{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_12313/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_12313","id":"gutenberg_12313","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12313","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Travel Writing","Fairy tales -- Sweden","Sweden -- Description and travel"],"text":"PICTURES OF SWEDEN\n\n\nBy\n\nHANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN\n\nAuthor of\n\"The Improvisatore,\" &c.\n\n\nLONDON:\n\nRICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.\n\n1851.\n\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\nTROLLH\u00c4TTA\n\nTHE BIRD PHOENIX\n\nKINNAKULLA\n\nGRANDMOTHER\n\nTHE PRISON-CELLS\n\nBEGGAR-BOYS\n\nVADSTENE\n\nTHE PUPPET-SHOWMAN\n\nTHE \"SKJ\u00c4RGAARDS\"\n\nSTOCKHOLM\n\nDIURGAERDEN\n\nA STORY\n\nUPSALA\n\nSALA\n\nTHE MUTE BOOK\n\nTHE Z\u00c4THER DALE\n\nTHE MIDSUMMER FESTIVAL IN LACKSAND\n\nFAITH AND KNOWLEDGE\n\nIN THE FOREST\n\nFAHLUN\n\nWHAT THE STRAWS SAID\n\nTHE POET'S SYMBOL\n\nTHE DAL-ELV\n\nDANEMORA\n\nTHE SWINE\n\nPOETRY'S CALIFORNIA\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\nWe Travel.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is a delightful spring: the birds warble, but you do not understand\ntheir song? Well, hear it in a free translation.\n\n\"Get on my back,\" says the stork, our green island's sacred bird, \"and\nI will carry thee over the Sound. Sweden also has fresh and fragrant\nbeech woods, green meadows and corn-fields. In Scania, with the\nflowering apple-trees behind the peasant's house, you will think that\nyou are still in Denmark.\"\n\n\"Fly with me,\" says the swallow; \"I fly over Holland's mountain ridge,\nwhere the beech-trees cease to grow; I fly further towards the north\nthan the stork. You shall see the vegetable mould pass over into rocky\nground; see snug, neat towns, old churches and mansions, where all is\ngood and comfortable, where the family stand in a circle around the\ntable and say grace at meals, where the least of the children says a\nprayer, and, morning and evening, sings a psalm. I have heard it, I\nhave seen it, when little, from my nest under the eaves.\"\n\n\"Come with me! come with me!\" screams the restless sea-gull, and flies\nin an expecting circle. \"Come with me to the Skj\u00e4rgaards, where rocky\nisles by thousands, with fir and pine, lie like flower-beds along the\ncoast; where the fishermen draw the well-filled nets!\"\n\n\"Rest thee between our extended wings,\" sing the wild swans. \"Let us\nbear thee up to the great lakes, the perpetually roaring elvs\n(rivers), that rush on with arrowy swiftness; where the oak forest has\nlong ceased, and the birch-tree becomes stunted. Rest thee between our\nextended wings: we fly up to Sulitelma, the island's eye, as the\nmountain is called; we fly from the vernal green valley, up over the\nsnow-drifts, to the mountain's top, whence thou canst see the North\nSea, on yonder side of Norway.\n\n\"We fly to Jemteland, where the rocky mountains are high and blue;\nwhere the Foss roars and rushes; where the torches are lighted as\n_budstikke_[A] to announce that the ferryman is expected. Up to the\ndeep, cold-running waters, where the midsummer sun does not set; where\nthe rosy hue of eve is that of morn.\"\n\n[Footnote A: A chip of wood in the form of a halberd, circulated for\nthe purpose of convening the inhabitants of a district in Sweden and\nNorway.]\n\nThat is the birds' song. Shall we lay it to heart? Shall we accompany\nthem?--at least a part of the way. We will not sit upon the stork's\nback, or between the swans' wings. We will go forward with steam, and\nwith horses--yes, also on our own legs, and glance now and then from\nreality, over the fence into the region of thought, which is always\nour near neighbour-land; pluck a flower or a leaf, to be placed in the\nnote-book--for it sprung out during our journey's flight: we fly and\nwe sing. Sweden, thou glorious land! Sweden, where, in ancient times,\nthe sacred gods came from Asia's mountains! land that still retains\nrays of their lustre, which streams from the flowers in the name of\n\"Linnaeus;\" which beams for thy chivalrous men from Charles the\nTwelfth's banner; which sounds from the obelisk on the field of\nLutzen! Sweden, thou land of deep feeling, of heart-felt songs! home\nof the limpid elvs, where the wild swans sing in the gleam of the\nNorthern Lights! Thou land, on whose deep, still lakes Scandinavia's\nfairy builds her colonnades, and leads her battling, shadowy host over\nthe icy mirror! Glorious Sweden! with thy fragrant Linnaeus, with\nJenny's soul-enlivening songs! To thee will we fly with the stork and\nthe swallow, with the restless sea-gull and the wild swans. Thy\nbirch-woods exhale refreshing fragrance under their sober, bending\nbranches; on the tree's white stem the harp shall hang: the North's\nsummer wind shall whistle therein!\n\n\n\n\nTROLLH\u00c4TTA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWho did we meet at Trollh\u00e4tta? It is a strange story, and we will\nrelate it.\n\nWe landed at the first sluice, and stood as it were in a garden laid\nout in the English style. The broad walks are covered with gravel, and\nrise in short terraces between the sunlit greensward: it is charming,\ndelightful here, but by no means imposing. If one desires to be\nexcited in this manner, one must go a little higher up to the older\nsluices, which deep and narrow have burst through the hard rock. It\nlooks magnificent, and the water in its dark bed far below is lashed\ninto foam. Up here one overlooks both elv and valley; the bank of the\nriver on the other side, rises in green undulating hills, grouped with\nleafy trees and red-painted wooden houses, which are bounded by rocks\nand pine forests. Steam-boats and sailing vessels ascend through the\nsluices; the water itself is the attendant spirit that must bear them\nup above the rock, and from the forest itself it buzzes, roars and\nrattles. The din of Trollh\u00e4tta Falls mingles with the noise from the\nsaw-mills and smithies.\n\n\"In three hours we shall be through the sluices,\" said the Captain:\n\"in that time you will see the Falls. We shall meet again at the inn\nup here.\"\n\nWe went from the path through the forest: a whole flock of bare-headed\nboys surrounded us. They would all be our guides; the one screamed\nlonger than the other, and every one gave his contradictory\nexplanation, how high the water stood, and how high it did not stand,\nor could stand. There was also a great difference of opinion amongst\nthe learned.\n\nWe soon stopped on a ling-covered rock, a dizzying terrace. Before us,\nbut far below, was the roaring water, the Hell Fall, and over this\nagain, fall after fall, the rich, rapid, rushing elv--the outlet of\nthe largest lake in Sweden. What a sight! what a foaming and roaring,\nabove--below! It is like the waves of the sea, but of effervescing\nchampagne--of boiling milk. The water rushes round two rocky islands\nat the top so that the spray rises like meadow dew. Below, the water\nis more compressed, then hurries down again, shoots forward and\nreturns in circles like smooth water, and then rolls darting its long\nsea-like fall into the Hell Fall. What a tempest rages in the\ndeep--what a sight! Words cannot express it!\n\nNor could our screaming little guides. They stood mute; and when they\nagain began with their explanations and stories, they did not come\nfar, for an old gentleman whom none of us had noticed (but he was now\namongst us), made himself heard above the noise, with his singularly\nsounding voice. He knew all the particulars about the place, and about\nformer days, as if they had been of yesterday.\n\n\"Here, on the rocky holms,\" said he, \"it was that the warriors in the\nheathen times, as they are called, decided their disputes. The warrior\nSt\u00e4rkodder dwelt in this district, and liked the pretty girl Ogn right\nwell; but she was fonder of Hergrimmer, and therefore he was\nchallenged by St\u00e4rkodder to combat here by the falls, and met his\ndeath; but Ogn sprung towards them, took her bridegroom's bloody\nsword, and thrust it into her own heart. Thus St\u00e4rkodder did not gain\nher. Then there passed a hundred years, and again a hundred years: the\nforests were then thick and closely grown; wolves and bears prowled\nhere summer and winter; the place was infested with malignant robbers,\nwhose hiding-place no one could find. It was yonder, by the fall\nbefore Top Island, on the Norwegian side--there was their cave: now it\nhas fallen in! The cliff there overhangs it!\"\n\n\"Yes, the Tailor's Cliff!\" shouted all the boys. \"It fell in the year\n1755!\"\n\n\"Fell!\" said the old man, as if in astonishment that any one but\nhimself could know it. \"Everything will fall once, and the tailor\ndirectly.\" The robbers had placed him upon the cliff and demanded that\nif he would be liberated from them, his ransom should be that he\nshould sew a suit of clothes up there; and he tried it; but at the\nfirst stitch, as he drew the thread out, he became giddy and fell down\ninto the gushing water, and thus the rock got the name of 'The\nTailor's Cliff.' One day the robbers caught a young girl, and she\nbetrayed them, for she kindled a fire in the cavern. The smoke was\nseen, the caverns discovered, and the robbers imprisoned and executed.\nThat outside there is called 'The Thieves' Fall,' and down there under\nthe water is another cave, the elv rushes in there and returns\nboiling; one can see it well up here, one hears it too, but it can be\nheard better under the bergman's loft.\n\nAnd we went on and on, along the Fall, towards Top Island,\ncontinuously on smooth paths covered with saw-dust, to Polham's\nSluice. A cleft had been made in the rock for the first intended\nsluice-work, which was not finished, but whereby art has created the\nmost imposing of all Trollh\u00e4tta's Falls; the hurrying water falling\nhere perpendicularly into the black deep. The side of the rock is here\nplaced in connection with Top Island by means of a light iron bridge,\nwhich appears as if thrown over the abyss. We venture on to the\nrocking bridge over the streaming, whirling water, and then stand on\nthe little cliff island, between firs and pines, that shoot forth from\nthe crevices. Before us darts a sea of waves, which are broken by the\nrebound against the stone block where we stand, bathing us with the\nfine spray. The torrent flows on each side, as if shot out from a\ngigantic cannon, fall after fall: we look out over them all, and are\nfilled with the harmonic sound, which since time began, has ever been\nthe same.\n\n\"No one can ever get to the island there,\" said one of our party,\npointing to the large island above the topmost fall.\n\n\"I however know one!\" said the old man, and nodded with a peculiar\nsmile.\n\n\"Yes, my grandfather could!\" said one of the boys, \"scarcely any one\nbesides has crossed during a hundred years. The cross that is set up\nover there was placed there by my grandfather. It had been a severe\nwinter, the whole of Lake Venern was frozen; the ice dammed up the\noutlet, and for many hours there was a dry bottom. Grandfather has\ntold about it: he went over with two others, placed the cross up, and\nreturned. But then there was such a thundering and cracking noise,\njust as if it were cannons. The ice broke up and the elv came over the\nfields and forest. It is true, every word I say!\"\n\nOne of the travellers cited Tegner:\n\n    \"Vildt G\u00f6ta stortade fr\u00e5n Fjallen,\n     Hemsk Trollet fr\u00e5n sat Toppfall r\u00f6t!\n     Men Snillet kom och spr\u00e4ngt stod Hallen,\n     Med Skeppen i sitt sk\u00f6t!\"\n\n\"Poor mountain sprite,\" he continued, \"thy power and glory recede! Man\nflies over thee--thou mayst go and learn of him.\"\n\nThe garrulous old man made a grimace, and muttered something to\nhimself--but we were just by the bridge before the inn. The steam-boat\nglided through the opened way, every one hastened to get on board, and\nit directly shot away above the Fall, just as if no Fall existed.\n\n\"And that can be done!\" said the old man. He knew nothing at all about\nsteam-boats, had never before that day seen such a thing, and\naccordingly he was sometimes up and sometimes down, and stood by the\nmachinery and stared at the whole construction, as if he were counting\nall the pins and screws. The course of the canal appeared to him to be\nsomething quite new; the plan of it and the guide-books were quite\nforeign objects to him: he turned them and turned them--for read I do\nnot think he could. But he knew all the particulars about the\ncountry--that is to say, from olden times.\n\nI heard that he did not sleep at all the whole night. He studied the\npassage of the steam-boat; and when we in the morning ascended the\nsluice terraces from Lake Venern, higher and higher from lake to lake,\naway over the high-plain--higher, continually higher--he was in such\nactivity that it appeared as if it could not be greater--and then we\nreached Motala.\n\nThe Swedish author Tj\u00f6rner\u00f6s relates of himself, that when a child he\nonce asked what it was that ticked in the clock, and they answered him\nthat it was one named \"_Bloodless_.\" What brought the child's pulse to\nbeat with feverish throbs and the hair on his head to rise, also\nexercised its power in Motala, over the old man from Trollh\u00e4tta.\n\nWe now went through the great manufactory in Motala. What ticks in the\nclock, beats here with strong strokes of the hammer. It is\n_Bloodless_, who drank life from human thought and thereby got limbs\nof metals, stone and wood; it is _Bloodless_, who by human thought\ngained strength, which man himself does not physically possess.\n_Bloodless_ reigns in Motala, and through the large foundries and\nfactories he extends his hard limbs, whose joints and parts consist of\nwheel within wheel, chains, bars, and thick iron wires. Enter, and see\nhow the glowing iron masses are formed into long bars. _Bloodless_\nspins the glowing bar! see how the shears cut into the heavy metal\nplates; they cut as quietly and as softly as if the plates were paper.\nHere where he hammers, the sparks fly from the anvil. See how he\nbreaks the thick iron bars; he breaks them into lengths; it is as if\nit were a stick of sealing-wax that is broken. The long iron bars\nrattle before your feet; iron plates are planed into shavings; before\nyou rolls the large wheel, and above your head runs living wire--long\nheavy wire! There is a hammering and buzzing, and if you look around\nin the large open yard, amongst great up-turned copper boilers, for\nsteam-boats and locomotives, _Bloodless_ also here stretches out one\nof his fathom-long fingers, and hauls away. Everything is living; man\nalone stands and is silenced by--_stop!_\n\nThe perspiration oozes out of one's fingers'-ends: one turns and\nturns, bows, and knows not one's self, from pure respect for the human\nthought which here has iron limbs. And yet the large iron hammer goes\non continually with its heavy strokes: it is as if it said: \"Banco,\nBanco! many thousand dollars; Banco, pure gain! Banco! Banco!\"--Hear\nit, as I heard it; see, as I saw!\n\nThe old gentleman from Trollh\u00e4tta walked up and down in full\ncontemplation; bent and swung himself about; crept on his knees, and\nstuck his head into corners and between the machines, for he would\nknow everything so exactly; he would see the screw in the propelling\nvessels, understand their mechanism and effect under water--and the\nwater itself poured like hail-drops down his forehead. He fell\nunconscious, backwards into my arms, or else he would have been drawn\ninto the machinery, and been crushed: he looked at me, and pressed my\nhand.\n\n\"And all this goes on naturally,\" said he; \"simply and comprehensibly.\nShips go against the wind, and against the stream, sail higher than\nforests and mountains. The water must raise, steam must drive them!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said I.\n\n\"Yes,\" said he, and again _yes_, with a sigh which I did not then\nunderstand; but, months after, I understood it, and I will at once\nmake a spring to that time, and we are again at Trollh\u00e4tta.\n\nI came here in the autumn, on my return home; stayed some days in this\nmighty piece of nature, where busy human life forces its way more and\nmore in, and, by degrees, transforms the picturesque to the useful\nmanufactory. Trollh\u00e4tta must do her work; saw beams, drive mills,\nhammer and break to pieces: one building grows up by the side of the\nother, and in half a century hence here will be a city. But that was\nnot the story.\n\nI came, as I have said, here again in the autumn. I found the same\nrushing and roaring, the same din, the same rising and sinking in the\nsluices, the same chattering boys who conducted fresh travellers to\nthe Hell Fall, to the iron-bridge island, and to the inn. I sat here,\nand turned over the leaves of books, collected here through a series\nof years, in which travellers have inscribed their names, feelings and\nthoughts at Trollh\u00e4tta--almost always the same astonishment, expressed\nin different languages, though generally in Latin: _veni, vidi,\nobstupui_.\n\nOne has written: \"I have seen nature's master-piece pervade that of\nart;\" another cannot say what he saw, and what he saw he cannot say. A\nmine owner and manufacturer, full of the doctrine of utility, has\nwritten: \"Seen with the greatest pleasure this useful work for us in\nV\u00e4rmeland, Trollh\u00e4tta.\" The wife of a dean from Scania expresses\nherself thus. She has kept to the family, and only signed in the\nremembrance book, as to the effect of her feelings at Trollh\u00e4tta. \"God\ngrant my brother-in-law fortune, for he has understanding!\" Some few\nhave added witticisms to the others' feelings; yet as a pearl on this\nheap of writing shines Tegner's poem, written by himself in the book\non the 28th of June, 1804:\n\n    \"Gotha kom i dans fr\u00e5n Seves fjallar, &c.\"\n\nI looked up from the book and who should stand before me, just about\nto depart again, but the old man from Trollh\u00e4tta! Whilst I had\nwandered about, right up to the shores of Siljan, he had continually\nmade voyages on the canal; seen the sluices and manufactories, studied\nsteam in all its possible powers of service, and spoke about a\nprojected railway in Sweden, between the Hjalmar and Venern. He had,\nhowever, never yet seen a railway, and I described to him these\nextended roads, which sometimes rise like ramparts, sometimes like\ntowering bridges, and at times like halls of miles in length, cut\nthrough rocks. I also spoke of America and England.\n\n\"One takes breakfast in London, and the same day one drinks tea in\nEdinburgh.\"\n\n\"That I can do!\" said the man, and in as cool a tone as if no one but\nhimself could do it, \"I can also,\" said I; \"and I have done it.\"\n\n\"And who are you, then?\" he asked.\n\n\"A common traveller,\" I replied; \"a traveller who pays for his\nconveyance. And who are you?\"\n\nThe man sighed.\n\n\"You do not know me: my time is past; my power is nothing! _Bloodless_\nis stronger than I!\" and he was gone.\n\nI then understood who he was. Well, in what humour must a poor\nmountain sprite be, who only comes up every hundred years to see how\nthings go forward here on the earth!\n\nIt was the mountain sprite and no other, for in our time every\nintelligent person is considerably wiser; and I looked with a sort of\nproud feeling on the present generation, on the gushing, rushing,\nwhirling wheel, the heavy blows of the hammer, the shears that cut so\nsoftly through the metal plates, the thick iron bars that were broken\nlike sticks of sealing-wax, and the music to which the heart's\npulsations vibrate: \"Banco, Banco, a hundred thousand Banco!\" and all\nby steam--by mind and spirit.\n\nIt was evening. I stood on the heights of Trollh\u00e4tta's old sluices,\nand saw the ships with outspread sails glide away through the meadows\nlike spectres, large and white. The sluice gates were opened with a\nponderous and crashing sound, like that related of the copper gates of\nthe secret council in Germany. The evening was so still that\nTrollh\u00e4tta's Fall was as audible in the deep stillness, as if it were\na chorus from a hundred water-mills--ever one and the same tone. In\none, however, there sounded a mightier crash that seemed to pass sheer\nthrough the earth; and yet with all this the endless silence of nature\nwas felt. Suddenly a large bird flew out from the trees, far in the\nforest, down towards the Falls. Was it the mountain sprite?--We will\nimagine so, for it is the most interesting fancy.\n\n\n\n\nTHE BIRD PHOENIX.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn the garden of Paradise, under the tree of knowledge, stood a hedge\nof roses. In the first rose a bird was hatched; its flight was like\nthat of light, its colours beautiful, its song magnificent.\n\nBut when Eve plucked the fruit of knowledge, when she and Adam were\ndriven from the garden of Paradise, a spark from the avenging angel's\nflaming sword fell into the bird's nest and kindled it. The bird died\nin the flames, but from the red egg there flew a new one--the only\none--the ever only bird Phoenix. The legend states that it takes up\nits abode in Arabia; that every hundred years it burns itself up in\nits nest, and that a new Phoenix, the only one in the world, flies out\nfrom the red egg.\n\nThe bird hovers around us, rapid as the light, beautiful in colour,\nglorious in song. When the mother sits by the child's cradle, it is by\nthe pillow, and with its wings flutters a glory around the child's\nhead. It flies through the chamber of contentment, and there is the\nsun's radiance within:--the poor chest of drawers is odoriferous with\nviolets.\n\nBut the bird Phoenix is not alone Arabia's bird: it flutters in the\nrays of the Northern Lights on Lapland's icy plains; it hops amongst\nthe yellow flowers in Greenland's short summer. Under Fahlun's copper\nrocks, in England's coal mines, it flies like a powdered moth over the\nhymn-book in the pious workman's hands. It sails on the lotus-leaf\ndown the sacred waters of the Ganges, and the eyes of the Hindoo girl\nglisten on seeing it.\n\nThe bird Phoenix! Dost thou not know it? The bird of Paradise, song's\nsacred swan! It sat on the car of Thespis, like a croaking raven, and\nflapped its black, dregs-besmeared wings; over Iceland's minstrel-harp\nglided the swan's red, sounding bill. It sat on Shakspeare's shoulder\nlike Odin's raven, and whispered in his ear: \"Immortality!\" It flew at\nthe minstrel competition, through Wartzburg's knightly halls.\n\nThe bird Phoenix! Dost thou not know it? It sang the Marseillaise for\nthee, and thou didst kiss the plume that fell from its wing: it came\nin the lustre of Paradise, and thou perhaps didst turn thyself away to\nsome poor sparrow that sat with merest tinsel on its wings.\n\nThe bird of Paradise! regenerated every century, bred in flames, dead\nin flames; thy image set in gold hangs in the saloons of the rich,\neven though thou fliest often astray and alone. \"The bird Phoenix in\nArabia\"--is but a legend.\n\nIn the garden of Paradise, when thou wast bred under the tree of\nknowledge, in the first rose, our Lord kissed thee and gave thee thy\nproper name--Poetry.\n\n\n\n\nKINNAKULLA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nKinnakulla, Sweden's hanging gardens! Thee will we visit. We stand by\nthe lowest terrace in a plenitude of flowers and verdure; the ancient\nvillage church leans its grey pointed wooden tower, as if it would\nfall; it produces an effect in the landscape: we would not even be\nwithout that large flock of birds, which just now chance to fly away\nover the mountain forest.\n\nThe high road leads up the mountain with short palings on either side,\nbetween which we see extensive plains with hops, wild roses,\ncorn-fields, and delightful beech woods, such as are not to be found\nin any other place in Sweden. The ivy winds itself around old trees\nand stones--even to the withered trunk green leaves are lent. We look\nout over the flat, extended woody plain, to the sunlit church-tower of\nMaristad, which shines like a white sail on the dark green sea: we\nlook out over the Venern Lake, but cannot see its further shore.\nSkj\u00e4rgaardens' wood-crowned rocks lie like a wreath down in the lake;\nthe steam-boat comes--see! down by the cliff under the red-roofed\nmansions, where the beech and walnut trees grow in the garden.\n\nThe travellers land; they wander under shady trees away over that\npretty light green meadow, which is enwreathed by gardens and woods:\nno English park has a finer verdure than the meadows near Hellekis.\nThey go up to \"the grottos,\" as they call the projecting masses of red\nstone higher up, which, being thoroughly kneaded with petrifactions,\nproject from the declivity of the earth, and remind one of the\nmouldering colossal tombs in the Campagna of Rome. Some are smooth and\nrounded off by the streaming of the water, others bear the moss of\nages, grass and flowers, nay, even tall trees.\n\nThe travellers go from the forest road up to the top of Kinnakulla,\nwhere a stone is raised as the goal of their wanderings. The traveller\nreads in his guide-book about the rocky strata of Kinnakulla: \"At the\nbottom is found sandstone, then alum-stone, then limestone, and above\nthis red-stone, higher still slate, and lastly, trap.\" And, now that\nhe has seen this, he descends again, and goes on board. He has seen\nKinnakulla:--yes, the stony rock here, amidst the swelling verdure,\nshowed him one heavy, thick stone finger, and most of the travellers\nthink that they are like the devil, if they lay hold upon one finger,\nthey have the body--but it is not always so. The least visited side of\nKinnakulla is just the most characteristic, and thither will we go.\n\nThe road still leads us a long way on this side of the mountain, step\nby step downwards, in long terraces of rich fields: further down, the\nslate-stone peers forth in flat layers, a green moss upon it, and it\nlooks like threadbare patches in the green velvet carpet. The high\nroad leads over an extent of ground where the slate-stone lies like a\nfirm floor. In the Campagna of Rome, one would say it is a piece of\n_via appia_, or antique road; but it is Kinnakulla's naked skin and\nbones that we pass over. The peasant's house is composed of large\nslate-stones, and the roof is covered with them; one sees nothing of\nwood except that of the door, and above it, of the large painted\nshield, which states to what regiment the soldier belongs who got this\nhouse and plot of ground in lieu of pay.\n\nWe cast another glance over Venern, to Lock\u00f6's old palace, to the town\nof Lendkjobing, and are again near verdant fields and noble trees,\nthat cast their shadows over Blomberg, where, in the garden, the poet\nGeier's spirit seeks the flower of Kinnakulla in his grand-daughter,\nlittle Anna.\n\nThe plain expands here behind Kinnakulla; it extends for miles around,\ntowards the horizon. A shower stands in the heavens; the wind has\nincreased: see how the rain falls to the ground like a darkening veil.\nThe branches of the trees lash one another like penitential dryades.\nOld Husaby church lies near us, yonder; though the shower lashes the\nhigh walls, which alone stand, of the old Catholic Bishop's palace.\nCrows and ravens fly through the long glass-less windows, which time\nhas made larger; the rain pours down the crevices in the old grey\nwalls, as if they were now to be loosened stone from stone: but the\nchurch stands--old Husaby church--so grey and venerable, with its\nthick walls, its small windows, and its three spires stuck against\neach other, and standing, like nuts, in a cluster.\n\nThe old trees in the churchyard cast their shade over ancient graves.\nWhere is the district's \"Old Mortality,\" who weeds the grass, and\nexplains the ancient memorials? Large granite stones are laid here in\nthe form of coffins, ornamented with rude carvings from the times of\nCatholicism. The old church-door creaks in the hinges. We stand within\nits walls, where the vaulted roof was filled for centuries with the\nfragrance of incense, with monks, and with the song of the choristers.\nNow it is still and mute here: the old men in their monastic dresses\nhave passed into their graves; the blooming boys that swung the censer\nare in their graves; the congregation--many generations--all in their\ngraves; but the church still stands the same. The moth-eaten, dusty\ncowls, and the bishops' mantle, from the days of the cloister, hang in\nthe old oak presses; and old manuscripts, half eaten up by the rats,\nlie strewed about on the shelves in the sacristy.\n\nIn the left aisle of the church there still stands, and has stood time\nout of mind, a carved image of wood, painted in various colours which\nare still strong: it is the Virgin Mary with the child Jesus. Fresh\nflower wreaths are hung around hers and the child's head; fragrant\ngarlands are twined around the pedestal, as festive as on Madonna's\nbirthday feast in the times of Popery. The young folks who have been\nconfirmed, have this day, on receiving the sacrament for the first\ntime, ornamented this old image--nay, even set the priest's name in\nflowers upon the altar; and he has, to our astonishment, let it remain\nthere.\n\nThe image of Madonna seems to have become young by the fresh wreaths:\nthe fragrant flowers here have a power like that of poetry--they bring\nback the days of past centuries to our own times. It is as if the\nextinguished glory around the head shone again; the flowers exhale\nperfume: it is as if incense again streamed through the aisles of the\nchurch--it shines around the altar as if the consecrated tapers were\nlighted--it is a sunbeam through the window.