HIGHWAYS, RAILWAYS, AND WATERWAYS
Since the sixteenth century Norway has had an excellent public posting
system which enables the traveler to go to the most remote parts
of the country at moderate and fixed rates. Fast and slow posting
stations are established by the government along all the national
highways. At the former, horses must be kept in readiness; whereas, at
the latter, the horses may be in distant fields at work, and a couple
of hours may elapse before the traveler can proceed upon his journey.
The rates, which are determined by the government, are, from fast
stations, about seven cents a mile for a horse and two-wheeled
conveyance or sledge; but from slow stations they are scarcely more
than half that price. When the road is over very steep mountains,
an extra fare is charged, usually double; but this is a government
regulation and is always understood. The posting stations are, for
the most part, isolated and solitary farms. The farmers undertake to
provide rooms and meals, as well as drivers, horses, and conveyances.
Stations are usually from seven to fifteen miles apart, and farmers
are required to convey the traveler only as far as the next station.
Two kinds of wagons are used, the carriole and the stolkjaerre. The
carriole resembles an American sulky, except that it is springless,
and nearly the entire weight is forward of the axle. It is a
two-wheeled gig with the body shaped like the bowl of a spoon. The
seat, in front of the axletree, is fastened by cross-pieces to the
long, slender shafts that project behind and provide a place for light
luggage and a seat for the driver. The carriole is for one passenger.
It is falling into disuse, and its place is being taken by the
stolkjaerre, a two-wheeled cart that will carry two passengers. It
also has long shafts which extend under the axletree to make a support
for the luggage and a seat for the driver. The passenger's seat is
in front, perched on two wooden bars stretched obliquely upwards and
backwards from the front of the vehicle. The drivers, usually men
although sometimes girls, vary in age from six to sixty years.
The Norwegian horses are stout, stubby, and spirited little beasts.
They are cream-colored, high crested, and have black manes and tails;
the manes are cropped, except the forelocks, which are left to protect
the eyes from the sun, and the tails are very full. Horses are valued
in Norway by the size and fullness of their tails. These little
animals are so trustworthy and intelligent that tourists, as well
as peasants, soon get to look upon them as companions. In every
"skyds-station," as the posting stations are called, in a conspicuous
place is posted this inscription: _Vaer god mod hesten_. This means
"be good to the horse." At every station there is also a book, called
the _skydsbog_, in which travelers are requested to write their names
and any complaints they may have to make regarding their treatment. At
intervals these books are examined by government officials.
Swedish horses are much larger than those of Norway, tall, heavy, with
long legs and barrel-shaped bodies, very much like Canadian stock.
They drive well, make good speed, and will eat anything. At the livery
stables one can hire outfits by the day or hour--the legal price being
63 cents an hour or 56 cents to any point within the city limits,
and there is an excellent cab system, with what is known as the
"taxameter" register. Every cab is equipped with an arrangement
similar to a gas meter, which shows on a dial the money due, whether
you are using it by the hour or by the distance. The hackman sets his
clock at zero at the time of starting, according to the number of
passengers or whether he is hired by time or distance, and it ticks
away while you ride or while he waits. The fare for one or two persons
is sixty-two cents per hour; for three persons, eighty-seven cents an
hour; for four persons, $1.24 and a tip to the driver anywhere from
one cent to fifteen cents, according to the time he has been with you.
The public posting system outside of the cities is similar to that of
Norway.
The national government builds the main highways, while the cross
roads are built by the parishes. The management is in the hands of a
bureau in the national department of public works, and the maintenance
falls upon the people who live in the neighborhood, under the
supervision of a local inspector. Every farmer has a piece of road
to take care of, according to the amount of land he owns, and at
intervals slabs of cast iron are erected bearing his name and
the section of the road he is to keep in order. Thus every man's
reputation is at stake in the neighborhood, and if there is a muddy
place or a rut, everybody knows who is to blame for it, and it can not
be laid to the county commissioner, as is the case in America. On the
outside of each road is a line of large blocks of stone set upright,
which serves as a barrier to prevent wagons from going off into the
ditch. There are 6,500 miles of main highway, and 11,000 miles of
cross-road, or a total of 17,500 miles of roads in Norway, and the
total expenditure upon them by national and local authorities will
average a million and a half dollars every year.
