But at last they had gone over all these things and were sleepy themselves, so they made up their beds on some sheep-skin rugs on the floor, and soon fell into a sound sleep.
The next day it was still storming, and so Father Mikko gave up all idea of leaving that day. About three o'clock in the afternoon--it was dark as night then--they had all finished dinner and settled down around the fire as on the day before, and Father Mikko was easily persuaded to go on with his stories.
Erik was at work on a pair of snow-shoes, just like those that Lemminkainen wore in the story of the hunt after the Hisi-deer. They were nearly finished--about six feet long and five inches wide in the broadest part, with a place in the middle to fasten them on to the feet, and the front ends were turned up. All that now remained to be done was to polish them off, and Erik worked at this while Father Mikko told his stories. The children had enough to do to watch 'Pappa' Mikko's face and listen to the wonderful tales, and Mother Stina was busy with some sewing--she couldn't spin because the noise of the wheel would have drowned Father Mikko's voice.
'Now that we have brought Lemminkainen back from the Death-river,' the old man said, 'we will see what Wainamoinen was doing all this while.' So he began as follows:
Wainamoinen started to build a boat from the Rainbow-maiden's distaff, but he had soon used up all his timber, and the boat was far from finished. So he asked Sampsa (the planter of the first trees that grew on earth) to go and search out the needful timber in order to finish the boat.
Sampsa started off with a golden axe upon his shoulder and a copper hatchet in his belt. He wandered through the mountain forests, and at length came upon a great aspen, and was just going to cut it down, when the aspen asked him what he wanted. 'I wish to take your timber for a vessel,' Sampsa replied, 'that the wise magician Wainamoinen is building.' Then the aspen answered: 'All the boats that have been made of my wood have been but failures; they float but a little way, and then sink to the ocean's bottom, for my trunk is full of hollow places, where the worms have eaten my wood.'
So Sampsa left the aspen and searched still further, until he came to a pine-tree that was even taller than the aspen was. Sampsa struck a blow with his axe, and at the same time asked the pine-tree if it would furnish good timber for Wainamoinen's boat. But the pine-tree answered: 'All the ships that have been made from me are useless. I am full of imperfections, for the ravens live among my branches and bring ill-luck.'