THE TWO UPPSALAS; GEFLE AND SÖDERHAMN
SÖDERHAMN, SWEDEN,
August 25, 191—
_Dear Cynthia_:
From Stockholm I went to Uppsala, which is a short distance to the
north—only an hour and a half by train; and Swedish trains are slow
affairs. At Uppsala is a fine Gothic cathedral of red brick. It is
the largest church in Sweden, and its high buttressed walls as well
as its twin spires tower grandly above all of the other buildings of
the town. Red brick, I know, does not _sound_ beautiful, but it is—at
Uppsala—especially when it comes after a whole gallery of mental
pictures of gray stone churches. Like many other things in Sweden, the
church was founded in the thirteenth century. But the present building
is quite new; it was completed only about twenty years ago. Uppsala
Cathedral, like Riddarholmen Church, contains the ashes of many of the
greatest Swedes; but those buried at Uppsala were more truly great,
in the best sense of the word, than most of the noted ones buried at
Stockholm. Practically all made worthy contributions to the world.
One of them, Saint Eric, is buried behind the high altar, in a
sixteenth century shrine of silver, shaped like a church, with gables
and turrets. So far as I have been able to learn, King Eric—for he was
a king as well as a saint—won his canonization by forcing Finland and
the more remote northern part of Sweden to accept Christianity. But
he is also called Eric Lag-gifvare in an ancient saga which credits
him with giving to his people “King Eric’s Laws.” If he was really
the giver, he gave them an excellent code, which did not overlook the
Swedish woman. To every wife was granted equal power with her husband
over locks, bolts and bars; and by this code she also gained the right
to a third of her husband’s property after his death. In view of the
fact that King Eric lived nearly eight hundred years ago, I think that
an excellent beginning. He was one of the pioneers of the equal rights
movement.
Speaking of saints brings me to the Finsta Chapel, also behind the
altar, where are buried Prince Birger Pedersson and his wife, Ingeborg
Bengtsdotter. These two people—Birger, the son of Peter, and Ingeborg,
the daughter of Bengt—were the parents of Saint Birgitta, who was
obviously named for her father, Birger. To the Swedes she is always
the great and good Birgitta, but among English-speaking people she is
generally called Bridget, which has led to her being confused with the
Irish Saint Bridget, or Brigid, who was born more than eight hundred
years before. The Irish saint is responsible for the popularity of the
name Bridget among the Irish; while the very common Swedish name Britta
is, I suspect, a condensed survival of the old pre-Reformation Saint’s
name Birgitta.
Saint Birgitta was born in 1302 in Vadstena, on Lake Vettern. On the
night of her birth, says legend, there appeared a bright cloud in
the sky on which stood a maiden who announced: “Of Birger is born a
daughter whose admirable voice shall be heard over the whole world.”
We may question the authenticity of the legend, but it is a fact that
Birgitta was the most important Swede of the Roman Catholic era. In
1346, with the aid of King Magnus, she founded upon her Vadstena
estate the first abbey for men and women existing upon a distinctly
co-operative basis. Her daughter, St. Katherine, became the first head
of this mother abbey of the Brigittine order, which later had houses
scattered all over Europe.
But Birgitta, if contemporary accounts may be believed, did not limit
her energies to the encouragement of monastic life. She was a leader
in long religious pilgrimages, going once even to Jerusalem. And so
daring was she and so convinced that she had been given the right to
speak with authority that she did not hesitate to point out to the pope
himself the error of his ways. By some she was hailed as a prophet; by
others she was denounced as a witch. Certainly she was a woman of high
ideals and great ability. It was fitting that the emblem on her crest
should be white angel’s wings. Saint Birgitta herself and her daughter
were buried at Vadstena; their portraits, however, are on the walls of
Finsta Chapel.
The greatest of all Swedish mystics, Emanuel Swedenborg, is also buried
in the Uppsala Cathedral, to which place his remains were brought in
1908 from England, where for long years they had lain. Did you know
that Swedenborg was a great scientist, a man who in various lines of
science made predictions and discoveries far in advance of his time?
