_RAILWAY JOURNEY TO THRONDHJEM._
SWEDISH RAILWAYS AND MEAL STATIONS—AMONG THE SNOW BANKS—THE DESCENT
TO THRONDHJEM—THE SHRINE OF ST. OLAF—NORTH CAPE STEAMERS.
From Upsala we started on a railway journey of four hundred and
ninety-four miles across Sweden to Throndhjem (Drontheim in English),
on the west coast of Norway, the distance being accomplished in thirty
hours, allowing liberal stops for meals _en route_.
Only second and third class carriages are run upon the road, a second
class ticket costing $11.25 for the entire journey.
The second class carriages are very comfortable, and are constructed
on the same plan as those in Austria, and like those now becoming
quite common throughout Germany. You enter from platforms at the
ends, a narrow passage extends the length of the car along one side,
upon which open the compartments by double sliding doors. When the
compartment doors are open a view is obtained from both sides, and when
weary from long-continued sitting one can walk up and down the passage.
There are toilet conveniences at one end, and the whole arrangement
is a great improvement over the old style, where the compartments are
entered from the sides and are entirely separated.
The railway, which was completed in 1882, passes through the eastern
part of the great mining district of Sweden, particularly rich in iron
and copper mines, and also possessing lead, nickel, zinc, and a few
gold and silver mines. The scenery is rather uninteresting, and the
small villages of plain wooden houses have little to attract one’s
notice. At one place we saw, across the road near the station, a wooden
building bearing a sign along its entire length, with this word in
large capital letters, all of a size: “J. JOHNSSONSDIVERSHANDEL” (J.
Johnson’s variety store), which is as long a word as some of its German
cousins.
On the Swedish time tables, a crossed knife and fork before the name of
a station signifies that it is a meal station. Our first experience was
at Storvik, where we arrived about four o’clock for dinner.
We entered a dining room, around which were arranged little tables
covered with snowy linen; in the centre stood a large table, one end
spread with the usual diversified collection of the _smörgasbord_, at
the other were piles of plates, knives, forks, and napkins. The soup
is brought in and placed on the central table; each one helps himself,
and, taking it to one of the small tables, eats at his leisure; the
soup finished you serve yourself with fish, roast meats, chicken, and
vegetables, in quantity and variety as you choose, and return to your
table. The servants replenish the supplies on the large table, remove
soiled plates and bring tea, coffee, beer, or wine, as ordered, to
the occupants of the small tables, but each one must serve himself
from the various courses, ending with pudding and nuts and raisins.
There was none of the hurry, bustle, and crowding usually encountered
in a railway restaurant, but plenty of time was given for a quiet,
comfortable meal, with no necessity for bolting your food.
For this abundant and well-cooked dinner the charge was forty
cents,—tea, coffee, beer, and wine being extra. Your word was taken
without questioning regarding the extras, as you paid for them and your
dinner at the table from which the coffee was dispensed. The matter of
payment was left entirely to the individual, and it never, apparently,
had entered the manager’s mind that one could easily have walked off,
without first conferring with the woman at the coffee urn.
After dinner there was time for a short walk up and down the platform,
and then we continued our journey through a country where the rail
fences, red farm houses, pine trees, and abundance of stumps and rocks,
made us imagine we were in Maine or New Hampshire, instead of on the
other side of the “great pond.” The scenery improved, and in places
was beautiful, especially as we skirted the shores of a chain of lakes
formed by the Ljusne river; and under a sky burning with the gorgeous
coloring of a brilliant Northern sunset, we arrived at half-past nine
at the little station where we were to take supper. Here was the same
arrangement as at dinner, each one waiting upon himself, and a good
supper of fish, hot and cold meats, eggs, tea and coffee was furnished
for thirty cents, which is likewise the charge for a substantial
breakfast.
There were few passengers on the train, and during most of the day we
two had had a compartment to ourselves. There are no sleeping cars on
the route, so as it was getting late we closed and fastened the doors
of our compartment, drew the curtains to shut out the bright light of
the Northern night, and lying on the long seats covered with our thick
railway rugs slept undisturbed, until suddenly awakened by a loud
rapping at our door. The train was in a station, female voices were
calling to us in Swedish, and we sprang up anxious to learn the cause
of this unlooked-for visitation. But when the door was opened, the dear
creatures beat a hasty retreat the moment they saw us, and evidently
were as surprised as ourselves at our meeting; as we soon heard their
voices in a neighboring compartment, we knew they had found those they
were seeking.
At five o’clock in the morning we arrived at Ostersund, where the train
stopped for an hour. We paid four cents and entered a toilet room with
marble wash-bowls, brushes, an abundance of fresh towels, and that
article which is never furnished free in Europe—soap. After taking
bread and coffee, and a brisk walk, we felt as fresh and rested as
though we had passed the night in the state-room of a vestibule Pullman.
We had previously congratulated each other on having a compartment to
ourselves; on resuming our journey, during the entire forenoon, we were
the sole occupants of a whole car.
We skirt the shores of a series of lakes connected by rivers, and then
through a dreary country ascend the range of mountains separating
Sweden from Norway. We pass through snow sheds, and between high
board fences built to keep the drifting snow from the track (both
much simpler in construction than those along the roads crossing the
Rocky Mountains), and in the midst of snow banks, enveloped in a thick
chilling mist, arrive at Storlien, two thousand feet above sea-level,
the last station in Sweden. We gather for the last time about the
_smörgasbord_ (we never saw it later in Norway), and a good dinner
cheers us in our desolate surroundings.