The first cost of a road is usually about $3,000 a mile. They first
dig an excavation about three feet deep, as if they were going to make
a canal. On the bottom are thrown heavy blocks of stone through which
the water can filter, and occasionally there is a little drain to
carry it off. Upon this is a layer of smaller stones, and then still
smaller, until the surfacing is reached, which is macadam of pounded
slate, mixed with gravel and stone.
During the winter the farmers have to keep their several sections free
from snow, but to do this it is necessary for them to co-operate, for
it would be impossible for one family to handle the heavy plows
that are necessary. Six, eight, and ten horses are often hitched to
them--all the horses in the neighborhood--and it is often the work of
weeks instead of days to get the roads opened up for travel, but when
it is once done, it is as clear and smooth for sleighs as a city
boulevard.
Norway has only one mile of railway for every one hundred square miles
of land; but the mountainous character of the country, the heavy
snowfall during the long winters, and the thin, scattered population
make railway construction almost prohibitive. Nevertheless, the new
kingdom has made a commendable beginning, and the state has plans for
enormous extensions during the next twenty-five years. There are
now nine railway lines in the country, with a total mileage of one
thousand five hundred and eighty-four, but half of which is
broad gauge. The state railways have been constructed partly by
subscriptions taken in the districts interested in the construction of
new lines, and partly at the expense of the national government.
The leading railway lines radiate from Christiania to Stockholm,
Goteborg, Trondhjem, Gudbransdal, Telemarken, and the Valders. The
longest line--three hundred and fifty miles--is from Christiania to
Trondhjem through Hamar. There is also a relatively long line--one
hundred and ninety miles--from Christiania up the Gudbrandsdal by Lake
Mjosen and through Lillehammer to Otta. In 1906, the Valders railway,
connecting Christiania with Fagernaes--a distance of one hundred and
thirty-one miles--was opened. This connects with the most important of
the new roads being built, the one from Christiania to Bergen. This
road will reach entirely across the country, from Christiania on
the Swedish frontier to Bergen on the Atlantic coast, thus making
connection between the two largest cities of Norway, journeys between
which are now only possible by steamships and carriages, consuming
from three to six days.
The new road goes through the mountains and presents many engineering
difficulties. Two-thirds of the way the roadbed must be cut out of the
mountain side, and there is a tunnel three miles long at a height of
two thousand eight hundred and twenty feet above the sea level. The
snow in the winter is so heavy that it will be necessary to cover
the tracks with sheds for a distance of nearly sixty miles. The
construction is not only difficult, but expensive, and although the
distance is but three hundred and ten miles, it will be one of the
most costly railroads ever built. Sixty-seven miles of the line
between Bergen and Vose, on the western coast, is already in
operation, and it is a favorite journey of tourists, for the scenery
is superb, although the traveler is in a tunnel one-tenth of the
entire distance. There are forty-eight tunnels in all. A shelf has
been hewn and blasted along the side of the mountains that encloses
the celebrated Sorfjord.
The Norwegians call a railway a _jernbane_, literally "an iron path."
Their cars are made on the conventional European pattern, and are
light and comfortable. They are furnished with toilet rooms, and
run smoothly and noiselessly. Most of the trains are equipped with
Westinghouse brakes, steam heat, and electric lights. The trains run
very slowly. Economy is studied in this respect, as in every
other. There is a certain speed--say, fifteen or eighteen miles an
hour--which can be maintained at a minimum consumption of fuel, and
the Scandinavian railway managers have figured it down to a dot. They
can haul a longer train a greater distance with a ton of coal than any
other engineers, and the most scrupulous attention is applied to every
feature of management, the tracks, the rolling stock, the station, the
crossings. The crossing-keepers are usually women. A large number of
that sex are employed by the railways.
