Mine host at Dal--Bernadotte’s prudent benignity--Taxing the
bill of costs--Hurrah for the mountains--Whetstones--Antique
wooden church--A wild country--“Raven depth”--How the English
like to do fine scenery--Ancient wood-carving--A Norwegian
peasant’s witticism--A rural rectory--Share and chair
alike--Ivory knife-handles--Historical pictures--An old Runic
calendar--The heathen leaven still exists in Norway--Washing
day--Old names of the Norsk months--Peasant songs--Rustic
reserve--A Norsk ballad.
Mine host at Dal, a venerable-looking personage, with long grey hair
floating on his shoulders, was a member of the Extraordinary Meeting
of Deputies at Eidsvold in 1815, when the Norwegians accepted the
Junction with Sweden. I and the old gentleman exchanged cards. The
superscription on his was--Gaardbruger Norgaard, Deputeret fra Norges
Storthing--_i.e._, Farmer Norgaard, A Deputy from Norway’s Storthing.
Another reminiscence of his early days is a framed and glazed copy of
the Grundlov (Fundamental Law) of Norway, its palladium of national
liberty, which a hundred and twelve Deputies drew up in six weeks, in
1814. Never was Constitution so hastily drawn up, and so generally
practical and sensible as this.
The Crown Prince, the crafty Bernadotte, with his invading army of
Swedes, had Norway quite at his mercy on that occasion; but the idea
seems to have struck him suddenly that it was as well not to deal too
hardly with her, as in case of his not being able to hold his own in
Sweden, he might have a worse place of refuge than among the sturdy
Norwegians. “I am resolved what to do, so that when I am put out of the
stewardship they may receive me into their houses.” So he assented to
Norway’s independence.
For my part, at this moment, I thought more about coffee than Norwegian
liberty and politics; but as it was nine o’clock, P.M., the good people
were quite put out by the request. Coffee in the forenoon, say they,
tea in the evening. As it was, they made me pay pretty smartly for the
accommodation next morning. “What’s to pay?” said I, striding into the
room, where sat the old Deputy’s daughter, the mistress of the house,
at the morning meal. She had not long ago become a widow, and had taken
as her second husband, a few days before, a grisly-looking giant, who
sat by in his shirt-sleeves.
“Ask _him_,” said the fair Quickly, thinking it necessary, perhaps,
just so recently after taking the vow of obedience, by this little
piece of deference to her new lord to express her sense of submission
to his authority. For my part, as an old traveller, I should rather say
she did it for another feeling. English pigeons did not fly that way
every day, and so they must be plucked; and the person to do it, she
thought, was the Berserker, her awful-looking spouse. The charge was
exorbitant; and as the good folks were regaling themselves with fresh
mutton-chops and strawberries and cream, while they had fobbed us off
with eggs and black bread and cheese--the latter so sharp that it went
like a dagger to my very vitals at the first taste--I resolutely taxed
the bill of costs, and carried my point; whereupon we took leave of the
Deputy and his descendants.
In one sense we had come to the world’s end; for there is no road for
wheels beyond this. The footpath up the steep cliff that looks down
upon the lake is only accessible to the nimble horses of the country.
“Hurrah!” exclaimed I, as I looked down on the blue lake, lying
hundreds of feet perpendicularly below us. “Hurrah for the mountains!
Adieu to the ‘boppery bop’ of civilization, with all its forms and
ceremonies, and turnpikes and twaddle. Here you can eat, and drink,
and dress as and when you like, and that is just the fun of the thing,
more than half the relaxation of the trip.” Why, this passion for
mountain-travelling over the hills and far away is not peculiar to
Englishmen. Don’t the ladies of Teheran, even, after their listless
“_vie à la pantoufle_,” delight to hear of the approach of the plague,
as they know they are sure to get off to the hills, and have a little
tent-life in consequence? Didn’t that fat boy Buttons (not in Pickwick,
but Horace), cloyed with the Priest’s luscious cheesecakes, long for a
bit of coarse black bread, and run away from his master to get it?
