Oxford in the Long Vacation--The rats make such a
strife--A case for Lesbia--Interview between a hermit and
a novice--The ruling passion--Blighted hopes--Norwegian
windows--Tortoise-shell soup--After dinner--Christiansand
again--Ferry on the Torrisdal river--Plain records of
English travellers--Salmonia--The bridal crown--A bridal
procession--Hymen, O Hymenæe!--A ripe Ogress--The head cook at
a Norwegian marriage--God-fearing people--To Sætersdal--Neck or
nothing--Lilies and lilies--The Dutch myrtle.
I was sitting in my rooms, about the end of the month of July, 1857,
having been dragged perforce, by various necessary avocations, into the
solitude of the Oxford Long Vacation; not a soul in this college, or,
in short, in any college. “A decided case of ‘Last Rose of Summer,’”
mused I. “Those rats or mice, too, in the cupboard, what a clattering
and squeaking they keep up, lamenting, probably, the death of one of
their companions in the trap this morning; but, nevertheless, they are
not a bit intimidated, for it is hunger that makes them valiant.”
The proverb, “Hungry as a church mouse,” fits a college mouse in Long
Vacation exactly. The supplies are entirely stopped with the departure
of the men: no remnants of cold chicken, or bread-and-butter, no
candles. It is not surprising, then, they have all found me out.
I positively go to bed in fear and trembling, lest they should make a
nocturnal attack.
Each hole and cranny they explore,
Each crook and corner of the chamber;
They hurry-skurry round the floor,
And o’er the books and sermons clamber.
The fate of that worthy Bishop Hatto stares me in the face. If they did
not spare so exalted a personage, what will become of me? And as for
keeping a cat, no, that may not be. I am not a Whittington. They are a
treacherous race, and purr, and fawn, and play the villain--quadrupedal
Nena Sahibs. I always hated them, and still more so since an incident I
witnessed one year in Norway.
On the newly-mown grass before the cottage where I was staying, a lot
of little redpoles--the sparrows of those high latitudes--were very
busily engaged picking up their honest livelihood, and making cheerful
remarks to one another on the brightness of the weather and the flavour
of the hay-seeds. Intently examining their motions through my glass, I
had paid no heed to a cat which seemed rolling about carelessly on the
lawn. Suddenly, I perceived that it had imperceptibly edged nearer and
nearer to the pretty little birds, and was gliding, snake-like, towards
them. I tapped at the window lustily, and screamed out in hopes of
alarming my friends; but it was too late; they flew up, the cat sprung
up aloft likewise, caught a poor little fellow in mid-air, and was away
with it and out of sight in a moment.
At vobis male sit, _catis dolorum_
_Plenis_, qui omnia bella devoratis!
Tam bellum mihi passerem abstulistis!
O factum malé! o miselle passer!
Norway! and why am I not there? It is too late this year to think of
it. I must write to that friend, and say I can’t keep my promise, and
join him thither. No, I must be content with a little trout-fishing
in Wales or Scotland. At this moment a tap is heard at the door. An
ingenuous youth, undergraduate of St. Sapientia College, and resident
in the neighbourhood, had brought a letter of introduction from a
common friend, begging me, as one deep in the mysteries of Norwegian
travelling, to give the bearer some information respecting that
country, as he thought of taking a month’s trip thither.
As I pulled out Munck’s map, chalked out a route for the youth, and
gave him a little practical advice on the subject, a regular spasm came
across me. Iö was never plagued by that malicious gadfly, or “tsetse,”
so much as I was for the rest of the day by an irresistible desire to
be off to the old country. The steamer was to start in three days.
On the third day I stood on board of her, in the highest possible
spirits. The ingenuous youth was also there; but high hope was not
the expression on his countenance. Most wofully he approached me. To
make assurance doubly sure, and secure a good berth, he had left home
the day before. On arriving at the terminus, his box was not to be
found--the box with all his traps, and the 50_l._ in it. He had sent
telegrams, or telegraphemes, to the four ends of Great Britain for the
missing box; but it was not forthcoming. In a few hours we weighed
anchor. The expectant visitor was left behind, and as there was no
vessel to Norway for the next fortnight, the chances were that his trip
thither would not take place. The above facts will serve as a warning
to young travellers.
