Translated from the Danish by Hanna Astrup Larsen and Published in Twelve stories as Røverstuen, 1827 WHO does not know--at least by name--this creature whose pranks almost always are just good-natured frolics? Who has not heard of his chubby little figure and his red Jacobin cap--symbol of uninhibited liberty? Who does not know that the house he chooses for his abode is perfectly safe from fires and other disasters? (In order not to forget it I will mention at once _in parenthesi_ that there is also a ship Nisse whose function it is to plan during the night--in a sort of shadow drawing--all the work that has to be done the next day: weigh anchor or cast it, hoist the sails or take them in, furl them, or reef them, which means a storm. He doesn't even think he is too good to swab the deck,