“The Anointed cast another look full of meaning at Peter, when a large and beautiful angel, the spirit of the mother of the cherub, began:  ’If you will permit me, O, holy Jesus, I, too, would like to say a word in favor of the condemned.  Before Hannele came home with the nuts, I lay in bed without hope, or help in my great suffering.  I had lost all faith, for my prayers had not been heard, and in the bitterness of my heart, it seemed that you, who were said to be the friend of the poor on earth, and God the Father, had forgotten us in our misery, in order to overwhelm the rich with greater gifts.  In my distress, and that of the child; I had learned to curse the day on which we were born.  Oh! how wild were my thoughts during the time that Hannele was trying to sell the sheep, and did not come home; though I needed her so sorely.  I was often so thirsty that my mouth burned as with fire, and the moments when I gasped for breath were frequent, and almost unbearable when no one was there to lift me up.  I called those people liars who would persuade the poor that they had a merciful Father in Heaven, who looked upon them as his children, and cared for them.  But when Hannele came home, and lighted the little lamp, and I saw her tiny face, where for a long time I had seen no smile, but only pain and grief, now beaming with joy, when I saw the nuts and the other good things which she had brought, and saw her pleasure in them, my belief in thee, O Lord, and in the kind Father returned, and I ceased not to be grateful to the end.  If now, in the glory of thy magnificence, I know bliss unutterable, I owe it to that woman, and to the fact that she was good enough to throw the nuts into Hannele’s apron.’

“Peter nodded affirmatively.  Then he bowed before the Saviour and said:  ’The little gift of the condemned soul has indeed borne better fruit than I imagined; yet when I tell you what a great sinner she was on earth. . . .’

“‘I know,’ the Son of God interrupted him.  ’Before we decide upon the fate of this woman, let us hear what the child did with the rest of the nuts, for we know that she did not eat them all.  Now my little angel, what became of the last of them?  Speak on.  Gladly will I listen to you.’

“Hannele began anew:  ’After they had buried mother, they sent me into the country among the mountains, for they said it was not the duty of the city to care for me, but that of the village parish, where my parents were born.  So I was taken there.  The six nuts that I had saved I took with me to play with.  This I most enjoyed doing in the spring, alone on the little strip of grass behind the Poor-house, in which I was the only child.  Besides me there were but three old women ‘being fed to death,’ as the peasants used to say.  Two of my companions were blind, and the third was dull-witted and gazed ever straight before her.  Not one of them noticed anything that happened around them, but my heart used to grow light when everything about me budded, and sprouted, and burst into bloom.  My body was always aching but my pains could not lessen my enjoyment of the spring.  Wherever I looked, men were sowing and planting.  It was the first time that I had ever seen it, and the wish came over me to confide something to the good earth that would take root, and sprout, and grow green and high for me.