\n\nThe sky without has become clear: we drive again in under Cleven, the\nbarren side of Kinnakulla: it is a rocky wall, different from almost\nall the others. The red stone blocks lie, strata on strata, forming\nfortifications with embrasures, projecting wings and round towers; but\nshaken, split and fallen in ruins--it is an architectural fantastic\nfreak of nature. A brook falls gushing down from one of the highest\npoints of the Cleven, and drives a little mill. It looks like a\nplaything which the mountain sprite had placed there and forgotten.\n\nLarge masses of fallen stone blocks lie dispersed round about; nature\nhas spread them in the forms of carved cornices. The most significant\nway of describing Kinnakulla's rocky wall is to call it the ruins of a\nmile-long Hindostanee temple: these rocks might be easily transformed\nby the hammer into sacred places like the Ghaut mountains at Ellara.\nIf a Brahmin were to come to Kinnakulla's rocky wall, he would\nrecognise the temple of Cailasa, and find in the clefts and crevices\nwhole representations from Ramagena and Mahabharata. If one should\nthen speak to him in a sort of gibberish--no matter what, only that,\nby the help of Brockhaus's \"Conversation-Lexicon\" one might mingle\ntherein the names of some of the Indian spectacles:--Sakantala,\nVikramerivati, Uttaram Ramatscheritram, &c.--the Brahmin would be\ncompletely mystified, and write in his note-book: \"Kinnakulla is the\nremains of a temple, like those we have in Ellara; and the inhabitants\nthemselves know the most considerable works in our oldest Sanscrit\nliterature, and speak in an extremely spiritual manner about them.\"\nBut no Brahmin comes to the high rocky walls--not to speak of the\ncompany from the steam-boat, who are already far over the lake Venern.\nThey have seen wood-crowned Kinnakulla, Sweden's hanging gardens--and\nwe also have now seen them.\n\n\n\n\nGRANDMOTHER.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nGrandmother is so old, she has so many wrinkles, and her hair is quite\nwhite; but her eyes! they shine like two stars, nay, they are much\nfiner--they are so mild, so blissful to look into. And then she knows\nthe most amusing stories, and she has a gown with large, large flowers\non it, and it is of such thick silk that it actually rustles.\nGrandmother knows so much, for she has lived long before father and\nmother--that is quite sure.\n\nGrandmother has a psalm-book with thick silver clasps, and in that\nbook she often reads. In the middle of it lies a rose, which is quite\nflat and dry; but it is not so pretty as the roses she has in the\nglass, yet she smiles the kindliest to it, nay, even tears come into\nher eyes!\n\nWhy does Grandmother look thus on the withered flower in the old book?\nDo you know why?\n\nEvery time that Grandmother's tears fall on the withered flower the\ncolours become fresher; the rose then swells and the whole room is\nfilled with fragrance; the walls sink as if they were but mists; and\nround about, it is the green, the delightful grove, where the sun\nshines between the leaves. And Grandmother--yes, she is quite young;\nshe is a beautiful girl, with yellow hair, with round red cheeks,\npretty and charming--no rose is fresher. Yet the eyes, the mild,\nblissful eyes,--yes, they are still Grandmother's! By her side sits a\nman, young and strong: he presents the rose to her and she smiles. Yet\ngrandmother does not smile so,--yes; the smile comes,--he is\ngone.--Many thoughts and many forms go past! That handsome man is\ngone; the rose lies in the psalm-book, and grandmother,--yes, she\nagain sits like an old woman, and looks on the withered rose that lies\nin the book.\n\nNow grandmother is dead!\n\nShe sat in the arm-chair, and told a long, long, sweet story. \"And now\nit is ended!\" said she, \"and I am quite tired: let me now sleep a\nlittle!\" And so she laid her head back to rest. She drew her breath,\nshe slept, but it became more and more still; and her face was so full\nof peace and happiness--it was as if the sun's rays passed over it.\nShe smiled, and then they said that she was dead.\n\nShe was laid in the black coffin; she lay swathed in the white linen:\nshe was so pretty, and yet the eyes were closed--but all the wrinkles\nwere gone. She lay with a smile around her mouth: her hair was so\nsilvery white, so venerable, one was not at all afraid to look on the\ndead, for it was the sweet, benign grandmother. And the psalm-book was\nlaid in the coffin under her head (she herself had requested it), and\nthe rose lay in the old book--and then they buried grandmother.\n\nOn the grave, close under the church-wall, they planted a rose-tree,\nand it became full of roses, and the nightingale sang over it, and the\norgan in the church played the finest psalms that were in the book\nunder the dead one's head. And the moon shone straight down on the\ngrave--but the dead was not there: every child could go quietly in the\nnight-time and pluck a rose there by the churchyard-wall. The dead\nknow more than all we living know--the dead know the awe we should\nfeel at something so strange as their coming to us. The dead are\nbetter than us all, and therefore they do not come.\n\nThere is earth over the coffin, there is earth within it; the\npsalm-book with its leaves is dust the rose with all its recollections\nhas gone to dust. But above it bloom new roses, above is sings the\nnightingale, and the organ plays:--we think of the old grandmother\nwith the mild, eternally young eyes. Eyes can never die! Ours shall\nonce again see her young, and beautiful, as when she for the first\ntime kissed the fresh red rose which is now dust in the grave.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PRISON-CELLS.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBy separation from other men, by solitary confinement, in continual\nsilence, the criminal is to be punished and amended; therefore were\nprison-cells contrived. In Sweden there were several, and new ones\nhave been built. I visited one for the first time in Mariestad. This\nbuilding lies close outside the town, by a running water, and in a\nbeautiful landscape. It resembles a large white-washed summer\nresidence, window above window.\n\nBut we soon discover that the stillness of the grave rests over it. It\nis as if no one dwelt here, or like a deserted mansion in the time of\nthe plague. The gates in the walls are locked: one of them is opened\nfor us: the gaoler stands with his bunch of keys: the yard is empty,\nbut clean--even the grass weeded away between the stone paving. We\nenter the waiting-room, where the prisoner is received: we are shown\nthe bathing-room, into which he is first led. We now ascend a flight\nof stairs, and are in a large hall, extending the whole length and\nbreadth of the building. Galleries run along the floors, and between\nthese the priest has his pulpit, where he preaches on Sundays to an\ninvisible congregation. All the doors facing the gallery are half\nopened: the prisoners hear the priest, but cannot see him, nor he\nthem. The whole is a well-built machine--a nightmare for the spirit.\nIn the door of every cell there is fixed a glass, about the size of\nthe eye: a slide covers it, and the gaoler can, unobserved by the\nprisoner, see everything he does; but he must come gently,\nnoiselessly, for the prisoner's ear is wonderfully quickened by\nsolitude. I turned the slide quite softly, and looked into the closed\nspace, when the prisoner's eye immediately met mine. It is airy,\nclean, and light within the cell, but the window is placed so high\nthat it is impossible to look out of it. A high stool, made fast to a\nsort of table, and a hammock, which can be hung upon hooks under the\nceiling, and covered with a quilt, compose the whole furniture.\n\nSeveral cells were opened for us. In one of these was a young, and\nextremely pretty girl. She had lain down in her hammock, but sprang\nout directly the door was opened, and her first employment was to lift\nher hammock down, and roll it together. On the little table stood a\npitcher with water, and by it lay the remains of some oatmeal cakes,\nbesides the Bible and some psalms.\n\nIn the cell close by sat a child's murderess. I saw her only through\nthe little glass in the door. She had had heard our footsteps; heard\nus speak; but she sat still, squeezed up into the corner by the door,\nas if she would hide herself as much as possible: her back was bent,\nher head almost on a level with her lap, and her hands folded over it.\nThey said this unfortunate creature was very young. Two brothers sat\nhere in two different cells: they were punished for horse stealing;\nthe one was still quite a boy.\n\nIn one cell was a poor servant girl. They said: \"She has no place of\nresort, and without a situation, and therefore she is placed here.\" I\nthought I had not heard rightly, and repeated my question, \"why she\nwas here,\" but got the same answer. Still I would rather believe that\nI had misunderstood what was said--it would otherwise be abominable.\n\nOutside, in the free sunshine, it is the busy day; in here it is\nalways midnight's stillness. The spider that weaves its web down the\nwall, the swallow which perhaps flies a single time close under the\npanes there high up in the wall--even the stranger's footstep in the\ngallery, as he passes the cell-doors, is an event in that mute,\nsolitary life, where the prisoners' thoughts are wrapped up in\nthemselves. One must read of the martyr-filled prisons of the\nInquisition, of the crowds chained together in the Bagnes, of the hot,\nlead chambers of Venice, and the black, wet gulf of the wells--be\nthoroughly shaken by these pictures of misery, that we may with a\nquieter pulsation of the heart wander through the gallery of the\nprison-cells. Here is light, here is air;--here it is more humane.\nWhere the sunbeam shines mildly in on the prisoner, there also will\nthe radiance of God shine into the heart.\n\n\n\n\nBEGGAR-BOYS.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe painter Callot--who does not know the name, at least from\nHoffmann's \"in Callot's manner?\"--has given a few excellent pictures\nof Italian beggars. One of these is a fellow, on whom the one rag\nlashes the other: he carries his huge bundle and a large flag with the\ninscription, \"Capitano de Baroni.\" One does not think that there can\nin reality be found such a wandering rag-shop, and we confess that in\nItaly itself we have not seen any such; for the beggar-boy there,\nwhose whole clothing often consists only of a waistcoat, has in it not\nsufficient costume for such rags.\n\nBut we see it in the North. By the canal road between the Venern and\nVigen, on the bare, dry rocky plain there stood, like beauty's\nthistles in that poor landscape, a couple of beggar-boys, so ragged,\nso tattered, so picturesquely dirty, that we thought we had Callot's\noriginals before us, or that it was an arrangement of some industrious\nparents, who would awaken the traveller's attention and benevolence.\nNature does not form such things: there was something so bold in the\nhanging on of the rags, that each boy instantly became a Capitano de\nBaroni.\n\nThe younger of the two had something round him that had certainly once\nbeen the jacket of a very corpulent man, for it reached almost to the\nboy's ancles; the whole hung fast by a piece of the sleeve and a\nsingle brace, made from the seam of what was now the rest of the\nlining. It was very difficult to see the transition from jacket to\ntrowsers, the rags glided so into one another. The whole clothing was\narranged so as to give him an air-bath: there were draught holes on\nall sides and ends; a yellow linen clout fastened to the nethermost\nregions seemed as if it were to signify a shirt. A very large straw\nhat, that had certainly been driven over several times, was stuck\nsideways on his head, and allowed the boy's wiry, flaxen hair to grow\nfreely through the opening where the crown should have been: the naked\nbrown shoulder and upper part of the arm, which was just as brown,\nwere the prettiest of the whole.\n\nThe other boy had only a pair of trowsers on. They were also ragged,\nbut the rags were bound fast into the pockets with packthread; one\nstring round the ancles, one under the knee, and another round about\nthe waist. He, however, kept together what he had, and that is always\nrespectable.\n\n\"Be off!\" shouted the Captain, from the vessel; and the boy with the\ntied-up rags turned round, and we--yes, we saw nothing but packthread,\nin bows, genteel bows. The front part of the boy only was covered: he\nhad only the foreparts of trowsers--the rest was packthread, the bare,\nnaked packthread.\n\n\n\n\nVADSTENE.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIn Sweden, it is not only in the country, but even in several of the\nprovincial towns, that one sees whole houses of grass turf or with\nroofs of grass turf; and some are so low that one might easily spring\nup to the roof, and sit on the fresh greensward. In the early spring,\nwhilst the fields are still covered with snow, but which is melted on\nthe roof, the latter affords the first announcement of spring, with\nthe young sprouting grass where the sparrow twitters: \"Spring comes!\"\n\nBetween Motala and Vadstene, close by the high road, stands a\ngrass-turf house--one of the most picturesque. It has but one window,\nbroader than it is high, and a wild rose branch forms the curtain\noutside.\n\nWe see it in the spring. The roof is so delightfully fresh with grass,\nit has quite the tint of velvet; and close to it is the chimney, nay,\neven a cherry-tree grows out of its side, now full of flowers: the\nwind shakes the leaves down on a little lamb that is tethered to the\nchimney. It is the only lamb of the family. The old dame who lives\nhere, lifts it up to its place herself in the morning and lifts it\ndown again in the evening, to give it a place in the room. The roof\ncan just bear the little lamb, but not more--this is an experience and\na certainty. Last autumn--and at that time the grass turf roofs are\ncovered with flowers, mostly blue and yellow, the Swedish\ncolours--there grew here a flower of a rare kind. It shone in the eyes\nof the old Professor, who on his botanical tour came past here. The\nProfessor was quickly up on the roof, and just as quick was one of his\nbooted legs through it, and so was the other leg, and then half of the\nProfessor himself--that part where the head does not sit; and as the\nhouse had no ceiling, his legs hovered right over the old dame's head,\nand that in very close contact. But now the roof is again whole; the\nfresh grass grows where learning sank; the little lamb bleats up\nthere, and the old dame stands beneath, in the low doorway, with\nfolded hands, with a smile on her mouth, rich in remembrances, legends\nand songs, rich in her only lamb on which the cherry-tree strews its\nflower-blossoms in the warm spring sun.\n\nAs a background to this picture lies the Vettern--the bottomless lake\nas the commonalty believe--with its transparent water, its sea-like\nwaves, and in calm, with \"Hegring,\" or fata morgana on its steel-like\nsurface. We see Vadstene palace and town, \"the city of the dead,\" as a\nSwedish author has called it--Sweden's Herculaneum, reminiscence's\ncity. The grass-turf house must be our box, whence we see the rich\nmementos pass before us--memorials from the chronicle of saints, the\nchronicle of kings and the love songs that still live with the old\ndame, who stands in her low house there, where the lamb crops the\ngrass on the roof. We hear her, and we see with her eyes; we go from\nthe grass-turf house up to the town, to the other grass-turf houses,\nwhere poor women sit and make lace, once the celebrated work of the\nrich nuns here in the cloister's wealthy time.\n\nHow still, solitary and grass-grown are these streets! We stop by an\nold wall, mouldy-green for centuries already. Within it stood the\ncloister; now there is but one of its wings remaining. There, within\nthat now poor garden still bloom Saint Bridget's leek, and once ran\nflowers. King John and the Abbess, Ana Gylte, wandered one evening\nthere, and the King cunningly asked: \"If the maidens in the cloister\nwere never tempted by love?\" and the Abbess answered, as she pointed\nto a bird that just then flew over them: \"It may happen! One cannot\nprevent the bird from flying over the garden; but one may surely\nprevent it from building its nest there!\"\n\nThus thought the pious Abbess, and there have been sisters who thought\nand acted like her. But it is quite as sure that in the same garden\nthere stood a pear-tree, called the tree of death; and the legend says\nof it, that whoever approached and plucked its fruit would soon die.\nRed and yellow pears weighed down its branches to the ground. The\ntrunk was unusually large; the grass grew high around it, and many a\nmorning hour was it seen trodden down. Who had been here during the\nnight?\n\nA storm arose one evening from the lake, and the next morning the\nlarge tree was found thrown down; the trunk was broken, and out from\nit there rolled infants' bones--the white bones of murdered children\nlay shining in the grass.\n\nThe pious but love-sick sister Ingrid, this Vadstene's Heloise, writes\nto her heart's beloved, Axel Nilsun--for the chronicles have preserved\nit for us:--\n\n\"Broderne og Systarne leka paa Spil, drikke Vin och dansa med\nhvarandra i Tradg\u00e5rden!\"\n\n(The brothers and sisters amuse themselves in play, drink wine and\ndance with one another in the garden).\n\nThese words may explain to us the history of the pear-tree: one is led\nto think of the orgies of the nun-phantoms in \"Robert le Diable,\" the\ndaughters of sin on consecrated ground. But \"judge not, lest ye be\njudged,\" said the purest and best of men that was born of woman. We\nwill read Sister Ingrid's letter, sent secretly to him she truly\nloved. In it lies the history of many, clear and human to us:--\n\n\"Jag djerfues for ingen utan for dig allena bek\u00e4nna, att jag form\u00e5r\nilia \u00e5nda mit Ave Maria eller l\u00e4sa mit Paternoster, utan du kommer mig\nich\u00e5gen. Ja i sjelfa messen kommer mig fore dit t\u00e4ckleliga Ansigte och\nvart k\u00e5rliga omgange. Jag tycker jag kan icke skifta mig for n genann\nan Menniska, jungfru Maria, St. Birgitta och himmelens H\u00e4rskaror\nskalla kanske straffe mig h\u00e5rfar? Men du vet det val, hjertans k\u00e4raste\natt jag med fri vilja och upps\u00e4t aldrig dissa reglar samtykt. Mine\nfor\u00e4ldrer hafva v\u00e4l min kropp i dette fangelset insatt, men hjert\u00e4t\nkan intet s\u00e5 snart fr\u00e5n verlden ater kalles!\"\n\n(I dare not confess to any other than to thee, that I am not able to\nrepeat my Ave Maria or read my Paternoster, without calling thee to\nmind. Nay, even in the mass itself thy comely face appears, and our\naffectionate intercourse recurs to me. It seems to me that I cannot\nconfess to any other human being--the Virgin Mary, St. Bridget, and\nthe whole host of heaven will perhaps punish me for it. But thou\nknowest well, my heart's beloved, that I have never consented with my\nfree-will to these rules. My parents, it is true, have placed my body\nin this prison, but the heart cannot so soon be weaned from the\nworld).\n\nHow touching is the distress of young hearts! It offers itself to us\nfrom the mouldy parchment, it resounds in old songs. Beg the\ngrey-haired old dame in the grass turf-house to sing to thee of the\nyoung, heavy sorrow, of the saving angel--and the angel came in many\nshapes. You will hear the song of the cloister robbery; of Herr Carl\nwho was sick to death; when the young nun entered the corpse chamber,\nsat down by his feet and whispered how sincerely she had loved him,\nand the knight rose from his bier and bore her away to marriage and\npleasure in Copenhagen. And all the nuns of the cloister sang: \"Christ\ngrant that such an angel were to come, and take both me and thee!\"\n\nThe old dame will also sing for thee of the beautiful Ogda and Oluf\nTyste; and at once the cloister is revived in its splendour, the bells\nring, stone houses arise--they even rise from the waters of the\nVettern: the little town becomes churches and towers. The streets are\ncrowded with great, with sober, well-dressed persons. Down the stairs\nof the town hall descends with a sword by his side and in fur-lined\ncloak, the most wealthy citizen of Vadstene, the merchant Michael. By\nhis side is his young, beautiful daughter Agda, richly-dressed and\nhappy; youth in beauty, youth in mind. All eyes are turned on the rich\nman--and yet forget him for her, the beautiful. Life's best blessings\nawait her; her thoughts soar upwards, her mind aspires; her future is\nhappiness! These were the thoughts of the many--and amongst the many\nthere was one who saw her as Romeo saw Juliet, as Adam saw Eve in the\ngarden of Paradise. That one was Oluf, the handsomest young man, but\npoor as Agda was rich. And he must conceal his love; but as only he\nlived in it, only he knew of it; so he became mute and still, and\nafter months had passed away, the town's folk called him Oluf Tyste\n(Oluf the silent).\n\nNights and days he combated his love; nights and days he suffered\ninexpressible torment; but at last--one dew-drop or one sunbeam alone\nis necessary for the ripe rose to open its leaves--he must tell it to\nAgda. And she listened to his words, was terrified, and sprang away;\nbut the thought remained with him, and the heart went after the\nthought and stayed there; she returned his love strongly and truly,\nbut in modesty and honour; and therefore poor Oluf came to the rich\nmerchant and sought his daughter's hand. But Michael shut the bolts of\nhis door and his heart too. He would neither listen to tears nor\nsupplications, but only to his own will; and as little Agda also kept\nfirm to her will, her father placed her in Vadstene cloister. And Oluf\nwas obliged to submit, as it is recorded in the old song, that they\ncast\n\n    \"----den svarta Muld\n     Alt \u00f6fver sk\u00f6n Agdas arm.\"[B]\n\n[Footnote B: The black mould over the beautiful Agda's arm.]\n\nShe was dead to him and the world. But one night, in tempestuous\nweather, whilst the rain streamed down, Oluf Tyste came to the\ncloister wall, threw his rope-ladder over it, and however high the\nVettern lifted its waves, Oluf and little Agda flew away over its\nfathomless depths that autumn night.\n\nEarly in the morning the nuns missed little Agda. What a screaming and\nshouting--the cloister is disgraced! The Abbess and Michael the\nmerchant swore that vengeance and death should reach the fugitives.\nLindkj\u00f6ping's severe bishop, Hans Brask, fulminated his ban over them,\nbut they were already across the waters of the Vettern; they had\nreached the shores of the Venern, they were on Kinnakulla, with one of\nOluf's friends, who owned the delightful Hellekis.\n\nHere their marriage was to be celebrated. The guests were invited, and\na monk from the neighbouring cloister of Husaby, was fetched to marry\nthem. Then came the messenger with the bishop's excommunication, and\nthis--but not the marriage ceremony--was read to them.\n\nAll turned away from them terrified. The owner of the house, the\nfriend of Oluf's youth, pointed to the open door and bade them depart\ninstantly. Oluf only requested a car and horse wherewith to convey\naway his exhausted Agda; but they threw sticks and stones after them,\nand Oluf was obliged to bear his poor bride in his arms far into the\nforest.\n\nHeavy and bitter was their wandering. At last, however, they found a\nhome: it was in Guldkroken, in West Gothland. An honest old couple\ngave them shelter and a place by the hearth: they stayed there till\nChristmas, and on that holy eve there was to be a real Christmas\nfestival. The guests were invited, the furmenty set forth; and now\ncame the clergyman of the parish to say prayers; but whilst he spoke\nhe recognised Oluf and Agda, and the prayer became a curse upon the\ntwo. Anxiety and terror came over all; they drove the excommunicated\npair out of the house, out into the biting frost, where the wolves\nwent in flocks, and the bear was no stranger. And Oluf felled wood in\nthe forest, and kindled a fire to frighten away the noxious animals\nand keep life in Agda--he thought that she must die. But just then she\nwas stronger of the two.\n\n\"Our Lord is almighty and gracious; He will not leave us!\" said she.\n\"He has one here on the earth, one who can save us, one, who has\nproved like us, what it is to wander amongst enemies and wild animals.\nIt is the King--Gustavus Vasa! He has languished like us!--gone astray\nin Dalecarlia in the deep snow! he has suffered, tried, knows it--he\ncan and he will help us!\"\n\nThe King was in Vadstene. He had called together the representatives\nof the kingdom there. He dwelt in the cloister itself, even there\nwhere little Agda, if the King did not grant her pardon, must suffer\nwhat the angry Abbess dared to advise: penance and a painful death\nawaited her.\n\nThrough forests and by untrodden paths, in storm and snow, Oluf and\nAgda came to Vadstene. They were seen: some showed fear, others\ninsulted and threatened them. The guard of the cloister made the sign\nof the cross on seeing the two sinners, who dared to ask admission to\nthe King.\n\n\"I will receive and hear all,\" was his royal message, and the two\nlovers fell trembling at his feet.\n\nAnd the King looked mildly on them; and as he long had had the\nintention to humiliate the proud Bishop of Lindkj\u00f6ping, the moment was\nnot unfavourable to them; the King listened to the relation of their\nlives and sufferings, and gave them his word, that the excommunication\nshould be annulled. He then placed their hands one in the other, and\nsaid that the priest should also do the same soon; and he promised\nthem his royal protection and favour.\n\nAnd old Michael, the merchant, who feared the King's anger, with which\nhe was threatened, became so mild and gentle, that he, as the King\ncommanded, not only opened his house and his arms to Oluf and Agda,\nbut displayed all his riches on the wedding-day of the young couple.\nThe marriage ceremony took place in the cloister church, whither the\nKing himself led the bride, and where, by his command, all the nuns\nwere obliged to be present, in order to give still more ecclesiastical\npomp to the festival. And many a heart there silently recalled the old\nsong about the cloister robbery and looked at Oluf Tyste:\n\n    \"Krist gif en sadan Angel\n    Kom, tog b\u00e5d mig och dig!\"[C]\n\n[Footnote C: Christ grant that such an angel were to come, and take\nboth me and thee!]\n\nThe sun now shines through the open cloister-gate. Let truth shine\ninto our hearts; let us likewise acknowledge the cloister's share of\nGod's influence. Every cell was not quite a prison, where the\nimprisoned bird flew in despair against the window-pane; here\nsometimes was sunshine from God in the heart and mind, from hence also\nwent out comfort and blessings. If the dead could rise from their\ngraves they would bear witness thereof: if we saw them in the\nmoonlight lift the tombstone and step forth towards the cloister, they\nwould say: \"Blessed be these walls!\" if we saw them in the sunlight\nhovering in the rainbow's gleam, they would say: \"Blessed be these\nwalls!\"\n\nHow changed the rich, mighty Vadstene cloister, where the first\ndaughters of the land were nuns, where the young nobles of the land\nwore the monk's cowl. Hither they made pilgrimages from Italy, from\nSpain: from far distant lands, in snow and cold, the pilgrim came\nbarefooted to the cloister door. Pious men and women bore the corpse\nof St. Bridget hither in their hands from Rome, and all the\nchurch-bells in all the lands and towns they passed through, tolled\nwhen they came.\n\nWe go towards the cloister--the remains of the old ruin. We enter St.\nBridget's cell--it still stands unchanged. It is low, small and\nnarrow: four diminutive frames form the whole window, but one can look\nfrom it out over the whole garden, and far away over the Vettern. We\nsee the same beautiful landscape that the fair Saint saw as a frame\naround her God, whilst she read her morning and evening prayers. In\nthe tile-stone of the floor there is engraved a rosary: before it, on\nher bare knees, she said a pater-noster at every pearl there pointed\nout. Here is no chimney--no hearth, no place for it. Cold and solitary\nit is, and was, here where the world's most far-famed woman dwelt, she\nwho by her own sagacity, and by her contemporaries was raised to the\nthrone of female saints.\n\nFrom this poor cell we enter one still meaner, one still more narrow\nand cold, where the faint light of day struggles in through a long\ncrevice in the wall. Glass there never was here: the wind blows in\nhere. Who was she who once dwelt in this cell?\n\nIn our times they have arranged light, warm chambers close by: a whole\nrange opens into the broad passage. We hear merry songs; laughter we\nhear, and weeping: strange figures nod to us from these chambers. Who\nare these? The rich cloister of St. Bridget's, whence kings made\npilgrimages, is now Sweden's mad-house. And here the numerous\ntravellers write their names on the wall. We hasten from the hideous\nscene into the splendid cloister church,--the blue church, as it is\ncalled, from the blue stones of which the walls are built--and here,\nwhere the large stones of the floor cover great men, abbesses and\nqueens, only one monument is noticeable, that of a knightly figure\ncarved in stone, which stands aloft before the altar. It is that of\nthe insane Duke Magnus. Is it not as if he stepped forth from amongst\nthe dead, and announced that such afflicted creatures were to be where\nSt. Bridget once ruled?