He was born in 1688. It was not until he had reached middle age that
he abandoned scientific research and took up the study of religion,
which led him eventually to believe himself divinely commissioned
to preach a new gospel of the New Jerusalem. There is no doubt that
Swedenborg was perfectly honest with himself and with others. Those who
knew and talked with him felt that he was “truth itself.” And though
his theology may seem unacceptable, his religion gave much which the
world will always need. “The life of religion,” he taught, “is to do
good”; and “the kingdom of heaven is a kingdom of uses.” This prophet,
however, was one who received but little honor in his own country.
There are many more adherents of the Swedenborgian teachings in the
United States than in Sweden, in proportion to population.
The ashes of Carl Linné, the greatest of modern systematists, rest at
Uppsala; and it is appropriate that they should, for Linné spent the
best years of his life at Uppsala University, teaching and carrying
on the researches which laid the foundation for all modern biological
study. I have always been much impressed with the daring which this
Swede displayed by classing humankind, together with apes, with the
“_quadrumana_ in the order of _primates_.” In view of the fact that
Linné lived a century before Darwin, that was a pretty long stride; and
I am so grateful to him for making it. When I reflect that we humans
are developed animals, I feel that—all things considered—we are doing
pretty well, and can keep up my courage; but were I dependent upon the
“fallen-angel” theory, I should frequently despair utterly over the
seemingly hopeless depths of evil into which the angel has descended.
Gustav Vasa, whose memory all lovers of justice and liberty delight to
honor, is buried in the oldest chapel of the cathedral, which stands
directly behind the altar. The windows of the room are of beautiful
stained glass, and on the walls are seven frescoes by Sandberg,
representing incidents in the life of the great king. To me, the most
interesting of these were the ones calling to mind the adventures of
Gustav intervening between his imprisonment by King Christian II of
Denmark and his triumphal entrance into Stockholm as king of free
Sweden. One of these frescoes represents the king while in hiding from
the Danes working as a farm laborer and threshing out grain for a
Dalecarlian peasant.
Lest all of this talk of dead Swedes give you the impression that
Uppsala is a veritable city of the dead, I must not delay longer in
telling about Uppsala University, the place of youth and fulness of
life. It is the older of the two Swedish universities and was founded
in 1477. It is co-educational and has a student enrollment of something
over two thousand. The University House, so called, is a stately
new building of brick and stone. Near the main entrance is a large
statue of Geijer, the greatest Swedish historian. In the vestibule are
several more statues of eminent Swedes. The ceilings of the vestibule
are supported by pillars of black granite, while in the corridors the
columns are of beautiful green marble, which the guard pointed out
with considerable pride. The stone was “made in Sweden.” The aula, or
assembly room, is large and airy, well lighted and well equipped, and
has a seating capacity of about two thousand. I noticed good paintings
upon the walls of several of the class rooms; and in one large lecture
room was a mammoth work in oils by Mas-Olle—of a young Swedish woman
standing on the edge of a dale blowing her lure. The evening shades of
purple and amethyst in the valley were unusually well done.
In the faculty rooms were several interesting old portraits. That of
Queen Christina especially held my attention. Christina, the daughter
of Gustav Adolf, was, I suppose, the most freakish and eccentric of
all of the sovereigns of Sweden. She had, among other peculiarities,
a love for scholarly pursuits, to which she subordinated her duties
as a sovereign. Moreover, she had no sympathy with the warlike spirit
which dominated Sweden at the time. The uncultured Swedes could hardly
regard such a successor to the great Gustav Adolf with enthusiasm.
Consequently, Christina was permitted to resign in favor of her cousin,
Charles X, who, you will remember, left little to be desired in the way
of qualities as a warrior. The ex-queen then shook the dust of Sweden
from her shoes, and later she abjured the faith for which her father
fought and became a Roman Catholic, spending much of the last part of
her life at Rome. The portrait at Uppsala, which was done by Abraham
Wuchters, seems faithfully to reflect the dominating will and the
brilliant but poorly-balanced mind of the queen.
