THE WEDDING.
When he came into the house at nightfall,
She was angry with him—his old mother—
“Son,” she said, “thou lay’st thy snares each morning,
And each day thou comest back empty handed!
Either thou lack’st skill, or thou art idle;
Others can take prey where thou’st taken none!”
Thus to her the gay young man made answer:
“Who need wonder that our luck is different,
When the same birds are not for our snaring?
At the little farm that lieth yonder,
Lives a wondrous bird, my good old mother;
Snares I laid to catch it all the autumn,
Now, this very winter have I caught it.
Marvellous is this bird! for it possesses
Not wings, but arms for tenderest embracing;
Not down, but locks of silky, sunny lustre;
No beak, but two fresh lips so warm and rosy!”
_The Young Fowler.—Runnèberg._
It was the morning of the wedding-day, and that day, of course, Sunday.
Autumn was a little advanced, but the sky was as serene, and the lake as
still and as smiling as it was on that day on which the fishermen had
last looked upon it.
The Parson had strolled out with Birger, after a very hurried and
uncomfortable breakfast,—the only time such a thing had ever occurred
under the hospitable roof of Torgensen; this was not so much for exercise
as for the sake of being out of the way of the good lady Christina, who
looked as if she considered the whole of her daughter’s earthly happiness
to depend on the perfection of the wedding-dinner, which, even at that
early hour of the morning, was in the course of preparation. Upstairs
and downstairs was she, with a face as red as her scarlet stomacher,
her great bunch of keys jingling like a sheep-bell as she moved, and her
embroidered skirt whisking round every corner. She was partially dressed
for the grand occasion, though her head was as yet muffled in a rather
dirty handkerchief, but the glories of her holiday gown were in a great
measure obscured by an immense apron, which bore indisputable marks of
something more than mere superintendence of her peculiar department. The
whole district would be there, no doubt, for though there are generally
appointed days for weddings, and several couples were usually married
at the same time, and moreover, the beginning of winter is a very
favourite time for such matters, yet the Torgensens were so indisputably
the squires of the place, that besides their own party which had been
collected from far and wide, and that of one or two of their dependants
who were to be married on the same day, the chances were that they would
have visitors enough from other and inferior bridals.
Come as many as there might, there were provisions enough for them all;
there was brandy enough to float a barge; there were heaps of fish and
game of all sorts; and—a much rarer thing at the beginning of autumn
and before the cattle have returned from the sœters,—plenty of beef and
mutton. Puddings, sweet soups, and all the infinite variety of gröds had
been in preparation for days and nights; still the good house-mother
distressed herself; and rendered uncomfortable everything around her,
lest something should have been forgotten, and the credit of Torgensen’s
hospitality should suffer in the eyes of the strangers.
The Captain, who had offered to officiate as bridesman, was taking
lessons in his arduous duties from little Lilla, the præst’s daughter,
who, proud of her English, and not at all unwilling to get up a
flirtation with a good-looking foreigner, had neglected her own duties
as bridesmaid, and enticed the Captain, nothing loth, to the præstgaard,
where he was practising the required duties of his office; and, to judge
from the time he took at his lessons, he must have been particularly slow
and stupid in comprehending them.
What was the morning occupation of Lota and her other bridesmaids was
a mystery,—not one of them was visible; that it was something of an
entertaining character was evident from the tittering, and gay laughter,
and occasional little screams that proceeded from a large square-headed
window wide open on the upper-floor, and on the farthest extremity of the
building. The only anxious and unhappy-looking countenance was that of
the happy bridegroom himself, who having nothing whatever to do, wandered
up and down the terrace with his hands in his pockets, the only idle
man, and consequently in the way of every one. Conscious that he was the
object of every body’s attention, and the butt of those jokes which are
common on such occasions, and no where more common or less delicate than
in Norway, he laboured hard to be at his ease and succeeded but very ill.
Indeed, his new jacket, which did not come down to his shoulder blades,
and was a little too tight for him into the bargain, and his stiff
glossy trousers would alone have been sufficient to disturb any man’s
self-possession, to say nothing of the chain of filagree silver balls,
each as large as a grape-shot, which were called shirt buttons, and hung
down from his neck; while a stout broad hat twice as broad in the crown
as in the rim, and stiffly turned up on each side, weighed on his brows
like a helmet,—so very new that it still exhibited the creases of the
paper in which it had been packed.
