CONTENTS
STRIFE AND PEACE.
OLD NORWAY.
Still the old tempests rage around the mountains,
And ocean's billows as of old appear;
The roaring wood and the resounding fountains
Time has not silenced in his long career,
For Nature is the same as ever.
Munch.
The shadow of God wanders through Nature.
Linnæus.
Before yet a song of joy or of mourning had gone forth from the valleys of Norway—before yet a smoke-wreath had ascended from its huts—before an axe had felled a tree of its woods—before yet king Nor burst forth from Jotunhem to seek his lost sister, and passing through the land gave to it his name; nay, before yet there was a Norwegian, stood the high Dovre mountains with snowy summits before the face of the Creator.
Westward stretches itself out the gigantic mountain chain as far as Romsdahlshorn, whose foot is bathed by the Atlantic ocean. Southward it forms under various names (Langfjeld, Sognefjeld, Filefjeld, Hardangerfjeld, and so forth), that stupendous mountainous district which in a stretch of a hundred and fifty geographical miles comprehends all that nature possesses of magnificent, fruitful, lovely, and charming. Here stands yet, as in the first days of the world, in Upper Tellemark, the Fjellstuga, or rock-house, built by an invisible hand, and whose icy walls and towers that hand alone can overthrow: here still, as in the morning of time, meet together at Midsummer, upon the snowy foreheads of the ancient mountains, the rose-tint of morning and the rose-tint of evening for a brotherly kiss; still roar as then the mountain torrents which hurl themselves into the abyss; still reflect the ice-mirrors of the glaciers the same objects—now delighting, now awakening horror; and still to-day, even as then, are there Alpine tracts which the foot of man never ascended: valleys of wood, "lonesome cells of nature," upon which only the eagle and the Midsummer-sun have looked down. Here is the old, ever young, Norway; here the eye of the beholder is astonished, but his heart expands itself; he forgets his own suffering, his own joy, forgets all that is trivial, whilst with a holy awe he has a feeling that "the shadow of God wanders through nature."
In the heart of Norway lies this country. Is the soul wearied with the tumults of the world or fatigued with the trifles of poor every-day life—is it depressed by the confined atmosphere of the room,—with the dust of books, the dust of company, or any other kind of dust (there are in the world so many kinds, and they all cover the soul with a great dust mantle); or is she torn by deep consuming passions,—then fly, fly towards the still heart of Norway, listen there to the fresh mighty throbbing of the heart of nature; alone with the quiet, calm, and yet so eloquent, objects of nature, and there wilt thou gain strength and life! There falls no dust. Fresh and clear stand the thoughts of life there, as in the days of their creation. "Wilt thou behold the great and the majestic? Behold the Gausta, which raises its colossal knees six thousand feet above the surface of the earth; behold the wild giant forms of Hurrungen, Fannarauken, Mugnafjeld; behold the Rjukan (the rushing), the Vöring, and Vedal rivers foaming and thundering over the mountains and plunging down in the abysses! And wilt though delight thyself in the charming, the beautiful? They exist among these fruitful scenes in peaceful solitude. The Säter-hut stands in the narrow valley; herds of cattle graze on the beautiful grassy meadows; the Säter-maiden, with fresh-colour, blue eyes, and bright plaits of hair, tends them and sings the while the simple, the gentle melancholy airs of the country; and like a mirror for that charming picture, there lies in the middle of the valley a little lake (kjœrn), deep, still, and of a clear blue colour, as is generally peculiar to the glacier water. All breathes an idyllian peace."
But a presentiment of death appears, even in the morning hour of creation, to have impressed its seal upon this country. The vast shadows of the dark mountain masses fall upon valleys where nothing but moss grows; upon lakes whose still waters are full of never-melted ice—thus the Cold Valley, the Cold Lake (Koledal and Koldesjö), with their dead, grey-yellow shores. The stillness of death reigns in this wilderness, interrupted only by the thunderings of the avalanche and by the noise which occasions the motion of the glaciers. No bird moves its wings or raises its twittering in this sorrowful region; only the melodious sighs of the cuckoo are borne thither by the winds at Midsummer.