\n\nPace lightly over the floor! Thy foot treads on the graves of the\npious: the flat, modest stone here in the corner covers the dust of\nthe noble Queen Philippa. She, that mighty England's daughter, the\ngreat-hearted, the immortal woman, who with wisdom and courage\ndefended her consort's throne, that consort who rudely and barbarously\ncast her off! Vadstene's cloister gave her shelter--the grave here\ngave her rest.\n\nWe seek one grave. It is not known--it is forgotten, as she was in her\nlifetime. Who was she? The cloistered sister Elizabeth, daughter of\nthe Holstein Count, and once the bride of King Hakon of Norway. Sweet\ncreature! she proudly--but not with unbecoming pride--advanced in her\nbridal dress, and with her court ladies, up to her royal consort. Then\ncame King Valdemar, who by force and fraud stopped the voyage, and\ninduced Hakon to marry Margaret, then eleven years of age, who thereby\ngot the crown of Norway. Elizabeth was sent to Vadstene cloister,\nwhere her will was not asked. Afterwards when Margaret--who justly\noccupies a great place in the history of Scandinavia, but only\ncomparatively a small one in the hearts--sat on the throne, powerful\nand respected, visited the then flourishing Vadstene, where the Abbess\nof the cloister was St. Bridget's grand-daughter, her childhood's\nfriend, Margaret kissed every monk on the cheek. The legend is well\nknown about him, the handsomest, who thereupon blushed. She kissed\nevery nun on the hand, and also Elizabeth, her, whom she would only\nsee here. Whose heart throbbed loudest at that kiss? Poor Elizabeth,\nthy grave is forgotten, but not the wrong thou didst suffer.\n\nWe now enter the sacristy. Here, under a double coffin lid, rests an\nage's holiest saint in the North, Vadstene cloister's diadem and\nlustre--St. Bridget.\n\nOn the night she was born, says the legend, there appeared a beaming\ncloud in the heavens, and on it stood a majestic virgin, who said: \"Of\nBirger is born a daughter whose admirable voice shall be heard over\nthe whole world.\" This delicate and singular child grew up in the\ncastle of her father, Knight Brake. Visions and revelations appeared\nto her, and these increased when she, only thirteen years of age, was\nmarried to the rich Ulf Gudmundsen, and became the mother of many\nchildren. \"Thou shalt be my bride and my agent,\" she heard Christ say,\nand every one of her actions was, as she averred, according to his\nannouncement. After this she went to Niddaros, to St. Oluf's holy\nshrine: she then went to Germany, France, Spain and Rome.\n\nSometimes honoured and sometimes mocked, she travelled, even to Cyprus\nand Palestine. Conscious of approaching death, she again reached Rome,\nwhere her last revelation was, that she should rest in Vadstene, and\nthat this cloister especially should be sanctified by God's love. The\nsplendour of the Northern lights does not extend so far around the\nearth as the glory of this fair saint, who now is but a legend. We\nbend with silent, serious thoughts before the mouldering remains in\nthe coffin here--those of St. Bridget and her daughter St. Catherine;\nbut even of these the remembrance will be extinguished. There is a\ntradition amongst the people, that in the time of the Reformation the\nreal remains were carried off to a cloister in Poland, but this is not\ncertainly known. Vadstene, at least, is not the repository of St.\nBridget and her daughter's dust.\n\nVadstene was once great and glorious. Great was the cloister's power,\nas St. Bridget saw it in the prospect of death. Where is now the\ncloister's might? It reposes under the tomb-stones--the graves alone\nspeak of it. Here, under our feet, only a few steps from the church\ndoor, is a stone in which are carved fourteen rings: they announce\nthat fourteen farms were given to the cloister, in order that he who\nmoulders here might have this place, fourteen feet within the church\ndoor. It was Boa Johnson Grip, a great sinner; but the cloister's\npower was greater than that of all sinners: the stone on his grave\nrecords it with no ordinary significance of language.\n\nGustavus, the first Vasa, was the sun--the ruling power: the\nbrightness of the cloister star must needs pale before him.\n\nThere yet stands a stone outline of Vadstene's rich palace which he\nerected, with towers and spires, close by the cloister. At a far\ndistance on the Vettern, it looks as if it still stood in all its\nsplendour; near, in moonlight nights, it appears the same unchanged\nedifice, for the fathom-thick walls yet remain; the carvings over the\nwindows and gates stand forth in light and shade, and the moat round\nabout, which is only separated from the Vettern by the narrow carriage\nroad, takes the reflection of the immense building as a mirrored\nimage.\n\nWe now stand before it in daylight. Not a pane of glass is to be found\nin it; planks and old doors are nailed fast to the window frames; the\nballs alone still stand on the two towers, broad, heavy, and\nresembling colossal toadstools. The iron spire of the one still towers\naloft in the air; the other spire is bent: like the hands on a\nsun-dial it shows the time--the time that is gone. The other two balls\nare half fallen down; lambs frisk about between the beams, and the\nspace below is used as a cow-stall.\n\nThe arms over the gateway have neither spot nor blemish: they seem as\nif carved yesterday; the walls are firm, and the stairs look like new.\nIn the palace yard, far above the gateway, the great folding door was\nopened, whence once the minstrels stepped out and played a welcome\ngreeting from the balcony, but even this is broken down: we go through\nthe spacious kitchen, from whose white walls, a sketch of Vadstene\npalace, ships, and flowering trees, in red chalk, still attract the\neye.\n\nHere where they cooked and roasted, is now a large empty space: even\nthe chimney is gone; and from the ceiling where thick, heavy beams of\ntimber have been placed close to one another, there hangs the\ndust-covered cobweb, as if the whole were a mass of dark grey dropping\nstones.\n\nWe walk from hall to hall, and the wooden shutters are opened to admit\ndaylight. All is vast, lofty, spacious, and adorned with antique\nchimney-pieces, and from every window there is a charming prospect\nover the clear, deep Vettern. In one of the chambers in the ground\nfloor sat the insane Duke Magnus, (whose stone image we lately saw\nconspicuous in the church) horrified at having signed his own\nbrother's death-warrant; dreamingly in love with the portrait of\nScotland's Queen, Mary Stuart; paying court to her and expecting to\nsee the ship, with her, glide over the sea towards Vadstene. And she\ncame--he thought she came--in the form of a mermaid, raising herself\naloft on the water: she nodded and called to him, and the unfortunate\nDuke sprang out of the window down to her. We gazed out of this\nwindow, and below it we saw the deep moat in which he sank.\n\nWe enter the yeoman's hall, and the council hall, where, in the\nrecesses of the windows, on each side, are painted yeomen in strange\ndresses, half Dalecarlians and half Roman warriors.\n\nIn this once rich saloon, Svanta Steenson Sture knelt to Sweden's\nQueen, Catherine L\u00e9jonhufved: she was Svanta Sture's love, before\nGustavus Vasa's will made her his Queen. The lovers met here: the\nwalls are silent as to what they said, when the door was opened and\nthe King entered, and saw the kneeling Sture, and asked what it meant.\nMargaret answered craftily and hastily: \"He demands my sister Martha's\nhand in marriage!\" and the King gave Svanta Sture the bride the Queen\nhad asked for him.\n\nWe are now in the royal bridal chamber, whither King Gustavus led his\nthird consort. Catherine Steenbock, also another's bride, the bride of\nthe Knight Gustavus. It is a sad story.\n\nGustavus of the three roses, was in his youth honoured by the King,\nwho sent him on a mission to the Emperor Charles the Fifth. He\nreturned adorned with the Emperor's costly golden chain--young,\nhandsome, joyous and richly clad, he returned home, and knew well how\nto relate the magnificence and charms of foreign lands: young and old\nlistened to him with admiration, but young Catherine most of all.\nThrough him the world in her eyes became twice as large, rich, and\nbeautiful; they became dear to each other, and their parents blessed\ntheir love. The love-pledge was to be drunk,--when there came a\nmessage from the King, that the young Knight must, without delay,\nagain bear a letter and greeting to the Emperor Charles. The betrothed\npair separated with heavy hearts, but with a promise of mutual\ninviolable troth. The King then invited Catherine's parents to come to\nVadstene palace. Catherine was obliged to accompany them; here King\nGustavus saw her for the first time, and the old man fell in love with\nher.\n\nChristmas was kept with great hilarity; there were song and harp in\nthese halls, and the King himself played the lute. When the time came\nfor departure, the King said to Catherine's mother, that he would\nmarry the young girl.\n\n\"But she is the bride of the Knight Gustavus!\" stammered the mother.\n\n\"Young hearts soon forget their sorrows,\" thought the King. The mother\nthought so likewise, and as there chanced to come a letter the same\nday and hour from the young Knight Gustavus, Fra Steenbock committed\nit to the flames. All the letters that came afterwards and all the\nletters that Catherine wrote, were burnt by her mother, and doubts and\nevil reports were whispered to Catherine, that she was forgotten\nabroad by her young lover. But Catherine was secure and firm in her\nbelief of him. In the spring her parents made known to her the King's\nproposal, and praised her good fortune. She answered seriously and\ndeterminedly, \"No!\" and when they repeated to her that it should and\nmust happen, she repeatedly screamed in the greatest anguish, \"No no!\"\nand sank exhausted at her father and mother's feet, and humbly prayed\nthem not to force her.\n\nAnd the mother wrote to the King that all was going on well, but that\nher child was bashful. The King now announced his visit to Torpe,\nwhere her parents, the Steenbocks, dwelt. The King was received with\nrejoicing and feasting, but Catherine had disappeared and the King\nhimself was the successful one who found her. She sat dissolved in\ntears under the wild rose tree, where she had bidden farewell to her\nheart's beloved.\n\nThere was merry song and joyous life in the old mansion; Catherine\nalone was sorrowful and silent. Her mother had brought her all her\njewels and ornaments, but she wore none of them: she had put on her\nsimplest dress, but in this she only fascinated the old King the more,\nand he would have that their betrothal should take place before he\ndeparted. Fra Steenbock wrested the Knight Gustavus's ring from\nCatherine's finger, and whispered in her ear: \"It will cost the friend\nof thy youth his life and fortune; the King can do everything!\" And\nthe parents led her to King Gustavus, showed him that the ring was\nfrom the maiden's hand; and the King placed his own golden ring on her\nfinger in the other's stead. In the month of August the flag waved\nfrom the mast of the royal yacht which bore the young Queen over the\nVettern. Princes and knights, in costly robes, stood by the shore,\nmusic played, and the people shouted. Catherine made her entry into\nVadstene Palace. The nuptials were celebrated the following day, and\nthe walls were hung with silk and velvet, with cloth of gold and\nsilver! It was a festival and rejoicing. Poor Catherine!\n\nIn November, the Knight Gustavus of the three roses, returned home.\nHis prudent, noble mother, Christina Gyldenstjerne, met him at the\nfrontiers of the kingdom, prepared him, consoled him, and soothed his\nmind: she accompanied him by slow stages to Vadstene, where they were\nboth invited by the King to remain during the Christmas festival. They\naccepted the invitation, but the Knight Gustavus was not to be moved\nto come to the King's table or any other place where the Queen was to\nbe found. The Christmas approached. One Sunday evening, Gustavus was\ndisconsolate; the Knight was long sleepless, and at daybreak he went\ninto the church, to the tomb of his ancestress, St. Bridget. There he\nsaw, at a few paces from him, a female kneeling before Philippa's\ntomb. It was the Queen he saw; their eyes met, and Gustavus hastened\naway. She then mentioned his name, begged him to stay, and commanded\nhim to do so.\n\n\"I command it, Gustavus!\" said she; \"the Queen commands it.\"\n\nAnd she spoke to him; they conversed together, and it became clear to\nthem both what had been done against them and with them; and she\nshowed him a withered rose which she kept in her bosom, and she bent\ntowards him and gave him a kiss, the last--their eternal\nleave-taking--and then they separated. He died shortly afterwards, but\nCatherine was stronger, yet not strong enough for her heart's deep\nsorrow. Here, in the bed-chamber, in uneasy dreams, says the story,\nshe betrayed in sleep the constant thought of her heart, her youth's\nlove, to the King, saying: \"Gustavus I love dearly; but the rose--I\nshall never forget.\"\n\nFrom a secret door we walk out on to the open rampart, where the sheep\nnow graze; the cattle are driven into one of the ruined towers. We see\nthe palace-yard, and look from it up to a window. Come, thou\nbirch-wood's thrush, and warble thy lays; sing, whilst we recal the\nbitterness of love in the rude--the chivalrous ages.\n\nUnder that window there stood, one cold winter's night, wrapped in his\nwhite cloak, the young Count John of East Friesland. His brother had\nmarried Gustavus Vasa's eldest daughter, and departed with her to his\nhome: wherever they came on their journey, there was mirth and\nfeasting, but the most splendid was at Vadstene Palace. Cecilia, the\nKing's younger daughter, had accompanied her sister hither, and was\nhere, as everywhere, the first, the most beautiful in the chase as\nwell as at the tournament. The winter began directly on their arrival\nat Vadstene; the cold was severe, and the Vettern frozen over. One\nday, Cecilia rode out on the ice and it broke; her brother, Prince\nErik, came galloping to her aid. John, of East Friesland, was already\nthere, and begged Erik to dismount, as he would, being on horseback,\nbreak the ice still more. Erik would not listen to him, and as John\nsaw that there was no time for dispute, he dragged Erik from the\nhorse, sprang into the water himself, and saved Cecilia. Prince Erik\nwas furious with wrath, and no one could appease him. Cecilia lay long\nin a fever, and during its continuance, her love for him who had saved\nher life increased. She recovered, and they understood each other, but\nthe day of separation approached. It was on the night previous that\nJohn, in his white cloak, ascended from stone to stone, holding by his\nsilk ladder, until he at length entered the window; here they would\nconverse for hours in all modesty and honour, speak about his return\nand their nuptials the following year; and whilst they sat there the\ndoor was hewn down with axes. Prince Erik entered, and raised the\nmurderous weapon to slay the young Lord of East Friesland, when\nCecilia threw herself between them. But Erik commanded his menials to\nseize the lover, whom they put in irons and cast into a low, dark\nhole, that cold frosty night, and the next day, without even giving\nhim a morsel of bread or a drop of water, he was thrown on to a\npeasant's sledge, and dragged before the King to receive judgment.\nErik himself cast his sister's fair name and fame into slander's\nbabbling pool, and high dames and citizens' wives washed unspotted\ninnocence in calumny's impure waters.\n\nIt is only when the large wooden shutters of the saloons are opened,\nthat the sunbeams stray in here; the dust accumulates in their twisted\npillars, and is only just disturbed by the draught of air. In here is\na warehouse for corn. Great fat rats make their nests in these halls.\nThe spider spins mourning banners under the beams. This is Vadstene\nPalace!\n\nWe are filled with sad thoughts. We turn our eyes from this place\ntowards the lowly house with the grass-turf roof, where the little\nlamb crops the grass under the cherry-tree, which strews its fragrant\nleaves over it. Our thoughts descend from the rich cloister, from the\nproud palace, to the grassy turf, and the sun fades away over the\ngrassy turf, and the old dame goes to sleep under the grassy turf,\nbelow which lie the mighty memorials of Vadstene.\n\n\n\n\nTHE PUPPET-SHOWMAN.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThere was an elderly man on the steam-boat, with such a contented face\nthat, if it did not lie, he must be the happiest man on earth. That he\nindeed said he was: I heard it from his own mouth. He was a Dane,\nconsequently my countryman, and was a travelling theatrical manager.\nHe had the whole _corps dramatique_ with him; they lay in a large\nchest--he was a puppet showman. His innate good-humour, said he, had\nbeen tried by a polytechnic candidate,[D] and from this experiment on\nhis patience he had become completely happy. I did not understand him\nat the moment, but he soon laid the whole case clearly before me; and\nhere it is.\n\n[Footnote D: One who has passed his examination at a polytechnic\nschool.]\n\n\"It was in Slagelse,\" said he, \"that I gave a representation at the\nparsonage, and had a brilliant house and a brilliant company of\nspectators, all young persons, unconfirmed, except a few old ladies.\nThen there came a person dressed in black, having the appearance of a\nstudent: he sat down amongst the others, laughed quite at the proper\ntime, and applauded quite correctly; that was an unusual spectator!\n\n\"I was bent on ascertaining who he was, and then I heard that he was a\ncandidate from the polytechnic school, who had been sent out to\ninstruct people in the provinces. At eight o'clock my representation\nwas over; the children were to go early to bed, and one must think of\nthe convenience of the public.\n\n\"At nine o'clock the candidate began his lectures and experiments, and\nnow _I_ was one of _his_ auditory.\n\n\"It was remarkable to hear and look at! The chief part of it went over\nmy head and into the parson's, as one says. Can it be possible,\nthought I, that we human beings can find out such things? in that\ncase, we must also be able to hold out longer, before we are put into\nthe earth. It was merely small miracles that he performed, and yet all\nas easy as an old stocking--quite from nature. In the time of Moses\nand the prophets, such a polytechnic candidate would have been one of\nthe wise men of the land, and in the Middle Ages he would have been\nburnt. I could not sleep the whole night, and as I gave a\nrepresentation the next evening, and the candidate was there again, I\ngot into a real merry humour.\n\n\"I have heard of an actor, who when playing the lovers' parts, only\nthought of one of the spectators; he played for _her_ alone, and\nforgot all the rest of the house; the polytechnic candidate was my\n_her_, my only spectator, for whom I played. And when the performance\nwas over, all the puppets were called forward, and I was invited by\nthe polytechnic candidate to take a glass of wine with him; and he\nspoke about my comedy, and I of his science; and I believe we each\nderived equal pleasure from the other. But yet I had the advantage,\nfor there was so much in his performance that he could not account\nfor: as for instance, that a piece of iron which falls through a\nspiral line, becomes magnetic,--well, how is that? The spirit comes\nover it, but whence does it come from? it is just as with the human\nbeings of this world, I think; our Lord lets them fall through the\nspiral line of time, and the spirit comes over them--and there stands\na Napoleon, a Luther, or a similar person.\n\n\"'All nature is a series of miracles,' said the candidate, 'but we are\nso accustomed to them that we call them things of every-day life.' And\nhe spoke and he explained, so that it seemed at last as if he lifted\nmy scull, and I honestly confessed, that if I were not an old fellow,\nI would go directly to the polytechnic school, and learn to examine\nthe world in the summer, although I was one of the happiest of men.\n\n\"'One of the happiest!' said he, and it was just as if he tasted it.\n'Are you happy?' 'Yes!' said I, 'I am happy, and I am welcome in all\nthe towns I come to with my company! There is certainly one wish, that\ncomes now and then like a night-mare, which rides on my good-humour,\nand that is to be a theatrical manager for a living company--a company\nof real men and women.'\n\n\"'You wish to have your puppets animated; you would have them become\nreal actors and actresses,' said he, 'and yourself be the manager? you\nthen think that you would be perfectly happy?'\n\n\"Now he did not think so, but I thought so; and we talked for and\nagainst; and we were just as near in our opinions as before. But we\nclinked our glasses together, and the wine was very good; but there\nwas witchcraft in it, or else the short and the long of the story\nwould be--that I was intoxicated.\n\n\"That I was not; my eyes were quite clear; it was as if there was\nsunshine in the room, and it shone out of the face of the polytechnic\ncandidate, so that I began to think of the old gods in my youth, and\nwhen they went about in the world. And I told him so, and then he\nsmiled, and I durst have sworn that he was a disguised god, or one of\nthe family!--And he was so--my first wish was to be fulfilled: the\npuppets become living beings and I the manager of men and women. We\ndrank that it should be so! he put all my puppets in the wooden chest,\nfastened it on my back, and then let me fall through a spiral line. I\ncan still hear how I came down, slap! I lay on the floor, that is\nquite sure and certain, and the whole company sprang out of the chest.\nThe spirit had come over us all together; all the puppets had become\nexcellent artists--they said so themselves--and I was the manager.\nEverything was in order for the first representation; the whole\ncompany must speak with me, and the public also. The female dancer\nsaid, that if she did not stand on one leg, the house would be in an\nuproar: she was master of the whole and would be treated as such.\n\n\"She who played the queen, would also be treated as a queen when off\nthe stage, or else she should get out of practice, and he who was\nemployed to come in with a letter made himself as important as the\nfirst lover. 'For,' said he, 'the small are of just as much importance\nas the great, in an artistic whole.' Then the hero demanded that the\nwhole of his part should only be retorts on making his exit, for these\nthe public applauded; the prima donna would only play in a red light,\nfor that suited her best--she would not be blue: they were all like\nflies in a bottle, and I was also in the bottle--for I was the\nmanager. I lost my breath, my head was quite dizzy! I was as miserable\nas a man can be; it was a new race of beings I had come amongst; I\nwished that I had them altogether again in the chest, that I had never\nbeen a manager: I told them that they were in fact only puppets, and\nso they beat me to death. That was my feeling!\n\n\"I lay on the bed in my chamber; but how I had come there from the\npolytechnic candidate, he must know best--for I do not. The moon shone\nin on the floor where the puppet-chest lay upset, and all the puppets\nspread about--great and small, the whole lot. But I was not floored! I\nsprang out of bed, and threw them all into the chest; some on their\nheads, and some on their legs; I smacked the lid down and sat myself\nupon it: it was worth painting, can't you conceive it? I can! 'Now you\nshall be there!' said I, 'and I will never more wish that you may\nbecome flesh and blood!' I was so glad; I was the happiest man\nalive--the polytechnic candidate had tried me! I sat in perfect bliss,\nand fell asleep on the chest; and in the morning--it was, properly\nspeaking, at noon, for I slept so very long that morning--I sat there\nstill, happy and edified--I saw that my previous and only wish had\nbeen stupid. I inquired for the polytechnic candidate, but he was\ngone, like the Greek and Roman gods.\n\n\"And from that time I have been the happiest man alive. I am a\nfortunate manager; my company does not argue with me, neither does the\npublic; they are amused to their heart's content, and I can myself put\nall my pieces nicely together. I take the best parts out of all sorts\nof comedies that I choose, and no one troubles himself about it.\nPieces that are now despised at the large theatres, but which thirty\nyears ago the public ran to see, and cried over--those pieces I now\nmake use of. I now present them before the young folks; and the young\nfolks--they cry just as their fathers and mothers used to do. I give\n'Johanna Montfakon' and 'Dyveke,' but abbreviated; for the little\nfolks do not like long, twaddling love-stories. They must have it\nunfortunate--but it must be brief. Now that I have travelled through\nDenmark, both to the right and left, I know everybody and am known\nagain. Now I have come to Sweden, and if I am successful and gain much\nmoney, I will be a Scandinavian, if the humour hold; and this I tell\nyou, as you are my countryman.\"\n\nAnd I, as his countryman, naturally tell it again--only for the sake\nof telling it.\n\n\n\n\nTHE \"SKJ\u00c4RGAARDS.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe canal voyage through Sweden goes at first constantly upwards,\nthrough elvs and lakes, forests and rocky land. From the heights we\nlook down on vast extents of forest-land and large waters, and by\ndegrees the vessel sinks again down through mountain torrents. At Mem\nwe are again down by the salt fiord: a solitary tower raises its head\nbetween the remains of low, thick walls--it is the ruins of Stegeberg.\nThe coast is covered to a great extent with dark, melancholy forests,\nwhich enclose small grass-grown valleys. The screaming sea-gulls fly\naround our vessel; we are by the Baltic; we feel the fresh sea-breeze:\nit blows as in the times of the ancient heroes, when the sea-kings,\nsons of high-born fathers, exercised their deeds here. The same sea's\nsurface then appeared to them as now to us, with its numberless isles,\nwhich lie strewed about here in the water by thousands along the whole\ncoast. The depth of water between the rocky isles and the solid land\nis that we call \"The Skj\u00e4rgaards:\" their waters flow into each other\nwith varying splendour. We see it in the sunshine, and it is like a\nlarge English landscape garden; but the greensward plain is here the\ndeep sea, the flower-beds in it are rocks and reefs, rich in firs and\npines, oaks and bushes. Mark how, when the wind blows from the east,\nand the sea breaks over sunken rocks and is dashed back again in spray\nfrom the cliffs, your limbs feel--even through the ship on which you\nstand--the power of the sea: you are lifted as if by supernatural\nhands.\n\nWe rush on against wind and sea, as if it were the sea-god's snorting\nhorse that bore us; from Skj\u00e4rgaard to Skj\u00e4rgaard. The signal-gun is\nfired, and the pilot comes from that solitary wooden house. Sometimes\nwe look upon the open sea, sometimes we glide again in between dark,\nstony islands; they lie like gigantic monsters in the water: one has\nthe form of the tortoise's arched shell, another has the elephant's\nback and rough grey colour. Mouldering, light grey rocks indicate that\nthe wind and weather past centuries has lashed over them.\n\nWe now approach larger rocky islands, and the huge, grey, broken rocks\nof the main land, where dwarfish pine woods grow in a continual combat\nwith the blast; the Skj\u00e4rgaards sometimes become only a narrow canal,\nsometimes an extensive lake strewed with small islets, all of stone,\nand often only a mere block of stone, to which a single little\nfir-tree clings fast: screaming sea-gulls flutter around the\nland-marks that are set up; and now we see a single farm-house, whose\nred-painted sides shine forth from the dark background. A group of\ncows lies basking in the sun on the stony surface, near a little\nsmiling pasture, which appears to have been cultivated here or cut out\nof a meadow in Scania. How solitary must it not be to live on that\nlittle island! Ask the boy who sits there by the cattle, he will be\nable to tell us. \"It is lively and merry here,\" says he. \"The day is\nso long and light, the seal sits out there on the stone and barks in\nthe early morning hour, and all the steamers from the canal must pass\nhere. I know them all; and when the sun goes down in the evening, it\nis a whole history to look into the clouds over the land: there stand\nmountains with palaces, in silver and in gold, in red and in blue;\nsailing dragons with golden crowns, or an old giant with a beard down\nto his waist--altogether of clouds, and they are always changing.\n\n\"The storms come on in the autumn, and then there is often much\nanxiety when father is out to help ships in distress; but one becomes,\nas it were, a new being.\n\n\"In winter the ice is locked fast and firm, and we drive from island\nto island and to the main land; and if the bear or the wolf pays us a\nvisit we take his skin for a winter covering: it is warm in the room\nthere, and they read and tell stories about old times!\"\n\nYes, old Time, how thou dost unfold thyself with remembrances of these\nvery Skj\u00e4rgaards--old Time which belonged to the brave. These waters,\nthese rocky isles and strands, saw heroes more greatly active than\nactively good: they swung the axe to give the mortal blow, or as they\ncalled it, \"the whining Jetteqvinde.\"[E]\n\n[Footnote E: Giantess.]\n\nHere came the Vikings with their ships: on the headland yonder they\nlevied provisions; the grazing cattle were slaughtered and borne away.