The precipitous path is studded at intervals with heaps of hones, or
whet-stones. I find that about here is the chief manufacture in all
Norway for this article. One year, a third of a million were turned
out. The next quarry in importance is at Kinservik, on the Hardanger
Fjord. Surmounting the ascent, we traverse swampy ground dotted with
birch-trees, and presently debouch upon one of those quaint edifices
not to be found out of this country--stabskirke (stave church), as
it is called--of which Borgund and Hitterdal Churches are well-known
specimens. It is so called from the lozenge-shaped shingles (staves),
overlapping each other like fish-scales, which case the roof and every
part of the outside. Smaller and less pretending than those edifices,
this secluded place of worship was of the same age--about nine hundred
years. The resinous pine has done its work well, and the carving on the
capitals of the wooden pillars at the doorway is in good preservation,
though parts have lately been churchwardenized.
“That is Eidsborg church,” said a young student, who had volunteered to
accompany me, as he was bound to a lone parsonage up the country, in
this direction. “This is the church the young lady on board the steamer
told you was so remarkable.”
After making a rough sketch of the exterior, we proceeded on our
journey. The few huts around were tenantless, the inhabitants all
gone up to the châlets. The blanching bear-skulls on the door of one
of these showed the wildness of the country we are traversing; while
a black-throated diver, which was busy ducking after the fish in the
sedge-margined pool close by, almost tempted me to load, and have a
long shot at him. As we proceed, I observe fieldfares, ring-ouzel, and
chaff-finches, while many English wild flowers enliven the scene, and
delicious strawberries assuage our thirst. Pursuing our path through
the forest, we come to a post on which is written “Ravne jüv,” Anglicè,
Raven depth.
“Det maa De see,” (you must see that,) said my companion, turning off
up a narrow path, and frightening a squirrel and a capercailzie, which
were apparently having a confab about things in general. I followed him
through the pine-wood, getting over the swampy ground by the aid of
some fallen trunks, and, in two or three minutes, came to the “Ravne
jüv.” It is made by the Sandok Elv, which here pierces through the
mountains, and may be seen fighting its way thousands of feet below us.
Where I stood, the cliff was perpendicular, or rather sloped inwards;
and, by a singular freak of nature, a regular embrasured battlement had
been projected forward, so as to permit of our approaching the giddy
verge with perfect impunity.
Es schwebt eine _Brustwehre_ über den Rand
Der furchtbaren Tiefe gebogen
Sie ward nicht erbauet von Menschen-hand
Es hätte sich’s Keiner verwogen.
Lying flat, I put my head through an embrasure, and looked down into
the Raven’s depth.
“Ah! it’s deeper than you think,” said my companion. “Watch this piece
of wood.”
I counted forty before it reached a landing-place, and that was not
above half the way.
Annoyed at our intrusion, two buff-coloured hawks and a large falcon
kept flying backwards and forwards within shot, having evidently chosen
this frightful precipice as the safest place they could find for
their young. Luckily for them, the horse and guide had gone on with
my fowling-piece, or they might have descended double-quick into the
sable depths below, and become a repast for the ravens; who, as in duty
bound, of course frequent the recesses of their namesake, although none
were now visible.
What a pity a bit of scenery like this cannot be transported to
England. The Norwegians look upon rocks as a perfect nuisance, while
we sigh for them. Fancy the Ravne jüv in Derbyshire. Why, we should
have Marcus’ excursion-trains every week in the summer, and motley
crowds of tourists thronging to have a peep into the dark profound, and
some throwing themselves from the top of it, as they used to do from
the Monument, and John Stubbs incising his name on the battlements,
cutting boldly as the Roman king did at the behests of that humbugging
augur; and another true Briton breaking off bits of the parapet,
just like those immortal excursionists who rent the Blarney Stone in
two. Then there would be a grand hotel close by, and greasy waiters
with white chokers, and the nape of their neck shaven as smooth as a
vulture’s head (faugh!) and their front and back hair parted in one
continuous straight line, just like the wool of my lady’s poodle. How
strongly they would recommend to your notice some most trustworthy
guide, to show you what you can’t help seeing if you follow your nose,
and are not blind--the said trustworthy guide paying him a percentage
on all grist thus sent to his mill. Eventually, there would be a high
wall erected, and a locked gate, as at the Turk Fall at Killarney, and
a shilling to pay for seeing “private property,” &c. &c. No, no! let
well alone. Give me the “Raven deep” when it is in the silent solitudes
of a Norwegian forest, and let me muse wonderingly, and filled with
awe, at the stupendous engineering of Nature, and derive such
edification as I may from the sight.