Jan Torgensen, Lota’s brother, who was his other bridesman, was doing his
best to keep him in countenance, for they had always been great allies,
and in fact, Torkel had been Jan’s preceptor in wood-craft, and, so Lota
declared, in every sort of mischief besides. At this present moment
any one who had seen them both, would have taken Jan for the preceptor
and Torkel for the pupil; and Jan for the happy bridegroom, and Torkel
for the disappointed swain,—so happy looked Jan and so sheepish looked
Torkel. But, in truth, Jan had his own particular pride and happiness,
connected, though in a remote manner, with that of his friend. He had
just received his appointment as skipper of the _Haabet_, vice Svensen,
superseded in Lota’s affections by Torkel, and in the command of the brig
by Jan; for the poor fellow, when he found how things were going with
him, resigned the command, settled accounts with old Torgensen, and, much
to the regret of the latter,—for Svensen was a first-rate sailor,—betook
himself to Copenhagen, out of the sight of his rival’s happiness.
Jan, who was a thorough partizan, and had never liked poor Svensen, not
so much on account of any of his demerits as out of affection for his
friend Torkel (for Lota it is to be feared, had coquetted between her
admirers much more than was altogether proper), was singing, or rather
roaring, at the full pitch of a sailor’s voice, the popular ballad of Sir
John and Sir Lavé:—
“To an island green Sir Lavé went;
He wooed a maiden with fair intent;—
‘I will ride with you,’ quoth John;
‘Put on helmets of gold, to follow Sir John.’
He wooed the maiden and took her home,
And knights and serving-men are come;—
‘Here am I!’ quoth John.
They set the bride on the bridal seat,—
Sir John, he bade them both drink and eat.
‘Drink, and drink deeply!’ quoth John.
They brought the bride to the bridal bed,—
They forgot to untie her laces red:
‘I can untie them!’ quoth John.
Sir John, he locked the door with speed;
‘Good night to you, Sir Lavé,’ he said.
‘I shall sleep here!’ quoth John.
Word was brought to Sir Lavé there—
‘Sir John is within, with thy bride so fair!’
‘That am I, in truth!’ quoth John.
At the door, Sir Lavé makes a loud din;—
‘Withdraw the bolts, and let us in!’
‘You had best keep out,’ quoth John.
He knocked at the door with shield and spear,—
‘Withdraw the bolts, and come out here!’
‘See if I do!’ quoth John.
‘If my bride may not in peace remain,
I will go and unto the king complain.’
‘Just as you like,’ quoth John.
Early next morn, when the birds ’gan to sing,
Sir Lavé is off to complain to the king;—
‘I will go, too!’ quoth John.
‘I was betrothed but yesterday,—
Sir John has taken my bride away!’
‘Yes, so I have!’ quoth John.
‘If that the maiden to both is dear,
It must be settled at point of spear.’
‘I’m very willing!’ quoth John.
As soon as the morrow’s sun was bright,
Came all the knights to see the fight;—
‘Here am I!’ quoth John.
The two were mounted, and at the first round
The knees of Sir John’s horse touched the ground.
‘Now help me, Heaven!’ quoth John.
Once more, and in the second round
Sir Lavé lies upon the ground;—
‘There let him lie,’ quoth John.
Sir John he rode to his hall in state,
And his maiden met him at the gate;—
‘Now thou art mine,’ quoth John.
Thus was Sir John made happy for life,
And the maiden became his wedded wife.
‘I knew I should have her,’ quoth John.
‘Put on helmets of gold, to follow Sir John.’”
“Come, come! Jan!” growled old Torgensen, “hold your saucy tongue;
Svensen was a better man than you will ever be in a year of Sundays.
And you, you grinning flirts,”—to the servant-girls, with whom Master
Jan was an especial favourite, and upon whom the application was by no
means lost—“get along with you, and mind your own business,—as if you
had nothing to do, on such a morning as this, but to listen to such
fooleries! Be off with you, I say!”