\nYe mouldering cliffs, had ye but a tongue, ye might tell us about the\nduels with the two-handed sword--about the deeds of the giants. Ye saw\nthe hero hew with the sword, and cast the javelin: his left hand was\nas cunning as his right The sword moved so quickly in the air that\nthere seemed to be three. Ye saw him, when he in all his martial array\nsprang forwards and backwards, higher than he himself was tall, and if\nhe sprang into the sea he swam like a whale. Ye saw the two\ncombatants: the one darted his javelin, the other caught it in the\nair, and cast it back again, so that it pierced through shield and man\ndown into the earth. Ye saw warriors with sharp swords and angry\nhearts; the sword was struck downwards so as to cut the knee, out the\ncombatant sprang into the air, and the sword whizzed under his feet.\nMighty Sagas from the olden times! Mouldering rocks, could ye but tell\nus of these things!\n\nYe, deep waters, bore the Vikings' ships, and when the strong in\nbattle lifted the iron anchor and cast it against the enemy's vessel,\nso that the planks were rent asunder, ye poured your dark heavy seas\ninto the hold, so that the bark sank. The wild _Berserk_ who with\nnaked breast stood against his enemy's blows, mad as a dog, howling\nlike a bear, tearing his shield asunder, rushing to the bottom of the\nsea here, and fetching up stones, which ordinary men could not\nraise--history peoples these waters, these cliffs for us! A future\npoet will conjure them to this Scandinavian Archipelago, chisel the\ntrue forms out of the old Sagas, the bold, the rude, the greatness and\nimperfections of the time, in their habits as they lived.\n\nThey rise again for us on yonder island, where the wind is whistling\nthrough the young fir wood. The house is of beams, roofed with bark;\nthe smoke from the fire on the broad stone in the hall, whirls through\nthe air-hole, near which stands the cask of mead; the cushions lie on\nthe bench before the closed bedsteads; deer-skins hang over the balk\nwalls, ornamented with shields, helmets, and armour. Effigies of gods,\ncarved, on wooden poles, stand before the high seat where the noble\nViking sits, a high-born father's youngest son, great in fame, but\nstill greater in deeds; the skjalds (bards) and foster-brothers sit\nnearest to him. They defended the coasts of their countrymen, and the\npious women; they fetched wheat and honey from England, they went to\nthe White Sea for sables and furs--their adventures are related in\nsong. We see the old man ride in rich clothing, with gloves sewn with\ngolden thread, and with a hat brought from Garderige; we see the youth\nwith a golden fillet around his brow; we see him at the _Thing_; we\nsee him in battle and in play, where the best is he that can cut off\nthe other's eyebrows without scratching the skin, or causing a wink\nwith the eyes, on pain of losing his station. The woman sits in the\nlog-house at her loom, and in the late moonlight nights the spirits of\nthe fallen come and sit down around the fire, where they shake the\nwet, dripping clothes; but the serf sleeps in the ashes, and on the\nkitchen bench, and dreams that he dips his bread in the fat soup, and\nlicks his fingers.\n\nThou future poet, thou wilt call forth the vanished forms from the\nSagas, thou wilt people these islands, and let us glide past these\nreminiscences of the olden time with the mind full of them; clearly\nand truly wilt thou let us glide, as we now with the power of steam\nfly past that firmly standing scenery, the swelling sea, rocks and\nreefs, the main land, and wood-grown islands.\n\nWe are already past Braavigen, where numberless ships from the\nnorthern kingdoms lay, when Upsala's King, Sigurd Ring, came,\nchallenged by Harald Hildetand, who, old and grey, feared to die on a\nsick bed, and would fall in battle; and the mainland thundered like\nthe plains of Marathon beneath the tramp of horses' hoofs during the\nbattle:[F] bards and female warriors surrounded the Danish King. The\nblind old man raised himself high in his chariot, gave his horse free\nrein, and hewed his way. Odin himself had due reverence paid to\nHildetand's bones; and the pile was kindled, and the King laid on it,\nand Sigurd conjured all to cast gold and weapons, the most valuable\nthey possessed, into the fire; and the bards sang to it, and the\nfemale warriors struck the spears on the bright shields. Upsala's\nLord, Sigurd Ring, became King of Sweden and Denmark: so says the\nSaga, which sounded over the land and water from these coasts.\n\n[Footnote F: The battle of Braavalla.]\n\nThe memorials of olden times pass swiftly through our thoughts; we fly\npast the scene of manly exercises and great deeds in the olden\ntimes--the ship cleaves the mighty waters with its iron paddles, from\nSkj\u00e4rgaard to Skj\u00e4rgaard.\n\n\n\n\nSTOCKHOLM.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe cast runes[G] here on the paper, and from the white ground the\npicture of Birger Jarl's six hundred years old city rises before thee.\n\n[Footnote G: \"To cast runes\" was, in the olden time, to exercise\nwitchcraft. When the apple, with ciphers cut in it, rolled into the\nmaiden's lap, her heart and mind were infatuated.]\n\nThe runes roll, you see! Wood-grown rocky isles appear in the light,\ngrey morning mist; numberless flocks of wild birds build their nests\nin safety here, where the fresh waters of the M\u00e4laren rush into the\nsalt sea. The Viking's ship comes; King Agna stands by the prow--he\nbrings as booty the King of Finland's daughter. The oak-tree spreads\nits branches over their bridal chamber; at daybreak the oak-tree bears\nKing Agna, hanged in his long golden chain: that is the bride's work,\nand the ship sails away again with her and the rescued Fins.\n\nThe clouds drive past--the years too.\n\nHunters and fishermen erect themselves huts;--it is again deserted\nhere, where the sea-birds alone have their homes. What is it that so\nfrightens these numberless flocks? the wild duck and sea-gull fly\nscreaming about, there is a hammering and driving of piles. Oluf\nSk\u00f6tkonge has large beams bored down into the ground, and strong iron\nchains fastened across the stream: \"Thou art caught, Oluf\nHaraldson,[H] caught with the ships and crews, with which thou didst\ndevastate the royal city Sigtuna; thou canst not escape from the\nclosed M\u00e4lar lake!\"\n\n[Footnote H: Afterwards called Saint Oluf.]\n\nIt is but the work of one night; the same night when Oluf Hakonson,\nwith iron and with fire, burst his onward way through the stubborn\nground; before the day breaks the waters of the M\u00e4lar roll there; the\nNorwegian prince, Oluf sailed through the royal channel he had cut in\nthe east. The stockades, where the iron chains hang, must bear the\ndefences; the citizens from the burnt-down Sigtuna erect themselves a\nbulwark here, and build their new, little town on stock-holms.[I]\n\n[Footnote I: Stock, signifies bulks, or beams; holms, i.e. islets,\nor river islands; hence Stockholm.]\n\nThe clouds go, and the years go! Do you see how the gables grow? there\nrise towers and forts. Birger Jarl makes the town of Stockholm a\nfortress; the warders stand with bow and arrow on the walls,\nreconnoitring over lake and fjord, over Brunkaberg sand-ridge. There\nwere the sand-ridge slopes upwards from R\u00f6rstrand's Lake they build\nClara cloister, and between it and the town a street springs up:\nseveral more appear; they form an extensive city, which soon becomes\nthe place of contest for different partisans, where Ladelaas's sons\nplant the banner, and where the German Albrecht's retainers burn the\nSwedes alive within its walls. Stockholm is, however, the heart of the\nkingdom: that the Danes know well; that the Swedes know too, and there\nis strife and bloody combating. Blood flows by the executioner's hand,\nDenmark's Christian the Second, Sweden's executioner, stands in the\nmarket-place.\n\nRoll, ye runes! see over Brunkaberg sand-ridge, where the Swedish\npeople conquered the Danish host, there they raise the May-pole: it is\nmidsummer-eve--Gustavus Vasa makes his entry into Stockholm.\n\nAround the May-pole there grow fruit and kitchen-gardens, houses and\nstreets; they vanish in flames, they rise again; that gloomy fortress\ntowards the tower is transformed into a palace, and the city stands\nmagnificently with towers and draw-bridges. There grows a town by\nitself on the sand-ridge, a third springs up on the rock towards the\nsouth; the old walls fall at Gustavus Adolphus's command; the three\ntowns are one, large and extensive, picturesquely varied with old\nstone houses, wooden shops, and grass-roofed huts; the sun shines on\nthe brass balls of the towers, and a forest of masts stands in that\nsecure harbour.\n\nRays of beauty shoot forth into the world from Versailles' painted\ndivinity; they reach the M\u00e4lar's strand into Tessin's[J] palace, where\nart and science are invited as guests with the King, Gustavus the\nThird, whose effigy cast in bronze is raised on the strand before the\nsplendid palace--it is in our times. The acacia shades the palace's\nhigh terrace on whose broad balustrades flowers send forth their\nperfume from Saxon porcelain; variegated silk curtains hang half-way\ndown before the large glass windows; the floors are polished smooth as\na mirror, and under the arch yonder, where the roses grow by the wall,\nthe Endymion of Greece lives eternally in marble. As a guard of honour\nhere, stand Fogelberg's Odin, and Sergei's Amor and Psyche.\n\n[Footnote J: The architect Tessin.]\n\nWe now descend the broad, royal staircase, and before it, where, in\nby-gone times, Oluf Sk\u00f6tkonge stretched the iron chains across the\nmouth of the M\u00e4lar Lake, there is now a splendid bridge with shops\nabove and the Streamparterre below: there we see the little steamer\n'Nocken,'[K] steering its way, filled with passengers from Diurgarden\nto the Streamparterre. And what is the Streamparterre? The Neapolitans\nwould tell us: It is in miniature--quite in miniature--the\nStockholmers' \"Villa Reale.\" The Hamburgers would say: It is in\nminiature--quite in miniature--the Stockholmers' \"Jungfernstieg.\"\n\n[Footnote K: The water-sprite.]\n\nIt is a very little semi-circular island, on which the arches of the\nbridge rest; a garden full of flowers and trees, which we overlook\nfrom the high parapet of the bridge. Ladies and gentlemen promenade\nthere; musicians play, families sit there in groups, and take\nrefreshments in the vaulted halls under the bridge, and look out\nbetween the green trees over the open water, to the houses and\nmansions, and also to the woods and rocks: we forget that we are in\nthe midst of the city.\n\nIt is the bridge here that unites Stockholm with Nordmalen, where the\ngreatest part of the fashionable world live, in two long Berlin-like\nstreets; yet amongst all the great houses we will only visit one, and\nthat is the theatre.\n\nWe will go on the stage itself--it has an historical signification.\nHere, by the third side-scene from the stage-lights, to the right, as\nwe look down towards the audience, Gustavus the Third was assassinated\nat a masquerade; and he was borne into that little chamber there,\nclose by the scene, whilst all the outlets were closed, and the motley\ngroup of harlequins, polichinellos, wild men, gods and goddesses with\nunmasked faces, pale and terrified crept together; the dancing\nballet-farce had become a real tragedy.\n\nThis theatre is Jenny Lind's childhood's home. Here she has sung in\nthe choruses when a little girl; here she first made her appearance in\npublic, and was cheeringly encouraged when a child; here, poor and\nsorrowful, she has shed tears, when her voice left her, and sent up\npious prayers to her Maker. From hence the world's nightingale flew\nout over distant lands, and proclaimed the purity and holiness of art.\n\nHow beautiful it is to look out from the window up here, to look over\nthe water and the Streamparterre to that great, magnificent palace, to\nLadegaards land, with the large barracks, to Skipholmen and the rocks\nthat rise straight up from the water, with S\u00f6dermalm's gardens,\nvillas, streets, and church cupolas between the green trees: the ships\nlie there together, so many and so close, with their waving flags. The\nbeautiful, that a poet's eye sees, the world may also see! Roll, ye\nrunes!\n\nThere sketches the whole varied prospect; a rainbow extends its arch\nlike a frame around it. Only see! it is sunset, the sky becomes\ncloudy over S\u00f6dermalm, the grey sky becomes darker and darker--a\npitch-dark ground--and on it rests a double rainbow. The houses are\nillumined by so strong a sunlight that the walls seem transparent;\nthe linden-trees in the gardens, which have lately put forth their\nleaves, appear like fresh, young woods; the long, narrow windows in\nthe Gothic buildings on the island shine as if it were a festal\nillumination, and between the dark firs there falls a lustre from the\npanes behind them as of a thousand flames, as if the trees were\ncovered with flickering--Christmas lights; the colours of the rainbow\nbecome stronger and stronger, the background darker and darker, and\nthe white sun-lit sea-gulls fly past.\n\nThe rainbow has placed one foot high up on S\u00f6dermalm's churchyard.\nWhere the rainbow touches the earth, there lie treasures buried, is a\npopular belief here. The rainbow rests on a grave up there: Stagnalius\nrests here, Sweden's most gifted singer, so young and so unhappy; and\nin the same grave lies Nicander, he who sang about King Enzio, and of\n\"Lejonet i Oken;\"[L] who sang with a bleeding heart: the fresh\nvine-leaf cooled the wound and killed the singer. Peace be with his\ndust--may his songs live for ever! We go to your grave where the\nrainbow points. The view from here is splendid. The houses rise\nterrace-like in the steep, paved streets; the foot-passengers can,\nhowever, shorten the way by going through narrow lanes, and up steps\nmade of thick beams, and always with a prospect downwards of the\nwater, of the rocks and green trees! It is delightful to dwell here,\nit is healthy to dwell here, but it is not genteel, as it is by\nBrunkaberg's sand-ridge, yet it will become so: Stockholm's \"Strada\nBalbi\" will one day arise on S\u00f6dermalm's rocky ground.\n\n[Footnote L: \"The Lion in the desert;\" i.e. Napoleon.]\n\nWe stand up here. What other city in the world has a better prospect\nover the salt fjord, over the fresh lake, over towers, cupolas,\nheaped-up houses, and a palace, which King Enzio himself might have\nbuilt, and round about the dark, gloomy forests with oaks, pines and\nfirs, so Scandinavian, dreaming in the declining sun? It is twilight;\nthe night comes on, the lamps are lighted in the city below, the stars\nare kindled in the firmament above, and the tower of Redderholm's\nchurch rises aloft towards the starry space. The stars shine through\nthere; it is as if cut in lace, but every thread is of cast-iron and\nof the thickness of beams.\n\nWe go down there, and in there, in the stilly eve.--A world of spirits\nreigns within. See, in the vaulted isles, on carved wooden horses,\nsits armour, that was once borne by Magnus Ladelaas, Christian the\nSecond, and Charles the Ninth. A thousand flags that once waved to the\npeal of music and the clang of arms, to the darted javelin and the\ncannon's roar, moulder away here: they hang in long rags from the\nstaff, and the staves lie cast aside, where the flag has long since\nbecome dust. Almost all the Kings of Sweden slumber in silver and\ncopper coffins within these walls. From the altar aisle we look\nthrough the open-grated door, in between piled-up drums and hanging\nflags: here is preserved a bloody tunic, and in the coffin are the\nremains of Gustavus Adolphus. Who is that dead opposite neighbour in\nthe chapel, across there in the other side-aisle of the church? There,\nbelow a glass lid, lies a dress shot through, and on the floor stands\na pair of long, thick boots--they belonged to the hero-King, the\nwanderer, Charles XII., whose realm is now this narrow coffin.\n\nHow sacred it is here under this vaulted roof! The mightiest men of\ncenturies are gathered together here, perishable as these moth-eaten\nflags--mute and yet so eloquent. And without there is life and\nactivity: the world goes on in its old course; generations change in\nthe old houses; the houses change--yet Stockholm is always the heart\nof Sweden, Birger's city, whose features are continually renewed,\ncontinually beautified.\n\n\n\n\nDIURGAERDEN.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nDiurgaerden is a large piece of land made into a garden by our Lord\nhimself. Come with us over there. We are still in the city, but before\nthe palace lie the broad hewn stone stairs, leading down to the water,\nwhere the Dalkulls--i.e., the Dalecarlian women--stand and ring with\nmetal bells. On board! here are boats enough to choose amongst, all\nwith wheels, which the Dalkulls turn. In coarse white linen, red\nstockings, with green heels, and singularly thick-soled shoes, with\nthe upper-leather right up the shin-bone, stands the Dalkull; she has\nornamented the boat, that now shoots away, with green branches. Houses\nand streets rise and unfold themselves; churches and gardens start\nforth; they stand on S\u00f6dermalm high above the tops of the ships'\nmasts. The scenery reminds one of the Bhosphorus and Pera; the motley\ndress of the Dalkulls is quite Oriental--and listen! the wind bears\nmelancholy Skalmeie tones out to us. Two poor Dalecarlians are playing\nmusic on the quay; they are the same drawn-out, melancholy tones that\nare played by the Bulgarian musicians in the streets of Pera. We stept\nout, and are in the Diurgarden.\n\nWhat a crowd of equipages pass in rows through the broad avenue! and\nwhat a throng of well-dressed pedestrians of all classes! One thinks\nof the garden of the Villa Borghese, when, at the time of the wine\nfeast, the Roman people and strangers take the air there. We are in\nthe Borghese garden; we are by the Bosphorus, and yet far in the\nNorth. The pine-tree rises large and free; the birch droops its\nbranches, as the weeping willow alone has power to do--and what\nmagnificently grand oaks! The pine-trees themselves are mighty trees,\nbeautiful to the painter's eye; splendid green grass plains lie\nstretched before us, and the fiord rolls its green, deep waters close\npast, as if it were a river. Large ships with swelling sails, the one\nhigh above the other, steamers and boats, come and go in varied\nnumbers.\n\nCome! let us up to Bystr\u00f6m's villa; it lies on the stony cliff up\nthere, where the large oak-trees stand in their stubborn grandeur: we\nsee from here the whole tripartite city, S\u00f6dermalm, Nordmalm and the\nisland with that huge palace. It is delightful, the building here on\nthis rock, and the building stands, and that almost entirely of\nmarble, a \"Casa santa d'Italia,\" as if borne through the air here in\nthe North. The walls within are painted in the Pompeian style, but\nheavy: there is nothing genial. Round about stand large marble figures\nby Bystr\u00f6m, which have not, however, the soul of antiquity. Madonna is\nencumbered by her heavy marble drapery, the girl with the\nflower-garland is an ugly young thing, and on seeing Hero with the\nweeping Cupid, one thinks of a _pose_ arranged by a ballet-master.\n\nLet us, however, see what is pretty. The little Cupid-seller is\npretty, and the stone is made as flexible as life in the waists of the\nbathing-women. One of them, as she steps out, feels the water with her\nfeet, and we feel, with her, a sensation that the water is cold. The\ncoolness of the marble-hall realizes this feeling. Let us go out into\nthe sunshine, and up to the neighbouring cliff, which rises above the\nmansions and houses. Here the wild roses shoot forth from the crevices\nin the rock; the sunbeams fall prettily between the splendid pines and\nthe graceful birches, upon the high grass before the colossal bronze\nbust of Bellmann. This place was the favourite one of that\nScandinavian improvisatore. Here he lay in the grass, composed and\nsang his anacreontic songs, and here, in the summer-time, his annual\nfestival is held. We will raise his altar here in the red evening\nsunlight. It is a flaming bowl, raised high on the jolly tun, and it\nis wreathed with roses. Morits tries his hunting-horn, that which was\nOberon's horn in the inn-parlour, and everything danced, from Ulla to\n\"Mutter paa Toppen:\"[M] they stamped with their feet and clapped their\nhands, and clinked the pewter lid of the ale-tankard; \"hej kara Sj\u00e6l!\nfukta din aske!\" (Hey! dear soul! moisten your clay).\n\n[Footnote M: The landlady of an alehouse.]\n\nA Teniers' picture became animated, and still lives in song. Morits\nblows the horn on Bellmann's place around the flowing bowl, and whole\ncrowds dance in a circle, young and old; the carriages too, horses and\nwaggons, filled bottles and clattering tankards: the Bellmann\ndithyrambic clangs melodiously; humour and low life, sadness--and\namongst others, about\n\n    \"----hur \u00f6gat gret\n     Ved de Cypresser, som str\u00f6ddes.\"[N]\n\n[Footnote N: How the eyes wept by the cypresses that were strewn\naround.]\n\nPainter, seize thy brush and palette and paint the Maenade--but not\nher who treads the winebag, whilst her hair flutters in the wind, and\nshe sings ecstatic songs. No, but the Maenade that ascends from\nBellmann's steaming bowl is the Punch's Anadyomene--she, with the high\nheels to the red shoes, with rosettes on her gown and with fluttering\nveil and mantilla--fluttering, far too fluttering! She plucks the rose\nof poetry from her breast and sets it in the ale-can's spout; clinks\nwith the lid, sings about the clang of the hunting horn, about\nbreeches and old shoes and all manner of stuff. Yet we are sensible\nthat he is a true poet; we see two human eyes shining, that announce\nto us the human heart's sadness and hope.\n\n\n\n\nA STORY.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAll the apple-trees in the garden had sprung out. They had made haste\nto get blossoms before they got green leaves; and all the ducklings\nwere out in the yard--and the cat too! He was, so to speak, permeated\nby the sunshine; he licked it from his own paws; and if one looked\ntowards the fields, one saw the corn standing so charmingly green! And\nthere was such a twittering and chirping amongst all the small birds,\njust as if it were a great feast. And that one might indeed say it\nwas, for it was Sunday. The bells rang, and people in their best\nclothes went to church, and looked so pleased. Yes, there was\nsomething so pleasant in everything: it was indeed so fine and warm a\nday, that one might well say: \"Our Lord is certainly unspeakably good\ntowards us poor mortals!\"\n\nBut the clergyman stood in the pulpit in the church, and spoke so loud\nand so angrily! He said that mankind was so wicked, and that God would\npunish them for it, and that when they died, the wicked went down into\nhell, where they would burn for ever; and he said that their worm\nwould never die, and their fire never be extinguished, nor would they\never get rest and peace!\n\nIt was terrible to hear, and he said it so determinedly. He described\nhell to them as a pestilential hole, where all the filthiness of the\nworld flowed together. There was no air except the hot, sulphurous\nflames; there was no bottom; they sank and sank into everlasting\nsilence! It was terrible, only to hear about it; but the clergyman\nsaid it right honestly out of his heart, and all the people in the\nchurch were quite terrified. But all the little birds outside the\nchurch sang so pleasantly, and so pleased, and the sun shone so\nwarm:--it was as if every little flower said: \"God is so wondrous good\nto us altogether!\" Yes, outside it was not at all as the clergyman\npreached.\n\nIn the evening, when it was bed-time, the clergyman saw his wife sit\nso still and thoughtful.\n\n\"What ails you?\" said he to her.\n\n\"What ails me?\" she replied; \"what ails me is, that I cannot collect\nmy thoughts rightly--that I cannot rightly understand what you said;\nthat there were so many wicked, and that they should burn\neternally!--eternally, alas, how long! I am but a sinful being; but I\ncould not bear the thought in my heart to allow even the worst sinner\nto burn for ever. And how then should our Lord permit it? he who is so\nwondrously good, and who knows how evil comes both from without and\nwithin. No, I cannot believe it, though you say it.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt was autumn. The leaves fell from the trees; the grave, severe\nclergyman sat by the bedside of a dying person; a pious believer\nclosed her eyes--it was the clergyman's own wife.\n\n\"If any one find peace in the grave, and grace from God, then it is\nthou,\" said the clergyman, and he folded her hands, and read a psalm\nover the dead body.\n\nAnd she was borne to the grave: two heavy tears trickled down that\nstern man's cheeks; and it was still and vacant in the parsonage; the\nsunshine within was extinguished:--she was gone.\n\nIt was night. A cold wind blew over the clergyman's head; he opened\nhis eyes, and it was just as if the moon shone into his room. But the\nmoon did not shine. It was a figure which stood before his bed--he saw\nthe spirit of his deceased wife. She looked on him so singularly\nafflicted; it seemed as though she would say something.\n\nThe man raised himself half erect in bed, and stretched his arms out\ntowards her.\n\n\"Not even to thee is granted everlasting peace. Thou dost suffer;\nthou, the best, the most pious!\"\n\nAnd the dead bent her head in confirmation of his words, and laid her\nhand on her breast.\n\n\"And can I procure you peace in the grave?\"\n\n\"Yes!\" it sounded in his ear.\n\n\"And how?\"\n\n\"Give me a hair, but a single hair of the head of that sinner, whose\nfire will never be quenched; that sinner whom God will cast down into\nhell, to everlasting torment.\"\n\n\"Yes; so easily thou canst be liberated, thou pure, thou pious one!\"\nsaid he.\n\n\"Then follow me,\" said the dead; \"it is so granted us. Thou canst be\nby my side, wheresoever thy thoughts will. Invisible to mankind, we\nstand in their most secret places; but thou must point with a sure\nhand to the one destined to eternal punishment, and ere the cock crow\nhe must be found.\"\n\nAnd swift, as if borne on the wings of thought, they were in the great\ncity, and the names of the dying sinners shone from the walls of the\nhouses in letters of fire: \"Arrogance, Avarice, Drunkenness,\nVoluptuousness;\" in short, sin's whole seven-coloured arch.\n\n\"Yes, in there, as I thought it, as I knew it,\" said the clergyman,\n\"are housed those condemned to eternal fire.\"\n\nAnd they stood before the splendidly-illumined portico, where the\nbroad stairs were covered with carpets and flowers, and the music of\nthe dance sounded through the festal saloons. The porter stood there\nin silk and velvet, with a large silver-headed stick.\n\n\"_Our_ ball can match with the King's,\" said he, and turned towards\nthe crowd in the street--his magnificent thoughts were visible in his\nwhole person. \"Poor devils! who stare in at the portico, you are\naltogether ragamuffins, compared to me!\"\n\n\"Arrogance,\" said the dead; \"dost thou see him?\"\n\n\"Him!\" repeated the clergyman; \"he is a simpleton--a fool only, and\nwill not be condemned to eternal fire and torment.\"\n\n\"A fool only,\" sounded through the whole house of Arrogance.\n\nAnd they flew into the four bare walls of Avarice, where skinny,\nmeagre, shivering with cold, hungry and thirsty, the old man clung\nfast with all his thoughts to his gold. They saw how he, as in a\nfever, sprang from his wretched pallet, and took a loose stone out of\nthe wall. There lay gold coins in a stocking-foot; he fumbled at his\nragged tunic, in which gold coins were sewed fast, and his moist\nfingers trembled.\n\n\"He is ill: it is insanity; encircled by fear and evil dreams.\"\n\nAnd they flew away in haste, and stood by the criminals' wooden couch,\nwhere they slept side by side in long rows. One of them started up\nfrom his sleep like a wild animal, and uttered a hideous scream: he\nstruck his companion with his sharp elbow, and the latter turned\nsleepily round.\n\n\"Hold your tongue, you beast, and sleep! this is your way every night!\nEvery night!\" he repeated; \"yes, you come every night, howling and\nchoking me! I have done one thing or another in a passion; I was born\nwith a passionate temper, and it has brought me in here a second time;\nbut if I have done wrong, so have I also got my punishment. But one\nthing I have not confessed. When I last went out from here, and passed\nby my master's farm, one thing and another boiled up in me, and I\ndirectly stroked a lucifer against the wall: it came a little too near\nthe thatch, and everything was burnt--hot-headedness came over it,\njust as it comes over me, I helped to save the cattle and furniture.\nNothing living was burnt, except a flock of pigeons: they flew into\nthe flames, and the yard dog. I had not thought of the dog. I could\nhear it howl, and that howl I always hear yet, when I would sleep; and\nif I do get to sleep, the dog comes also--so large and hairy! He lies\ndown on me, howls, and strangles me! Do but hear what I am telling\nyou. Snore--yes, that you can--snore the whole night through, and I\nnot even a quarter of an hour!\"\n\nAnd the blood shone from the eyes of the fiery one; he fell on his\ncompanion, and struck him in the face with his clenched fist.\n\n\"Angry Mads has become mad again!