Then we enter the Norwegian train of second and third class carriages,
on the common European model of compartments entered from the sides,
with the second class, in their fittings, fully equal to the first of
many other countries, and begin the descent to the sea coast. The snow
mountains are veiled by clouds, there is little vegetation, barren
rocks are succeeded by marshy land and swamps, but soon we emerge from
the mist into bright sunshine.
We are the only occupants of the second class carriage; the guard, who
speaks English, opens the door as we arrive at a station and tells us
how long we are to stop, and following the general custom we get out
for a few minutes’ walk, and to look at the natives.
We were both intently reading when the door opened and the guard made
this startling announcement: “Gentlemen, this is Hell; we stop five
minutes.” We hastily left our seats to see the place against which we
had been warned all our lives, hoping at least to refresh ourselves
with a few glasses of sulphur water. No fumes of sulphur, no odor
of brimstone greeted us, but instead, “a nipping and an eager air”
enveloped the forlorn little settlement, even on that summer afternoon.
Whatever _Hell_ may signify in Norwegian, this place is decidedly
different as regards climate from that of the same name mentioned in
King James’ version.
Descending from Hell the railroad runs for a long distance close to
the edge of the lovely Throndhjem fjord, with its transparent waters,
clusters of islands, and on the opposite side its deeply indented and
darkly wooded shores, with a background of pale blue mountains. Then
we roll into the most northern railway station in the world, and are
in Throndhjem, a city of 23,000 inhabitants, the third largest city in
Norway, situated on a line with the south coast of Iceland.
The houses are mostly built of wood, on very wide streets as a
protection against the spread of conflagrations. At the head of a long
street stands the cathedral, the most interesting edifice in the North.
It is built over the burial site of St. Olaf, the Norwegian king who
first introduced Christianity into his country, at the end of the tenth
century. A succession of fires has destroyed the interior, which for
years has been in process of restoration, and at the present time the
nave, from the transepts to the west end, is given up to masons and
stone-cutters, who are busy upon its reconstruction.
The choir ends in an exquisitely sculptured octagon formerly containing
the relics of St. Olaf, on the south side of which is St. Olaf’s well.
Tradition assures us that it burst forth from the place where the saint
was buried. The early kings of Norway were crowned and buried here,
and, by the present constitution, every king of Sweden and Norway
is required to repair to Throndhjem for coronation in this historic
cathedral.
Surrounding this old edifice is the “cathedral garden,” so called, a
graveyard where each grave is buried beneath flowering shrubs, with
vases of fresh-cut flowers before the tombstones, and where the seats
beside the graves bespeak an unbroken connection between the living and
the dead.
Rising on a high hill just back of the town is an old fortress, now
disused, although a sentry still keeps guard upon one of its ramparts.
We climbed thither in the twilight, to enjoy the extended view over
the old city, with its background of rugged hills, and the river Nid
winding through it, with picturesque bridges, old wooden warehouses,
and shipping along its quays. Out in the blue fjord is the little
island called Munkholm, covered by a fortress commanding the harbor,
small islands rise from the water, and across the wide fjord wooded
hills extend upward from the shores, and the view is closed by distant
mountains.
In one of the streets we saw throngs of peasants, who had come into
the city to the weekly market, bringing butter and produce, besides an
endless variety of cheeses, rolls of homespun cloth, and linen from the
hand-loom. We strolled along the quays, interested in the shipping and
the sea-faring men, and visited the finer buildings in the city, built
of stone, occupied by shops with a fine display of goods; but we found
the place chiefly interesting from its natural beauty and situation.
Our first impression of the Norwegians was a favorable one, for as we
left the hotel and were vainly trying to find our way to a steamship
office with an unpronounceable name, we asked a man both in English and
German to direct us. Not understanding, but finding out where we wished
to go from our pointing to the name in our guide book, he immediately
turned and conducted us a long distance, and even when we were within
sight of the building would not leave us until we arrived at the very
doorway, when he politely touched his hat and disappeared before we had
a chance to thank him.
During June and July Throndhjem is full of tourists, who take the
steamer here for the North Cape and the regions of the midnight sun.
The steamers start from Christiania and Bergen, but most travellers,
instead of taking the long and disagreeable voyage along the coast, go
directly from Christiania to Throndhjem by rail, a distance of three
hundred and sixty miles. From the middle of June until the end of July
two tourist steamers leave Bergen and Throndhjem weekly, and make the
trip from Throndhjem to the North Cape and return in eight days. These
steamers are handsomely fitted up, take only first-class passengers,
and stop at but few places, yet in their course they include the
grandest features of the scenery. The price of round-trip tickets,
including everything, varies from 250 to 350 crowns ($67.50 to $94.50)
according to location of state-room and number occupying the same.
There are also two lines of mail steamers coming from Christiania,
which leave Throndhjem weekly for the North Cape, and a line of
steamers from Hamburg to the North Cape and Vadsö, leaving Throndhjem
once a week. The mail steamers run up the fjords along the coast, call
at all of the little out-of-the-way places, and occupy eleven days in
the round trip between Throndhjem and the North Cape.
The ticket, including passage and state-room, costs 111 crowns ($30),
and there is a daily charge, for meals and attendance, of five and a
half crowns, making $16.50 for the meals, and a total of $46.50 for the
cost of the round trip.
As our object was to see as much of the country and people as possible,
and as we preferred to save half the cost of the journey to three
days of time, we engaged passage in a mail steamer, and shall always
consider ourselves very fortunate to have made this decision; for since
making the journey we have often compared experiences with travellers
who have been by the tourist steamers, and have found that we saw
much more, visited more points of interest, and learned more about the
people and the country.
THE NORWEGIAN NORDLAND.