As daylight peered through the small porthole in the morning, I found
that we had no less than eight people in our cabin, and that the
porthole was shut, although it was smooth water.
“What an atmosphere,” said an Englishman, in an adjoining berth. “I
have opened that porthole two or three times in the night; but that
fat, drum-bellied Norwegian there, who seems as fond of hot, stifling
air as a melon, has shut it again.”
“What can you expect of the people of a country,” replied I, “where the
windows are often not made to open?”
A tall, gentlemanly-looking man, who stood before the looking-glass,
and had just brushed his glossy wig into a peak like Mr. Pecksniff,
here turned round and said, in Norwegian-English--
“I do assure you, sir, that the Norwegian windows will open.”
“Yes, in the towns; but frequently in the country not. I have been
there a good deal, and I speak from experience.”
I find that our friend, who is very communicative, was in London in
the days of the Prince Regent--yes, and he once dined with him at the
London Tavern, at a dinner given in aid of foreigners in distress:
the ticket cost 10_l._ He remembers perfectly well how, on another
occasion, a tortoise-shell, all alive, was carried round London in a
cart, with a notice that it would be made into _tortoise-shell_ soup on
a certain day. He dined, and the soup was super-excellent.
Consul ----, for I found that he had attained that distinction--was
well acquainted with all the resorts of London. Worxall pleased him
much. He had even learned to box. He had also something to say about
the war with the Swedes, led on by Karl Johann, in which he took part.
After dinner we divert ourselves by observing the sleeping countenance
of the obese Norwegian who was so fond of carbonic acid gas, assume all
sorts of colours,--livid, red, yellow,--not from repletion, though this
might well have been the case, but from the light of the painted glass
overhead, which transferred its chameleon hues to his physiognomy.
Here I am, once more plunging into the heart of Norway in the national
vehicle, the carriole; up hills, down hills, across stony morasses,
through sandy pine forests. We landed this afternoon at Christiansand,
and I am now seven miles north of it, and standing by the side of the
magnificent Torrisdal river, waiting for the great unwieldy ferry-boat
to come over. The stream is strong and broad, and there is only one man
working the craft; but, by taking advantage of a back stream on the
other side, and one on this, he has actually accomplished the passage
with little trouble, and hit the landing-place to an inch.
On the other side, three or four carrioles, some of them double ones,
are just descending the steep hill, and I have to wait till they get
down to the waterside, in consequence of the narrowness of the road.
One of the strangers, with a broad gold band round his cap, turns out
to be the British consul. He is returning with a party of ladies and
gentlemen from a pic-nic at the Vigelandsfoss, about three miles from
this, where the river makes a fine fall.
That evening we stop at the Verwalter’s (Bailiff’s), close by the
falls. I have no salmon-rod, but Mr. C----, an Englishman, who has come
up with me to sketch the foss, and try for a salmon, obtains leave,
as a great favour, to fish in the pools for one dollar a day, and a
dollar to each of the boatmen. The solitary grilse that he succeeded in
catching during the next day cost him therefore some fifteen shillings.
The charges are an infallible sign that Englishmen have been here.
As in the Tweed, the take of salmon in these southern rivers has fallen
off terribly. In Mandal river, a little to the westward, the fishing in
the last twenty years has become one-tenth of what it was. Here, where
1600 fish used to be taken yearly, 200 only are caught. But at Boen, in
the Topdal river, which, like this, enters the sea at Christiansand,
no decrease is observable. For the last ten years the average yield
of the salmon fishery there has been 2733 fish per annum. In this
state of things, the services of Mr. Hetting, the person deputed by
the Norwegian Government to travel about the country and teach the
inhabitants the method of artificially breeding salmon and other
fish, have been had recourse to. Near this, breeding-places have been
constructed under his auspices.
