Then Gudbrand opened the door and said, "Well, what do you say now? Have I won the hundred crowns?" and his neighbor was forced to admit that he had. Once on a time, there was a man who had a meadow, which lay high upon the hillside, and in the meadow was a barn, which he had built to keep his hay in. Now, I must tell you there hadn't been much in the barn for the last year or two, for every St.
Now have we left no more than two hundred men out of that force with which we met him, and I advise thee, father, not to fight with that man. 'One may hear, said Gudbrand, 'that all vigour is beaten out of thee. Ill luck went with thee, and long will thy journey be spoken of. Thou believest at once those mad fancies which that man brings who hath wrought foul shame on thee and thine.
Much afraid was Gudbrand at this terror, and told it to Thord Fat-paunch, a chief man of the Dales. He answered: 'Just the same vision appeared to me. And on the morrow they bade the trumpet-blast summon an assembly, and said that they thought it good counsel to hold a conference with that man who came from the north with new doctrine, and to learn what proofs he could bring.
There Gudbrand held an assembly with them, and said: 'There is a man come to Loa named Olaf; he would fain offer us a faith other than we had before, and break all our gods in sunder. And he says that he has a God far greater and mightier. A wonder it is that the earth does not burst in sunder beneath him who dares to say such things; a wonder that our gods let him any longer walk thereon.
Thus it happened to the greater renown of Monsieur de Bayard, who was esteemed not only by the French, his countrymen, but by the Spaniards of the kingdom of Naples, to be a peerless knight, who had no equal look where you may. THERE was a man named Gudbrand of the Dales, who was as good as king over the Dales though he had but the title of duke. He had one son, of whom this story makes mention.
The Bishop baptized Gudbrand and his son. King Olaf and Bishop Sigurd left behind them teachers; and they who met as enemies parted as friends. And afterwards Gudbrand built a church in the valley." Olaf was by no means an unmerciful man, much the reverse where he saw good cause.
We are so well to do that we may drive to church, just as well as other people, and if we choose to keep a horse we have a right to get one, I should think." So, turning to her child she said, "Run out, deary, and put up the horse." "Ah!" said Gudbrand, "but you see I have not the horse after all, for when I got a bit farther on the road, I traded it for a pig."
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