“That was a perilous time for us; one false step, and we might have been undone; but each man had only one thought, and that was for his country. In this strait,” continued he, his eyes sparkling, “one hundred Norskmen met at Eidsvold on May 1, and on May 17 the constitution was drawn up which we now enjoy. Please God it may last. The Norwegians may well be proud of it, and no wonder that the Swedes are jealous of us with their four estates, and their miserable pretence of a constitution—the worst in Europe. Their shoals of nobility are the drag-chain; we got rid of them here in 1821. That was a great blessing; Carl Johann was against it, and three thousand Swedish soldiers were in the vicinity of Christiania. Count Jarlsberg, our chief noble, was for the abolition; its chief opponent was Falsing. He said in the Storthing, that if our nobility were abolished he would say farewell to Norway. Another member took him up short, and said, ‘And the Norsk hills would echo well.’”
Dinner over, I drove through the woods back to Vallö, where I was to meet the steamer. Two Swiss gentlemen possess a large establishment here for the manufacture of salt by the evaporation of salt water; a cotton mill is also adjoining, belonging to the same proprietors.
On applying for my ticket at the office—where it may be had a trifle cheaper than on board—my passport is demanded and examined, and the office-keeper informs me that it is against the rules to give a ticket for an outward-bound steamer to any one whose passport has not been countersigned by the Norwegian authorities. Now, on leaving Norway by way of Christiania, as I was aware, it is required to be shown to the police, and viséd, but as I had never been near the capital this year, and, from the moment I had landed to this, the passport had never been demanded, it did not occur to me that a visé would be required. For the moment I was disconcerted, as nobody was to be found at Vallö who could remedy the defect.
On inquiry, however, I found that the naval officer in command of the coming vessel was my old friend Captain H., and so I felt secure. There were plenty of faces that I knew on board, among the rest some Oxford Undergraduates returning from a delightful excursion up the country; there were also some “Old Norwegians,” who had been fishing in the north, and complained loudly of the unfavourableness of the season. There had been an unusual amount of rain and cold, and the rivers had been so full of snow-water, that the salmon had stuck at the mouths, a prey to nets, &c., in preference to braving the chills of the Elv.
Among other small talk, I began to recount as I sat in the Captain’s room, how I had seen the old gentleman with the star and diplomatic coat. (See antè). Just then somebody came and called out the first lieutenant by name, which was, I perceived, the very same as that of the last baron whom I was engaged in taking off.
“Is he any relation?” I inquired in alarm.
“Only his son,” was the reply.
Fortunately I had not said anything derogatory to the papa, or I might have placed myself in an awkward fix. This is only another proof how cautious you ought to be on board one of these steamers of talking about whom you have seen, and what you think, for the coast being the great high road, everybody of condition takes that route—you may have been, perhaps, for instance, abusing some merchant for overcharges—and after speaking your mind, pro or con, the gentleman with whom you are conversing may surprise you with a—
“Ja so! Indeed! That’s my own brother.”
“Were you ever up beyond the North Cape?” said a Frenchman to me, at dinner.