Extensive saw-mills are erected all about this place; and it is
probable that the dust, which is known to bother the salmon by clogging
their gills, may have diminished their productiveness, or driven them
elsewhere. The vast volume of water which here descends, is cut into
two distinct falls; but a third fall, a few hundred yards above, excels
them in height and grandeur.
While eating my breakfast, an old dame comes in with a large basket
and mysterious looks. Her mission is one of great importance--viz.,
to hire the bridal crown belonging to the mistress of the house,
for a wedding, which will take place at the neighbouring church this
afternoon. She gets the article, and pays one dollar for the use of it.
Hearing that the bridal _cortège_ will sweep by at five o’clock, P.M.,
on its way from the church, I determined to defer my journey northwards
till it had passed.
At that hour, the cry of “They come! they come!” saluted my ears.
Pencil or pen of Teniers or Fielding, would that you were mine, so that
I might do justice to what I saw. Down the steep hill leading to the
house there came, at a slow pace, first a carriole, with that important
functionary, the Kiögemester, standing on the board behind, and, like a
Hansom cabman, holding the reins over the head of the bridesmaid, a fat
old lady, with a voluminous pile of white upon her head, supposed to be
a cap. Next came a cart, containing two spruce young maidens, who wore
caps of dark check with broad strings of red satin riband, in shape
a cross between those worn by the buy-a-broom girls and the present
fashionable bonnet, which does _not_ cover the head of English ladies.
Their jackets were of dark blue cloth, and skirt of the same material
and colour, with a narrow scarlet edging, similar to that worn by
peasant women in parts of Wales. Over the jacket was a coloured shawl,
the ends crossed at the waist, and pinned tight. Add to this a large
pink apron, and in their hands a white kerchief, after the manner of
Scotch girls, on their way to kirk. After these came a carriole, with
four little boys and girls clustered upon it.
But the climax is now reached. The next vehicle, a cart, contains the
chief actors in the show, the bride and bridegroom, who are people
of slender means. He is evidently somewhat the worse, or better, for
liquor, and is dressed in the short blue seaman’s jacket and trousers,
which have become common in Norway wherever the old national costume
has disappeared. The bride--oh! all ye little loves, lave the point of
my pen in _couleur de rose_, that I may describe meetly this mature
votary of Venus. There she sat like an image of the goddess Cybele;
on her head a turret of pasteboard, covered with red cloth, with
flamboyant mouldings of spangles, beads, and gold lace; miserable
counterfeit of the fine old Norwegian bridal crown of silver gilt!
Nodding over the turret was a plume of manifold feathers--ostrich,
peacock, chicken, mixed with artificial flowers; from behind it
streamed a cataract of ribands of some fifteen different tints and
patterns. Her plain yellow physiognomy was unrelieved by a single lock
of hair.
“It is not the fashion,” explained a female bystander, “for the bride
to disclose any hair. It must on this occasion be all tucked in out of
sight.”
This ripe ogress of half a century was further dressed in a red skirt
with gold belt, a jacket of black brocade, over which was a cuirass
of scarlet cloth shining resplendently in front with the national
ornament, the Sölje, a circular silver-gilt brooch, three inches
in diameter, with some twenty gilded spoon-baits (fishermen will
understand me) hung on to its rim. Frippery of divers sorts hung about
her person. On each shoulder was an epaulet or bunch of white gauze
bows, while the other ends of her arms were adorned by ruffles and
white gloves.
As this wonderful procession halted in front of the door, the gallant
Kiögemester advanced and lifted the bride in his arms out of her
vehicle. As she mounted the door-steps, a decanter of brandy in hand,
all wreathed in smiles and streamers, flowers and feathers, I bowed
with great reverence, which evidently gratified her vanity.