\" resounded on all sides, and the\nother rascals seized hold of him, wrestled with him, and bent him\ndouble, so that his head was forced between his legs, where they bound\nit fast, so that the blood was nearly springing out of his eyes, and\nall the pores.\n\n\"You will kill him!\" said the clergyman,--\"poor unfortunate!\" and as\nhe stretched his hands out over him, who had already suffered too\nseverely, in order to prevent further mischief, the scene changed.\n\nThey flew through rich halls, and through poor chambers;\nvoluptuousness and envy, all mortal sins strode past them. A recording\nangel read their sin and their defence; this was assuredly little for\nGod, for God reads the heart; He knows perfectly the evil that comes\nwithin it and from without, He, grace, all-loving kindness. The hand\nof the clergyman trembled: he did not venture to stretch it out, to\npluck a hair from the sinner's head. And the tears streamed down from\nhis eyes, like the waters of _grace_ and love, which quenched the\neternal fire of hell.\n\nThe cock then crowed.\n\n\"Merciful God! Thou wilt grant her that peace in the grave which I\nhave not been able to redeem.\"\n\n\"That I now have!\" said the dead; \"it was thy hard words, thy dark,\nhuman belief of God and his creatures, which drove me to thee! Learn\nto know mankind; even in the bad there is a part of God--a part that\nwill conquer and quench the fire of hell.\"\n\nAnd a kiss was pressed on the clergyman's lips:--it shone around him.\nGod's clear, bright sun shone into the chamber, where his wife,\nliving, mild, and affectionate, awoke him from a dream, sent from God!\n\n\n\n\nUPSALA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is commonly said, that Memory is a young girl with light blue eyes.\nMost poets say so; but we cannot always agree with most poets. To us\nmemory comes in quite different forms, all according to that land, or\nthat town to which she belongs. Italy sends her as a charming Mignon,\nwith black eyes and a melancholy smile, singing Bellini's soft,\ntouching songs. From Scotland Memory's sprite appears as a powerful\nlad with bare knees; the plaid hangs over his shoulder, the\nthistle-flower is fixed on his cap; Burns's songs then fill the air\nlike the heath-lark's song, and Scotland's wild thistle flowers\nbeautifully fragrant as the fresh rose. But now for Memory's sprite\nfrom Sweden, from Upsala. He comes thence in the form of a student--at\nleast, he wears the Upsala student's white cap with the black rim. To\nus it points out its home, as the Phrygian cap denotes Ganymede.\n\nIt was in the year 1843, that the Danish students travelled to Upsala.\nYoung hearts met together; eyes sparkled: they laughed, they sang.\nYoung hearts are the future--the conquering future--in the beautiful,\ntrue and good; it is so good that brothers should know and love each\nother. Friendship's meeting is still annually remembered in the\npalace-yard of Upsala, before the monument of Gustavus Vasa--by the\nhurra! for Denmark, in warm-hearted compliment to me.\n\nTwo summers afterwards, the visit was returned. The Swedish students\ncame to Copenhagen, and that they might there be known amongst the\nmultitude, the Upsala students wore a white cap with a black rim: this\ncap is accordingly a memorial,--the sign of friendship's bridge over\nthat river of blood which once flowed between kindred nations. When\none meets in heart and spirit, a blissful seed is then sown. Memory's\nsprite, come to us! we know thee by the cap from Upsala: be thou our\nguide, and from our more southern home, after years and days, we will\nmake the voyage over again, quicker than if we flew in Doctor Faustus'\nmagic cloak. We are in Stockholm: we stand on the Ridderholm where the\nsteamers lie alongside the bulwarks: one of them sends forth clouds of\nthick smoke from its chimney; the deck is crowded with passengers, and\nthe white cap with the black rim is not wanting.\n\nWe are off to Upsala; the paddles strike the waters of the M\u00e4lar, and\nwe shoot away from the picturesque city of Stockholm. The whole\nvoyage, direct to Upsala, is a kaleidescope on a large scale. It is\ntrue, there is nothing of the magical in the scenery, but landscape\ngives place to landscape, and clouds and sunshine refresh their\nvariegated beauty. The M\u00e4lar lake curves, is compressed, and widens\nagain: it is as if one passed from lake to lake through narrow canals\nand broad rivers. Sometimes it appears as if the lake ended in small\nrivulets between dark pines and rocks, when suddenly another large\nlake, surrounded by corn fields and meadows, opens itself to view: the\nlight-green linden trees, which have just unfolded their leaves, shine\nforth before the dark grey rocks. Again a new lake opens before us,\nwith islets, trees and red painted houses, and during the whole voyage\nthere is a lively arrival and departure of passengers, in flat\nbottomed boats, which are nearly upset in the billowy wake of the\nvessel.\n\nIt appears most dangerous opposite to Sigtuna, Sweden's old royal\ncity: the lake is broad here; the waves rise as if they were the\nwaters of the ocean; the boats rock--it is fearful to look at! But\nhere there must be a calm; and Sigtuna, that little interesting town\nwhere the old towers stand in ruins, like outposts along the rocks,\nreflects itself in the water.\n\nWe fly past! and now we are in Tyris rivulet! Part of a meadow is\nflooded; a herd of horses become shy from the snorting of the\nsteamer's engine; they dash through the water in the meadow, and it\nspurts up all over them. It glitters there between the trees on the\ndeclivity: the Upsala students lie encamped there, and exercise\nthemselves in the use of arms.\n\nThe rivulet forms a bay, and the high plain extends itself. We see old\nUpsala's hills; we see Upsala's city with its church, which, like\nNotre Dame, raises its stony arms towards heaven. The university rises\nto the view, in appearance half palace and half barracks, and there\naloft, on the greensward-clothed bank, stands the old red-painted huge\npalace with its towers.\n\nWe stop at the bulwark near the arched bridge, and so go on shore.\nWhither wilt thou conduct us first, thou our guide with the\nwhite-and-black student's cap? Shall we go up to the palace, or to\nLinnaeus's garden! or shall we go to the church-yard where the nettles\ngrow over Geier's and T\u00f6rnro's graves? No, but to the young and the\nliving Upsala's life--the students. Thou tellest us about them; we\nhear the heart's pulsations, and our hearts beat in sympathy!\n\nIn the first year of the war between Denmark and the insurgents, many\na brave Upsala student left his quiet, comfortable home, and entered\nthe ranks with his Danish brothers. The Upsala students gave up their\nmost joyous festival--the May-day festival--and the money they at\nother times used to contribute annually towards the celebration\nthereof, they sent to the Danes, after the sum had been increased by\nconcerts which were given in Stockholm and Vesteraas. That\ncircumstance will not be forgotten in Denmark.\n\nUpsala student, thou art dear to us by thy disposition! thou art dear\nto us from thy lively jests! We will mention a trait thereof. In\nUpsala, it had become the fashion to be Hegelianers--that is to say,\nalways to interweave Hegel's philosophical terms in conversation. In\norder to put down this practice, a few clever fellows took upon\nthemselves the task of hammering some of the most difficult technical\nwords into the memory of a humorous and commonly drunken country\ninnkeeper, at whose house many a _Sexa_ was often held; and the man\nspoke Hegelianic in his mellow hours, and the effect was so absurd,\nthat the employment of philosophical scraps in his speech was\nridiculed, understood, and the nuisance abandoned.\n\nBeautiful songs resound as we approach: we hear Swedish, Norwegian and\nDanish. The melody's varied beacon makes known to us where Upsala's\nstudents are assembled. The song proceeds from the assembly-room--from\nthe tavern saloon, and like serenades in the silent evening, when a\nyoung friend departs, or a dear guest is honoured. Glorious melodies!\nye enthral, so that we forget that the sun goes down, and the moon\nrises.\n\n    \"Herre min Gud hvad din M\u00e5nen lyser\n     Se, hvilken Glands ut ofver Land och Stad!\"\n\nis now sung, and we see:\n\n    \"H\u00f6gt opp i Slottet hvarenda ruta\n     Blixtrar some vore den en \u00e4delsten.\"[O]\n\n[Footnote O: Lord, my God, how Thy moon shines! See what lustre over\nland and city! High up in the palace every pane glistens as if it\nwere a gem.]\n\nUp thither then is our way! lead us, memory's sprite, into the palace,\nthe courteous governor of Upland's dwelling; mild glances greet us; we\nsee dear beings in a happy circle, and all the leading characters of\nUpsala. We again see him whose cunning quickened our perceptions as to\nthe mysteries of vegetable life, so that even the toad-stool is\nunveiled to us as a building more artfully constructed than the\nlabyrinths of the olden time. We see \"The Flowers'\" singer, he who led\nus to \"The Island of Bliss;\" we meet with him whose popular lays are\nborne on melodies into the world; his wife by his side. That quiet,\ngentle woman with those faithful eyes is the daughter of Frithiof's\nbard; we see noble men and women, ladies of the high nobility, with\nsounding and significant family names with _silver_ and\n_lilies_,--_stars_ and _swords_.\n\nHark! listen to that lively song. Gunnar Wennerberg, Gluntarra's poet\nand composer, sings his songs with Boronees,[P] and they acquire a\ndramatic life and reality.\n\n[Footnote P: Gluntarra duets, by Gunnar Wennerberg.]\n\nHow spiritual and enjoyable! one becomes happy here, one feels proud\nof the age one lives in, happy in being distant from the horrible\ntragedies that history speaks of within these walls.\n\nWe can hear about them when the song is silent, when those friendly\nforms disappear, and the festal lights are extinguished: from the\npages of history that tale resounds with a clang of horror. It was in\nthose times, which the many still call poetic--the romantic middle\nages--that bards sang of its most brilliant periods, and covered with\nthe radiance of their genius the sanguinary gulf of brutality and\nsuperstition. Terror seizes us in Upsala's palace: we stand in the\nvaulted hall, the wax tapers burn from the walls, and King Erik the\nFourteenth sits with Saul's dark despondency, with Cain's wild looks.\nNiels Sture occupies his thoughts, the recollection of injustice\nexercised against him lashes his conscience with scourges and\nscorpions, as deadly terrible as they are revealed to us in the page\nof history.\n\nKing Erik the Fourteenth, whose gloomy distrust often amounted to\ninsanity, thought that the nobility aimed at his life. His favourite,\nGoran Persson, found it to his advantage to strengthen him in this\nbelief. He hated most the popularly favoured race of the Stures, and\nof them, the light-haired Niels Sture in particular; for Erik thought\nthat he had read in the stars that a man with light hair should hurl\nhim from the throne; and as the Swedish General after the lost battle\nof Svarteaa, laid the blame on Niels Sture, Erik directly believed it,\nyet dared not to act as he desired, but even gave Niels Sture royal\npresents. Yet because he was again accused by one single person of\nhaving checked the advance of the Swedish army at B\u00e4h\u00fcs, Erik invited\nhim to his palace at Svartsj\u00f6, gave him an honourable place at his\nroyal table, and let him depart in apparent good faith for Stockholm,\nwhere, on his arrival, the heralds were ordered to proclaim in the\nstreets: \"Niels Sture is a traitor to his country!\"\n\nThere Goran Persson and the German retainers seized him, and sat him\nby force on the executioner's most miserable hack; struck him in the\nface so that the blood streamed down, placed a tarred straw crown on\nhis head, and fastened a paper with derisive words, on the saddle\nbefore him. They then let a row of hired beggar-boys and old\nfish-wives go in couples before, and to the tail of the horse they\nbound two fir-trees, the roots of which dragged on the ground and\nswept the street after the traitor. Niels Sture exclaimed that he had\nnot deserved this treatment from his King and he begged the groom, who\nwent by his side, and had served him in the field of battle, to attest\nthe truth like an honest man; when they all shouted aloud, that he\nsuffered innocently, and had acted like a true Swede. But the\nprocession was driven forward through the streets without stopping,\nand at night Niels Sture was conducted to prison.\n\nKing Erik sits in his royal palace: he orders the torches and candles\nto be lighted, but they are of no avail--his thoughts' scorpions sting\nhis soul.\n\n\"I have again liberated Niels Sture,\" he mutters; \"I have had placards\nput up at every street-corner, and let the heralds proclaim that no\none shall dare to speak otherwise than well of Niels Sture! I have\nsent him on an honourable mission to a foreign court, in order to sue\nfor me in marriage! He has had reparation enough made to him; but\nnever will he, nor his mighty race, forget the derision and shame I\nhave made him suffer. They will all betray me--kill me!\"\n\nAnd King Erik commands that all Sture's kindred shall be made\nprisoners.\n\nKing Erik sits in his royal palace: the sun shines, but not into the\nKing's heart. Niels Sture enters the chamber with an answer of consent\nfrom the royal bride, and the King shakes him by the hand, making fair\npromises--and the following evening Niels Sture is a prisoner in\nUpsala Palace.\n\nKing Erik's gloomy mind is disturbed; he has no rest; he has no peace,\nbetween fear and distrust. He hurries away to Upsala Palace; he will\nmake all straight and just again by marrying Niels Sture's sister.\nKneeling, he begs her imprisoned father's consent, and obtains it; but\nin the very moment, the spirit of distrust is again upon him, and he\ncries in his insanity:\n\n\"But you will not forgive me the shame I brought on Niels!\"\n\nAt the same time, Goran Persson announced that King Erik's brother,\nJohn, had escaped from his prison, and that a revolt was breaking out.\nAnd Erik ran, with a sharp dagger into Niels Sture's prison.\n\n\"Art thou there, traitor to thy country!\" he shouted, and thrust the\ndagger into Shire's arm; and Sture drew it out again, wiped off the\nblood, kissed the hilt, and returned the weapon to the King, saying:\n\n\"Be lenient with me, Sire; I have not deserved your disfavour.\"\n\nErik laughed aloud.\n\n\"Ho! ho! do but hear the villain! how he can pray for himself!\"\n\nAnd the King's halberdier stuck his lance through Niels Sture's eye,\nand thus gave him his death. Sture's blood cleaves to Upsala\nPalace--to King Erik always and everlastingly. No church masses can\nabsolve his soul from that base crime.\n\nLet us now go to the church.\n\nA little flight of stairs in the side aisle leads us up to a vaulted\nchamber, where kings' crowns and sceptres, taken from the coffins of\nthe dead, are deposited in wooden closets. Here, in the corner, hangs\nNiels Sture's blood-covered clothes and knight's hat, on the outside\nof which a small silk glove is fastened. It was his betrothed one's\ndainty glove--that which he, knight-like, always bore.\n\nO, barbarous era! highly vaunted as you are in song, retreat, like the\nstorm-cloud, and be poetically beautiful to all who do not see thee in\nthy true light.\n\nWe descend from the little chamber, from the gold and silver of the\ndead, and wander in the church's aisles. The cold marble tombs, with\nshields of arms and names, awaken other, milder thoughts.\n\nThe walls shine brightly, and with varied hues, in the great chapel\nbehind the high altar. The fresco paintings present to us the most\neventful circumstances of Gustavus Vasa's life. Here his clay\nmoulders, with that of his three consorts. Yonder, a work in marble,\nby Sargel, solicits our attention: it adorns the burial-chapel of the\nDe Geers; and here, in the centre aisle, under that flat stone, rests\nLinnaeus. In the side chapel, is his monument, erected by _amici_ and\n_discipuli_: a sufficient sum was quickly raised for its erection, and\nthe King, Gustavus the Third, himself brought his royal gift. The\nprojector of the subscription then explained to him, that the purposed\ninscription was, that the monument was erected only by friends and\ndisciples, and King Gustavus answered: \"And am not I also one of\nLinnaeus's disciples?\"\n\nThe monument was raised, and a hall built in the botanical garden,\nunder splendid trees. There stands his bust; but the remembrance of\nhimself, his home, his own little garden--where is it most vivid? Lead\nus thither.\n\nOn yonder side of Fyri's rivulet, where the street forms a declivity,\nwhere red-painted, wooden houses boast their living grass roofs, as\nfresh as if they were planted terraces, lies Linnaeus's garden. We\nstand within it. How solitary! how overgrown! Tall nettles shoot up\nbetween the old, untrimmed, rank hedges. No water-plants appear more\nin that little, dried-up basin; the hedges that were formerly clipped,\nput forth fresh leaves without being checked by the gardener's shears.\n\nIt was between these hedges that Linnaeus at times saw his own\ndouble--that optical illusion which presents the express image of a\nsecond self--from the hat to the boots.\n\nWhere a great man has lived and worked, the place itself becomes, as\nit were, a part and parcel of him: the whole, as well as a part, has\nmirrored itself in his eye; it has entered into his soul, and become\nlinked with it and the whole world.\n\nWe enter the orangeries: they are now transformed into assembly-rooms;\nthe blooming winter-garden has disappeared; but the walls yet show a\nsort of herbarium. They are hung round with the portraits of learned\nSwedes--herbarium from the garden of science and knowledge. Unknown\nfaces--and, to the stranger, the greatest part are unknown names--meet\nus here.\n\nOne portrait amongst the many attracts our attention: it looks\nsingular; it is the half-length figure of an old man in a shirt, lying\nin his bed. It is that of the learned theologian, Oedmann, who after\nhe had been compelled to keep his bed by a fever, found himself so\ncomfortable in it, that he continued to lie there during the remainder\nof his long life, and was not to be induced to get up. Even when the\nnext house was burning, they were obliged to carry him out in his bed\ninto the street. Death and cold were his two bugbears. The cold would\nkill him, was his opinion; and so, when the students came with their\nessays and treatises, the manuscripts were warmed at the stove before\nhe read them. The windows of his room were never opened, so that there\nwas a suffocating and impure air in his dwelling. He had a\nwriting-desk on the bed; books and manuscripts lay in confusion round\nabout; dishes, plates, and pots stood here or there, as the\nconvenience of the moment dictated, and his only companion was a deaf\nand dumb laughter.\n\nShe sat still in a corner by the window, wrapped up in herself, and\nstaring before her, as if she were a figure that had flown out of the\nframe around the dark, mouldy canvas, which had once shown a picture\non the wall.\n\nHere, in the room, in this impure atmosphere, the old man lived\nhappily, and reached his seventieth year, occupied with the\ntranslation of travels in Africa. This tainted atmosphere, in which he\nlay, became, to his conceit, the dromedary's high back, which lifted\nhim aloft in the burning sun; the long, hanging-down cobwebs were the\npalm-trees' waving banners, and the caravan went over rivers to the\nwild bushmen. Old Oedmann was with the hunters, chasing the elephants\nin the midst of the thick reeds; the agile tiger-cat sprang past, and\nthe serpents shone like garlands around the boughs of the trees: there\nwas excitement, there was danger--and yet he lay so comfortably in his\ngood and beloved bed in Upsala.\n\nOne winter's day, it happened that a Dalecarlian peasant mistook the\nhouse, and came into Oedmann's chamber in his snow-covered skin cloak,\nand with his beard full of ice. Oedmann shouted to him to go his way,\nbut the peasant was deaf, and therefore stepped quite close up to the\nbed. He was the personification of Winter himself, and Oedmann fell\nill from this visit: it was his only sickness during the many years he\nlay here as a polypus, grown fast, and where he was painted, as we see\nhis portrait in the assembly-room.\n\nFrom the hall of learning we will go to its burial-place--that is to\nsay, its open burial-place--the great library. We wander from hall to\nhall, up stairs and down stairs. Along the shelves, behind them and\nround about, stand books, those petrifactions of the mind, which might\nagain be vivified by spirit. Here lives a kind-hearted and mild old\nman, the librarian, Professor Schr\u00f6der. He smiles and nods as he hears\nhow memory's sprite takes his place here as guide, and tells of and\nshows, as we see, Tegner's copy and translation of Ochlenschloeger's\n\"Hakon Jarl and Palnatoke.\" We see Vadstene cloister's library, in\nthick hog's leather bindings, and think of the fair hands of the nuns\nthat have borne them, the pious, mild eyes that conjured the spirit\nout of the dead letters. Here is the celebrated Codex Argentius, the\ntranslation of the \"Four Evangelists.\"[Q] Gold and silver letters\nglisten from the red parchment leaves. We see ancient Icelandic\nmanuscripts, from de la Gardie's refined French saloon, and Thauberg's\nJapanese manuscripts. By merely looking at these books, their bindings\nand names, one at last becomes, as it were, quite worm-eaten in\nspirit, and longs to be out in the free air--and we are there; by\nUpsala's ancient hills. Thither do thou lead us, remembrance's elf,\nout of the city, out on the far extended plain, where Denmark's church\nstands--the church that was erected from the booty which the Swedes\ngained in the war against the Danes. We follow the broad high road: it\nleads us close past Upsala's old hills--Odin's, Thor's and Freia's\ngraves, as they are called.\n\n[Footnote Q: A Gothic translation of the Four Evangelists, and\nascribed to the Moesogothic Archbishop Ulphilas.]\n\nThere once stood ancient Upsala, here now are but a few peasants'\nfarms. The low church, built of granite blocks, dates from a very\nremote age; it stands on the remains of the heathen temple. Each of\nthe hills is a little mountain, yet each was raised by human hands.\nLetters an ell long, and whole names, are cut deep in the thin\ngreensward, which the new sprouting grass gradually fills up. The old\nhousewife, from the peasant's cot close by the hill, brings the\nsilver-bound horn, a gift of Charles John XIV., filled with mead. The\nwanderer empties the horn to the memory of the olden time, for Sweden,\nand for the heart's constant thoughts--young love!\n\nYes, thy toast is drunk here, and many a beauteous rose has been\nremembered here with a heartfelt hurra! and years after, when the same\nwanderer again stood here, she, the blooming rose, had been laid in\nthe earth; the spring roses had strown their leaves over her coffined\nclay; the sweet music of her lips sounded but in memory; the smile in\nher eyes and around her mouth, was gone like the sunbeams, which then\nshone on Upsala's hills. Her name in the greensward is grown over; she\nherself is in the earth, and it is closed above her; but the hill\nhere, closed for a thousand years, is open.\n\nThrough the passage which is dug deep into the hills, we come to the\nfunereal urns which contain the bones of youthful kindred; the dust of\nkings, the gods of the earth.\n\nThe old housewife, from the peasant's cot, has lighted half a hundred\nwax candles and placed them in rows in the otherwise pitchy-dark,\nstone-paved passage. It shines so festally in here over the bones of\nthe olden time's mighty ones, bones that are now charred and burnt to\nashes. And whose were they? Thou world's power and glory, thou world's\nposthumous fame--dust, dust like beauty's rose, laid in the dark\nearth, where no light shines; thy memorials are but a name, the name\nbut a sound. Away hence, and up on the hill where the wind blows, the\nsun shines, and the eye looks over the green plain, to the sunlit,\ndear Upsala, the student's city.\n\n\n\n\nSALA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSweden's great King, Germany's preserver, Gustavus Adolphus, founded\nSala. The little wood, close by, still preserves legends of the heroic\nKing's youthful love--of his meeting here with Ebba Brahe.\n\nSala's silver mines are the largest, the deepest, and oldest in\nSweden: they reach to the depth of one hundred and seventy fathoms,\nconsequently they are almost as deep as the Baltic. This of itself is\nenough to awaken an interest for a little town; but what is its\nappearance? \"Sala,\" says the guide-book, \"lies in a valley, in a flat,\nand not very pleasant district.\" And so truly it is: it was not very\nattractive approaching it our way, and the high road led directly into\nthe town, which is without any distinctive character. It consists of a\nlong street with what we may term a nucleus and a few fibres. The\nnucleus is the market-place, and the fibres are the few lanes\ndiverging from it. The long street--that is to say, long in a little\ntown--is quite without passengers; no one comes out from the doors, no\none is to be seen at the windows.\n\nIt was therefore with pleased surprise that I at length descried a\nhuman being: it was at an ironmonger's, where there hung a paper of\npins, a handkerchief and two tea-pots in the window. There I saw a\nsolitary shop-boy, standing quite still, but leaning over the counter\nand looking out of the open door. He certainly wrote in his journal,\nif he had one, in the evening: \"To-day a traveller drove through the\ntown; who he was, God knows, for I don't!\"--yes, that was what the\nshop-boy's face said, and an honest face it was.\n\nIn the inn at which I arrived, there was the same grave-like stillness\nas in the street. The gate was certainly closed, but all the inner\ndoors were wide open; the farm-yard cock stood uplifted in the middle\nof the traveller's room and crowed, in order to show that there was\nsomebody at home. The house, however, was quite picturesque: it had an\nopen balcony, from which one might look out upon the yard, for it\nwould have been far too lively had it been facing the street. There\nhung the old sign and creaked in the wind, as if to show that it at\nleast was alive. I saw it from my window; I saw also how the grass in\nthe street had got the mastery over the pavement. The sun shone\nbrightly, but shone as into the bachelor's solitary room, and on the\nold maid's balsams in the flower-pots. It was as still as a Scotch\nSunday--and yet it was a Tuesday. One was disposed for Young's \"Night\nThoughts.\"\n\nI looked out from the balcony into the neighbouring yard: there was\nnot a soul to be seen, but children had been playing there. There was\na little garden made of dry sticks: they were stuck down in the soft\nsoil and had been watered; a broken pan, which had certainly served by\nway of watering-pot, lay there still. The sticks signified roses and\ngeraniums.\n\nIt had been a delightful garden--alas, yes! We great, grown-up men--we\nplay just so: we make ourselves a garden with what we call love's\nroses and friendship's geraniums; we water them with our tears and\nwith our heart's blood; and yet they are, and remain, dry sticks\nwithout root. It was a gloomy thought; I felt it, and in order to get\nthe dry sticks in my thoughts to blossom, I went out. I wandered in\nthe fibres and in the long threads--that is to say, in the small\nlanes--and in the great street; and here was more life than I dared to\nexpect. I met a herd of cattle returning or going--which I know\nnot--for they were without a herdsman. The shop-boy still stood behind\nthe counter, leaned over it and greeted me; the stranger took his hat\noff again--that was my day's employment in Sala.\n\nPardon me, thou silent town, which Gustavus Adolphus built, where his\nyoung heart felt the first emotions of love, and where the silver lies\nin the deep shafts--that is to say, outside the town, \"in a flat, and\nnot very pleasant district.\"\n\nI knew no one in the town; I had no one to be my guide, so I\naccompanied the cows, and came to the churchyard. The cows went past,\nbut I stepped over the stile, and stood amongst the graves, where the\ngrass grew high, and almost all the tombstones lay with worn-out\ninscriptions. On a few only the date of the year was legible.\n\"Anno\"--yes, what then? And who rested here? Everything on the stone\nwas erased--blotted out like the earthly life of those mortals that\nhere were earth in earth. What life's dream have ye dead played here\nin silent Sala?\n\nThe setting sun shone over the graves; not a leaf moved on the trees;\nall was still--still as death--in the city of the silver-mines, of\nwhich this traveller's reminiscence is but a frame around the shop-boy\nwho leaned over the counter.\n\n\n\n\nTHE MUTE BOOK.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBy the high road into the forest there stood a solitary farm-house.\nOur way lay right through the farm-yard; the sun shone; all the\nwindows were open; there was life and bustle within, but in the yard,\nin an arbour of flowering lilacs, there stood an open coffin. The\ncorpse had been placed out here, and it was to be buried that\nforenoon. No one stood by and wept over that dead man; no one hung\nsorrowfully over him; his face was covered with a white cloth, and\nunder his head there lay a large, thick book, every leaf of which was\na whole sheet of grey paper, and between each lay withered flowers,\ndeposited and forgotten--a whole herbarium, gathered in different\nplaces. He himself had requested that it should be laid in the grave\nwith him. A chapter of his life was blended with every flower.