“Carolina Rediviva” is the name of the University library—a name
having its origin in an old university building, which in the time
of Gustav Adolf was called Carolina Academy. Carolina Rediviva is
decidedly the largest library in Sweden, and contains many treasures of
various sorts. Among these are beautiful examples of illuminated work
from the eleventh century on. One of the manuscripts has every initial
letter in gold. A copy of the first book printed in Swedish, from about
the middle of the sixteenth century, and a copy of a Bible of Martin
Luther, containing his autograph and that of Melanchthon, are there
also.
But the distinctive gem of the collection is the “Silver Bible” (_Codex
Argenteus_), of Ulfilas. It is by far the oldest example of the Gothic
language in existence, and is a thing of great beauty as well as a
priceless treasure from a philological viewpoint. It was a real joy to
me to see it; I have wanted to do so for years. The guard turned over
the book in order that I might view both the cover and the parchment
pages. Originally the parchment was of a purple color and the lettering
was of silver; but the purple has long since faded into a beautiful
rose, and the letters have oxidized black. The cover, however—from
which the Bible gets its name—is of bright, richly worked silver and
is only three centuries old. The cover was made in Sweden. This Gothic
Bible was rediscovered to the world in Germany during the sixteenth
century. Later it was carried away to Sweden by the soldiers of Gustav
Adolf, and subsequently was given to Queen Christina, shortly after
which it reached its present abode.
I am not a defender of international highway robbery, nevertheless I
feel that there is a decided appropriateness in Sweden’s being the
guardian of this oldest relic of Gothic culture. For Scandinavia is
commonly recognized as the cradle-land of the Teutonic peoples, of
which the Goths were a branch, and the Scandinavians are the purest
blooded existing descendants of the ancient Teutons. Of the three
Scandinavian countries, Sweden, too, seems the best entitled to the
honor of possessing the Goths’ Bible, for one of her provinces is still
named Gothland—a survival of the name applied in historic times to the
whole south of Sweden, whose inhabitants were called Goths, as their
neighbors to the North were called Swedes. It almost seems as if the
bringing of the Bible of Ulfilas to Sweden were a restoration—a return
to the home of its remotest origin.
The handwriting of a person who has passed from this life helps me, far
more than does his tomb, to a realization of his personality and of the
force of his one-time existence. Hence, the sight of the collection of
autographic writings of some of the greatest figures of Sweden’s past
which occupy the room with the Silver Bible, was a real contribution to
my contact with the humanity of the ages. The strong, bold autographs
of Gustav Vasa and Gustav Adolf, the signatures of Swedenborg, and
Tegnér, and Linné spoke eloquently to me of giant achievement; as did
also the delicate, modest hand of Fredrika Bremer, a giant too, whose
spirit still lives mightily in the women of Sweden. This closer contact
with Miss Bremer made me want to read again “The Home” and “Strife and
Peace,” and other works of hers which contributed to the pleasures of
my girlhood.
Before taking final leave of Sweden’s oldest university, I want to
remind you that it was this university which conferred upon Selma
Lagerlöf the honorary degree of doctor of letters in 1907; and she
stood beneath the monument to Carl Linné in the Uppsala cathedral
when the laurel wreath was placed upon her brow. Two years later she
received the Nobel prize.
My last remark moves me to ask: Did you know that Alfred Nobel, the
founder of the Nobel Prize Fund, was a Swede? And did you know that he
was the inventor of dynamite, smokeless powder, and other explosives,
by which he made his fortune? His arrangement for the prize fund
reminds me of the Gothenburg temperance system; the money made from the
invention and manufacture of war materials contributes not only toward
a prize fund for those who have excelled in science and literature, but
also for those who have done most in the interest of universal peace.
My pilgrimage from the famous modern Uppsala to Gamla or Old Uppsala
will always be one of the choicest of my Scandinavian memories. Gamla
Uppsala was the ancient capital of Sweden and the last stronghold of
the pagan cult of Thor and Odin. In the dark forests of this Uppsala
during heathen times lives of men as well as of beasts were sacrificed
to the mighty gods of the North.
The old town is less than four miles from the new, and the road
stretched so smooth and inviting that I decided to walk there. And I
promptly realized that my decision was a wise one, for the landscape
was charming—suggestive of dear old Bornholm, and yet with a Swedish
stamp. Patches of woods in varied greens and of golden fields with
bright farmhouses here and there furnished perfect backgrounds for
the harvesters near at hand; and the pinks and blues and reds of the
dresses worn by the white-aproned and white-kerchiefed women working
among the sheaves gave just the needed touch of color to the foreground
of the picture.
