There was once upon a time a troll who lived in a vast rock fall far, far north in the mountains. There were no folk for miles all around, and the troll didn’t come out into the light of day more than once every hundred years. It lived on the marrow of the mountains, and dressed in the north wind and drizzle. It was as strong as the thunder itself, and of advanced intelligence – for a troll, that is.
Then there was one day that the great hundred-year bell of the mountain should begin to strike, that the troll came out of its hole in the rock and sat down on a stone to look out across the world.
Just as it sat pondering there, a little boy came walking down the slope. He had a stick in his hand and a huge knapsack on his back. And he hummed and sang, he did, so that everything around him listened in wonder.
“What does this little boy want, then?” asked the troll, making its voice gentle and cheerful.
“I am out looking for my match,” the boy replied.
“I’ve been doing the same for many hundreds of years, but do you think I have been able to find him?” said the troll.
The boy threw down his staff and knapsack, put both hands on his hips, and looked at the troll.
“You shall find him here,” he said.
But then the troll began to laugh – a little at first, and quietly, so the mountains barely trembled. But then it grew more and more, so that it sounded like thunder, and boulders crashed down the slopes. And at last it sat bent double with its nose in a feverous cloud, holding on to its knees, laughing so hard that it split far up to above its ears, and lakes rained down from its eyes.
“Who are you, then?” he finally asked, looking down at the boy and laughing.
“I’m a human, I am,” the boy replied.
“Well, well, well! So there are still some of your kind left, then,” said the troll, yawning and sitting down.
“Oh, I think you’ll certainly see some sign of them, I do,” said the boy, sitting down too. “But then we must go together, and be good friends and get along,” he said.
Yes, they could certainly do so, the troll thought, and so they set off, the both of them, across the mountain, sticks in their hands and knapsacks on their backs, to look for people.
When they had been walking for a while, they came high up on a mountain. And the troll began to stare and glare with its big eyes, first on one side of its nose, then on the other.
“Do you see anything?” the boy asked.
“Now, I have gone across the whole of Jotunheimen and the whole of Dovrefjell, but never have I seen the like of what may be called signs of humans,” said the troll, sitting down.
“That’s because you’re nearsighted, that is,” replied the boy, taking a small round horn out of his knapsack. He pulled it out until it was half an ell long, and started to to look and look across the mountain.
“What are you doing?” asked the troll.
“Stretching out my nose,” replied the boy. “For the longer your nose is, the farther sighted you grow,” he said.
“Do you see anything now, then?” asked the troll, gaping and glaring at the boy.
“Certainly I see,” replied the boy. “Far away there to the eastern border is a stripe, as narrow as a thread. That is a human road, that is,” said the boy, pushing his telescope together and putting it back down into his knapsack.
“No, could you imagine anything so bad?” said the troll.
“Look for yourself,” replied the boy.
And the troll began to stretch and pull at its nose until it was a whole half league long; but even so, it could not see any farther, you understand.
“You must certainly be my match – in the way of vision, that is,” said the troll, standing there with its long nose, not being able to shorten it.
“Yes, but then you get even with me by way of your nose, you do,” replied the boy. And so they wandered across the mountain again, to find the human road the boy had seen.
Well, when they had walked both well and far, they eventually reached it.
“Here is the road, and strong it is, for it is made only of tough iron,” said the boy – it was the railway line, you understand. “But we must travel quickly, if we are to arrive before the sun goes down.”
“I’ll give you quickly!” replied the troll, sitting on a mound and opening up its knapsack.
“Do you see these, you?” it said, holding out its seven-league boots.
“Oh, you shall go quickly enough,” replied the boy, “but here you will find your match, anyway, if only you wait until my horse arrives.”
Yes, the troll would certainly wait, there was no doubt about that.
And so they each sat down on a stone, took out their food and ate well until they were full.
Suddenly they heard a whistle far to the north.
“We ought to get ready now, for my horse is whinnying,” said the boy to the troll. And they barely had time to close their knapsacks before a strange beast came straining and panting across the mountain. And it stopped right in front of the boy and the troll. And it was not a horse, nor was it a chariot, and yet it was both horse and chariot.
“That is a strange steed,” said the troll. “And he won’t last long, for he pants and carries on so that his red breath comes out of his nostrils.”
“We’ll try,” said the boy, jumping on.
And you can imagine the running contest all across the mountains!
The troll took off with its big seven-league boots, so that boulders bounded and lakes splashed and the earth quaked where it trod; and the boy ran slowly and quietly behind on his horse.