In the meanwhile the Parson and Birger,—who, by the way, hardly
recognised each other in their gala habits, for the one was habited,
in honour of the occasion, in the black dress of an English clergyman,
while the other, with his sword clinking by his side, blazed in all
the blue and yellow splendour of the Swedish guard,—took up their old
position at the lich gate of the church; one as before balancing on
the stocks, the other astride on the dwarf wall, glad to be out of the
din of preparation. It was not a happy day for any of them, for it was
the last day of the expedition, which every member of it had enjoyed so
thoroughly;—Birger’s leave of absence was running to an end, and the two
Englishmen had taken passage with young Torgensen to the _Haabet_. They
were to sail—so Torgensen said—that night; but, as it was quite certain
that, before that time, the whole crew would be drunk, in honour of their
young mistress, this probably meant to-morrow. Still, to-morrow was to
be the final break-up of the party; and Tom had been philosophizing,
with tears in his eyes, on the transitory nature of human pleasures; and
Torkel, bridegroom as he was, would willingly have postponed his wedding
if he could have prolonged the expedition,—at least, so Lota had told him
the evening before, and he did not look as if he was speaking the truth
when he denied it.
Neither of the friends felt much inclined for conversation. They were
natives of different parts of the world; their courses from that point
lay in opposite directions; the chances were very much against their
meeting again, and, though their acquaintance had not been of very long
duration, so far as time is concerned, one week’s campaign in the wild
forest does more towards ripening an intimacy than a year of ordinary
life.
In the meanwhile the time passed on, and the early peal rang out, and
the groups began to collect as before in the church-yard, and the lake
to be dotted with boats, all pulling or sailing from its remoter bays
and islets to the church, as a common centre. Here and there a party, as
before, was occupied round a grave, pulling up the overgrown convolvulus
and trimming the withering leaves of the lilies. By and by a bugle
sounded a call, and a couple of fiddles from one of the nearest boats
struck up a polka.
“Here come some of the wedding parties,” said Birger; “there seem to be
plenty of happy couples in Soberud this year. Well! there is nothing like
fashion,—in this, as in other things, one fool makes many. Look at that
leading boat!—that one, I mean, just pulling round the point of the
island!—there is a crowned bride in her! Holy Gefjon, Mother of Maids!
such a sight as that is rare in Norway! I should think the chances were
that she got some one to pull her crown off her head before the day was
over. She does not seem much afraid, either, and an uncommonly pretty
girl, too, which makes it all the more wonderful. Well! well! ‘a virtuous
woman is a crown to her husband;’ I hope he will appreciate his blessings
as he ought, such blessings as that do not fall to the lot of many in
this country.”
“What do you mean by that, Birger?” said the Parson, getting up, and
shading his eyes with his hands as he looked out on the lake.
“Ah, you may well shade your eyes before beauty and innocence,” said
Birger; “you do not often see them combined, in this country.”
“Well, the fact is this,” said he, dropping his bantering tone, “what you
commonly call virtue—that is to say, chastity,—is a very rare article
indeed, I am sorry to say, either in Norway or Sweden; the manners of
the people do not tend to foster it. Their promiscuous way of living in
the winter, and the sœter life in summer, makes it absolutely necessary
for a girl either to have a very great respect for herself, or to be
forbiddingly ugly; and whatever the case may have been in earlier and
better times, certain it is that beauty is now much more common among us
than self-respect. Then, again, the laws which prevail in Sweden, and
the customs, which the Udal tenures in Norway make as stringent as laws,
forbid any to marry who are not householders (whence your word husband,
which simply means huus bonde—a peasant with a house), and at the same
time forbid the erection of more than a specified number of houses on
any land. All this renders early marriages almost impossible. The result
may easily be imagined. And to make this the more certain, our wise
laws enact that a woman, having any number of children by any number
of fathers, who at any time of her life shall marry any one whatever,
by the simple act of marriage affiliates all the children she may ever
have had on her unhappy husband; and wherever the Udal law prevails,
he is obliged to share his land equally among them. The consequence of
this is, that unchastity is no sort of disgrace. It is the commonest
thing in the world for a noble to live with a woman all his life, under
promise of marriage to be performed on his death-bed, and the woman is
all the while received much like the Morganatic bride of a German prince.
Frederika Bremer, herself as exemplary a woman as ever lived, has made
the plot of one of her novels to hinge on a man living in such a manner,
and dying suddenly, without being able to perform his promise. She does
not attach the shadow of disgrace to any one, except the relatives of the
deceased, who refused to acknowledge the woman merely on account of this
‘unfortunate accident,’ as she calls it. And so it is. Had she written
otherwise, she would have been out of costume; there is no disgrace in
the matter. I do not mean to say that this girl is not proud of her
crown—of course she is, just as I am proud of this blue and yellow ribbon
of mine,” pointing to the Order of the Sword with which he had decorated
his uniform-coat for the occasion; “but look how she is kissing that girl
in green, who has just landed from that other boat,—that is another bride
who cannot claim the distinction; she no more thinks her disgraced, than
I should think a brother officer disgraced to whom his gracious Majesty
had not been pleased to give the same distinction that he has to me.”