After I had passed the turn in the road, the famous mounds of Gamla
Uppsala came clearly into sight, with the steep, gabled roof of the old
church peeping above them. As I wished to take a picture of the mounds,
I turned off the highway and followed the railroad track, from which
approach I could obtain a more unobscured view.
I did not take to walking the railroad ties, however, with perfect
security of mind, for my observation of affairs European had convinced
me that but rarely are passengers permitted to stand on car platforms,
even “at their own risk.” Consequently, I quaked inwardly upon
perceiving a brass-buttoned man on the track ahead; but I walked past
him with my best American air, and proceeded to adjust my camera.
Presently the official approached me, and suddenly I remembered that
“ignorance of the law excuses no one.” Visions of arrest and disgrace
loomed large. With a waist-deep Swedish bow, the man of the shining
buttons handed me a paper. It was a black strip from the film-pack
of my camera which I had thrown away, and which had blown in his
vicinity! After I had thanked him and explained that I had discarded
the paper, he politely asked a question or two about the operation of
my camera, executed another ninety-degree bow, and withdrew. Obviously
the man was not so unsophisticated as really to think that strip of
paper of any value. He simply used it as an excuse for attempting to
satisfy masculine curiosity roused by the foreign-looking person upon
his railroad track. Swedes do occasionally stoop to such depths of
diplomatic cunning!
The three so-called burial mounds of Frey, Thor, and Odin, the
mightiest gods of Northern paganism, stand in a row, Odin’s being
nearest the church. They are real burial mounds, as was proved when
they were opened some years since and were found to contain the
remains of human beings, with the usual pagan equipment of weapons,
and utensils, and other objects intended to contribute to the welfare
of the Asgard-bound traveler. From the top of Odin’s mound I obtained
a good view of the surrounding country. Near at hand was a lower and
flatter eminence. Upon it in heathen times the Swedish parliament
assembled and under the open sky enacted the laws; and even as late as
the sixteenth century Gustav Vasa addressed his people from the mound.
This good old custom of holding open-air parliaments seems to have
existed in times past wherever Scandinavians ruled. The Thingvellir
of Iceland got its name from the fact that the Thing, or parliament,
met there for its deliberations; and the quaint ceremonies by which
the newly-enacted laws of the Isle of Man are still promulgated by the
House of Keys from the top of Tynwald Hill on the fifth of each July
are a vestige of the same custom, and are Scandinavian in origin.
Gamla Uppsala church is of such substantial construction as to suggest
that in ancient times its functions, like those of the rotundas of
Bornholm, were military as well as religious. Its walls are very thick
and are of rough, irregular stone, built up with cement which gives
them the appearance of conglomerate. The church is very old; in fact,
its origin is lost in the mists of the dawn of Swedish history. But
this history states that Uppsala was made a diocese early in the
twelfth century, and it is believed that the church was established
nearly a hundred years before that. Some parts of the present building
certainly date well back toward the eleventh century.
A note on the church door informed me that admission could be gained
by applying to the schoolmaster or organist, so I went around
the parliament mound to the white wooden school building. The
schoolmaster’s family lived on the upper floor, and the schoolmaster’s
wife responded to my knock, and called her boy—a little chap of nine
or ten years, barefooted and close-cropped—who went forth with me,
carrying two mighty keys. The smaller of these was about as large
as that regularly and conspicuously carried by Saint Peter, and the
larger was ponderous indeed. My little boy was, of course, accompanied
by another little boy—one about two sizes larger. The ponderous key
belonged to the outside door of the church, which was of dark oak, very
worm-eaten and old and possessed of decorative wrought-iron hinges with
handsome scrolls spreading over its venerable oaken surface. But the
key was so large and the boy so small that he had difficulty in turning
it in the lock, even though he caught his toes in the scrolls of the
hinges and climbed up the side of the door, monkey fashion, to get a
purchase upon the key. Through our united efforts, however, the door
was finally opened. It admitted us into a tunnel-like, white-plastered
vestibule at the end of which was the door for which the smaller key
was designed. This key being more nearly the boy’s size, the inner door
was opened without difficulty.
