The town ought to be handsome, but it is not; the description would look well on paper. A great broad canal through the centre, with quays all the way on both sides, as at Dublin, only twice as broad, forming a very wide street; and from this five or six similar canals, similarly furnished with quays and streets, branch off at right angles. The banks of all these canals are planted with trees, and arranged as shaded footways. All this sounds as if the place ought to be pretty, but, though every word of this is true, the reality falls far short of the ideas it conveys. The houses are mean and low, and, the windows being flush with the sides, the whole appearance is pasteboard-like and unsubstantial, which the reality is not. The Swedes build their wooden houses in very good taste, and they harmonise very well with the scenery, but they should stick to that—ne sutor ultra crepidam: let not the carpenter aspire to be a mason. Every house, large or small, in town or in country, has very large panes of glass,—the very cabins have them; the glass is as bad as bad can be, full of flaws and waves, and very thin besides; even this produces a bad effect; besides, it is impossible to admire the finest of towns, when walking over streets so roughly paved that eyes and thoughts must be continually directed towards the footing.
There is a capital market, and the canals bring the hay, and the fuel, and all other heavy articles from the interior, to the very doors of the houses. It was singular to see floating haystacks and faggot piles—for so they looked, the hulls of the boats being completely hidden by their freight,—towed up in strings by the little steam-tugs, and moored to the quays. If Gotheborg is not a prosperous town, Sweden will not support one at all, for it is impossible for any situation to be more favourable for trade. The river itself forms a secure harbour, its only fault being that vessels of heavy draught cannot anchor within a mile of the town. The interior water communications comprehend all the midland provinces, and the landing and shipping of goods is as easy as art can make it; besides, it is the outermost port of the whole country.
The markets, certainly, are well supplied, especially that of fish, both salt and fresh-water. Beef and mutton are among its articles of export to the southern coasts of Norway, and there is not a bad display of vegetables for so northern a country. The quantities of spinach which are seen everywhere, and which mingle with every dish, rather surprise the traveller, till he finds out that the sandhills which he has seen on each side of him all the way up the river, are covered with it, growing wild—wild as it is, English garden spinach is not at all better flavoured. Singularly enough, melons are plentiful; one would almost as soon expect to meet with pines in these latitudes,—but the short summer of Sweden is peculiarly favourable for them.
The trade of the place does not look very lively, and the bustle in the streets is nothing at all like that of Bristol or Liverpool. What little stir there was just then, seemed to be rather military than mercantile. Dirty, slovenly-looking artillerymen, with ugly blue and yellow uniforms, putting one disagreeably in mind of the Edinburgh Review; overalls patched extensively with leather that terribly wanted the blacking-brush; and dingy steel scabbards, that did not know what emery-stone was, were clanking about the streets, followed by little crowds; and groups of officers were standing at the doors of the hotels and lodging-houses. Evidently a review was not an everyday business.
The Parson and Captain were soon deserted by their military cicerone, who left them, to prepare for his part in the military display, having directed them into the street that leads to the scene of action. This was a large meadow, or small park, to the east of the town, rather a pretty promenade, enclosed with trees, which was now crowded with people. Towns, especially trading towns, are not remarkable for costume. The people, seeing such a variety of foreigners, get to be citizens of the world themselves, and so lose their nationalities. But there were a few fancy dresses, too, from the country round; short round corduroy jackets, sometimes a sort of tartan, too, but which invariably had rows of buttons sewed as thick together as they could stand. Among the women, a handkerchief was frequently tied round the head instead of a bonnet; but every one, almost, carried his or her bunch of flowers, an article which abounded in the markets; these were very often carried in the hats, or stuck through the knots of the kerchiefs.
And now the bugles of the artillery were heard, and the rumbling of wheels, and the trampling of horses, as battery after battery rolled into the park. The Swedes call them horse artillery, but they are, in reality, only field batteries; for of horse artillery, properly so called, that most beautiful of military toys, they have none. Their guns, twelve pounders, are drawn by six horses, each of which carries a man. In bringing the guns into action, the off-man of each pair dismounted, and these were joined by three others, whose seat was on the limbers. These are hardly men enough to work so heavy a gun, allowing for the casualties of action, but on emergencies the driver of the middle pair also lends his services.
There was nothing showy in the review, the manœuvres of which were confined to advancing and retreating in line, and forming column, and deploying into line again; but all at a foot’s pace, or at a very slow trot. They had no idea of changing front, or retreating in echéllon, or any of those showy manœuvres in which the prolong is used. In fact, so far as display went, it was a very slow affair indeed; the men, however, seemed to know their work pretty well, and though individually dirty and slovenly and without the well set up carriage of our own soldiers, they bore, as a body, rather a soldier-like appearance. They ride very forward, absolutely on the horse’s withers—this is said to give the horse greater facility of draught; and it may, but at all events, it gives a most awkward and unsoldier-like appearance to the men, which is in no way improved by the manner in which they carry their swords—the elbows sticking out at right angles to the body, and their knuckles thrust into their sides, as if they had a pain in their ribs.
The guns seemed to be very much under-horsed, but perhaps this is more apparent than real; for the Swedish horses, though small, are strong and wiry, and their enclosed country is not only not calculated for horse artillery manœuvres, but does not admit of them. The chances are, that a whole campaign might be fought in Sweden without the artillery being required to move faster than at a foot-pace. So far as numbers went, they mustered at least three times as many guns as can be got together at Woolwich for love or money at the best of times.
The army of Sweden is very curiously constituted, and it is not easy to reckon up its effective strength. The regular army does not consist of above 10,000 men; the guards—than which no finer body of men is to be seen in Europe,—the artillery, and three or four garrison regiments, who are stationed at Wanås, in the interior, and Carlscrona, and one or two other fortresses on the coast.
The militia, which is called Beväring, consists of every man in the country between the ages of twenty and twenty-five; these have regular days of exercise, generally Sunday evenings in the summer, which is with them by no means a popular arrangement, for those are the hours which the ingenuous youths of Sweden devote to dancing, an amusement of which they are passionately fond. This really is a much more effective force than it seems, for the Swedes are natural soldiers; besides which, it gives them all a habit of drill, which might be rendered serviceable in case of invasion; for, as every man in the country has been drilled in his youth, they are all capable of immediately taking their places in the ranks of the regular regiments. It would be a very great improvement if they were drilled to ball practice, like the Swiss and Tyrolese, for a Swede is terribly clumsy with fire-arms, and on a skal, is just as likely to shoot himself or his comrade, as a bear or a wolf.