Now I'm going to tell a pretty story.
A good many years ago there was to be a very big wedding at Svartsjö
parish in Vermland.
First, there was to be a church ceremony and after that three days of
feasting and merrymaking, and every day while the festivities lasted
there was to be dancing from early morning till far into the night.
Since there was to be so much dancing, it was of very great importance
to get a good fiddler, and Juryman Nils Olafsson, who was managing the
wedding, worried almost more over this than over anything else.
The fiddler they had at Svartsjö he did not care to engage. His name was
Jan Öster. The Juryman knew, to be sure, that he had quite a big name;
but he was so poor that sometimes he would appear at a wedding in a
frayed jacket and without shoes to his feet. The Juryman didn't wish to
see such a ragtag at the head of the bridal procession, so he decided to
send a messenger to a musician in Jösse parish, who was commonly called
Fiddler Mårten, and ask him if he wouldn't come and play at the wedding.
Fiddler Mårten didn't consider the proposition for a second, but
promptly replied that he did not want to play at Svartsjö, because in
that parish lived a musician who was more skilled than all others in
Vermland. While they had him, there was no need for them to call
another.
When Nils Olafsson received this answer, he took a few days to think it
over, and then he sent word to a fiddler in Big Kil parish, named Olle
in Säby, to ask him if he wouldn't come and play at his daughter's
wedding.
Olle in Säby answered in the same way as Fiddler Mårten. He sent his
compliments to Nils Olafsson, and said that so long as there was such a
capable musician as Jan Öster to be had in Svartsjö, he didn't want to
go there to play.
Nils Olafsson didn't like it that the musicians tried in this way to
force upon him the very one he did not want. Now he considered that it
was a point of honor with him to get another fiddler than Jan Öster.
A few days after he had the answer from Olle in Säby, he sent his
servant to fiddler Lars Larsson, who lived at the game lodge in Ullerud
parish. Lars Larsson was a well-to-do man who owned a fine farm. He was
sensible and considerate and no hotspur, like the other musicians. But
Lars Larsson, like the others, at once thought of Jan Öster, and asked
how it happened that he was not to play at the wedding.
Nils Olafsson's servant thought it best to say to him that, since Jan
Öster lived at Svartsjö, they could hear him play at any time. As Nils
Olafsson was making ready to give a grand wedding, he wished to treat
his guests to something a little better and more select.
"I doubt if you can get any one better," said Lars Larsson.
"Now you must be thinking of answering in the same way as fiddler Mårten
and Olle in Säby did," said the servant. Then he told him how he had
fared with them.
Lars Larsson paid close attention to the servant's story, and then he
sat quietly for a long while and pondered. Finally he answered in the
affirmative: "Tell your master that I thank him for his invitation and
will come."
The following Sunday Lars Larsson journeyed down to Svartsjö. He drove
up to the church knoll just as the wedding guests were forming into line
to march to the church. He came driving in his own chaise and with a
good horse and dressed in black broadcloth. He took out his fiddle from
a highly polished box. Nils Olafsson received him effusively, thinking
that here was a fiddler of whom he might be proud.
Immediately after Lars Larsson's arrival, Jan Öster, too, came marching
up to the church, with his fiddle under his arm. He walked straight up
to the crowd around the bride, exactly as if he were asked to come and
play at the wedding.
Jan Öster had come in the old gray homespun jacket which they had seen
him wearing for ages. But, as this was to be such a grand wedding, his
wife had made an attempt at mending the holes at the elbow by sewing big
green patches over them. Jan Öster was a tall handsome man, and would
have made a fine appearance at the head of the bridal procession, had he
not been so shabbily dressed, and had his face not been so lined and
seamed by worries and the hard struggle with misfortune.
When Lars Larsson saw Jan Öster coming, he seemed a bit displeased. "So
you have called Jan Öster, too," he said under his breath to the Juryman
Nils Olafsson, "but at a grand wedding there's no harm in having two
fiddlers."
"I did not invite him, that's certain!" protested Nils Olafsson. "I
can't comprehend why he has come. Just wait, and I'll let him know that
he has no business here!"