The walls of the main room were plastered white, and the altar and
pulpit looked quite new; but the church contained many ancient relics.
The small boy was evidently the regular exhibitor of these; and he
recited his explanation of them with a perfectly expressionless face,
and in the mechanical tone of an unimaginative book-agent. “That,”
said the infant (in Swedish), “is a Christus from the twelfth century.
Those”—pointing to a hideous row of carved and painted wooden
saints—“are from the fourteenth century. There is a bridal stool from
the Middle Ages.” Back against a wall was a chest which looked many
centuries old, made from an unhewn tree trunk, iron bound. When I asked
what it contained, he opened the little door or lid on top and fished
out a wooden Christus, which consisted only of a very rudely carved
body and head. The limbs had been broken or worn off. The figure, the
boy announced, dated from the eleventh century. In a little room off
the main one were portraits of ancient Swedish clergymen, and censers
and other ecclesiastical utensils dating from Roman Catholic times.
There was also a copy of the first Bible printed in Swedish. Our round
of the church being completed, I paid the boy the fifty-öre fee at the
outside door. He uttered the customary “Tack så mycke” (Many thanks),
grabbed off his cap with a crisp, business-like “Adjö,” and scampered
off, the larger-sized boy close at his heels.
[Illustration: Gamla Uppsala Church]
[Illustration: Choir of Gamla Uppsala Church]
Late in the afternoon I returned to the new Uppsala; and just before
sunset I left for Gefle, which is farther to the north, and is the port
and metropolis of Norrland. In Gefle nearly four score years ago my
father was born; and some Swedish relatives still live there. These
were the attractions which brought me there. From the ordinary tourist
point of view the place has little of interest. It is a clean, pretty
city, however, with a population of about thirty-five thousand. Gefle
is really the oldest town in Norrland, as the northern part of Sweden
is called, but it looks very new and modern with its broad tree-planted
boulevards and its handsome stone theatre and school and municipal
buildings. This is because it has been almost completely rebuilt since
1869, when it was swept by a fire which destroyed all of the landmarks
of my father’s boyhood days.
Gefle has one possession of which she is very proud, and justly so.
This is her park—one of the finest of the sort in Sweden. It has all
of the features which characterize the Swedish park—thick clumps
of evergreens and birches, with velvety stretches of grass between,
blazing flower beds, graceful fountains playing here and there,
artistically bridged mirrorlike streams upon which the lilies grow—and
in addition it has a palm garden. There they were growing, evidently in
perfect contentment—a large number and variety of palm trees. Gefle,
you should know, is north of the latitude of the southern extremity of
Greenland; therefore, I marveled greatly and could scarcely believe my
eyes. But it was no miracle, as my cousin who was walking through the
park with me explained. Those enterprising Swedes set out the palms
every spring and dig them up and return them to the greenhouse every
autumn.
As time pressed, my visit in Gefle was very short. Early last Wednesday
morning I left there to the accompaniment of Swedish cousinly bows
and cordial “Adjös” and “Hälsa hemms.” My destination was Söderhamn
(South Haven), my present address, which, like Gefle, is on the Gulf
of Bothnia, but still farther north. For my journey here, through a
mistake, I selected a freight train which carries lumber, instead of an
express. But it was really a very fortunate blunder, for the trip was
much more interesting than one in the orthodox express would have been.
To the north of Gefle is Sweden’s great lumbering district, which we
soon entered. It is a rugged region covered with magnificent evergreen
forests, dotted here and there by small clearings brightened by the
typical red-painted houses with white trimmings. The oat and clover
hay grown on the cleared patches was hung on wire clothes-line-like
racks to dry. Occasionally I noticed farmers hauling hay in long, very
low-wheeled wagons. These vehicles, as compared with the American hay
racks, have a decidedly Dachshund appearance. The object of the small
wheels is evidently to lower the centre of gravity, and thus prevent
the wagons from upsetting upon the steep hillsides. The little barns
in which the hay is stored are queer cage-like structures with walls
sloping outward from the floors. They are apparently so built to guard
against damp weather.
