“It is not without reason,” said Birger, as they sat on the roadside, at the top of one of these descents, watching the slow progress of their carioles, under the care of their respective schutzebonder—little boys or girls, as the case may be, who sit on the foot-boards, and bring the horses back after they have done their stage;—“it is not without reason that the ancient Swedes have invented the legend that in certain places the elves and the trees are identical; that these forest elves are intensely patriotic, and that in times of invasion they assemble their bands and fight by the side of their human countrymen, in defence of their common country. Many of the trees in Carlstadtlan, as well as in other places, are trees only by day, but are armed soldiers by night. Of course the idea is that the forests fight for the country in case of invasion, and add to the numbers of its defenders; and so they do. Russia might pour her thousands upon us, and sweep us off the face of the earth, by mere force of numbers, in an open field; but how would she ever force her passage through a forest like this, filled with a few thousand riflemen? The trees would fight for us even by day; but by night our numbers, counting the elves, would be irresistible.
“The slight variety that there is in the legend in Denmark, bears this out there also; where the deep Sound and fjords intersect the kingdom, the stony promontories are its best defence, and the elf kings are called Klintekonger, or Promontory Kings. There are several stories about their parading their elf soldiers, with fife and drum, on the breaking out of a war, and driving over the sea, with snorting horses, in clouds and blackness, from one promontory to another. The elf king of Bornholm will not allow any earthly prince to sleep more than three nights within his dominions, nor will King Tolv permit any king besides himself to pass the bridge of Skjelskör. This is all part of the same allegory; the elves are the spirits of the woods, and the Grims of the cataracts, and the Haaf manner of the sea, and the Strömkarls of the rivers. They all bear the same character; they are capricious as the elements are over which they preside, and often injure most those who are most accustomed to them, but in case of an invasion become rivers, and lakes, and fjords, and forests, and unite to repel the invader. Bother that little schutzebonde of mine; I wish she were a boy, that I might whip her instead of the horse;” and Birger strode down the hill to infuse fresh spirit into the post-horse and post-girl.
Thus they travelled on, at the rate of five or six miles an hour on the average, bowling along through the forest, but interrupted, whenever they came near cultivation, by timber fences and swing gates across the road, living mostly on their own provisions, with the help of a little gröd which they got from the post-houses, sleeping when they would in the haylofts, sometimes in the open air, and occasionally on peculiarly dirty sheepskins in the post-houses. Oh those sheepskins—
“Ye gentlemen of England,
Who live at home at ease,
How little do you think upon
The dangers of the fleas!”
CHAPTER XXI.
THE MEET.
“A various scene the clansmen made—