At Sandok we get a fresh horse from the worthy Oiesteen, and some
capital beer, which he brings in a wooden quaigh, containing about half
a gallon.
On the face of the “loft,” loft or out-house, I see an excellent
specimen of wood carving. “That,” said Oiesteen, “has often been
pictured by the town people.” All the farm-houses in this part of the
country used to be carved in this fashion. One has only to read the
Sagas to know why all these old houses no longer exist. It is not that
the wood has perished in the natural way; experience, in fact, seems
to show that the Norwegian pine is almost as lasting, in ordinary
circumstances, as stone, growing harder by age. The truth is, in those
fighting days of the Vikings, when one party was at feud with another,
he would often march all night when his enemy least expected him, and
surrounding the house where he lay, so as to let none escape, set it on
fire.
The lad who took charge of the horse next stage was called Björn
(Bear), a not uncommon name all over Norway. It was now evening, and
chilly.
“Are you cold, Björn?” said the student.
“No; the Björn is never chilly,” was the facetious reply. The nearest
approach to a witticism I had ever heard escape the mouth of a
Norwegian peasant.
Two or three miles to the right we descry the river descending by a
huge cataract from its birthplace among the rocky mountains of Upper
Thelemarken. Presently we join what professes to be the high road from
Christiania, which is carried some twenty miles further westward, and
then suddenly ceases.
Long after midnight, we arrived at the Rectory House at ----, where
I was to sleep. Mr. ---- was an intelligent sort of person, very
quiet and affable, and dressed in homespun from head to foot. After
breakfast, the staple of which was trout from the large lake close by,
I offered him a weed, which he declined, with the remark, “Ieg tygge,”
I chew. The ladies, as usual, are kind and unassuming, with none of
the female arts to be found in cities. A friend of mine, proud of his
fancied skill in talking Norsk, was once stopping at a clergyman’s
in Norway, when he apologised to the ladies for his deficiencies in
their language. He was evidently fishing for compliments, and was
considerably taken aback when one of them, in the most unsophisticated
manner, observed, taking him quite at his word, “Oh yes, strangers, you
know, often confound the words, and say one for another, which makes it
very difficult to comprehend them.”
Ludicrous mistakes are sometimes made by the Norwegians also. An
English gentleman arrived at a change-house in Österdal late one
evening, and was lucky in obtaining the only spare bed. Presently, when
he was on the point of retiring to rest, a Norwegian lady also arrived,
intending to spend the night there. What was to be done? Like a gallant
Englishman as he was, with that true, unselfish courtesy which is not,
as in France, confined to mere speeches, he immediately offered to give
up his bed to the “unprotected female,” who was mistress of a little
English. “Many thanks; but what will you do, sir?” “Oh! I will take
a chair for the night.” At this answer the lady blushed, and darted
out of the room, and in a few minutes her carriole was driving off
in the darkness. What could be the meaning of it? The peasant’s wife
soon after looked into the room, with a knowing sort of look at the
Englishman. He subsequently discovered the key to the enigma. The lady
thought he said “he would take a _share_,” and was, of course, mightily
offended. So much for a smattering of a foreign language. Doubtless,
from that day forward, she would quote this incident to her female
friends as an instance of the natural depravity of Englishmen; and this
scapegrace would be looked upon as a type of his nation.
The priest has some knives, the handles of which are of ivory, and
exquisitely carved in a flowing pattern. They cost as much as three
dollars apiece, a great sum. But the artificer, who lives near, is the
best in Thelemarken, the part of Norway most celebrated for this art.