As we journeyed north, the country became more rugged, and the forests
grander. The painted board houses gave way to a considerable extent
to rough-hewn log ones, and the people took on a more back-woodsy,
mountaineer appearance. Among the forest homes I saw several women who
were both barefooted and bareheaded. They were at work under the pale
slant rays of the Northern sun and seemed perfectly healthy and happy.
While I am dwelling near Sweden’s broad northern frontier, I wish
to digress sufficiently to tell you what I recently learned of the
work-cottages of Norrbotten, the most northern province of Sweden.
These cottages originated in a threatened famine in the region, due
to failure of crops, in 1902. The people of the isolated district
called upon their neighbors to the south for help; and they did not
call in vain. Even Swedes living in America contributed to the relief
work; and, thanks to the far-extending railroads, food reached the
starving people in time. In the remotest and most seriously afflicted
parishes temporary homes were established for the feeding of more than
four hundred children. After all danger of starvation had passed, the
leaders in the relief work came to see that such children’s homes
were a continual need in the region. Dirt and disease, indifference
and ignorance, had long ruled in the far-northern land. This state of
affairs was a result of the isolation and the depressing effect of
the long, dark, cold winters, as well as of the lack of educational
facilities; for in this bleak, sparsely-populated territory the regular
compulsory education laws cannot be enforced.
Partly through private benevolence, partly through State contribution,
the work-cottages, now eight in number, were put upon a permanent
basis. And there they are now, engaged in a splendid work. They are
educational institutions of the first order—doing for the backward
frontiers people what the settlement houses do for the slum in the
American city—and more. The needy children remain at the work-cottages
for nine months of the year for a period of four or five years,
during which time they undergo a transforming process. They are taught
personal cleanliness and orderliness, and love and patience and
self-control; they are taught to work with their hands and to think
with their heads. And when their course is finished, they return to
their homes and bring the salvation of intelligence to dark places.
More than half of the children thus befriended are Lapps, and speak
the Lapp tongue; but they learn Swedish in the work-cottages. For the
more nomadic Lapps, Norway, as well as Sweden, has provided ambulatory
schools which migrate from camp to camp with the pupils.
Thus Scandinavia is doing for her remote Northern population, both
Mongolian and white, a work such as we should be engaged in in the
interest of the mountain whites and the Negroes of our Southern States.
At Kilafors, where I changed trains for Söderhamn on the coast to
the east, it was necessary to wait two hours. Kilafors is tiny but
interesting. The great dark trees press in on every side so closely as
to give the little village the appearance of having been made to order
and lowered with derricks into a deep hole cut in the forest to receive
it. When we reached Kilafors it was well past noon, and, as there was
no dining car on the freight train, I was about starved upon arriving.
There seemed to be but one eating house in the place, and that was
a large wooden hotel, already closed, as it was past the hour for
the noon meal. Hope sprang again, however, when I saw a plain little
bakery sign up the trail-like street, and I lost no time in reaching
it. Swedish bakeries—at least country ones—are arranged rear part
before, the work room opening upon the street and the salesroom being
at the back, where the wares are mostly stored away in boxes, and not
displayed in show-cases, as in the United States.
I bought some nice little cakes and some zwieback, and when I had paid
for my purchases, the bakerman, his curiosity evidently roused by my
bad Swedish and my foreign appearance, asked whether I was a Russian.
I promptly replied that I was not.
Was I a German, then, he asked.
I replied more promptly and more emphatically that I was not a German.
Then, as his repertoire of possible nationalities seemed to be
exhausted, I volunteered the information that I was an American.
His face lit up with vivid interest. “Ja så!” he exclaimed. (“Ja så,”
is an interjection employed by Scandinavians to express almost the
whole range of emotion.)
“Yes,” said I, “I am a Californian.”
California, the Land of Gold! The bakerman’s excitement increased many
fold.
