JULIANA'S HOUSE 135 



pansions before ever I crossed its doorstep ; but I 

 have watched other houses in the making, and have 

 chatted with their owners as they went about their 

 work. 



" Hai, Jonas, are you house-building?" 



" No," says Jonas, "but my house is too small ; 

 my children are now three, and last winter I had 

 not room for the skinning of my seals, so I am mak- 

 ing my house larger." 



And Jonas would tear the back wall out of his 

 house, and lay a fresh foundation of stones beyond 

 it, and raise a few new uprights, and nail his planks 

 to them, and fashion a roof to the extension ; and 

 so the house would seem to have an outgrowth, 

 proudly referred to by Jonas as his bedroom. 



And Benjamin's house was of this sort. In 

 course of time it had lost its individuality ; the 

 original hut was represented by four smoke-black- 

 ened uprights, very convenient for folk to lean 

 against while they talked or while they waited on a 

 stormy day for the church bell to ring. The four old 

 uprights stood in the midst of the floor-space, but 

 on all sides the walls had been pushed back to meet 

 the needs of a growing family. The porch had 

 edged its way so close to the path that the steps up 

 to the door had lost all dignity, and were no better 

 than a little ladder ; and the back wall was so close 

 to the rocks that rose steeply behind it that the roof 

 became part of the hillside when the winter snow 

 had fallen, and the boys of the village were wont to 

 go tobogganing over it for the sheer fun of the 

 thing. 