The patterns used are, I hear, of very ancient date; being, in some
instances, identical with those on various metal articles discovered
from time to time in the barrows and cromlechs.
The walls of the sitting-room are hung with some engravings on national
subjects, _e.g._, “Anna Kolbjörnsdatter og de Svenske,” “Olaf, killed
at Sticklestad,” and “Konrad Adeler, at Tenedos.” Kort Adeler, whose
name lives in a popular song by Ingemann, was born at Brevik, in 1622,
but took service under the Venetians, and on one occasion fought and
slew Ibrahim, the Turkish admiral. Ibrahim’s sword and banner are still
to be seen at Copenhagen. Adeler’s successor, as Norwegian Admiral, was
the renowned Niels Juel, the Nelson of the North.
I saw tossing about the Manse an old Runic Calendar, which nobody
seemed to care anything about. It was found in the house when the
parson came there, and appeared occasionally to have been used
for stirring the fire, as one end was quite charred. Without much
difficulty I succeeded in rescuing it from impending destruction, and
possess it at this moment. Some of these calendars are shaped like a
circle, others like an ellipse. They were of two kinds. Messedag’s
stav (mass-day stave) and Primstav. But the latter term properly
applies to a much more complex sort of calendar than the other. It
contained not only runes for festivals and other days, but also the
Sunday letter or quarters of the moon for every golden number. Its
name is derived from prima luna, _i.e._, the first full moon after
the vernal equinox. The primstav proper was generally four feet long.
The almanack I here obtained is flat, and figured on two sides, not
as some of the old Anglo-Saxon calendars were, square, and figured on
four sides. It is shaped like a flat sword, an inch and a half broad
and half an inch thick, and is provided with a handle. The owner of it
appears to have been born on the 6th June, as his monogram which is on
the handle occurs again on that day. On the broad sides the days of the
week are notched, and on the narrow sides there is a notch for every
seventh day; _i.e._, the narrow sides mark the weeks, the broad sides
the days.
The day-marks or signs do not go from January to July, and from July
to December. On the one side, which was called the Vetr-leid, winter
side, they begin with the 14th of October, or “winter night,” and
reach to the 13th of April. On the other side, which was called the
summer side, they begin with the 14th of April “summer night,” and
go to the 13th of October. The runes, or marks distinguishing the
days, are derived from a variety of circumstances: sometimes from the
weather, or farming operations, or from legends of saints. But it
must be observed that hardly two calendars can be found corresponding
to each other. Some are simpler, others more complex. In some, one
saint’s day is distinguished, in others another. Winter then began with
the old Norwegians on the 14th of October; Midwinter was ninety days
after--_i.e._, on the 11th January, and Midsummer ninety-four days from
the 14th of April.
The great winter festival in honour of Thor, on 20th January, was
called Höggenät, _i.e._--slaughter-night.[4] This word is derived from
högge (to cut or hew), on account of the number of animals slaughtered
in honour of Thor. The word still survives in Scotland, in Hogmanáy
(the last night of the old year).
Snorro Sturlesen informs us that it was Hacon the Good, foster-son
of our King Athelstan, who made a law that the great Asa, or heathen
festival, which used to be held for three successive days in January,
should be transferred to the end of December, and kept so many days as
it was usual to keep Christmas in the English Church. His missionaries
being Northmen who had resided in England, like St. Augustine, the
Apostle of England, accommodated themselves to the superstitions and
habits in vogue among the people they came to convert. The great
banquets, where people feasted on the flesh of horses and other
victims, were turned into eating and drinking bouts of a more godly
sort; and the Skaal to Odin assumed the shape of a brimming bowl to the
honour of the Redeemer, the Virgin, and the saints. In their cups, no
doubt, their ideas would become at times confused, and many a baptized
heathen would hiccup a health to Odin and Thor. Even now, as we have
seen, after the lapse of so many centuries, much of the old heathen
leaven infects their Christianity.