“Ja så!” he cried again, and stared me over from top to toe. I started
toward the outer door, and had to cross the workroom on an oblique line
in order to do so. Three men were rolling dough in the corner. With my
first move to go, the bakerman hurried toward his three colleagues;
and as neither side of a triangle is as long as its hypothenuse, he
reached the men before I gained the door. He whispered excitedly. The
three dropped their rolling pins, and in the few seconds before I made
my escape all four stared at me, as frankly and naturally as do a group
of youngsters before a cage of monkeys. This was scarcely a result of
bad manners; it was rather due to the temporary and legitimate waiving
of the code of etiquette in the interest of science, so to speak. An
opportunity to see a “genuine Californian” does not often present
itself in this north country, which is far from the beaten track of
tourists. Probably nothing short of a Patagonian or an Ainu could
produce equivalent excitement in the country districts of the United
States. I suppose, however, that, had the bakermen known that I was of
Scandinavian parentage, their interest in me would have been much less
keen.
I took my bakery wares and some additional ones obtained at a grocer’s
into the forest and had a picnic luncheon under the trees. After that,
I walked around and explored the place. On the outskirts of the village
I found to my astonishment a large merry-go-round, all fitted up with
wooden steeds of many colors, ready to rear and prance when the power
should be turned on. The merry-go-round was “made in America”!
On the wall of the waiting room in the railroad station was a “Prayer
of the Horse,” which had been put up by the Society of Swedish Women
for the Protection of Animals. It is needed up in that forest region
where the labor of the horse is heavy.
As train time approached, a crowd of men gathered outside of the
station. I judged them to be from the lumber camps, for they were
rather a rough-looking group. While they waited they talked noisily and
indulged in horse-play, punctuated by a very free use of profanity. One
burly, overgrown youth seemed to possess a particularly rich vocabulary
of “swear words,” and exhibited it with great gusto. Just when the
noisiness had reached its climax, a neatly dressed, gentle-faced woman,
who had been standing near me, stepped up to the men and handed several
of them pieces of white paper which looked like handbills. Then she
walked quietly away. The champion at profanity received a paper. “Svär
icke!” (Swear not at all) was printed on it in staring black type. The
voices of the men immediately dropped considerably, and after a few
scattered remarks to one another, they separated. As the burly Swede
walked away, he caught my eye and saw that I had been watching them and
had noted what had taken place. Evidently mistaking me for a native, he
came straight up to me.
“Say,” he asked, “did you see what that paper had on it?—Swear not at
all!”
“Yes,” I replied, “I saw.”
He stared blankly at me for a moment or two as if he expected me to
say something further, and then he moved off. This concrete method
of teaching the second commandment seemed to have knocked the ground
out from under his feet. I am not ready to conclude, however, that as
a result of the lady’s missionary efforts he now is a candidate for
membership in an anti-profanity society.
Presently the train for Söderhamn arrived, and I climbed aboard
and journeyed toward the coast. The territory between Kilafors and
Söderhamn is the heart of the lumbering region. Here I found the
forests larger and denser, the streams filled with logs, and along the
railroad tracks large piles of lumber covering many acres, awaiting
transportation. We passed several saw-mills, near which were great
mounds of bark and sawdust, saved for the sake of valuable by-products
to be secured from them, such as charcoal, perfumes, and dyes.
Söderhamn has a population of several thousand, and is an important
lumber-shipping harbor on the Gulf of Bothnia. My cousin Gunnar, whom
I came to visit, is customs officer for the port. He lives half way up
one of the pretty woodsy hills, in an orthodox Swedish house—dark red
with white trimmings. As my Swedish kindred are mostly town dwellers,
there is not much to say about them which would interest you, for they
live very much as town dwellers do in all countries where the culture
is of European origin. But there were a few things at Cousin Gunnar’s
which got my special attention. One was the potted tomato plant growing
in a sunny window of the dining room. It had several ripe tomatoes
upon it, in which my cousin’s wife took such pride that she hesitated
to gather them for the relish for which they were intended. When I
reflected that the tomato vine was in the latitude of south Greenland,
my respect for the small red fruit was profound. Another thing which
impressed me was the courtier-like qualities of Swedish manners as
illustrated by my cousins. Cousin Gunnar has six grown sons, some
married, with homes of their own, and others still under the paternal
roof. One or the other of these seven men seemed constantly to be just
arriving or just departing, and always with bows numerous and profound.