Wilt thou, however, see life in its pomp and fairest magnificence? Then see the embrace of the winter and the summer in old Norway; descend into the plain of Svalem, behold the valleys of Aamaadt and Sillejord, or the paradisaically beautiful Vestfjordal, through which the Mån flows still and clear as a mirror, and embraces in its course little, bright green islands, which are overgrown with bluebells and sweet-scented wood-lilies; see how the silver stream winds itself down from the mountains, between groups of trees and fruitful fields; see how, behind the near hills with their leafy woods, the snow-mountains elevate themselves, and like worthy patriarchs look down upon a younger generation; observe in these valleys the morning and evening play of colours upon the heights, in the depths; see the affluent pomp of the storm; see the calm magnificence of the rainbow, as it vaults itself over the waterfall,—depressed spirit, see this, understand it, and—— breathe!
From these beautifully, universally known scenes we withdraw ourselves to a more unknown region, to the great stretch of valley where the Skogshorn rears itself to the clouds; where Urunda flows brightly between rocks,—the waterfalls of Djupadahl stream not the less charmingly and proudly because they are only rarely admired by the eyes of curious travellers. We set ourselves down in a region whose name and situation we counsel nobody to seek out in maps, and which we call—
HEIMDAL.
Knowest thou the deep, cool dale,
Where church-like stillness doth prevail;
Where neither flock nor herd you meet;
Which hath no name nor track of feet?
Velhaven.
Heimdal, we call a branch of Hallingdal, misplace it in the parish of Aal, and turn it over to the learned—that they may wonder at our boldness. Like its mother valley it possesses no historical memories. Of the old kings of Hallingdal one knows but very little. Only a few monumental stones, a few burial-mounds, give a dim intelligence of the mighty who have been. It is true that a people dwelt here, who from untold ages were renowned as well for their simplicity and their contentedness under severe circumstances as for their wild contest-loving disposition; but still, in quiet as in unquiet, built and dwelt, lived and died here, without tumult and without glory, among the ancient mountains and the pine-woods, unobserved by the rest of the world.
One river, the son of Hallen-Jokul, flows through Heimdal. Foaming with wild rage it comes through the narrow mountain-pass down into the valley, finds there a freer field, becomes calm, and flows clear as a mirror between green shores, till its banks become again compressed together by granite mountains. Then is it again seized upon by disquiet, and rushes thence in wild curves till it flings itself into the great Hallingdal river, and there dies.
Exactly there, where the stream spreads itself out in the extended valley, lies a large estate. A well-built, but somewhat decayed, dwelling-house of wood stretches out its arms into the depths of the valley. Thence may be seen a beautiful prospect, far, far into the blue distance. Hills overgrown with, wood stretch upward from the river, and cottages surrounded with inclosed fields and beautiful grassy paths, lie scattered at the foot of the hills. On the other side of the river, a mile-and-half from the Grange, a chapel raises its peaceful tower. Beyond this the valley gradually contracts itself.
On a cool September evening, strangers arrived at the Grange, which had now been long uninhabited. It was an elderly lady, of a noble but gloomy exterior, in deep mourning. A young, blooming maiden accompanied her. They were received by a young man, who was called there "the Steward." The dark-appareled lady vanished in the house, and after that was seen nowhere in the valley for several months. They called her there "the Colonel's lady," and said Mrs. Astrid Hjelm had experienced a very strange fate, of which many various histories were in circulation. At the estate of Semb, which consisted of the wide-stretching valley of Heimdal, and which was her paternal heritage, had she never, since the time of her marriage, been seen. Now as widow she had again sought out the home of her childhood. It was known also and told, that her attendant was a Swedish girl, who had come with her from one of the Swedish watering-places, where she had been spending the summer, in order to superintend her housekeeping; and it was said, that Susanna Björk ruled as excellently as with sovereign sway over the economical department, over the female portion of the same, Larina the parlour-maid, Karina the kitchen-maid, and Petro the cook, as well as over the farm-servants Mathea, Budeja, and Göran the cattle-boy, together with all their subjects of the four-footed and two-legged races. We will now with these last make a little nearer acquaintance.