But with the stones and the gold it might have gone fairly well, if such a lot of horrid things had not been lying all around the island.  It looked like whales and sharks and other big sea-monsters.  But the boy understood that it was the sea-trolls, who had gathered around the island and intended to crawl up on it, to fight with the land-trolls who lived there.  And those on the land were probably afraid, for he saw how a big giant stood on the highest point of the island and raised his arms—­as if in despair over all the misfortune that should come to him and his island.

The boy was not a little terrified when he noticed that Akka began to descend right over that particular island!  “No, for pity’s sake!  We must not light there,” said he.

But the geese continued to descend, and soon the boy was astonished that he could have seen things so awry.  In the first place, the big stone blocks were nothing but houses.  The whole island was a city; and the shining gold specks were street lamps and lighted window-panes.  The giant, who stood highest up on the island, and raised his arms, was a church with two cross-towers; all the sea-trolls and monsters, which he thought he had seen, were boats and ships of every description, that lay anchored all around the island.  On the side which lay toward the land were mostly row-boats and sailboats and small coast steamers; but on the side that faced the sea lay armour-clad battleships; some were broad, with very thick, slanting smokestacks; others were long and narrow, and so constructed that they could glide through the water like fishes.

Now what city might this be?  That, the boy could figure out because he saw all the battleships.  All his life he had loved ships, although he had had nothing to do with any, except the galleys which he had sailed in the road ditches.  He knew very well that this city—­where so many battleships lay—­couldn’t be any place but Karlskrona.

The boy’s grandfather had been an old marine; and as long as he had lived, he had talked of Karlskrona every day; of the great warship dock, and of all the other things to be seen in that city.  The boy felt perfectly at home, and he was glad that he should see all this of which he had heard so much.

But he only had a glimpse of the towers and fortifications which barred the entrance to the harbour, and the many buildings, and the shipyard—­before Akka came down on one of the flat church-towers.

This was a pretty safe place for those who wanted to get away from a fox, and the boy began to wonder if he couldn’t venture to crawl in under the goosey-gander’s wing for this one night.  Yes, that he might safely do.  It would do him good to get a little sleep.  He should try to see a little more of the dock and the ships after it had grown light.

The boy himself thought it was strange that he could keep still and wait until the next morning to see the ships.  He certainly had not slept five minutes before he slipped out from under the wing and slid down the lightning-rod and the waterspout all the way down to the ground.