\n\n\"Who is that dead man?\" we asked, and the answer was: \"The old student\nfrom Upsala. They say he was once very clever; he knew the learned\nlanguages, could sing and write verses too; but then there was\nsomething that went wrong, and so he gave both his thoughts and\nhimself up to drinking spirits, and as his health suffered by it, he\ncame out here into the country, where they paid for his board and\nlodging.\n\n\"He was as gentle as a child, when the dark humour did not come over\nhim, for then he was strong, and ran about in the forest like a hunted\ndeer; but when we got him home, we persuaded him to look into the book\nwith the dry plants. Then he would sit the whole day and look at one\nplant, and then at another, and many a time the tears ran down his\ncheeks. God knows what he then thought! But he begged that he might\nhave the book with him in his coffin; and now it lies there, and the\nlid will soon be fastened down, and then he will take his peaceful\nrest in the grave!\"\n\nThey raised the winding-sheet. There was peace in the face of the\ndead: a sunbeam fell on it; a swallow in its arrowy flight, darted\ninto the new-made arbour, and in its flight circled twittering over\nthe dead man's head.\n\nHow strange it is!--we all assuredly know it--to take out old letters\nfrom the days of our youth and read them: a whole life, as it were,\nthen rises up with all its hopes, and all its troubles. How many of\nthose with whom we, in their time, lived so devotedly, are now even as\nthe dead to us, and yet they still live! But we have not thought of\nthem for many years--them whom we once thought we should always cling\nto, and share our mutual joys and sorrows with.\n\nThe withered oak-leaf in the book here, is a memorial of the\nfriend--the friend of his school-days--the friend for life. He fixed\nthis leaf on the student's cap in the green wood, when the vow of\nfriendship was concluded for the whole of life. Where does he now\nlive? The leaf is preserved; friendship forgotten. Here is a foreign\nconservatory-plant, too fine for the gardens of the North--it looks as\nif there still were fragrance in these leaves!--_she_ gave it to\nhim--she, the young lady of that noble garden.\n\nHere is the marsh-lotus which he himself has plucked and watered with\nsalt tears--the marsh-lotus from the fresh waters. And here is a\nnettle: what does its leaf say? What did he think on plucking it--on\npreserving it? Here are lilies of the valley from the woodland\nsolitudes; here are honeysuckle leaves from the village ale-house\nflower-pot; and here the bare, sharp blade of grass.\n\nThe flowering lilac bends its fresh, fragrant clusters over the dead\nman's head; the swallow again flies past; \"quivit! quivit!\" Now the\nmen come with nails and hammer; the lid is placed over the corpse,\nwhose head rests on the Mute-Book--preserved--forgotten!\n\n\n\n\nTHE Z\u00c4THER DALE.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nEverything was in order, the carriage examined, even a whip with a\ngood lash was not forgotten. \"Two whips would be best,\" said the\nironmonger, who sold it, and the ironmonger was a man of experience,\nwhich travellers often are not. A whole bag full of \"slanter\"--that\nis, copper coins of small value--stood before us for bridge-money, for\nbeggars, for shepherd's boys, or whoever might open the many\nfield-gates for us that obstructed our progress. But we had to do this\nourselves, for the rain pattered down and lashed the ground; no one\nhad any desire to come out in such weather. The rushes in the marsh\nbent and waved; it was a real rain feast for them, and it whistled\nfrom the tops of the rushes: \"We drink with our feet, we drink with\nour heads, we drink with the whole body, and yet we stand on one leg,\nhurra! We drink with the bending willow, with the dripping flowers on\nthe bank; their cups run over--the marsh marigold, that fine lady, can\nbear it better! Hurra! it is a feast! it pours, it pours; we whistle\nand we sing; it is our own song. Tomorrow the frogs will croak the\nsame after us and say, 'it is quite new!'\"\n\nAnd the rushes waved, and the rain pattered down with a splashing\nnoise--it was fine weather to travel in to Z\u00e4ther Dale, and to see its\nfar-famed beauties. The whip-lash now came off the whip; it was\nfastened on again, and again, and every time it was shorter, so that\nat last there was not a lash, nor was there any handle, for the handle\nwent after the lash--or sailed after it--as the road was quite\nnavigable, and gave one a vivid idea of the beginning of the deluge.\n\nOne poor jade now drew too much, the other drew too little, and one of\nthe splinter bars broke; well, by all that is vexatious, that was a\nfine drive! The leather apron in front had a deep pond in its folds\nwith an outlet into one's lap. Now one of the linch-pins came out; now\nthe twisting of the rope harness became loose, and the cross-strap was\ntired of holding any longer. Glorious inn in Z\u00e4ther, how I now long\nmore for thee than thy far-famed dale. And the horses went slower, and\nthe rain fell faster, and so--yes, so we were not yet in Z\u00e4ther.\n\nPatience, thou lank spider, that in the ante-chamber quietly dost spin\nthy web over the expectant's foot, spin my eyelids close in a sleep as\nstill as the horse's pace! Patience? no, she was not with us in the\ncarriage to Z\u00e4ther. But to the inn, by the road side, close to the\nfar-famed valley, I got at length, towards evening.\n\nAnd everything was flowing in the yard, chaotically mingled; manure\nand farming implements, staves and straw. The poultry sat there washed\nto shadows, or at least like stuck-up hens' skins with feathers on,\nand even the ducks crept close up to the wet wall, sated with the wet.\nThe stable-man was cross, the girl still more so; it was difficult to\nget them to bestir themselves: the steps were crooked, the floor\nsloping and but just washed, sand strewn thickly on it, and the air\nwas damp and cold. But without, scarcely twenty paces from the inn, on\nthe other side of the road, lay the celebrated valley, a garden made\nby nature herself, and whose charm consists of trees and bushes, wells\nand purling brooks.\n\nIt was a long hollow; I saw the tops of the trees looming up, and the\nrain drew its thick veil over it. The whole of that long evening did I\nsit and look upon it during that shower of showers. It was as if the\nVenern, the Vettern and a few more lakes ran through an immense sieve\nfrom the clouds. I had ordered something to eat and drink, but I got\nnothing. They ran up and they ran down; there was a hissing sound of\nroasting by the hearth; the girls chattered, the men drank \"sup,\"[R]\nstrangers came, were shown into their rooms, and got both roast and\nboiled. Several hours had passed, when I made a forcible appeal to the\ngirl, and she answered phlegmatically: \"Why, Sir, you sit there and\nwrite without stopping, so you cannot have time to eat.\"\n\n[Footnote R: Swedish, _sup_. Danish, _snaps_. German, _schnaps_.\nEnglish, _drams_.]\n\nIt was a long evening, \"but the evening passed!\" It had become quite\nstill in the inn; all the travellers, except myself, had again\ndeparted, certainly in order to find better quarters for the night at\nHedemore or Brunbeck. I had seen, through the half-open door into the\ndirty tap-room, a couple of fellows playing with greasy cards; a huge\ndog lay under the table and glared with its large red eyes; the\nkitchen was deserted; the rooms too; the floor was wet, the storm\nrattled, the rain beat against the windows--\"and now to bed! said I.\"\n\n\n\nI slept an hour, perhaps two, and was awakened by a loud bawling from\nthe high road. I started up: it was twilight, the night at that period\nis not darker--it was about one o'clock. I heard the door shaken\nroughly; a deep manly voice shouted aloud, and there was a hammering\nwith a cudgel against the planks of the yard-gate. Was it an\nintoxicated or a mad man that was to be let in? The gate was now\nopened, but many words were not exchanged. I heard a woman scream at\nthe top of her voice from terror. There was now a great bustling\nabout; they ran across the yard in wooden shoes; the bellowing of\ncattle and the rough voices of men were mingled together. I sat on the\nedge of the bed. Out or in! what was to be done? I looked from the\nwindow; in the road there was nothing to be seen, and it still rained.\nAll at once some one came up stairs with heavy footsteps: he opened\nthe door of the room adjoining mine--now he stood still! I listened--a\nlarge iron bolt fastened my door. The stranger now walked across the\nfloor, now he shook my door, and then kicked against it with a heavy\nfoot, and whilst all this was passing, the rain beat against the\nwindows, and the blast made them rattle.\n\n\"Are there any travellers here?\" shouted a voice; \"the house is on\nfire!\"\n\nI now dressed myself and hastened out of the room and down the stairs.\nThere was no smoke to be seen, but when I reached the yard, I saw that\nthe whole building--a long and extensive one of wood--was enveloped in\nflames and clouds of smoke. The fire had originated in the baking\noven, which no one had looked to; a traveller, who accidently came\npast, saw it, called out and hammered at the door: and the women\nscreamed, and the cattle bellowed, when the fire stuck its red tongue\ninto them.\n\nNow came the fire-engine and the flames were extinguished. By this\ntime it was morning. I stood in the road, scarcely a hundred steps\nfrom the far-famed dale. \"One may as well spring into it as walk into\nit!\" and I sprang into it; and the rain poured down, and the water\nflowed--the whole dale was a well.\n\nThe trees turned their leaves the wrong side out, purely because of\nthe pouring rain, and they said, as the rushes did the day before: \"We\ndrink with our heads, we drink with our feet, and we drink with the\nwhole body, and yet stand on our legs, hurra! it rains, and it pours;\nwe whistle and we sing; it is our own song--and it is quite new!\"\n\nYes, that the rushes also sang yesterday--but it was the same, ever\nthe same. I looked and looked, and all I know of the beauty of Z\u00e4ther\nDale is, that she had washed herself!\n\n\n\n\nTHE MIDSUMMER FESTIVAL IN LACKSAND.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nLacksand lay on the other side of the dal-elv which the road now led\nus over for the third or fourth time. The picturesque bell-tower of\nred painted beams, erected at a distance from the church, rose above\nthe tall trees on the clayey declivity: old willows hung gracefully\nover the rapid stream. The floating bridge rocked under us--nay, it\neven sank a little, so that the water splashed under the horse's\nhoofs; but these bridges have such qualities! The iron chains that\nheld it rattled, the planks creaked, the boards splashed, the water\nrose, and murmured and roared, and so we got over where the road\nslants upwards towards the town. Close opposite here the last year's\nMay-pole still stood with withered flowers. How many hands that bound\nthese flowers are now withered in the grave?\n\nIt is far prettier to go up on the sloping bank along the elv, than to\nfollow the straight high-road into the town. The path conducts us,\nbetween pasture fields and leaf trees, up to the parsonage, where we\npassed the evening with the friendly family. The clergyman himself was\nbut lately dead, and his relatives were all in mourning. There was\nsomething about the young daughter--I knew not myself what it was--but\nI was led to think of the delicate flax flower, too delicate for the\nshort northern summer.\n\nThey spoke about the Midsummer festival the next day, and of the\nwinter season here, when the swans, often more than thirty at a time,\nsit (motionless themselves) on the elv, and utter strange, mournful\ntones. They always come in pairs, they said, two and two, and thus\nthey also fly away again. If one of them dies, its partner always\nremains a long time after all the others are gone; lingers, laments,\nand then flies away alone and solitary.\n\nWhen I left the parsonage in the evening, the moon, in its first\nquarter, was up. The May-pole was raised; the little steamer, 'Prince\nAugustus,' with several small vessels in tow, came over the Siljan\nlake and into the elv; a musician sprang on shore, and began to play\ndances under the tall wreathed May-pole. And there was soon a merry\ncircle around it--all so happy, as if the whole of life were but a\ndelightful summer night.\n\nNext morning was the Midsummer Festival. It was Sunday, the 24th of\nJune, and a beautiful sunshiny day it was. The most picturesque sight\nat the festival is to see the people from the different parishes\ncoming in crowds, in large boats over Siljan's lake, and landing on\nits shores. We drove out to the landing-place, Barkedale, and before\nwe got out of the town, we met whole troops coming from there, as well\nas from the mountains.\n\nClose by the town of Lacksand, there is a row of low wooden shops on\nboth sides of the way, which only get their interior light through the\ndoorway. They form a whole street, and serve as stables for the\nparishioners, but also--and it was particularly the case that\nmorning--to go into and arrange their finery. Almost all the shops or\nsheds were filled with peasant women, who were anxiously busy about\ntheir dresses, careful to get them into the right folds, and in the\nmean time peeped continually out of the door to see who came past. The\nnumber of arriving church-goers increased; men, women, and children,\nold and young, even infants; for at the Midsummer festival no one\nstays at home to take care of them, and so of course they must come\ntoo--all must go to church.\n\nWhat a dazzling army of colours! Fiery red and grass green aprons meet\nour gaze. The dress of the women is a black skirt, red bodice, and\nwhite sleeves: all of them had a psalm-book wrapped in the folded silk\npocket-handkerchief. The little girls were entirely in yellow, and\nwith red aprons; the very least were in Turkish-yellow clothes. The\nmen were dressed in black coats, like our palet\u00f4ts, embroidered with\nred woollen cord; a red band with a tassel hung down from the large\nblack hat; with dark knee breeches, and blue stockings, with red\nleather gaiters--in short, there was a dazzling richness of colour,\nand that, too, on a bright sunny morning in the forest road.\n\nThis road led down a steep to the lake, which was smooth and blue.\nTwelve or fourteen long boats, in form like gondolas, were already\ndrawn up on the flat strand, which here is covered with large stones.\nThese stones served the persons who landed, as bridges; the boats were\nlaid alongside them, and the people clambered up, and went and bore\neach other on land. There certainly were at least a thousand persons\non the strand; and far out on the lake, one could see ten or twelve\nboats more coming, some with sixteen oars, others with twenty, nay,\neven with four-and-twenty, rowed by men and women, and every boat\ndecked out with green branches. These, and the varied clothes, gave to\nthe whole an appearance of something so festal, so fantastically rich,\nas one would hardly think the north possessed. The boats came nearer,\nall crammed full of living freight; but they came silently, without\nnoise or talking, and rowed up to the declivity of the forest.\n\nThe boats were drawn up on the sand: it was a fine subject for a\npainter, particularly one point--the way up the slope, where the whole\nmass moved on between the trees and bushes. The most prominent figures\nthere, were two ragged urchins, clothed entirely in bright yellow,\neach with a skin bundle on his shoulders. They were from Gagne, the\npoorest parish in Dalecarlia. There was also a lame man with his blind\nwife: I thought of the fable of my childhood, of the lame and the\nblind man: the lame man lent his eyes, and the blind his legs, and so\nthey reached the town.\n\nAnd we also reached the town and the church, and thither they all\nthronged: they said there were above five thousand persons assembled\nthere. The church-service began at five o'clock. The pulpit and organ\nwere ornamented with flowering lilacs; children sat with lilac-flowers\nand branches of birch; the little ones had each a piece of oat-cake,\nwhich they enjoyed. There was the sacrament for the young persons who\nhad been confirmed; there was organ-playing and psalm-singing; but\nthere was a terrible screaming of children, and the sound of heavy\nfootsteps; the clumsy, iron-shod Dal shoes tramped loudly upon the\nstone floor. All the church pews, the gallery pews, and the centre\naisle were quite filled with people. In the side aisle one saw various\ngroups--playing children, and pious old folks: by the sacristy there\nsat a young mother giving suck to her child--she was a living image of\nthe Madonna herself.\n\nThe first impression of the whole was striking, but only the\nfirst--there was too much that disturbed. The screaming of children,\nand the noise of persons walking were heard above the singing, and\nbesides that, there was an insupportable smell of garlic: almost all\nthe congregation had small bunches of garlic with them, of which they\nate as they sat. I could not bear it, and went out into the\nchurchyard: here--as it always is in nature--it was affecting, it was\nholy. The church door stood open; the tones of the organ, and the\nvoices of the psalm-singers were wafted out here in the bright\nsunlight, by the open lake: the many who could not find a place in the\nchurch, stood outside, and sang with the congregation from the\npsalm-book: round about on the monuments, which are almost all of\ncast-iron, there sat mothers suckling their infants--the fountain of\nlife flowed over death and the grave. A young peasant stood and read\nthe inscription on a grave:\n\n    \"Ach hur s\u00f6dt al hafve lefvet,\n     Ach hur skj\u00f6ut al kunne d\u00f6e!\"[S]\n\n[Footnote S: \"How sweet to live--how beautiful to die!\"]\n\nBeautiful Christian, scriptural language, verses certainly taken from\nthe psalm-book, were read on the graves; they were all read, for the\nservice lasted several hours. This, however, can never be good for\ndevotion.\n\nThe crowd at length streamed from the church; the fiery-red and\ngrass-green aprons glittered; but the mass of human beings became\nthicker, and closer, and pressed forward. The white head-dresses, the\nwhite band over the forehead, and the white sleeves, were the\nprevailing colours--it looked like a long procession in Catholic\ncountries. There was again life and motion on the road; the\nover-filled boats again rowed away; one waggon drove off after the\nother; but yet there were people left behind. Married and unmarried\nmen stood in groups in the broad street of Lacksand, from the church\nup to the inn. I was staying there, and I must acknowledge that my\nDanish tongue sounded quite foreign to them all. I then tried the\nSwedish, and the girl at the inn assured me that she understood me\nbetter than she had understood the Frenchman, who the year before had\nspoken French to her.\n\nAs I sit in my room, my hostess's grand-daughter, a nice little child,\ncomes in, and is pleased to see my parti-coloured carpet-bag, my\nScotch plaid, and the red leather lining of the portmanteau. I\ndirectly cut out for her, from a sheet of white paper, a Turkish\nmosque, with minarets and open windows, and away she runs with it--so\nhappy, so happy!\n\nShortly after, I heard much loud talking in the yard, and I had a\npresentiment that it was concerning what I had cut out; I therefore\nstepped softly out into the balcony, and saw the grandmother standing\nbelow, and with beaming face, holding my clipped-out paper at arm's\nlength. A whole crowd of Dalecarlians, men and women, stood around,\nall in artistic ecstacy over my work; but the little girl--the sweet\nlittle child--screamed, and stretched out her hands after her lawful\nproperty, which she was not permitted to keep, as it was too fine.\n\nI sneaked in again, yet, of course, highly flattered and cheered; but\na moment after there was a knocking at my door: it was the\ngrandmother, my hostess, who came with a whole plate full of\nspice-nuts.\n\n\"I bake the best in all Dalecarlia,\" said she; \"but they are of the\nold fashion, from my grandmother's time. You cut out so well, Sir,\nshould you not be able to cut me out some new fashions?\"\n\nAnd I sat the whole of Midsummer night, and clipped fashions for\nspice-nuts. Nutcrackers with knights' boots, windmills which were both\nmill and miller--but in slippers, and with the door in the\nstomach--and ballet-dancers that pointed with one leg towards the\nseven stars. Grandmother got them, but she turned the ballet-dancers\nup and down; the legs went too high for her; she thought that they had\none leg and three arms.\n\n\"They will be new fashions,\" said she; \"but they are difficult.\"\n\n\n\n\nFAITH AND KNOWLEDGE.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nTruth can never be at variance with truth, science can never militate\nagainst faith: we naturally speak of them both in their purity: they\nrespond to and they strengthen man's most glorious thought:\n_immortality_. And yet you may say, \"I was more peaceful, I was safer\nwhen, as a child, I closed my eyes on my mother's breast and slept\nwithout thought or care, wrapping myself up simply in faith.\" This\nprescience, this compound of understanding in everything, this\nentering of the one link into the other from eternity to eternity,\ntears away from me a support--my confidence in prayer; that which is,\nas it were, the wings wherewith to fly to my God! If it be loosened,\nthen I fall powerless in the dust, without consolation or hope.\n\nI bend my energies, it is true, towards attaining the great and\nglorious light of knowledge, but it appears to me that therein is\nhuman arrogance: it is, as one should say, \"I will be as wise as God.\"\n\"That you shall be!\" said the serpent to our first parents when it\nwould seduce them to eat of the tree of knowledge. Through my\nunderstanding I must acknowledge the truth of what the astronomer\nteaches and proves. I see the wonderful, eternal omniscience of God in\nthe whole creation of the world--in the great and in the small, where\nthe one attaches itself to the other, is joined with the other, in an\nendless harmonious entireness; and I tremble in my greatest need and\nsorrow. What can my prayer change, where everything is law, from\neternity to eternity?\n\nYou tremble as you see the Almighty, who reveals Himself in all\nloving-kindness--that Creator, according to man's expression, whose\nunderstanding and heart are one--you tremble when you know that he has\nelected you to immortality.\n\nI know it in the faith, in the holy, eternal words of the Bible.\nKnowledge lays itself like a stone over my grave, but my faith is that\nwhich breaks it.\n\nNow, thus it is! The smallest flower preaches from its green stalk, in\nthe name of knowledge--_immortality_. Hear it! the beautiful also\nbears proofs of immortality, and with the conviction of faith and\nknowledge, the immortal will not tremble in his greatest need; the\nwings of prayer will not droop: you will believe in the eternal laws\nof love, as you believe in the laws of sense.\n\nWhen the child gathers flowers in the fields and brings us the whole\nhandful, where one is erect and the other hangs the head, thrown as it\nwere among one another, then it is that we see the beauty in every one\nby itself--that harmony in colour and in form, which pleases our eye\nso well. We arrange them instinctively, and every single beauty is\nblended together in one entire beauteous group. We do not look at the\nflower, but on the whole bouquet. The beauty of harmony is an instinct\nin us; it lies in our eyes and in our ears, those bridges between our\nsoul and the creation around us--in all our senses there is such a\ndivine, such an entire and perfect stream in our whole being, a\nstriving after the harmonious, as it shows itself in all created\nthings, even in the pulsations of the air, made visible in Chladni's\nfigures.\n\nIn the Bible we find the expression: \"God in spirit and in\ntruth,\"--and hence we most significantly find an expression for the\nadmission of what we call a feeling of the beautiful; for what else is\nthis revelation of God but spirit and truth? And just as our own soul\nshines out of the eye and the fine movement around the mouth, so does\nthe created image shine forth from God in spirit and truth. There is\nharmonious beauty from the smallest leaf and flower to the large,\nswelling bouquet, from our earth itself to the numberless globes in\nthe firmamental space--as far as the eye sees, as far as science\nventures, all, small and great, is beauty and harmony.\n\nBut if we turn to mankind, for whom we have the highest, the holiest\nexpression; \"created in God's image,\" man, who is able to comprehend\nand admit in himself all God's creation, the harmony in the harmony\nthen seems to be defective, for at our birth we are all equal! as\ncreatures we have equally \"no right to demand;\" yet how differently\nGod has granted us abilities! some few so immensely great, others so\nmean! At our birth God places us in our homes and positions; and to\nhow many of us are allotted the hardest struggles! We are placed\n_there_, introduced _there_--how many may not say justly: \"It were\nbetter for me that I had never been born!\"\n\nHuman life, consequently--the highest here on the earth--does not come\nunder the laws of harmonious beauty: it is inconceivable, it is an\ninjustice, and thus cannot take place.\n\nThe defect of harmony in life lies in this:--that we only see a small\npart thereof, namely, existence here on the earth: there must be a\nlife to come--an immortality.\n\nThat, the smallest flower preaches to us, as does all that is created\nin beauty and harmony.\n\nIf our existence ceased with death here, then the most perfect work of\nGod was not perfect; God was not justice and love, as everything in\nnature and revelation affirms; and if we be referred to the whole of\nmankind, as that wherein harmony will reveal itself, then our whole\nactions and endeavours are but as the labours of the coral-insect:\nmankind becomes but a monument of greatness to the Creator: he would\nthen only have raised His _glory_, not shown His greatest _love_.\nLoving-kindness is not self-love.\n\nWe are immortal! In this rich consciousness we are raised towards God,\nfundamentally sure, that whatever happens to us, is for our good. Our\nearthly eye is only able to reach to a certain boundary in space; our\nsoul's eye also has but a limited scope; but beyond _that,_ the same\nlaws of loving-kindness must reign, as here. The prescience of eternal\nomniscience cannot alarm us; we human beings can apprehend the notion\nthereof in ourselves. We know perfectly what development must take\nplace in the different seasons of the year; the time for flowers and\nfor fruits; what kinds will come forth and thrive; the time of\nmaturity, when the storms must prevail, and when it is the rainy\nseason. Thus must God, in an infinitely greater degree, have the same\nknowledge of the whole created globes of His universe, as of our earth\nand the human race here. He must know when that development, that\nflowering in the human race ordained by Himself, shall come to pass;\nwhen the powers of intellect, of full development, are to reign; and\nunder these characters, come to a maturity of development, men will\nbecome mighty, driving wheels--every one be the eternal God's likeness\nindeed.\n\nHistory shows us these things: joint enters into joint, in the world\nof spirits, as well as in the materially created world; the eye of\nwisdom--the all-seeing eye--encompasses the whole! And should we then\nnot be able, in our heart's distress, to pray to this Father with\nconfidence--to pray as the Saviour prayed: \"If it be possible, let\nthis cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.\"\n\nThese last words we do not forget! and our prayer will be granted, if\nit be for our good; or if it be not, then let us, as the child here,\nthat in its trouble comes to its earthly Father, and does not get its\nwish fulfilled, but is refreshed by mild words, and the affectionate\nlanguage of reason, so that the eye weeps, which thereby mitigates\nsorrow, and the child's pain is soothed. This, will prayer also grant\nus: the eye will be filled with tears, but the heart will be full of\nconsolation! And who has penetrated so deeply into the ways of the\nsoul, that he dare deny that prayer is the wings that bear thee to\nthat sphere of inspiration whence God will extend to thee the\nolive-branch of help and grace?\n\nBy walking with open eyes in the path of knowledge, we see the glory\nof the Annunciation. The wisdom of generations is but a span on the\nhigh pillar of revelation, above which sits the Almighty; but this\nshort span will grow through eternity, in faith and with faith.\nKnowledge is like a chemical test that pronounces the gold pure!\n\n\n\n\nIN THE FOREST\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe are a long way over the elv. We have left the corn-fields behind,\nand have just come into the forest, where we halt at that small inn,\nwhich is ornamented over the doors and windows with green branches for\nthe Midsummer festival. The whole kitchen is hung round with branches\nof birch and the berries of the mountain-ash: the oat-cakes hang on\nlong poles under the ceiling; the berries are suspended above the head\nof the old woman who is just scouring her brass kettle bright.\n\nThe tap-room, where the peasant sits and carouse, is just as finely\nhung round with green. Midsummer raises its leafy arbour everywhere,\nyet it is most flush in the forest--it extends for miles around. Our\nroad goes for miles through that forest, without seeing a house, or\nthe possibility of meeting travellers, driving, riding or walking.