“There seem to be plenty of brides,” said the Parson, “for there is
another green lady, of damaged fame; she seems to be a rich one, by the
number of her fiddlers before, and followers after.”
“They generally have one wedding-day for the district,” said Birger,
“and a good plan too; it diminishes the expense when they all have their
festivities together, and diminishes the drunkenness very considerably,
both on the day and on its anniversaries, for the whole district get
drunk together at once, and get it over, instead of inviting one another
to help them to on their several wedding-days.”
“But what are the ‘crowns?’” said the Parson.
“An ancient custom, by which they challenge any imputation on their
fair fame; any one who has anything to say against the chastity of the
wearer, is privileged to pull off the crown and to drive the lady out of
the church, only the accuser is bound to prove his allegations.”
“It seems a pretty expensive affair, at least, to judge of it at this
distance.”
“O yes, far too expensive to be the property of any individual; they hire
it for the occasion, and, I will be bound, pay five or six dollars for
the pleasure of wearing that and the rest of the costume. Just look at
her as she comes into the light; that dress of black bombazine, with the
short sleeves and white mittens, is probably her own,—very likely it was
her mother’s before her, only fresh dyed for the occasion; but that gay
apron, with the ribbons, and beads, and the silver chains and necklaces,
I should think were hired; the dollars round her neck are her dowry in
all probability, and, consequently, her own; so is the muff, and the
handkerchiefs of various colours that hang from it; and possibly, also,
those yellow kid gloves. But look at the crown itself! why it is silver
gilt!—and that scarf, which hangs down from the spray on the top of it,
is covered with satin lappets, three-quarters long! now do you think a
peasant would buy that? A green bridal, you see, is a much more modest
affair; they wear their silver chains over their green bodices like the
others, but on their heads, instead of the crown, they have the ordinary
wimple of married women, made of fine white linen, and above it the
triangular snood of unmarried girls.”
“Here come our party at last! What a host they have collected! the church
will not hold them all. And there is pretty Lota, with her bridesmaids
after her. Well, I hope no one will pull her crown off; how pretty she
looks in it.”
“Not half so pretty as that little fresh-looking, innocent, Lilla
Nordlingen,” said Birger. “Upon my word I am half inclined to make love
to her myself.”
“You had better not, Mr. Guardsman, you do not stand the ghost of a
chance; how she would turn up that innocent little Norwegian nose of hers
at a brute of a Swede. Besides, do you not see how she is making love to
the Captain, how uncommonly smart the Captain has turned out in his red
uniform! to which the moustache he has been growing ever since he has
been here, forms so appropriate an appendage. Your blue and yellow would
look dingy to eyes that have been dazzled with such scarlet magnificence.”
“Ah, well, we will see. The Captain looks as if he were saying to her,
‘_Aimez moi vite, car je pars demain._’”
“That’s your best chance,” said the Parson, maliciously; “but come,
the bells are ringing in, and we had better get into the ranks of the
procession. Here comes Nordlingen, with his long-legged Candidatus at his
heels.”
While the Pfarrherr went in to array himself in his robes, the different
marriage parties, warned by the bells, had begun to arrange themselves
into one grand procession; while their respective musicians, who together
formed a pretty numerous band, laid their heads together about the tune
to be played on this grand occasion, and tuned their fiddles into concord.
The party had by this time increased considerably, and when at last the
band, having settled their harmonious differences, marched up the nave of
the church playing, somewhat incongruously, a jolly polka, there marched
after them no less than six happy couples, with their followers, each
bride and each bridegroom having a silver ort (ninepence) tied up under
their respective garters, for luck. Only two of the six were crowned
brides, and that, Birger whispered, as they took their places, was a
wonderfully large proportion.
