A Quaint House in Rättvik
Rättvikers on the Way to Church
Around the church is the burying ground filled with neatly-kept graves most of which are marked with plain crosses. The morning services had not yet begun and a few old women, wearing white linen caps upon their heads and plaid woolen shawls about their shoulders, were busying themselves with the flowers growing upon the mounds. Down beside the gateway which faced the water were two orthodoxly clad men, talking sociably. Near this gateway Gustav Vasa stood four hundred years ago and addressed the people of Rättvik, as they streamed from the church, calling upon them to help him free the land from the Danish tyrant. The place is marked by the Gustav Vasa “runestone,” to which one of the men called my attention. It is a great rough slab of granite upon which, in letters graven in imitation of the ancient runes and filled in with gold, are briefly recorded the exploits of the George Washington of Sweden. Encircling the main stone are a number of low granite slabs. These bear the names of the Dal-people who particularly befriended and aided Vasa while he was in hiding from the Danish spies. And this service was not restricted to men; some of the stones are marked with the names of women, one of whom, Barbro Stigsdotter, aided Gustav Vasa in defiance of her husband’s wrath. While her husband had gone to betray him to his enemies, the independent-spirited Barbro lowered Vasa from an upper story window by means of a long sheet, thus enabling him to escape and free his people from the Danish yoke. At Ornäs, near Falun, the home of Barbro Stigsdotter still stands, now a museum belonging to the Swedish nation.
The Swedish peasants are an unusually fine class of people. They have always been free and have always constituted the backbone of the nation; they have participated in the government and have owned the land which they tilled. The same homesteads have been in the possession of some of the peasant families for many centuries.
And the qualities which one finds in the Swedish peasants in general are noticeable to a marked degree in the Dalecarlians, who are regarded by scientists as the purest representatives of the old Swedish type. They are exceedingly independent and democratic. They seem to feel that they are second to none. In times past, in recognition of their services in establishing the freedom of Sweden, they had the privilege of shaking hands with the king whenever they met him, and they regard themselves as his equal. They have a reputation for saying “thou” (du) instead of “you” (ni) to all men, regardless of rank; they ignore titles of nobility and call even the king “Mister” (Herr). Hans Christian Andersen in his “Pictures of Travel” gives an instance of the Dalecarlian viewpoint. Once when a grandson of King Carl Johan was in Dalecarlia an old peasant came up to him, shook hands, and said: “Please greet thy grandfather for me at Stockholm.”
So far, I have mostly mentioned the characteristics which make the Dalecarlians unique. They are far from being freaks, however, and have many qualities more generally distributed over the world than those to which I have called attention. They are really an excellent people. In their plain, sensible faces one can read little of which the Dalecarlians need feel ashamed. There is self-complacency, indeed, which in them is only self-complacency, but which in a smaller and meaner people would become contemptible egotism. But there are also the strength and firmness which in times past gave the Dalecarlians the courage of their convictions. United with this are kindness and good nature, a strong sense of personal dignity, and a saving self-respect. And, writ large over all, is that stern and uncompromising honesty which clearly distinguishes between mine and thine and prefers the unvarnished truth to the polite lie.
But time presses, Cynthia, the train on which I am to leave Falun is almost ready. With me, you must say good-by not only to the land of the Dal-people, but also to the whole pleasant land of Sweden, a land which I leave with regret, and to which I shall return with pleasure. Now, it is Ho for Norway!
CHAPTER VIII
TRONDHJEM AND MOLDE; THE NORWEGIAN FIORDS