\nCome! The ostler puts fresh horses to the carriage; come with us into\nthe large woody desert: we have a regular trodden way to travel, the\nair is clear, here is summer's warmth and the fragrance of birch and\nlime. It is an up and down hill road, always bending, and so, ever\nchanging, but yet always forest scenery--the close, thick forest. We\npass small lakes, which lie so still and deep, as if they concealed\nnight and sleep under their dark, glassy surfaces.\n\nWe are now on a forest plain, where only charred stumps of trees are\nto be seen: this long tract is black, burnt, and deserted--not a bird\nflies over it. Tall, hanging birches now greet us again; a squirrel\nsprings playfully across the road, and up into the tree; we cast our\neye searchingly over the wood-grown mountain-side, which slopes so\nfar, far forward; but not a trace of a house is to be seen: nowhere\ndoes that blueish smoke-cloud rise, that shows us, here are\nfellow-men.\n\nThe sun shines warm; the flies dance around the horses, settle on\nthem, fly off again, and dance, as though it were to qualify\nthemselves for resting and being still. They perhaps think: \"Nothing\nis going on without us: there is no life while we are doing nothing.\"\nThey think, as many persons think, and do not remember that Time's\nhorses always fly onward with us!\n\nHow solitary it is here!--so delightfully solitary! one is so entirely\nalone with God and one's self. As the sunlight streams forth over the\nearth, and over the extensive solitary forests, so does God's spirit\nstream over and into mankind; ideas and thoughts unfold\nthemselves--endless, inexhaustible, as he is--as the magnet which\napportions its powers to the steel, and itself loses nothing thereby.\nAs our journey through the forest-scenery here along the extended\nsolitary road, so, travelling on the great high-road of thought, ideas\npass through our head. Strange, rich caravans pass by from the works\nof poets, from the home of memory, strange and novel--for capricious\nfancy gives birth to them at the moment. There comes a procession of\npious children with waving flags and joyous songs; there come dancing\nMoenades, the blood's wild Bacchantes. The sun pours down hot in the\nopen forest: it is as if the Southern summer had laid itself up here\nto rest in Scandinavian forest-solitude, and sought itself out a glade\nwhere it might lie in the sun's hot beams and sleep: hence this\nstillness, as if it were night. Not a bird is heard to twitter, not a\npine-tree moves: of what does the Southern summer dream here in the\nNorth, amongst pines and fragrant birches?\n\nIn the writings of the olden time, from the classic soil of the South,\nare _sagas_ of mighty fairies who, in the skins of swans, flew towards\nthe North, to the Hyperborean's land, to the east of the north wind;\nup there, in the deep, still lakes, they bathed themselves, and\nacquired a renewed form. We are in the forest by these deep lakes; we\nsee swans in flocks fly over us, and swim upon the rapid elv and on\nthe still waters. The forests, we perceive, continue to extend further\ntowards the west and the north, and are more dense as we proceed: the\ncarriage-roads cease, and one can only pursue one's way along the\noutskirts by the solitary path, and on horseback.\n\nThe saga, from the time of the plague (A.D., 1350), here impresses\nitself on the mind, when the pestilence passed through the land, and\ntransformed cultivated fields and towns--nay, whole parishes, into\nbarren fields and wild forests. Deserted and forgotten, overgrown with\nmoss, grass, and bushes, churches stood for years far in the forest;\nno one knew of their existence, until, in a later century, a huntsman\nlost himself here: his arrow rebounded from the green wall, the moss\nof which he loosened, and the church was found. The wood-cutter felled\nthe trees for fuel; his axe struck against the overgrown wall, and it\ngave way to the blow; the fir-planks fell, and the church, from the\ntime of the pestilence, was discovered; the sun again shone bright\nthrough the openings of the doors and windows, on the brass candelabra\nand the altar, where the communion-cup still stood. The cuckoo came,\nsat there, and sang: \"Many, many years shalt thou live!\"\n\nWoodland solitude! what images dost thou not present to our thoughts!\nWoodland solitude! through thy vaulted halls people now pass in the\nsummer-time with cattle and domestic utensils; children and old men go\nto the solitary pasture where echo dwells, where the national song\nsprings forth with the wild mountain flower! Dost thou see the\nprocession?--paint it if thou canst! The broad wooden cart laden high\nwith chests and barrels, with jars and with crockery. The bright\ncopper kettle and the tin dish shine in the sun. The old grandmother\nsits at the top of the load and holds her spinning-wheel, which\ncompletes the pyramid. The father drives the horse, the mother carries\nthe youngest child on her back, sewed up in a skin, and the procession\nmoves on step by step. The cattle are driven by the half-grown\nchildren: they have stuck a birch branch between one of the cows'\nhorns, but she does not appear to be proud of her finery, she goes the\nsame quiet pace as the others and lashes the saucy flies with her\ntail. If the night becomes cold on this solitary pasture, there is\nfuel enough here--the tree falls of itself from old age and lies and\nrots.\n\nBut take especial care of the fire fear the fire-spirit in the forest\ndesert! He comes from the unextinguishable pile--he comes from the\nthunder-cloud, riding on the blue lightning's flame, which kindles the\nthick, dry moss of the earth: trees and bushes are kindled, the flames\nrun from tree to tree--it is like a snow-storm of fire! the flame\nleaps to the tops of the trees--what a crackling and roaring, as if it\nwere the ocean in its course! The birds fly upward in flocks, and fall\ndown suffocated by the smoke; the animals flee, or, encircled by the\nfire, are consumed in it! Hear their cries and roars of agony! The\nhowling of the wolf and the bear, dos't thou know it? A calm,\nrainy-day, and the forest-plains themselves, alone are able to confine\nthe fiery sea, and the burnt forest stands charred, with black trunks\nand black stumps of trees, as we saw them here in the forest by the\nbroad high-road. On this road we continue to travel, but it becomes\nworse and worse; it is, properly speaking, no road at all, but it is\nabout to become one. Large stones lie half dug up, and we drive past\nthem; large trees are cast down, and obstruct our way, and therefore\nwe must descend from the carriage. The horses are taken out, and the\npeasants help to lift and push the carriage forward over ditches and\nopened paths.\n\nThe sun now ceases to shine; some few rain-drops fall, and now it is a\nsteady rain. But how it causes the birch to shed its fragrance! At a\ndistance there are huts erected, of loose trunks of trees and fresh\ngreen boughs, and in each there is a large fire burning. See where the\nblue smoke curls through the green leafy roof; peasants are within at\nwork, hammering and forging; here they have their meals. They are now\nlaying a mine in order to blast a rock, and the rain falls faster and\nfaster, and the pine and birch emit a finer fragrance. It is\ndelightful in the forest.\n\n\n\n\nFAHLUN.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe made our way at length out of the forest, and saw a town before us\nenveloped in thick smoke, having a similar appearance to most of the\nEnglish manufacturing towns, save that the smoke was greenish--it was\nthe town Fahlun.\n\nThe road now went downwards between large banks, formed by the dross\ndeposited here from the smelting furnaces, and which looks like\nburnt-out hardened lava. No sprout or shrub was to be seen, not a\nblade of grass peeped forth by the way-side, not a bird flew past, but\na strong sulphurous smell, as from among the craters in Solfatara,\nfilled the air. The copper roof of the church shone with corrosive\ngreen.\n\nLong straight streets now appeared in view. It was as deathly still\nhere as if sickness and disease had lain within these dark wooden\nhouses, and frightened the inhabitants from coming abroad; yet\nsickness and disease come but to few here, for when the plague raged\nin Sweden, the rich and powerful of the land hastened to Fahlun, whose\nsulphureous air was the most healthy. An ochre-yellow water runs\nthrough the brook, between the houses; the smoke from the mines and\nsmelting furnaces has imparted its tinge to them; it has even\npenetrated into the church, whose slender pillars are dark from the\nfumes of the copper. There chanced to come on a thunder-storm when we\narrived, but its roaring and the lightning's flashes harmonized well\nwith this town, which appears as if it were built on the edge of a\ncrater.\n\nWe went to see the copper mine which gives the whole district the name\nof \"Stora Kopparberget,\" (the great copper mountain). According to the\nlegend, its riches were discovered by two goats which were\nfighting--they struck the ground with their horns and some copper ore\nadhered to them.\n\nFrom the solitary red-ochre street we wandered over the great heaps of\nburnt-out dross and fragments of stone, accumulated to whole ramparts\nand hills. The fire shone from the smelting furnaces with green,\nyellow and red tongues of flame under a blue-green smoke; half-naked,\nblack-smeared fellows threw out large glowing masses of fire, so that\nthe sparks flew around and about:--one was reminded of Schiller's\n\"Fridolin.\"\n\nThe thick sulphureous smoke poured forth from the heaps of cleansed\nore, under which the fire was in full activity, and the wind drove it\nacross the road which we must pass. In smoke, and impregnated with\nsmoke, stood building after building: three buildings had been\nstrangely thrown, as it were, by one another: earth and stone-heaps,\nas if they were unfinished works of defence, extended around.\nScaffolding, and long wooden bridges, had been erected there; large\nwheels turned round; long and heavy iron chains were in continual\nmotion.\n\nWe stood before an immense gulf, called \"Stora St\u00f6ten,\" (the great\nmine). It had formerly three entrances, but they fell in and now there\nis but one. This immense sunken gulf now appears like a vast valley:\nthe many openings below, to the shafts of the mine, look, from above,\nlike the sand-martin's dark nest-holes in the declivities of the\nshore: there were a few wooden huts down there. Some strangers in\nminers' dresses, with their guide, each carrying a lighted fir-torch,\nappeared at the bottom, and disappeared again in one of the dark\nholes. From within the dark wooden houses, in which great water-wheels\nturned, issued some of the workmen. They came from the dizzying\ngulf--from narrow, deep wells: they stood in their wooden shoes two\nand two, on the edge of the tun which, attached to heavy chains, is\nhoisted up, singing and swinging the tun on all sides: they came up\nmerry enough. Habit makes one daring.\n\nThey told us that, during the passage upwards, it often happened that\none or another, from pure wantonness, stepped quite out of the tun,\nand sat himself between the loose stones on the projecting piece of\nrock, whilst they fired and blasted the rock below so that it shook\nagain, and the stones about him thundered down. Should one expostulate\nwith him on his fool-hardiness, he would answer with the usual\nwitticism here: \"I have never before killed myself.\"\n\nOne descends into some of the shafts by a sort of machinery, which\nlooks as if they had placed two iron ladders against each other, each\nhaving a rocking movement, so that by treading on the ascending-step\non the one side and then on the other, which goes upwards, one\ngradually ascends, and by going on the downward sinking-step one gets\nby degrees to the bottom. They said it was very easy, only one must\nstep boldly, so that the foot should not come between and get crushed;\nand then one must remember that there is no railing or balustrade\nhere, and directly outside these stairs there is the deep abyss into\nwhich one may fall headlong. The deepest shaft has a perpendicular\ndepth of more than a hundred and ninety fathoms, but for this there is\nno danger, they say, only one must not be dizzy, nor get alarmed. One\nof the workmen, who had come up, descended with a lighted pine-branch\nas a torch: the flame illumined the dark rocky wall, and by degrees\nbecame only a faint streak of light which soon vanished.\n\nWe were told that a few days before, five or six schoolboys had\nunobserved stolen in here, and amused themselves by going from step to\nstep on these machine-like rocking stairs, in pitchy darkness, but at\nlast they knew not rightly which way to go, up or down, and had then\nbegun to shout and scream lustily. They escaped luckily that bout.\n\nBy one of the large openings, called \"Fat Mads,\" there are rich copper\nmines, but which have not yet been worked. A building stands above it:\nit was at the bottom of this that they found, in the year 1719, the\ncorpse of a young miner. It appeared as if he had fallen down that\nvery day, so unchanged did the body seem--but no one knew him. An old\nwoman then stepped forward and burst into tears: the deceased was her\nbridegroom, who had disappeared forty nine years ago. She stood there\nold and wrinkled; he was young as when they had met for the last time\nnearly half a century before.[T]\n\n[Footnote T: In another mine they found, in the year 1635, a corpse\nperfectly fresh, and almost with the appearance of one asleep; but\nhis clothes, and the ancient copper coins found on him, bore witness\nthat it was two hundred years since he had perished there.]\n\nWe went to \"The Plant House,\" as it is called, where the vitriolated\nliquid is crystallized to sulphate of copper. It grew up long sticks\nplaced upright in the boiling water, resembling long pieces of\ngrass-green sugar. The steam was pungent, and the air in here\npenetrated our tongues--it was just as if one had a corroded spoon in\none's mouth. It was really a luxury to come out again, even into the\nrarefied copper smoke, under the open sky.\n\nSteaming, burnt-out, and herbless as the district is on this side of\nthe town, it is just as refreshing, green, and fertile on the opposite\nside of Fahlun. Tall leafy trees grow close to the farthest houses.\nOne is directly in the fresh pine and birch forests, thence to the\nlake and to the distant blueish mountain sides near Z\u00e4ther.\n\nThe people here can tell you and show you memorials of Engelbrekt and\nhis Dalecarlians' deeds, and of Gustavus Vasa's adventurous\nwanderings. But we will remain here in this smoke-enveloped town, with\nthe silent street's dark houses. It was almost midnight when we went\nout and came to the market-place. There was a wedding in one of the\nhouses, and a great crowd of persons stood outside, the women nearest\nthe house, the men a little further back. According to an old Swedish\ncustom, they called for the bride and bridegroom to come forward, and\nthey did so--they durst not do otherwise. Peasant girls, with candles\nin their hands, stood on each side; it was a perfect tableau: the\nbride with downcast eyes, the bridegroom smiling, and the young\nbridesmaids each with a laughing face. And the people shouted: \"Now\nturn yourselves a little! now the back! now the face! the bridegroom\nquite round, the bride a little nearer!\" And the bridal pair turned\nand turned--nor was criticism wanting. In this instance, however, it\nwas to their praise and honour, but that is not always the case. It\nmay be a painful and terrible hour for a newly-wedded pair: if they do\nnot please the public, or if they have something to say against the\nmatch, or the persons themselves, they are then soon made to know what\nis thought of them. There is perhaps also heard some rude jest or\nanother, accompanied by the laughter of the crowd. We were told, that\neven in Stockholm the same custom was observed among the lower classes\nuntil a few years ago, so that a bridal pair, who, in order to avoid\nthis exposure, wanted to drive off, were stopped by the crowd, the\ncarriage-door was opened on each side, and the whole public marched\nthrough the carriage. They would see the bride and bridegroom--that\nwas their right.\n\nHere, in Fahlun, the exhibition was friendly; the bridal pair smiled,\nthe bridesmaids also, and the assembled crowd laughed and shouted,\nhurra! In the rest of the market-place and the streets around, there\nwas dead silence and solitude.\n\nThe roseate hue of eve still shone: it passed, changed into that of\nmorn--it was the Midsummer time.\n\n\n\n\nWHAT THE STRAWS SAID.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOn the lake there glided a boat, and the party within it sang Swedish\nand Danish songs; but by the shore, under that tall, hanging birch,\nsat four young girls--so pretty--so sylph-like! and they each plucked\nup from the grass four long straws, and bound these straws two and two\ntogether, at the top and the bottom.\n\n\"We shall now see if they will come together in a square,\" said the\ngirls: \"if it be so, then that which I think of will be fulfilled,\"\nand they bound them, and they thought.\n\nNo one got to know the secret thought, the heart's silent wish of the\nothers. But yet a little bird sings about it.\n\nThe thoughts of one flew over sea and land, over the high mountains,\nwhere the mule finds its way in the mists, down to Mignon's beautiful\nland, where the old gods live in marble and painting. \"Thither,\nthither! shall I ever get there?\" That was the wish, that was the\nthought, and she opened her hand, looked at the bound straws, and they\nappeared only two and two bound together.\n\nAnd where were the second one's thoughts? also in foreign lands, in\nthe gunpowder's smoke, amongst the glitter of arms and cannons, with\nhim, the friend of her childhood, fighting for imperial power, against\nthe Hungarian people. Will he return joyful and unharmed--return to\nSweden's peaceful, well-constituted, happy land? The straws showed no\nsquare: a tear dwelt in the girl's eye.\n\nThe third smiled: there was a sort of mischief in the smile. Will our\naged bachelor and that old maiden-lady yonder, who now wander along so\nyoung, smile so young, and speak so youthfully to each other, not be a\nmarried couple before the cuckoo sings again next year? See--that is\nwhat I should like to know! and the smile played around the thinker's\nmouth, but she did not speak her thoughts. The straws were\nseparated--consequently the bachelor and the old maid also. \"It may,\nhowever, happen nevertheless,\" she certainly thought: it was apparent\nin the smile; it was obvious in the manner in which she threw the\nstraws away.\n\n\"There is nothing I would know--nothing that I am curious to know!\"\nsaid the fourth; but yet she bound the straws together; for within her\nalso there was a wish alive; but no bird has sung about it; no one\nguesses it.\n\nRock thyself securely in the heart's lotus flower, thou shining\nhumming-bird, thy' name shall not be pronounced: and besides the\nstraws said as before--\"without hope!\"\n\n\"Now you! now you!\" cried the young girls to a stranger, far from the\nneighbouring land, from the green isle, that Gylfe ploughed from\nSweden. \"What dear thing do you wish shall happen, or not\nhappen!--tell us the wish!\"--\"If the oracle speaks well for me,\" said\nhe, \"then I will tell you the silent wish and prayer, with which I\nbind these knots on the grass straw; but if I have no better success\nthan you have had, I will then be silent!\" and he bound straw to\nstraw, and as he bound, he repeated: \"it signifies nothing!\" He now\nopened his hand, his eyes shone brighter, his heart beat faster. The\nstraws formed a square! \"It will happen, it will happen!\" cried the\nyoung girls. \"What did you wish for?\" \"That Denmark may soon gain an\nhonourable peace!\"\n\n\"It will happen! it will happen!\" said the young girls; \"and when it\nhappens, we will remember that the straws have told it before-hand.\"\n\n\"I will keep these four straws, bound in a prophetic wreath for\nvictory and peace!\" said the stranger; \"and if the oracle speaks\ntruth, then I will draw the whole picture for you, as we sit here\nunder the hanging birch by the lake, and look on Z\u00e4ther's blue\nmountains, each of us binding straw to straw.\"\n\nA red mark was made in the almanack; it was the 6th of July, 1849. The\nsame day a red page was written in Denmark's history. The Danish\nsoldier made a red, victorious mark with his blood, at the battle of\nFredericia.\n\n\n\n\nTHE POET'S SYMBOL.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIf a man would seek for the symbol of the poet, he need not look\nfarther than \"The Arabian Nights' Tales.\" Scherezade who interprets\nthe stories for the Sultan--Scherezade is the poet, and the Sultan is\nthe public who is to be agreeably entertained, or else he will\ndecapitate Scherezade.\n\nPowerful Sultan! Poor Scherezade!\n\nThe Sultan-public sits in more than a thousand and one forms, and\nlistens. Let us regard a few of these forms.\n\nThere sits a sallow, peevish, scholar; the tree of his life bears\nleaves impressed with long and learned words: diligence and\nperseverance crawl like snails on the hog's leather bark: the moths\nhave got into the inside--and that is bad, very bad! Pardon the rich\nfulness of the song, the inconsiderate enthusiasm, the fresh young,\nintellect. Do not behead Scherezade! But he beheads her out of hand,\n_sans_ remorse.\n\nThere sits a dress-maker, a sempstress who has had some experience of\nthe world. She comes from strange families, from a solitary chamber\nwhere she sat and gained a knowledge of mankind--she knows and loves\nthe romantic. Pardon, Miss, if the story has not excitement enough for\nyou, who have sat over the needle and the muslin, and having had so\nmuch of life's prose, gasp after romance.\n\n\"Behead her!\" says the dress-maker.\n\nThere sits a figure in a dressing gown--this oriental dress of the\nNorth, for the lordly minion, the petty prince, the rich brewer's son,\n&c., &c., &c. It is not to be learned from the dressing gown, nor from\nthat lordly look and the fine smile around the mouth, to what stem he\nbelongs: his demands on Scherezade are just the same as the\ndress-maker's: he must be excited, he must be brought to shudder all\ndown the vertebrae, through the very spine: he must be crammed with\nmysteries, such as those which Spriez knew how to connect and thicken.\n\nScherezade is beheaded!\n\nWise, enlightened Sultan! Thou comest in the form of a schoolboy; thou\nbearest the Romans and Greeks together in a satchel on thy back, as\nAtlas sustained the world. Do not cast an evil eye upon poor\nScherezade; do not judge her before thou hast learned thy lesson, and\nart a child again,--do not behead Scherezade!\n\nYoung, full-dressed diplomatist, on whose breast we can count, by the\nbadges of honour, how many courts thou hast visited with thy princely\nmaster, speak mildly of Scherezade's name! speak of her in French,\nthat she may be ennobled above her mother tongue! translate but one\nstrophe of her song, as badly as thou canst, but carry it into the\nbrilliant saloon, and her sentence of death is annulled in the sweet,\nabsolving _charmant_!\n\nMighty annihilator and elevator!--the newspapers' Zeus--thou weekly,\nmonthly, and daily journals' Jupiter, shake not thy locks in anger!\nCast not thy lightnings forth, if Scherezade sing otherwise than thou\nart accustomed to in thy family, or if she go without a _suite_ of\nthine own clique. Do not behead her!\n\nWe will see one figure more--the most dangerous of them all; he with\nthe praise on his lips, like that of the stormy river's swell--the\nblind enthusiast. The water in which Scherezade dipped her fingers, is\nfor him a fountain of Castalia; the throne he erects to her apotheosis\nbecomes her scaffold.\n\nThis is the poet's symbol--paint it:\n\n    \"THE SULTAN AND SCHEREZADE.\"\n\nBut why none of the worthier figures--the candid, the honest, and the\nbeautiful? They come also, and on them Scherezade fixes her eye.\nEncouraged by them, she boldly raises her proud head aloft towards the\nstars, and sings of the harmony there above, and here beneath, in\nman's heart.\n\n_That_ will not clearly show the symbol:\n\n    \"THE SULTAN AND SCHEREZADE.\"\n\nThe sword of death hangs over her head whilst she relates--and the\nSultan-figure bids us expect that it will fall. Scherezade is the\nvictor: the poet is, like her, also a victor. He is rich,\nvictorious--even in his poor chamber, in his most solitary hours.\nThere, in that chamber, rose after rose shoots forth; bubble after\nbubble sparkles on the magic stream. The heavens shine with shooting\nstars, as if a new firmament were created, and the old rolled away.\nThe world does not know it, for it is the poet's own creation, richer\nthan the king's costly illuminations. He is happy, as Scherezade is;\nhe is victorious, he is mighty. _Imagination_ adorns his walls with\ntapestry, such as no land's ruler owns; _feeling_ makes the beauteous\nchords sound to him from the human breast; _understanding_ raises him,\nthrough the magnificence of creation, up to God, without his\nforgetting that he stands fast on the firm earth. He is mighty, he is\nhappy, as few are. We will not place him in the stocks of\nmisconstruction, for pity and lamentation; we merely paint his symbol,\ndip into the colours on the world's least attractive side, and obtain\nit most comprehensibly from\n\n    \"THE SULTAN AND SCHEREZADE.\"\n\nSee--that is it! Do not behead Scherezade!\n\n\n\n\nTHE DAL-ELV.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nBefore Homer sang there were heroes; but they are not known; no poet\ncelebrated their fame. It is just so with the beauties of nature, they\nmust be brought into notice by words and delineations, be brought\nbefore the eyes of the multitude; get a sort of world's patent for\nwhat they are, and then they may be said first to exist. The elvs of\nthe north have rushed and whirled along for thousands of years in\nunknown beauty. The world's great highroad does take this direction;\nno steam-packet conveys the traveller comfortably along the streams of\nthe Dal-elvs; fall on fall makes sluices indispensable and invaluable.\nSchubert is as yet the only stranger who has written about the wild\nmagnificence and southern beauty of Dalecarlia, and spoken of its\ngreatness.\n\nClear as the waves of the sea does the mighty elv stream in endless\nwindings through forest deserts and varying plains, sometimes\nextending its deep bed, sometimes confining it, reflecting the bending\ntrees and the red painted block houses of solitary towns, and\nsometimes rushing like a cataract over immense blocks of rock.\n\nMiles apart from one another, out of the ridge of mountains between\nSweden and Norway, come the east and west Dal-elvs, which first become\nconfluent and have one bed above B\u00e5lstad. They have taken up rivers\nand lakes in their waters. Do but visit this place! here are pictorial\nriches to be found; the most picturesque landscapes, dizzyingly grand,\nsmilingly pastoral--idyllic: one is drawn onward up to the very source\nof the elv, the bubbling well above Finman's hut: one feels a desire\nto follow every branch of the stream that the river takes in.\n\nThe first mighty fall, Njupeskoers cataract, is seen by the Norwegian\nfrontier in Sernasog. The mountain stream rushes perpendicularly from\nthe rock to a depth of seventy fathoms.\n\nWe pause in the dark forest, where the elv seems to collect within\nitself nature's whole deep gravity. The stream rolls its clear waters\nover a porphyry soil where the mill-wheel is driven, and the gigantic\nporphyry bowls and sarcophagi are polished.\n\nWe follow the stream through Siljan's lake, where superstition sees\nthe water-sprite swim, like the sea-horse with a mane of green\nsea-weed, and where the a\u00ebrial images present visions of witchcraft in\nthe warm summer days.\n\nWe sail on the stream from Siljan's lake, under the weeping willows of\nthe parsonage, where the swans assemble in flocks; we glide along\nslowly with horses and carriages on the great ferry-boat, away over\nthe rapid current under B\u00e5lstad's picturesque shore. Here the elv\nwidens and rolls its billows majestically in a woodland landscape, as\nlarge and extended as if it were in North America.\n\nWe see the rushing, rapid stream under Avista's yellow clay\ndeclivities: the yellow water falls like fluid amber in picturesque\ncataracts before the copper-works, where rainbow-coloured tongues of\nfire shoot themselves upwards, and the hammer's blows on the copper\nplates resound to the monotonous, roaring rumble of the elv-fall.\n\nAnd now, as a concluding passage of splendour in the life of the\nDal-elvs, before they lose themselves in the waters of the Baltic, is\nthe view of Elvkarleby Fall. Schubert compares it with the fall of\nSchafhausen; but we must remember, that the Rhine there has not such a\nmass of water as that which rushes down Elvkarleby.\n\nTwo and a half Swedish miles from Gefle, where the high road to Upsala\ngoes over the Dal-elv, we see from the walled bridge, which we pass\nover, the whole of that immense fall. Close up to the bridge, there is\na house where the bridge toll is paid. There the stranger can pass the\nnight, and from his little window look over the falling waters, see\nthem in the clear moonlight, when darkness has laid itself to rest\nwithin the thicket of oaks and firs, and all the effect of light is in\nthose foaming, flowing waters, and see them when the morning sun\nstretches his rainbow in the trembling spray, like an airy bridge of\ncolours, from the shore to the wood-grown rock in the centre of the\ncataract.