First after the fiddlers came the Candidatus in his gown, who had gone
out to marshal the procession; then came the married men related to the
parties, in their short blue jackets and white-fronted shirts, some
of which were clean; then came the bridegrooms with their bridesmen,
dressed something in the same fashion, except that they affected buckskin
breeches and white stockings: each bridegroom, by way of distinction, had
a fine white handkerchief (cambric, if he could possibly come by it),
tied round his right arm; then came the bridesmaids in green, (which
there is not an unlucky colour as it is with us), with bare heads, and
their hair, which was plaited with many coloured ribands, hanging down
their backs in two tails; then the bride-leaders, married women, who
are supposed to encourage the brides during the ceremony, and lastly,
the brides themselves, in all their splendour. The chancel was as full
as it could hold, the principals disposing themselves round the altar,
kneeling, while the bridesmaids held canopies of shawls and handkerchiefs
over their heads, and the congregation craned in through the chancel
rails, while the priest proceeded with the service.
Scarcely was the benediction pronounced, when the fiddlers again struck
up their polka, and the happy couples, now arm-in-arm, marched down after
them, (the wedding-party forming a sort of escort), and proceeded with
great ceremony to the præstgaard meadow, where the marriage feast—an
enormous pic-nic—was prepared for them, and where the wedding presents,
many of them of considerable value, were set out for public inspection.
These were not exactly the expensive sort of trumpery which forms the
staple of bridal presents in England,—silver vessels that no one ever
drinks out of, and dressing cases far too expensive for ordinary use. The
presents here were real honest implements of house-keeping or farming;
pots and pans, and plates and dishes, and chairs and tables,—spades,
pickaxes: a tonne of rye-meal was the offering of one,—a sack of potatoes
of another; here was a pile of oderiferous salt-fish,—there a flitch
of bacon, at which one of the Captain’s best jokes missed fire—bacon
having no allegorical value whatever in Norway; here again was a good
milch cow, tethered to a tree, or half-a-dozen sheep or pigs folded with
hurdles, while the bride’s feather-beds would have borne a high value in
England. Lota’s were something quite magnificent. With such hunters in
her train, as Torkel and poor Svensen, and her own brother Jan, (who in
his younger days and before he had found out some one to whom to transfer
his youthful allegiance, had contributed largely to his sister’s stores),
it was not to be wondered at if she easily eclipsed all the brides of the
season.
At a comparatively early hour, Torkel and his wife took their leave,
as they had that evening to reach Lönvik, a pretty little farm in the
interior, on the banks of a small lake of the same name, which Torkel’s
father had given up to him on his marriage. But this by no means put a
stop to the festivities, which were carried on to a late hour in the
night, and at which, Sunday though it was, Nordlingen himself presided.
Sunday in Norway begins at six o’clock on Saturday night, when invariably
preparations are commenced for the next day, in the way of looking up
Sunday clothes, and brushing up or washing out the house,—sometimes,
in religious families, by special prayer, though that is not very
common,—sometimes even by washing their own persons, though this, it must
be confessed, is rarer still,—for all of them have a very great horror of
the personal application of soap and water. Sunday, therefore, even as
a day of worship, legitimately ceases at the same hour on the following
day, and, as Nordlingen himself remarked,—what was a more fitting time
for enjoyment than just after they had been admitted to their Lord’s
presence, and had had their sins forgiven them. It was surely much more
congruous than the English way of “making a Saturday night of it,” with
all their sins yet upon their shoulders.
If, however, there was dancing, there was no visible drunkenness; the
Pfarrherr was a man of sufficient influence to make a stand against the
national vice, and if any of the guests did feel a little the worse for
liquor, he quietly took himself, or was taken by his friends, beyond the
glare of the great bonfire, where no one could see him,—for Nordlingen
was wise enough not to look too closely into what was not intended for
his inspection.
It was this idea, or perhaps the recollection that the _Haabet_ was to
sail the next day, that induced him to close his eyes to the fact that
that innocent little Lilla had danced with no one but the Captain the
whole evening, on the plea that no girl of the party, except herself,
was able to talk to him in English. Whatever it was that they had to
say to one another, there was a good deal of it, and it took a good
while saying, and as Birger, who was outrageously jealous remarked
spitefully,—“they, as well as the drunkards, preferred evidently the
light of the moon to that of the great wedding bonfire,” and thinking,
probably, how he would make up for lost time after the _Haabet_ had
tripped her anchor, whistled pensively the Swedish song—
“Hence on the shallows our little boat leaving,
On to the Haaf where the green waves are heaving,
Causing to Thyrsis so much dismay.”