Before these replicas of Sir Walter Raleigh I felt myself to be a
person of at least the importance of Queen Elizabeth.
Like Gefle and all other Swedish cities which I have visited, Söderhamn
has clean, tree-shaded streets, handsome public buildings, and a
beautiful city park. Whenever possible, the Swedish park is a hilly
tract, rugged and woodsy. Such is the one at Söderhamn. And it was
beautiful indeed when I saw it a few days ago. There were the dark old
evergreens, dainty, silver-barked birches, rowan in abundance dotted
with ripe red berries, and heather in purple bloom trailing over the
gray rocks. On a high point of ground is a stone observation tower,
built in the style of a castle and named Oskarsborg in honor of the
late king. From this tower I had a fine view of the little city at
our feet, and a panoramic sweep of the tiers of forested mountains,
and of the gulf to the east. Siegfried, Cousin Gunnar’s son, who was
with me, pointed out the elevation near the coast where, in the time
of the wicked King Christian II, a Danish fort stood for the purpose
of holding the Swedes in subjection. Christian II dominated even so
far north as Söderhamn. Once, also, Siegfried told me, in Sweden’s
old warring days, the Russians had sailed up the harbor and burned
Söderhamn. May such a war-cursed time never again come near to the land
of Sweden!
ON THE TRAIN EN ROUTE TO FALUN.
P. S.—The above letter was supposed to be closed and ready for posting
at my next stop; but I am adding this to tell about a funny man from
whom I just parted company. He happened to be in the same compartment
with me when the train left Söderhamn this morning, and when the
conductor struggled to understand my bad Swedish, he kindly came to
the rescue and answered my question in English. As the gentleman
seemed quite mild and entirely harmless, I was glad of an excuse for
conversation. Nearly twenty years ago, he told me, he spent several
years in the United States as the secretary of a Swedish legation
or consulate—I have forgotten which. His English pronunciation and
grammar were remarkably good, but whole tracts of his vocabulary seemed
to have dropped out of his memory. However, I supplied the words as
needed, and we got on swimmingly for a time.
After he had given me much interesting information about the region
through which we journeyed, I, wishing to say something particularly
pleasant about his country, turned with my usual tact to the subject
which had impressed me most wherever I had been in Scandinavia—the
advanced position of the women. The gentleman acquiesced courteously
in my view; and I, much encouraged, praised the Scandinavian men for
their broad-minded attitude toward woman suffrage. Then I suddenly
found that what I had taken for mildness in the Swede’s face was really
conservatism. He promptly made it clear that he was opposed to the
enfranchisement of women. I asked for his reasons, curious to know what
a Swedish man’s objections would be like. In preparation for a crushing
argument, he mobilized his English vocabulary.
“What is the word that goes with publicans?” he asked.
“Sinners,” I replied promptly, remembering my New Testament and
wondering what was coming, “publicans and sinners.”
“Oh, yes, publicans and sinners,” said he. “Well, women are natural
born sinners” (I gasped), “or socialists,” he added, “which is the
same thing, and men are natural born publicans.”
“Democrats” was the word he had groped for—“democrats and
republicans!” I explained that I had misunderstood, and supplied the
proper words; and then the conservative gentleman proceeded to expound
his theory—that woman suffrage would produce strife in the family,
perhaps even divorce! Men folks are much alike the world over, after
all, aren’t they? As are women folks. Other arguments were marshalled
forth by both sides, but of course both of us remained of our original
opinions; and the discussion ended by my quoting the retort of Mrs.
Poyser in “Adam Bede”: “I’m not denying women are fools, God Almighty
made ’em to match the men,” whereupon my opponent laughed and found
another topic of conversation.
He was very gallant, however, and when I had to change trains at
Storvik, where he did not, he insisted, at the peril of having his
train depart without him, upon carrying all of my bundles into the
waiting room for me, and upon obtaining detailed information regarding
the train which I was to take for Falun. He was evidently used to the
“clinging-vine” type of woman. I wonder how he supposed I reached
Northern Sweden all alone.