The stops at the stations seem unnecessarily long to impatient
Americans, but the time is utilized by the leisurely passengers in
drinking big goblets of beer, and by the conductor in parading up
and down the platform so that the patrons of the road can have
an opportunity to admire his radiant uniform and fine shape. In
Scandinavian countries the best-looking men seem to have been selected
for railway conductors and policemen, and their deportment is
decidedly different from what we are used to in America. If you ask a
question of a Norwegian policeman, he will bring his heels together,
give a military salute, and stand in the attitude of attention like
a soldier while he answers. He usually understands English, too, and
those who can not are remarkably accurate guessers, and all take a
friendly interest in your inquiries instead of giving you a short
answer and a cold shoulder like the policemen in our cities. They will
walk to the corner to point out the house in the middle of the next
block if that is where you want to go, and when you thank them for
their attention, you get another salute that makes you feel as big as
a major general, or as if you had been mistaken for a member of the
royal family. Railway conductors are equally polite, and seem
to understand that it is a part of their business to protect
tender-footed travelers, as angels always look after good little boys.
In southern Sweden there is scarcely a parish without a railway, and
in the northern part of the kingdom, where the railway facilities are
limited, posting stations are maintained by the government similar to
those in Norway. There is a railway running as far north as the 67th
parallel of latitude, about fifty miles beyond the polar circle
into Lapland, to the famous mines of Malmberget, with a branch to
Trondhjem, Norway. The line follows the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia
very closely, through a country well covered with small pine timber,
which was being rapidly stripped until the government interfered by
passing rigid regulations and appointing foresters to enforce them.
You can see the midnight sun from several places on this railway,
anywhere above 66 degrees and 33 minutes of latitude, from the 9th
of June to the 3d of July, and farther north for a longer period. At
Gellivare the midnight sun can be seen regularly from June 5 to July
11, and it is a much more convenient and quicker journey than to the
North Cape and other polar resorts in Norway. During that period a
traveler is reasonably certain of seeing the sun at all hours of the
day as long as he cares to stay, while over in Norway that privilege
is rare and uncertain, owing to the fogs and clouds that obscure the
horizon sometimes for days at a time. But there is nothing else to
call the tourist to this part of Sweden, for the scenery is monotonous
and uninteresting and the facilities for travel are primitive and the
tourists are few.
Everybody who has taken the trouble to make the journey, of course,
advises other people to do the same, and insists that it is worth the
time, money, and fatigue it costs, on the same principle as the fox
that lost his tail in a trap wanted all the other foxes to cut off
their tails. There is one train each way daily, but it runs very
slowly,--about fifteen or eighteen miles an hour,--and stops a long
time at the stations. The cars are comfortable. The road belongs to
the government, and was built in the '90's for the transportation of
ore from the iron mines, which was previously hauled by cart in summer
and reindeer sledges in winter, to the ports of Lulea and Allapen, a
distance of about one hundred and forty miles.
When it is recalled that two-thirds of the inhabitants of Norway live
upon the coasts and fjords, the large part which water traffic plays
in the economy of the country will be easily understood. The coast
being well protected by a chain of islands, the skjaergaard, both
travel and commerce are carried on by means of small open boats. The
fjord rowboats, as a rule, are light and pointed, with upright and
high prow, and they carry a square sail. They are light to row, and
they go capitally before the wind. There is an extensive government
posting system on the coasts, fjords, and inland lakes, similar to
that along the public highways already described. The tariff from
fast stations for a four-oared boat and sail with two rowers is about
twelve cents a mile; eighteen cents for three rowers and a six-oared
boat, and twenty-four cents a mile for a boat with eight oars and four
rowers. The tariff is decided by the size of the boat and not by the
number of passengers. The rowers are not infrequently girls and women.