“I’ll tell you what she reminds me of,” said my English companion,
who had left his profitless fishing to see the sight, “a Tyrolese cow
coming home garlanded from the châlet. No doubt this procession would
look rather ridiculous in Hyde Park, but here, in this wild outlandish
country, do you know, with the sombre pine-trees and the grey rocks,
and wild rushing river, it does not strike me as so contemptible. She
is tricked out in all the finery she can lay her hands on, and in that
she is only doing the same as her sex the world over, from the belle
savage of Central Africa to Queen Victoria herself.”
The Kiögemester (head cook)--not that he attends to the cooking
department, whatever he might have done in former days--is a
very ancient institution on this occasion. He is the soul of the
whole festival. Without him everything would be in disorder or at
a stand-still. Bowing to the procession, he is also bowed down by
the weight of his responsibility. In his single self he is supposed
to combine, at first-rate weddings, the offices of master of the
ceremonies, chief butler, speechifier, jester, precentor, and, above
all, of peace-maker. His activity as chief butler often calls forth a
corresponding degree of activity as an assuager of broils. The baton
which he frequently wields is shaped like the ancient fool’s bauble. If
he is a proficient in his art he will, like Mr. Robson, shine in the
comic as well as the serious department, alternating original jests
with solemn apophthegms. But the race is dying out. The majority are
mere second-hand performers. The real adepts in the science give an
_éclat_ to the whole proceedings, and are consequently much in request,
being sent for from long distances.
By-the-bye, I must not omit to mention that on the left arm of the
bride hung a red shawl, just like that on the arm of the Spanish
bull-fighter, whose province it is to give the _coup de grace_ to the
devoted bull. From the manner in which she displayed it, I fancy it
must have been an essential item in her toilette. Hearing no pipe and
tabor, or, more strictly speaking, no fiddle, the almost invariable
accompaniment of these pageants, I inquired the reason.
“They are gudfrygtig folk (God-fearing people); they will have nothing
to do with such vanities,” was the answer.
There seemed to me, however, to be some contradiction between this
“God-fearing” scrupulosity and the size of the bride’s person. It
struck me, as I saw the stalwart master of the ceremonies exerting all
his strength to lift her into the cart again, that it was high time she
was married.
At this moment up drives a gentleman dressed in black, with dark
rat-taily hair shading his sallow complexion, and a very large nose
bridged by a huge pair of silver spectacles, the centre arch of which
was wrapped with black riband, that it might not press too much on the
keystone. This is the parson who has tied the fatal noose, and is now
wending his way homewards to his secluded manse.
Bidding adieu to my companion, who purposed driving round the coast, I
now set off to the station, Mosby, to join the main route to Sætersdal,
one of the wildest, poorest, and most primitive valleys of Norway,
which I’m bent on exploring. On the road I once or twice narrowly
escape coming into collision with the carriole of a young peasant
who has been at the wedding. Mad with brandy, he keeps passing and
repassing me at full gallop. The sagacious horse--I won’t call him
brute, a term much more applicable to his master--makes up by his
circumspection for his driver’s want of it. He seems to be perfectly
aware of the state of things, and, while goaded into a break-neck pace,
dexterously avoids the dangers.
Oak--a rare sight to me in this country--aspen (asp), sycamore (lön),
hazel, juniper, bracken, fringe the sides of the road northward. Now
and then a group of white “wand-like” lilies (Tjorn-blom) rises from
some silent tarn (in Old Norsk, Tjorn), looking very small indeed
after those huge fellows I have left reposing in the arms of the Isis
at Oxford. Their moonlight-coloured chalice is well-known to be a
favourite haunt of the tiny water-elves, so I suppose the Scandinavian
ones are tinier than their sisters of Great Britain.
Nor must I omit to mention the quantities of Dutch myrtle, or sweet
gale (pors), with which the swampy grounds abound. It possesses strong
narcotic qualities, and is put in some districts into the beer,
while, elsewhere, a decoction of it is sprinkled about the houses to
intimidate the fleas, who have a great horror of it. Lyng (lüng),
some of it white, and that of a peculiar kind, which I have never
seen before, also clings to the sides of the high grounds, while
strawberries and raspberries of excellent taste are not wanting.