We may here observe that the Norwegian word for Saturday is Löverdag,
_i.e._, washing-day, as a preparation for the Sunday festival, so that
the division of time into weeks of seven days must have originated in
Norway within the period of its conversion to Christianity. Herein,
then, they differed from the Anglo-Saxons, who called it Sæterndæg
(Saturns-day); while the South Germans called it after the Jewish
Sabbath, Sambaztag, now Samstag. The Scandinavians had exhausted their
great gods upon the other days. Sun and Moon, Tyr, Odin, Thor, and
Freya, had been used up, so they took the appropriate name Löverdag,
above-mentioned.
The following are the old names of the Norsk months:
Gormánaðr from Oct. 21 to Nov. 19.
Ýlir ” Nov. 20 ” Dec. 19.
Mörsúgr ” Dec. 20 ” Jan. 18.
Þorri ” Jan. 19 ” Feb. 17.
Goe, or Gœ ” Feb. 18 ” March 19.
Ein mánaðr ” March 20 ” April 18.
Gauk ” April 19 ” May 18.
Skerpla ” May 19 ” June 17.
Sólmánaðr ” June 18 ” July 22.
Heyannir ” July 23 ” Aug. 21.
Tvimánaðr ” Aug. 22 ” Sep. 20.
Haustmánaðr ” Sep. 21 ” Oct. 20.
Some of these names are very appropriate, _e.g._, Gormánaðr is
gore-month, when so many victims were slaughtered. Ýlir, or Jýlir, is
the month that prepares for Yule. Mörsúgr refers to the good cheer
which people sucked up at that period. Þorri is said to come from
Þverra, to get short, because the good things are then nearly run out.
Gaukmánaðr is Gauk’s (cuckoo’s) month. Sólmánaðr is the sun’s month.
Heyannir is hay-time. Tvimánaðr (from tvi, two) is the second month
after midsummer, while Haustmánaðr is harvest (scotticè) “har’st” month.
But our readers will think us becoming prosy, so we will mount the
cart, and discarding the society of the fat peasant woman who proposes
inflicting herself upon us, accept the kind offer of our intelligent
student to accompany us on our journey to Kos-thveit (Kos-thwaite, as
we should say in East Anglia), on the Lake of Totak.
“Are there any songs current in the mouths of the peasants here?”
I inquired, as we drove very slowly along a narrow road, through
morasses, studded with birch. “This is pre-eminently the old fashioned
part of Norway, so I suppose if they are anywhere they are here.”
“Oh, yes. There has been a student from Christiania wandering about
these parts lately, collecting songs for the purpose of publication.
Many of them are dying out fast. Some years ago, the girls used to
improvise over the loom. At weddings, lad and lass used to stevne (sing
staves) in amœbean fashion, on the spur of the moment.”
Some of these pieces are highly witty and satirical. But the bonders
are very averse to repeating them. One of them, on being asked by the
student to repeat a stave, replied, “Ieg vil ikke være en Narr for
Byen-folk:” (I won’t play the fool to amuse the city folks.)
Here is a specimen of one native to this part done into English.
STAVE.
_A._ Oh! fair is the sight to see,
When the lads and the lasses are dancin’;
The cuckoo, he calls from the tree,
And the birds through the green wood are glancin’!
_B._ Oh! ’tis fair in Vining-town,
When to kirk the lovers repair:
Of other light need they have none,
So light is the bride’s yellow hair.
_A._ Oh! fair is the sight I trow,
When the bride the kirk goes in,
No need of the torch’s glow,
So bright is her cherry chin.[5]
_B._ Her neck’s like the driven snow,
Her hair’s like the daffodil,
Her eyes in their sockets glow,
Like the sun rising over the hill.
The whole winds up with a description of the married life of the pair.
_A._ The cock he struts into the house,
The bonder gives him corn,
The flocks on the northern lea browse,
And the shepherd he blows his horn.
_B._ The shepherd the mountain ascends,
And the setting sun doth bide,
As blithe, when night descends,
As the bairns at merry Yule-tide.