SNOW PLOUGH DRAWN BY EIGHT OR TEN HORSES
In a country of such scattered population, the keeping of the miles of road in good order is naturally a question of moment. On most of his drives the traveller will notice hundreds of little poles painted red, and bearing some kind of inscription, planted at short intervals. These signposts give the name of the farmer or landowner appointed by the lensmand to look after and repair a certain area of road, which is also indicated on the post. I do not know whether the farmer or the careless lensmand is to be blamed for the terrible condition of some few of the roads over which we passed. On the other hand, the difficulties to be contended with considered, the condition of the chief ways is wonderfully good. Many of the roads are cut up inconveniently by gates, placed at quite short intervals. Every second minute one has to scramble off one's cart to open these obstacles; but I believe they are less for the purpose of causing trouble than for keeping some sort of control over the straying of the farm animals. All along the route one meets with curious wedge-shaped constructions of wood. These are the snow ploughs. When they are needed, as many as six or eight horses are harnessed to them, and slowly they force a passage through the deep snow. I think they can be used only at the beginning or at the end of winter, though I am not quite certain; but why should people use ploughs when winter transit is entirely and most conveniently accomplished on sledges and skis? The deep valleys which are generally a feature on one side of a Norwegian roadway are levelled with drifts of snow, and it is only when spring comes that the road may be tracked by the heads of the ten-foot poles planted along the path, which begin to show themselves only as the thaw sets in. What a lonely, mysterious journey for the solitary postman!
Somewhere in the neighbourhood of Odde lives to this day a postman who had a terrible adventure in the snow. The history of it was told me by a man who drove us for days along the road across Norway between Odde and Christiania. In the winter in the farming districts letters are delivered only once a week—perforce by the postmen on skis. I gathered that the day of delivery is not absolutely certain, and the man is sometimes days on his trip. The postman in question set out, as usual, alone; half way to his destination he sank into a snow-drift on the side of the mountain. In a day or two, when his continued absence was remarked, search-parties of thirty or forty men set out to find him. Of these searchers my driver was one. With them they took his coffin, expecting indeed to find him, but resigned to the certitude of finding his dead body only. Before the third day was over they sorrowfully gave up the search, and returned to their homes to wait until spring should force the secret from the snow. At the end of the third day, a feeble, white-haired man staggered into the station, and fell fainting to the ground. For three days the postman had been buried alive, and at last, by dint of digging with his post-horn, he had got free. The rescue party had passed over his very head, and he had heard them speaking of him and finally deciding to give up the search; but of course it was impossible for him to discover himself to them. Imagine the joy of the community at his return! You may be sure he was well nursed back to health; and still, summer and winter alike, he carries the mail-bag over his allotted route.
FISHING THROUGH THE ICE ON CHRISTIANIA FJORD
It is obvious that the winter is in Norway a time of enforced cessation from farm work. With the exception of a certain amount of labour connected with the cattle, there is little to be done for several months. The men pass most of this quiet time in carving wood and making various articles out of birch bark. The women spin for their household needs, and knit and embroider what may be called fancy goods in expectation of the tourist season. The large shops buy up enormous quantities of the peasants' winter work, and each of the posting inns is a small centre where the peasants of the neighbourhood endeavour to get large prices for the products of their winter industry—prices which dwindle through the summer as the days become shorter and the tourists fewer. It must be admitted that they are extraordinarily clever carvers; and they have a rather primitive method of painting their wares which is very decorative and, when it is not too well done, quite attractive. Their nicest carving they keep to themselves: witness the delightful fairy-tale animals which form the handle of the family mangling-board, and the equally charming monsters which seem to perch on the arms and backs of chairs.
A word on their primitive method of mangling may not be amiss. Two utensils are necessary—the first a kind of rolling-pin, round which the sprinkled linen is tightly swathed. The other, a mangling-board, a narrow flat piece of wood wielded by the picturesque handle I have described, is then pressed tightly on the linen and rolled with as much force as possible. I do not really believe that this operation can, even with great strength, make very much difference to the condition of the linen; but the process is much more interesting to watch than the working of a civilised mangling-machine.
It is in the winter that the work of a forester is at its height. The felling of trees begins late in September, and is continued under many difficulties and hardships all through the winter. As the large forests are often at some distance from populated areas, the woodsmen build themselves log huts. They fill up the crannies between the logs with moss and turf, but on the roof they lay first a covering of birch bark to keep things close and dry. These huts are warmed day and night by a wood fire, which is always kept burning; on this they make their tea and coffee and do what little cooking they may need. I could not discover what happens to the poor horses that help the woodsmen in their labours. Do they share the hut with their masters, or do they sleep as best they may outside in the cold and snow?