"Then some practical joker must have bidden him," said Lars Larsson.
"But if you care to be guided by my counsel, appear as if nothing were
wrong and go over and bid him welcome. I have heard said that he is a
quick-tempered man, and who knows but he may begin to quarrel and fight
if you were to tell him that he was not invited?"
This the Juryman knew, too! It was no time to begin fussing when the
bridal procession was forming on the church grounds; so he walked up to
Jan Öster and bade him be welcome. Thereupon the two fiddlers took their
places at the head of the procession. The bridal pair walked under a
canopy, the bridesmaids and the groomsmen marched in pairs, and after
them came the parents and relatives; so the procession was both imposing
and long.
When everything was in readiness, a groomsman stepped up to the
musicians and asked them to play the Wedding March. Both musicians swung
their fiddles up to their chins, but beyond that they did not get. And
thus they stood! It was an old custom in Svartsjö for the best fiddler
to strike up the Wedding March and to lead the music.
The groomsman looked at Lars Larsson, as though he were waiting for him
to start; but Lars Larsson looked at Jan Öster and said, "It is you, Jan
Öster, who must begin."
It did not seem possible to Jan Öster that the other fiddler, who was as
finely dressed as any gentleman, should not be better than himself, who
had come in his old homespun jacket straight from the wretched hovel
where there were only poverty and distress. "No, indeed!" said he. "No,
indeed!"
He saw that the bridegroom put forth his hand and touched Lars Larsson.
"Larsson shall begin," said he.
When Jan Öster heard the bridegroom say this, he promptly lowered his
fiddle and stepped aside.
Lars Larsson, on the other hand, did not move from the spot, but
remained standing in his place, confident and pleased with himself. Nor
did he raise the bow. "It is Jan Öster who shall begin," he repeated
stubbornly and resistingly, as one who is used to having his own way.
There was some commotion among the crowds over the cause of the delay.
The bride's father came forward and begged Lars Larsson to begin. The
sexton stepped to the door of the church and beckoned to them to hurry
along. The parson stood waiting at the altar.
"You can ask Jan Öster to begin, then," said Lars Larsson. "We musicians
consider him to be the best among us."
"That may be so," said a peasant, "but we peasants consider you the best
one."
Then the other peasants also gathered around them. "Well, begin, why
don't you?" they said. "The parson is waiting. We'll become a
laughing-stock to the church people."
Lars Larsson stood there quite as stubborn and determined as before. "I
can't see why the people in this parish are so opposed to having their
own fiddler placed in the lead."
Nils Olafsson was perfectly furious because they wished in this way to
force Jan Öster upon him. He came close up to Lars Larsson and
whispered: "I comprehend that it is you who have called hither Jan
Öster, and that you have arranged this to do him honor. But be quick,
now, and play up, or I'll drive that ragamuffin from the church grounds
in disgrace and by force!"
Lars Larsson looked him square in the face and nodded to him without
displaying any irritation. "Yes, you are right in saying that we must
have an end of this," said he.
He beckoned to Jan Öster to return to his place. Then he himself walked
forward a step or two, and turned around that all might see him. Then
he flung the bow far from him, pulled out his case-knife, and cut all
four violin strings, which snapped with a sharp twang. "It shall not be
said of me that I count myself better than Jan Öster!" said he.
It appears that for three years Jan Öster had been musing on an air
which he couldn't get out over the strings because at home he was bound
down by dull, gray cares and worries, and nothing ever happened to him,
either great or small, to lift him above the daily grind. But when he
heard Lars Larsson's strings snap, he threw back his head and filled his
lungs. His features were rapt, as though he were listening to something
far away; and then he began to play. And the air which he had been
musing over for three years became all at once clear to him, and as the
tones of it vibrated he walked with proud step down to the church.
The bridal procession had never before heard an air like that! It
carried them along with such speed that not even Nils Olafsson could
think of staying back. And every one was so pleased both with Jan Öster
and with Lars Larsson that the entire following entered the church,
their eyes brimming with tears of joy.