\n\nWe came hither from Gefle, and saw at a great distance on the way, the\nblue clouds from the broken, rising spray, ascend above the dark-green\ntops of the trees. The carriage stopped near the bridge; we stepped\nout, and close before us fell the whole redundant elv.\n\nThe painter cannot give us the true, living image of a waterfall on\ncanvas--the movement is wanting; how can one describe it in words,\ndelineate this majestic grandeur, brilliancy of colour, and arrowy\nflight? One cannot do it; one may however attempt it; get together, by\nlittle and little, with words, an outline of that mirrored image which\nour eye gave us, and which even the strongest remembrance can only\nretain--if not vaguely, dubiously.\n\nThe Dal-elv divides itself into three branches above the fall: the two\nenclose a wood-grown rocky island, and rush down round its smooth-worn\nstony wall. The one to the right of these two falls is the finer; the\nthird branch makes a circuit, and comes again to the main stream,\nclose outside the united fall; here it dashes out as if to meet or\nstop the others, and is now hurried along in boiling eddies with the\narrowy stream, which rushes on foaming against the walled pillars that\nbear the bridge, as if it would tear them away along with it.\n\nThe landscape to the left was enlivened by a herd of goats, that were\nbrowsing amongst the hazel bushes. They ventured quite out to the very\nedge of the declivity, as they were bred here and accustomed to the\nhollow, thundering rumble of the water. To the right, a flock of\nscreaming birds flew over the magnificent oaks. Cars, each with one\nhorse, and with the driver standing upright in it, the reins in his\nhand, came on the broad forest road from Oens Br\u00fcck.\n\nThither we will go in order to take leave of the Dal-elv at one of the\nmost delightful of places, which vividly removes the stranger, as it\nwere, into a far more southern land, into a far richer nature, than he\nsupposed was to be found here. The road is so pretty--the oak grows\nhere so strong and vigorously with mighty crowns of rich foliage.\n\nOens Br\u00fcck lies in a delightfully pastoral situation. We came thither;\nhere was life and bustle indeed! The mill-wheels went round; large\nbeams were sawn through; the iron forged on the anvil, and all by\nwater-power. The houses of the workmen form a whole town: it is a long\nstreet with red-painted wooden houses, under picturesque oaks, and\nbirch trees. The greensward was as soft as velvet to look at, and up\nat the manor-house, which rises in front of the garden like a little\npalace, there was, in the rooms and saloon, everything that the\nEnglish call comfort.\n\nWe did not find the host at home; but hospitality is always the\nhouse-fairy here. We had everything good and homely. Fish and wild\nfowl were placed before us, steaming and fragrant, and almost as\nquickly as in beautiful enchanted palaces. The garden itself was a\npiece of enchantment. Here stood three transplanted beech-trees, and\nthey throve well. The sharp north wind had rounded off the tops of the\nwild chesnut-trees of the avenue in a singular manner: they looked as\nif they had been under the gardener's shears. Golden-yellow oranges\nhung in the conservatory; the splendid southern exotics had to-day got\nthe windows half open, so that the artificial warmth met the fresh,\nwarm, sunny air of the northern summer.\n\nThat branch of the Dal-elv which goes round the garden is strewn with\nsmall islands, where beautiful hanging birches and fir-trees grow in\nScandinavian splendour. There are small islands with green, silent\ngroves; there are small islands with rich grass, tall brackens,\nvariegated bell-flowers, and cowslips--no Turkey carpet has fresher\ncolours. The stream between these islands and holms is sometimes\nrapid, deep, and clear; sometimes like a broad rivulet with\nsilky-green rushes, water-lilies, and brown-feathered reeds; sometimes\nit is a brook with a stony ground, and now it spreads itself out in a\nlarge, still mill-dam.\n\nHere is a landscape in Midsummer for the games of the river-sprites,\nand the dancers of the elves and fairies! Here, in the lustre of the\nfull moon, the dryads can tell their tales, the water-sprite seize the\ngolden harp, and believe that one can be blessed, at least for one\nsingle night like this.\n\nOn the other side of Oens Br\u00fcck is the main stream--the full Dal-elv.\nDo you hear the monotonous rumble? it is not from Elvkarleby Fall that\nit reaches hither; it is close by; it is from Laa-Foss, in which lies\nAsh Island: the elv streams and rushes over the leaping salmon.\n\nLet us sit here, between the fragments of rock by the shore, in the\nred evening sunlight, which sheds a golden lustre on the waters of the\nDal-elv.\n\nGlorious river! But a few seconds' work hast thou to do in the mills\nyonder, and thou rushest foaming on over Elvkarleby's rocks, down into\nthe deep bed of the river, which leads thee to the Baltic--thy\neternity.\n\n\n\n\nDANEMORA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nReader, do you know what giddiness is? Pray that she may not seize\nyou, this mighty \"Loreley\" of the heights, this evil-genius from the\nland of the sylphides; she whizzes around her prey, and whirls it into\nthe abyss. She sits on the narrow rocky path, close by the steep\ndeclivity, where no tree, no branch is found, where the wanderer must\ncreep close to the side of the rock, and look steadily forward. She\nsits on the church spire and nods to the plumber who works on his\nswaying scaffold; she glides into the illumined saloon, and up to the\nnervous, solitary one, in the middle of the bright polished floor, and\nit sways under him--the walls vanish from him.\n\nHer fingers touch one of the hairs of our head, and we feel as if the\nair had left us, and we were in a vacuum.\n\nWe met with her at Danemora's immense gulf, whither we came on broad,\nsmooth, excellent high-roads, through the fresh forest. She sat on the\nextreme edge of the rocky wall, above the abyss, and kicked at the tun\nwith her thin, awl-like legs, as it hung in iron chains on large\nbeams, from the tower-high corner of the bridge by the precipice.\n\nThe traveller raised his foot over the abyss, and set it on the tun,\ninto which one of the workmen received him, and held him; and the\nchains rattled; the pulleys turned; the tun sank slowly, hovering\nthrough the air. But he felt the descent; he felt it through his bones\nand marrow; through all the nerves. Her icy breath blew in his neck,\nand down the spine, and the air itself became colder and colder. It\nseemed to him as if the rocks grew over his head, always higher and\nhigher: the tun made a slight swinging, but he felt it, like a fall--a\nfall in sleep, that shock in the blood. Did it go quicker downwards,\nor was it going up again? He could not distinguish by the sensation.\n\nThe tun touched the ground, or rather the snow--the dirty trodden,\neternal snow, down to which no sunbeam reaches, which no summer warmth\nfrom above ever melts. A hollow sound was heard from within the dark,\nyawning cavern, and a thick vapour rolled out into the cold air. The\nstranger entered the dark halls; there seemed to be a crashing above\nhim: the fire burned; the furnaces roared; the beating of hammers\nsounded; the watery damps dripped down--and he again entered the tun,\nwhich was hoven up in the air. He sat with closed eyes, but giddiness\nbreathed on his head, and on his breast; his inwardly-turned eye\nmeasured the giddy depth through the tun: \"It is appalling,\" said he.\n\n\"Appalling!\" echoed the brave and estimable stranger, whom we met at\nDanemora's great gulf. He was a man from Scania, consequently from the\nsame street as the Sealander--if the Sound be called a street\n(strait). \"But, however, one can say one has been down there,\" said\nhe, and he pointed to the gulf; \"right down, and up again; but it is\nno pleasure at all.\"\n\n\"But why descend at all?\" said I. \"Why will men do these things?\"\n\n\"One must, you know, when one comes here,\" said he. \"The plague of\ntravelling is, that one must see everything: one would not have it\nsupposed otherwise. It is a shame to a man, when he gets home again,\nnot to have seen everything, that others ask him about.\"\n\n\"If you have no desire, then let it alone. See what pleases you on\nyour travels. Go two paces nearer than where you stand, and become\nquite giddy: you will then have formed some conception of the passage\ndownward. I will hold you fast, and describe the rest of it for you.\"\nAnd I did so, and the perspiration sprang from his forehead.\n\n\"Yes, so it is: I apprehend it all,\" said he: \"I am clearly sensible\nof it.\"\n\nI described the dirty grey snow covering, which the sun's warmth never\nthaws; the cold down there, and the caverns, and the fire, and the\nworkmen, &c.\n\n\"Yes; one should be able to tell all about it,\" said he. \"That _you_\ncan, for you have seen it.\"\n\n\"No more than you,\" said I. \"I came to the gulf; I saw the depth, the\nsnow below, the smoke that rolled out of the caverns; but when it was\ntime I should get into the tun--no, thank you. Giddiness tickled me\nwith her long, awl-like legs, and so I stayed where I was I have felt\nthe descent, through the spine and the soles of the feet, and that as\nwell as any one: the descent is the pinch. I have been in the Hartz,\nunder Rammelsberg; glided, as on Russian mountains, at Hallein,\nthrough the mountain, from the top down to the salt-works; wandered\nabout in the catacombs of Rome and Malta: and what does one see in the\ndeep passages? Gloom--darkness! What does one feel? Cold, and a sense\nof oppression--a longing for air and light, which is by far the best;\nand that we have now.\"\n\n\"But nevertheless, it is so very remarkable!\" said the man; and he\ndrew forth his \"Hand-book for Travellers in Sweden,\" from which he\nread: \"Danemora's iron-works are the oldest, largest, and richest in\nSweden; the best in Europe. They have seventy-nine openings, of which\nseventeen only are being worked. The machine mine is ninety-three\nfathoms deep.\"\n\nJust then the bells sounded from below: it was the signal that the\ntime of labour for that day was ended. The hue of eve still shone on\nthe tops of the trees above; but down in that deep, far-extended gulf,\nit was a perfect twilight. Thence, and out of the dark caverns, the\nworkmen swarmed forth. They looked like flies, quite small in the\nspace below: they scrambled up the long ladders, which hung from the\nsteep sides of the rocks, in separate landing-places: they climbed\nhigher and higher--upwards, upwards--and at every step they became\nlarger. The iron chains creaked in the scaffolding of beams, and three\nor four young fellows stood in their wooden shoes on the edge of the\ntun; chatted away right merrily, and kicked with their feet against\nthe side of the rock, so that they swung from it: and it became darker\nand darker below; it was as if the deep abyss became still deeper!\n\n\"It is appalling!\" said the man from Scania. \"One ought, however, to\nhave gone down there, if it were only to swear that one _had_ been.\nYou, however, have certainly been down there,\" said he again to me.\n\n\"Believe what you will,\" I replied; and I say the same to the reader.\n\n\n\n\nTHE SWINE.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThat capital fellow, Charles Dickens, has told us about the swine, and\nsince then it puts us into a good humour whenever we hear even the\ngrunt of one. Saint Anthony has taken them under his patronage, and if\nwe think of the \"prodigal son,\" we are at once in the midst of the\nsty, and it was just before such a one that our carriage stopped in\nSweden. By the high road, closely adjoining his house, the peasant had\nhis sty, and that such a one as there is probably scarcely its like in\nthe world. It was an old state-carriage, the seats were taken out of\nit, the wheels taken off, and thus it stood, without further ceremony,\non its own bottom, and four swine were shut in there. If these were\nthe first that had been in it one could not determine; but that it was\nonce a state-carriage everything about it bore witness, even to the\nstrip of morocco that hung from the roof inside, all bore witness of\nbetter days. It is true, every word of it.\n\n\"Uff,\" said the occupiers within, and the carriage creaked and\ncomplained--it was a sorrowful end it had come to.\n\n\"The beautiful is past!\" so it sighed; so it said, or it might have\nsaid so.\n\nWe returned here in the autumn. The carriage, or rather the body of\nthe carriage, stood in its old place, but the swine were gone: they\nwere lords in the forests; rain and drizzle reigned there; the wind\ntore the leaves off all the trees, and allowed them neither rest nor\nquiet: the birds of passage were gone.\n\n\"The beautiful is past!\" said the carriage, and the same sigh passed\nthrough the whole of nature, and from the human heart it sounded: \"The\nbeautiful is past! with the delightful green forest, with the warm\nsunshine, and the song of birds--past! past!\" So it said, and so it\ncreaked in the trunks of the tall trees, and there was heard a sigh,\nso inwardly deep, a sigh direct from the heart of the wild rose-bush,\nand he who sat there was the rose-king. Do you know him! he is of a\npure breed, the finest red-green breed: he is easily known. Go to the\nwild rose hedges, and in autumn, when all the flowers are gone, and\nthe red hips alone remain, one often sees amongst these a large\nred-green moss-flower: that is the rose-king. A little green leaf\ngrows out of his head--that is his feather: he is the only male person\nof his kind on the rose-bush, and he it was who sighed.\n\n\"Past! past! the beautiful is past! The roses are gone; the leaves of\nthe trees fall off!--it is wet here, and it is cold and raw!--The\nbirds that sang here are now silent; the swine live on acorns; the\nswine are lords in the forest!\"\n\nThey were cold nights, they were gloomy days; but the raven sat on the\nbough and croaked nevertheless: \"brah, brah!\" The raven and the crow\nsat on the topmost bough: they have a large family, and they all said:\n\"brah, brah! caw, caw!\" and the majority is always right.\n\nThere was a great miry pool under the tall trees in the hollow, and\nhere lay the whole herd of swine, great and small--they found the\nplace so excellent. \"Oui! oui!\" said they, for they knew no more\nFrench, but that, however, was something. They were so wise, and so\nfat, and altogether lords in the forest.\n\nThe old ones lay still, for they thought; the young ones, on the\ncontrary, were so brisk--busy, but apparently uneasy. One little pig\nhad a curly tail--that curl was the mother's delight. She thought that\nthey all looked at the curl, and thought only of the curl; but that\nthey did not. They thought of themselves, and of what was useful, and\nof what the forest was for. They had always heard that the acorns they\nate grew on the roots of the trees, and therefore they had always\nrooted there; but now there came a little one--for it is always the\nyoung ones that come with news--and he asserted that the acorns fell\ndown from the branches: he himself had felt one fall right on his\nhead, and that had given him the idea, so he had made observations,\nand now he was quite sure of what he asserted. The old ones laid their\nheads together. \"Uff,\" said the swine, \"uff! the finery is past! the\ntwittering of the birds is past! we will have fruit! whatever can be\neaten is good, and we eat everything!\"\n\n\"Oui! oui!\" said they altogether.\n\nBut the mother sow looked at her little pig with the curly tail.\n\n\"One must not, however, forget the beautiful!\" said she.\n\n\"Caw! caw!\" screamed the crow, and flew down, in order to be appointed\nnightingale: one there should be--and so the crow was directly\nappointed.\n\n\"Past! past!\" sighed the Rose King, \"all the beautiful is past!\"\n\nIt was wet; it was gloomy; there was cold and wind, and the rain\npelted down over the fields, and through the forest, like long water\njets. Where are the birds that sang? where are the flowers in the\nmeadows, and the sweet berries in the wood?--past! past!\n\nA light shone from the forester's house: it twinkled like a star, and\nshed its long rays out between the trees. A song was heard from\nwithin; pretty children played around their old grandfather, who sat\nwith the Bible on his lap and read about God, and eternal life, and\nspoke of the spring that would come again: he spoke of the forest that\nwould renew its green leaves, of the roses that would flower, of the\nnightingales that would sing, and of the beautiful that would again be\nparamount.\n\nBut the Rose King did not hear it; he sat in the raw, cold weather,\nand sighed:\n\n\"Past! past!\"\n\nAnd the swine were lords in the forest, and the mother sow looked at\nher little pig, and his curly tail.\n\n\"There will always be some, who have a sense for the beautiful!\" said\nthe mother sow.\n\n\n\n\nPOETRY'S CALIFORNIA.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nNature's treasures are most often unveiled to us by accident. A dog's\nnose was dyed by the bruised purple fish, and the genuine purple dye\nwas discovered; a pair of wild buffalos were fighting on America's\nauriferous soil, and their horns tore up the green sward that covered\nthe rich gold vein.\n\n\"In former days,\" as it is said by most, \"everything came\nspontaneously. Our age has not such revelations; now one must slave\nand drudge if one would get anything; one must dig down into the deep\nshafts after the metals, which decrease more and more;--when the earth\nsuddenly stretches forth her golden finger from California's\npeninsula, and we there see Monte Christo's foolishly invented riches\nrealized; we see Aladdin's cave with its inestimable treasures. The\nworld's treasury is so endlessly rich that we have, to speak plain and\nstraightforward, scraped a little off the up-heaped measure; but the\nbushel is still full, the whole of the real measure is now refilled.\nIn science also, such a world lies open for the discoveries of the\nhuman mind!\n\n\"But in poetry, the greatest and most glorious is already found, and\ngained!\" says the poet. \"Happy he who was born in former times; there\nwas then many a land still undiscovered, on which poetry's rich gold\nlay like the ore that shines forth from the earth's surface.\"\n\nDo not speak so! happy poet thou, who art born in our time! thou dost\ninherit all the glorious treasures which thy predecessors gave to the\nworld; thou dost learn from them, that truth only is eternal,--the\ntrue in nature and mankind.\n\nOur time is the time of discoveries--poetry also has its new\nCalifornia.\n\n\"Where does it exist?\" you ask.\n\nThe coast is so near, that you do not think that _there_ is the new\nworld. Like a bold Leander, swim with me across the stream: the black\nwords on the white paper will waft you--every period is a heave of the\nwaves.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt was in the library's saloon. Book-shelves with many books, old and\nnew, were ranged around for every one; manuscripts lay there in heaps;\nthere were also maps and globes. There sat industrious men at little\ntables, and wrote out and wrote in, and that was no easy work. But\nsuddenly, a great transformation took place; the shelves became\nterraces for the noblest trees, with flowers and fruit; heavy clusters\nof grapes hung amongst leafy vines, and there was life and movement\nall around.\n\nThe old folios and dusty manuscripts rose into flower-covered tumuli,\nand there sprang forth knights in mail, and kings with golden crowns\non, and there was the clang of harp and shield; history acquired the\nlife and fullness of poetry--for a poet had entered there. He saw the\nliving visions; breathed the flowers' fragrance; crushed the grapes,\nand drank the sacred juice. But he himself knew not yet that he was a\npoet--the bearer of-light for times and generations yet to come.\n\nIt was in the fresh, fragrant forest, in the last hour of\nleave-taking. Love's kiss, as the farewell, was the initiatory baptism\nfor the future poetic life; and the fresh fragrance of the forest\nbecame sweeter, the chirping of the birds more melodious: there came\nsunlight and cooling breezes. Nature becomes doubly delightful where a\npoet walks.\n\nAnd as there were two roads before Hercules, so there were before him\ntwo roads, shown by two figures, in order to serve him; the one an old\ncrone, the other a youth, beautiful as the angel that led the young\nTobias.\n\nThe old crone had on a mantle, on which were wrought flowers, animals,\nand human beings, entwined in an arabesque manner. She had large\nspectacles on, and beside her lantern she held a bag filled with old\ngilt cards--apparatus for witchcraft, and all the amulets of\nsuperstition: leaning on her crutch, wrinkled and shivering, she was,\nhowever, soaring, like the mist over the meadow.\n\n\"Come with me, and you shall see the world, so that a poet can have\nbenefit from it,\" said she. \"I will light my lantern; it is better\nthan that which Diogenes bore; I shall lighten your path.\"\n\nAnd the light shone; the old crone lifted her head, and stood there\nstrong and tall, a powerful female figure. She was Superstition.\n\n\"I am the strongest in the region of romance,\" said she,--and she\nherself believed it.\n\nAnd the lantern's light gave the lustre of the full moon over the\nwhole earth; yes, the earth itself became transparent, as the still\nwaters of the deep sea, or the glass mountains, in the fairy tale.\n\n\"My kingdom is thine! sing what thou see'st; sing as if no bard before\nthee had sung thereof.\"\n\nAnd it was as if the scene continually changed. Splendid Gothic\nchurches, with painted images in the panes, glided past, and the\nmidnight-bell struck, and the dead arose from the graves. There, under\nthe bending elder tree, sat the mother, and swathed her newly-born\nchild; old, sunken knights' castles rose again from the marshy ground;\nthe drawbridge fell, and they saw into the empty halls, adorned with\nimages, where, under the gloomy stairs of the gallery, the\ndeath-proclaiming white woman came with a rattling bunch of keys. The\nbasilisk brooded in the deep cellar; the monster bred from a cock's\negg, invulnerable by every weapon, but not from the sight of its own\nhorrible form: at the sight of its own image, it bursts like the steel\nthat one breaks with the blow of a stout staff. And to everything that\nappeared, from the golden chalice of the altar-table, once the\ndrinking-cup of evil spirits, to the nodding head on the gallows-hill,\nthe old crone hummed her songs; and the crickets chirped, and the\nraven croaked from the opposite neighbour's house, and the\nwinding-sheet rolled from the candle. Through the whole spectral world\nsounded, \"death! death!\"\n\n\"Go with me to life and truth,\" cried the second form, the youth who\nwas beautiful as a cherub. A flame shone from his brow--a cherub's\nsword glittered in his hand. \"I am _Knowledge_,\" said he: \"my world is\ngreater--its aim is truth.\"\n\nAnd there was a brightness all around; the spectral images paled; it\ndid not extend over the world they had seen. Superstition's lantern\nhad only exhibited _magic-lantern_ images on the old ruined wall, and\nthe wind had driven wet misty vapours past in figures.\n\n\"I will give thee a rich recompense. Truth in the created--truth in\nGod!\"\n\nAnd through the stagnant lake, where before the misty spectral figures\nrose, whilst the bells sounded from the sunken castle, the light fell\ndown on a swaying vegetable world. One drop of the marsh water, raised\nagainst the rays of light, became a living world, with creatures in\nstrange forms, fighting and revelling--a world in a drop of water. And\nthe sharp sword of Knowledge cleft the deep vault, and shone therein,\nwhere the basilisk killed, and the animal's body was dissolved in a\ndeath-bringing vapour: its claw extended from the fermenting\nwine-cask; its eyes were air, that burnt when the fresh wind touched\nit.\n\nAnd there resided a powerful force in the sword; _so_ powerful, that\nthe grain of gold was beaten to a flat surface, thin as the covering\nof mist that we breathe on the glass-pane; and it shone at the sword's\npoint, so that the thin threads of the cobweb seemed to swell to\ncables, for one saw the strong twistings of numberless small threads.\nAnd the voice of Knowledge seemed over the whole world, so that the\nage of miracles appeared to have returned. Thin iron ties were laid\nover the earth, and along these the heavily-laden waggons flew on the\nwings of steam, with the swallow's flight; mountains were compelled to\nopen themselves to the inquiring spirit of the age; the plains were\nobliged to raise themselves; and then thought was borne in words,\nthrough metal wires, with the lightning's speed, to distant towns.\n\"Life! life!\" it sounded through the whole of nature. \"It is our time!\nPoet, thou dost possess it! Sing of it in spirit and in truth!\"\n\nAnd the genius of Knowledge raised the shining sword; he raised it far\nout into space, and then--what a sight! It was as when the sunbeams\nshine through a crevice in the wall in a dark space, and appear to us\na revolving column of myriads of grains of dust; but every grain of\ndust here was a world! The sight he saw was our starry firmament!\n\nThy earth is a grain of dust here, but a speck whose wonders astonish\nthee; only a grain of dust, and yet a star under stars. That long\ncolumn of worlds thou callest thy starry firmament, revolves like the\nmyriads of grains of dust, visibly hovering in the sunbeam's revolving\ncolumn, from the crevice in the wall into that dark space. But still\nmore distant stands the milky way's whitish mist, a new starry heaven,\neach column but a radius in the wheel! But how great is this itself!\nhow many radii thus go out from the central point--God!\n\nSo far does thine eye reach, so clear is thine age's horizon! Son of\ntime, choose, who shall be thy companion? Here is thy new career! with\nthe greatest of thy time, fly thou before thy time's generation! Like\ntwinkling Lucifer, shine thou in time's roseate morn.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nYes, in knowledge lies Poetry's California! Every one who only looks\nbackward, and not clearly forward, will, however high and honourably\nhe stands, say, that if such riches lie in knowledge, they would long\nsince have been made available by great and immortal bards, who had a\nclear and sagacious eye for the discovery of truth. But let us\nremember that when Thespis spoke from his car, the world had also wise\nmen. Homer had sung his immortal songs, and yet a new form of genius\nappeared, to which a Sophocles and Aristophanes gave birth; the Sagas\nand mythology of the North were as an unknown treasure to the stage,\nuntil Oehlenschl\u00e4ger showed what mighty forms from thence might be\nmade to glide past us.\n\nIt is not our intention that the poet shall versify scientific\ndiscoveries. The didactic poem is and will be, in its best form,\nalways but a piece of mechanism, or wooden figure, which has not the\ntrue life. The sunlight of science must penetrate the poet; he must\nperceive truth and harmony in the minute and in the immensely great\nwith a clear eye: it must purify and enrich the understanding and\nimagination, and show him new forms which will supply to him more\nanimated words. Even single discoveries will furnish a new flight.\nWhat fairy tales cannot the world unfold under the microscope, if we\ntransfer our human world thereto? Electro-magnetism can present or\nsuggest new plots in new comedies and romances; and how many humorous\ncompositions will not spring forth, as we from our grain of dust, our\nlittle earth, with its little haughty beings look out into that\nendless world's universe, from milky way to milky way? An instance of\nwhat we here mean is discoverable in that old noble lady's words: \"If\nevery star be a globe like our earth, and have its kingdoms and\ncourts--what an endless number of courts--the contemplation is enough\nto make mankind giddy!\"\n\nWe will not say, like that French authoress: \"Now, then, let me die:\nthe world has no more discoveries to make!\" O, there is so endlessly\nmuch in the sea, in the air, and on the earth--wonders, which science\nwill bring forth!--wonders, greater than the poet's philosophy can\ncreate! A bard will come, who, with a child's mind, like a new\nAladdin, will enter into the cavern of science,--with a child's mind,\nwe say, or else the puissant spirits of natural strength would seize\nhim, and make him their servant; whilst he, with the lamp of poetry,\nwhich is, and always will be, the human heart, stands as a ruler, and\nbrings forth wonderful fruits from the gloomy passages, and has\nstrength to build poetry's new palace, created in one night by\nattendant spirits.\n\nIn the world itself events repeat themselves; the human character was\nand will be the same during long ages and all ages; and as they were\nin the old writings, they must be in the new. But science always\nunfolds something new; light and truth are everything that is\ncreated--beam out from hence with eternally divine clearness. Mighty\nimage of God, do thou illumine and enlighten mankind; and when its\nintellectual eye is accustomed to the lustre, the new Aladdin will\ncome, and thou, man, shalt with him, who concisely dear, and richly\nsings the beauty of truth, wander through Poetry's California.\n\n\nTHE END.","title":"Pictures of Sweden","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":41567}