In other provinces she has to pick nine different kinds of flowers from as many different farms, and this bouquet is even more efficacious than a smaller one. Why should we not have such a midsummer holiday in America? It is true that we have our Fourth of July, which is not very far from the right date, but, however “safe and sane” we may make it, the Fourth of July can never be anything but a patriotic holiday, nor should it be.
Thanksgiving Day is too late in the year for an out-of-door holiday, and the thirtieth of May is dedicated to a sacred celebration all its own. But why should we not have one genuine out-of-door day, a day when we shall see to it that every city child may romp and play in God’s green fields, and when we may make it a joyous duty to thank the Giver of all, not only for the harvests and for the full granaries as on Thanksgiving Day, but for the sun and the green trees and the flowers and grass and everything that makes us glad to be alive? What day could be so good for such a celebration in America as well as in Sweden as Midsummer’s Day?
Before we bid good-by to Gotland and Visby, let us climb in the late evening twilight the ruined towers of the church of St. Nikolaus. From the old wall we can look out to sea, and if our imagination is strong enough, supplemented by a sufficient knowledge of old traditions, perhaps we shall see an eerie, reddish light on the calm waters of the Baltic. This light comes from two great carbuncles in the bottom of the Baltic. These carbuncles once adorned the western gable of the church of St. Nikolaus, where, according to the tradition, “these carbuncles shone with the brightness of the sun at noonday, throughout the night, and served as guiding lights to storm-tossed mariners far out on the Baltic wave. Twenty-four soldiers stood constantly on guard to watch these ruddy gems, the most precious possessions of the church, and no one, on pain of death, might approach the sanctuary after the going down of the sun.”
Ruins of St. Nikolaus Cathedral, Visby, Gotland.
King Valdemar could not leave such priceless jewels to St. Nikolaus, and so he snatched them from the rose windows which they adorned, put them on his biggest ship, and sailed away to Denmark. But justice followed the sacrilegious freebooter; his ship was wrecked on one of the little islands which line the coast of Gotland, and the king himself barely escaped with his life. The carbuncles sank to the bottom of the sea, which accounts for that strange glow which any one with a vivid imagination can see from the ruined tower of St. Nikolaus as he looks off on the peaceful Baltic.
Faithfully yours,
Phillips.