The commonplace Knud or Swen brings us a mind pinched by the petty parochialism of little countries on the world's byways. Coming from some valley-closet in a mountainous country, only three per cent. of which is fit for the plow, the Norse immigrant is here spiritually enlarged, like the native of a box-cañon let out into a plain, or the cove-dweller who comes to live by the open sea. In a log hut by a lonely fjord in Trondhjem, or on a dreary moor in Finmark, the story of a Norse peasant lad rising to be governor or senator in this country thrills as did, near a thousand years ago, the romantic tale of some Varangian back from service in the emperor's guard at Constantinople.
In the home-land, a distinguished Norwegian-American, Dr. Wergeland, finds:
Such an oppressive spiritual atmosphere of narrow-minded intolerance, of unloving readiness to raise teacup storms, of insolence, private and political, of clerical and æsthetic arrogance, that the Norseman, though scarcely knowing why, longs to get away from it all and to breathe a fresher, sweeter air. No wonder the people emigrate. There is a peculiar hardness and inflexibility in the Norseman's nature, and the mild virtues of forbearance grow but sparsely in his surroundings. This is perhaps the reason why the Norse immigrant brings to his new homestead for the first four or five years nothing but an open mouth and a silent tongue—speechless astonishment. And this is the reason that to come back to Norway, after spending some years abroad, is so often like coming from open fields into narrow alleys.
In this strain writes a North Dakota pioneer:
What of change the new-comer notices in us American Norsemen is good manners; the respect shown to women; the small class distinctions between rich and poor, high and low; and, finally, the quickness and practical insight into work and business.
Another pioneer, after revisiting Norway, writes:
I was often surprised to find that persons who had never seen me before took me at once for an American. It seems that even the expression of one's face is greatly changed here. During this visit I discovered that my mode of thinking and my spiritual life had changed so much during my thirteen years in America that I did not feel quite at home with my childhood friends.... The Norwegian who has lived a while in America is more civilized than if he had not been here. He has seen more, experienced more, thought more, and all this has opened his eyes and broadened his view. He is more wide-awake, lives a richer life, and is in a closer correspondence with his surroundings. His sympathies are widened, and he takes more interest in what is going on in the world.
CONTRASTS AMONG SCANDINAVIANS
It will not do to shuffle all our Scandinavians into one deck. The Danes are courteous and pleasure-loving, though moody, and they run to moderation in virtues as in vices. The Swedes bear the impress of a society that has long known aristocracy, refinement, and industrialism. They are more polished in manner than the Norwegians, although the humble betray a servility which grates upon Americans. Many show a sociability and a love of pleasure worthy of "the French of the North." They bring, too, a love of letters, and I am told that most of the servant-girls write verse. The editor of a Swedish weekly receives very well written poems and contributions from his readers. Learning stands high with the Swedes, and since John Ericsson they have sent us many fine technical men. Only lately their great chemist Arrhenius hazarded the prediction that, owing to the tendency of American men of ability to go into business, our university chairs will some day be filled with scholars of German and Scandinavian blood.