Thus it went for half an hour across the tundra – the troll before and the boy after – but then the boy opened up the steam, and then he yelled, “Yee-ha” so that it resounded among all the mounds.
Then off it went, the sparks flying and the pistons pounding, and it pulled ahead, so the scrub surged like meadows in a storm, and the mountains passed by in an instant.
“Hurrah! Now you’ll have to pull you socks up!” cried the boy, drawing alongside the troll.
“Full speed!” he screamed, pulling his hat down over his ears. And his horse steamed and panted and burned, and the wheels went like spinning lightning, and he pulled ahead, as if you should draw a line across the mountain. But as he turned to catch his breath, he saw the troll like a little black dot, falling farther and farther behind, the wrong way. So he stopped.
After a couple of hours or so he saw the troll coming, heaving, the sweat falling off it, and it could hardly utter a word, so out of breath it was.
“Thank you for coming,” said the boy, as he lay roasting in the sun on a bank.
“Oh my word!” said the troll. “What a steed you have!” it said.
“Oh, I’m sure you could get yourself such wheelbones, too,” replied the boy.
“I suppose I could, if only I had enough time,” said the troll, and off it went by itself across the mountain.
The boy waited for seven long and seven broad.
Then the troll returned, carrying four huge grindstones.
“Now just you watch,” it said.
It put a grindstone on each foot and one on each hand, and then it cranked away across the ground.
“Full speed!” shouted the boy, jumping up on to the troll’s back and sitting there swinging his hat.
But the more it cranked and the more it wobbled, the worse it went, and finally the troll fell on its nose straight down into a huge pit, and the grindstones rolled away, one this way and the other that way, rolling and tumbling down the slope.
“Quick and wrong!” said the boy, lying on the ground, laughing.
But the troll got up and was furiously angry.
“Yes, it may well be you are my match on foot,” it screamed, “but you shall have a full beating, anyway, for here is power and strength from both land and sea,” it said, clenching its fists. And it began to throw boulders high into the air and catch them again with just its fingers.
The boy sat down on a stone, he did, and watched, but he didn’t even blink his eyes at it.
“Well, you’re strong,” he said, “but I don’t believe you dare get to grips with me.”
“You shoe plug!” said the troll, looking at him; and its breath was hot. “Come now; I’ll crush you to pieces as small as the sand on the beach,” it cried, reaching out its fist.
“Just wait till I get my fingers out,” replied the boy. And then he took out a small square box from his knapsack, and out of this he took two small shiny brass rods, and held them out to the troll.
“What manner of thing is this?” The troll asked, taking them.
“My fingers,” replied the boy. “And now you may squeeze them,” he said, pressing a small shiny button inside the box.
“Ow, ow, ow!” shouted the troll. And then you should have seen it! It couldn’t hold on, but it couldn’t let go. It kicked and bounced like a bear in a hot cauldron of buttermilk, and roared and carried on so that you could see far down its red throat. And away in the mountains, all the trolls opened their gates a crack, to see what was going on.
Then the boy turned the current off.
The troll fell on its bottom, and remained sitting on the ground, cradling its hands, and staring open-mouthed at the boy. “What strong fingers you have!” it said.
“Yes, and those were just my little fingers,” replied the boy, putting the box back in his knapsack.
“Dear me, what kind of devilment have you got in your fingers then?” asked the troll, sitting there watching.
“Electricity,” replied the boy.
“Eckey-leckey,” said the troll; it couldn’t say electricity.
“The things that people come up with!” it said. And then it sat down to ponder this for a whole day; but it grew none the wiser.
During the evening, it rose. “Well, it’s all the same,” it said. “You may be my match in boxing, but you are not so strong all over your body,” it said, haughtily.
“We’ll see when it’s needed,” said the boy; and then they wandered across the mountains again.
Just as they walked, they saw a glaring light far, far away.
“I wonder what manner of thing that is,” said the troll.
“That’s the town, where all the people live,” replied the boy.
Yes, the troll thought it would be so fine to go there, and so it asked the boy if he knew of anywhere it might stay.
“I’ll have to hear,” said the boy, and so they went up to a small hut that stood alone in the midst of the wild mountain. But a fine wire on white posts led away from the hut, reaching as far as the eye could see.
“What manner of thing is that?” asked the troll, pointing.
“Telephone,” replied the boy.
“Telly-tully,” said the troll; it couldn’t say telephone.
“Yes, human ears and human mouths, of course,” replied the boy.
“Long have I lived, and much have I seen, but never have I seen ears so long and and a snout so broad that they go like a needle and thread all across the mountains,” said the troll, shaking its head.