The large fjords and lakes have ample steamboat facilities, the coast
service between Bergen and Trondhjem being especially good. The
navigable channels of the fjords represent a coast line of twelve
thousand miles, and they are so entirely separated from the sea by
islands and reefs and obstructed at their entrances by old moraines,
that the fresh water from the melting snows and rivers lies four or
five feet deep on the surface. Small steamers ply on all the larger
fjords on which the rates are moderate and the accommodations fair. On
most of these boats a passenger pays full fare for himself and half
fare for the other members of his family, including his wife. Persons
who want to see the fjords of Norway thoroughly should take the
regular mail steamers, which call at all small ports and take a month
instead of a week for the voyage. The boats are small, but clean and
comfortable, and only occasionally have bad weather--very seldom in
summer. They wind in and out of the narrow passages, and because of
their size can navigate where the larger tourist steamers are not able
to go, and therefore the passengers on the latter miss some of the
finest scenery.
Voyages to the North Cape by the tourist steamers are limited to a few
weeks during the midsummer, when the sun is supposed to be visible at
midnight in the arctic regions, but steamers run regularly all the
year way around the Cape to Archangel, Vadsö, and Horningsvaag, the
arctic ports of Russia. The fjords never freeze, so that navigation is
always open, and there is more or less travel in midwinter between the
civilized portions of the arctic regions.
If you will take your map and examine the north coast of Europe within
the arctic circle, you will find several towns east of the North Cape
on the White Sea which are wide open 365 days in the year, and do more
business in the winter than during the summer months. They do not see
the sun from December to February. At some places it is invisible for
a longer period, but at Hammerfest the streets, houses, and business
places are lighted with electric lights, and similar plants are being
introduced into other cities of the polar section. It is stated, also,
that the aurora borealis is so brilliant night after night as to make
it easy to read ordinary newspaper print without artificial light, and
by long experience people are prepared for the peculiar conditions
that exist there. The passengers on the steamers in these waters in
winter are mostly commercial travelers and men interested in the
fisheries, which are more active from October to March than at any
other time of the year.
There are also two canals in Norway that are used for passenger
traffic--the Fredrikshald canal, connecting the Femsjöen and Skullerud
lakes, and the Skien-Nordsjö-Bandak canal, connecting the Nordsjö lake
with the Hitterdal and Bandak lakes. Between the Hitterdal and the
Nordsjö lake there is a rise of fifty feet, which is overcome by two
locks at Skien and four at Loveid; and between the Nordsjö and the
Bandak lakes there is a rise of one hundred and eighty-seven feet,
which is overcome by fourteen locks, five of which are around a
waterfall, the Vrangfos, where the average rise for each lock is about
thirteen feet. The postal, telegraph, and telephone systems, all under
government control, are both cheaper and more efficient than in the
United States, where the two latter are private monopolies. With the
exception of Switzerland, Norway is more abundantly supplied with
postoffices, in proportion to her size, than any other country in the
international postal union. The length of her telegraph lines, in
relation to the population of the country is greater than in any other
country. There is no place in the world where telephones are so cheap
or so numerous as in Stockholm. There are more telephones in Stockholm
than in Berlin or London, and it is contended that there are more than
in Paris, but that is doubtful. The total number of instruments in use
is nearly 50,000 to a population of 300,000. You can find a telephone
in every shop and in almost every house, and in the parks and on the
street corners on lamp posts are little booths similar to those
used for police boxes in the cities of the United States. They work
automatically. You drop a little coin worth three cents into the slot,
and then ring the bell. For several years every room in the principal
hotels has had its own telephone, on the same system that has recently
been introduced into the United States, and upon some of the steamers
sailing from Stockholm there is a telephone in every stateroom. The
long distance 'phones and all the lines outside of two or three of
the principal cities belong to the government and are operated by the
Postoffice Department. The rents vary from $10 to $28 a year.
The telegraph system is owned by the government, which charges a
uniform rate of fifteen cents for ten words to any part of the
country.