The boy didn’t answer, he just went into the little room and rang a small bell that stood there. Then he picked up a small funnel lying there and put it to his ear. And then he shouted:
“Do you have lodgings for a troll for a night or two?”
The troll stood outside the door, cocked its head – first one way, then the other – and listened and pondered, almost like when a dog hears a fly. “Did you get an answer?” it asked, half afraid.
“They say they already have enough trolls,” replied the boy.
“I might almost have known,” said the troll. “Well, I know no better than to ask my cousin in Ekeberg if he might have a free lodging.”
“Do it yourself,” said the boy. “Kin is closest to kin.”
“I will,” replied the troll. “But then I will use my own tools,” it said, and skulked off as the boy was ringing and talking. And off it went inland across the tundra.
The boy slept in the little hut that night, and he got up early, as the sun rose. Then he saw the troll below, coming up the slope with a millstone, which it had taken from one of its giant querns. It had jammed the wheel on to a huge mast tree, and came dragging everything behind it, up the slope.
“Now you’ll hear,” it said.
Then it put both hands to its mouth and shouted to the south:
“Tore in Ekeberg, do you have lodgings for your kin?”
Then it put the millstone to its ear and listened.
“Do you hear anything?” asked the boy.
Then the troll shouted a second time, and the whole sky turned black:
“Tore in Ekeberg, do you have lodgings for your kin?”
But even so, it didn’t get an answer.
Then it shouted a third time, in thunderous anger, with the millstone to its ear and end of the mast tree in the air:
“Tore in Ekeberg, do you have lodgings for your kin?”
Then lightning struck, and hit the mast tree so that the millstone cracked and the troll was thrown into a pit in the ground.
“Did you hear anything now, then?” asked the boy.
“Well, I got an answer, and it was from the fellow, but I don’t know if it was a yes or a no,” replied the troll.
“Well, then we should go calling,” said the boy. And with that they wandered south, towards the human town.
When they had walked for a while, they came to an immensely huge rock gate, which was closed.
“Wait, and I’ll throw that gate open, I will,” said the troll. And it set one claw into the ground and one into the slabs of rock above, and lifted so that the mountain groaned. But for all the lifting and all the toil, the rock gate remained standing, it did.
“Come away, little one, so I can use my middle finger,” said the boy. Then he took a small thing with a long cord in it, put it under the slab of rock, lit the cord, and came away.
“What manner of thing is that?” asked the troll, sniffing at it with its long nose.
Suddenly there was a bang! And the rock gate was blown into the sky in a shower of stones. And when the boy looked for the troll, it lay on its back, far away in a marsh, kicking its legs in the air.
When the boy reached it, it had barely sat up again, and it remained on the ground, weeping. “Oh, now people have become such that there is no use in being a troll any longer,” it said.
“But in the name of all the world, what kind of devilment do you have in your fingers, you?” it asked, hulking and drying its eyes.
“Dynamite,” replied the boy.
“Dine and mine,” said the troll. “Yes, was that not what I was thinking? For there is always trouble when one touches that.”
And then they wandered further southwards.
Before they knew it, they stood at Ekeberg itself. Evening had fallen, and they could see nothing; only a strange heavy hum sounded over all the mountains.
“What manner of thing is that?” asked the troll. The boy took its hand, and he felt it quaking all over its body.
“The town, where all the people live,” said the boy.
Suddenly all the lights were lit. And bells rang, and spires glittered, and bridges and houses and castles rose up, and the hum came from the great town, like a mighty note high across the mountains.
“Oh no, oh no!” said the troll. It grasped its head with both hands and began to weep.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked the boy.
“I don’t know, I don’t know!” replied the troll, rocking and swaying, as its tears ran.
“I’ll tell you what’s wrong with you, I will,” said the boy.
“What’s wrong with me, then?” asked the troll.
“Wit,” replied the boy.
“Wit! What manner of thing is that?” asked the troll, it’s voice trembling, looking at him with big, stupid, sad eyes.
“Oh, it’s something you’ll never understand,” replied the boy. And he felt so odd, too.
And when he looked for the troll, he saw it go, bent over and lonely, down across the mountains.
“Troll, where are you going?” he called after it.
“Home,” it replied, like a sigh, far, far away.
And so the troll crept back into its hole in the rock. It had found its match.
And the great hundred-year bell of the mountain sounded nineteen strokes.
— J. B. Bull. Eventyr og Historier. A. Bloch (illus.).
Oslo: Cappelen, 1928.
