Before going further, it may be well to mention how the Kalevala came into existence. Finland is thinly peopled, but every Finn is at heart musical and poetical; therefore, far removed from the civilised world, they made songs among themselves—fantastic descriptions of their own country. By word of mouth these poems were handed on from generation to generation, and generally sung to the accompaniment of the kantele in a weird sort of chant. By such means the wonderful Sagas of Iceland were preserved to us until the year 1270, when they first began to be written down on sheepskins, in Runic writing, for Iceland at that date shone as a glorious literary light when all was gloom around. By means of tales, and poems, and chanted songs, the Arabian Nights stories, so dearly loved by the Arabs, which as yet have not been collected as they should have been, are related even to-day by the professional story-tellers we have seen in the market-places of Morocco.
Professor Elias Lönnrot, as mentioned in the last chapter, realising the value to scholars and antiquaries of the wonderful poems of Finland, so descriptive of the manners and customs of the Finns, set to work in the middle of the nineteenth century to collect and bring them out in book form before they were totally forgotten. This was a tremendous undertaking; he travelled through the wildest parts of Finland; disguised as a peasant, he walked from village to village, from homestead to homestead, living the life of the people, and collecting, bit by bit, the poems of his country. As in all mythological or gipsy tales, he found many versions of the same subject, for naturally verses handed on orally change a little in different districts from generation to generation. But he was not to be beaten by this extra amount of work, and finally wove into a connected whole the substance of the wondrous tales he had heard from the peasantry. This whole he called Kalevala, the name of the district where the heroes of the poem once existed. Gramophones will in future collect such treasures for posterity.
In 1835 the first edition appeared. It contained thirty-two runos or cantos of about twelve thousand lines, and the second, which was published in 1849, contained fifty runos or about twenty-two thousand eight hundred lines (seven thousand more than the Iliad).
There is no doubt about it, experts declare, that the poems or verses were written at different times, but it is nearly all of pre-Christian origin, for, with the exception of a few prayers in the last pages, there are few signs of Christian influence.
No one knows exactly how these poems originated. Indeed, the Kalevala is unique among epics, although distinct traces of foreign influence may occasionally be found, the Christian influence being only noticeable in the last runos when the Virgin's Son, the Child Christ, appears, after which advent Wäinämöinen disappears for unknown lands. With this exception the entire poem is of much earlier date.
The last runo is truly remarkable.
"Mariatta, child of beauty," becomes wedded to a berry—
Like a cranberry in feature,
Like a strawberry in flavour.
.....
Wedded to the mountain berry
.....
Wedded only to his honour.
.....
I shall bear a noble hero,
I shall bear a son immortal,
Who will rule among the mighty,
Rule the ancient Wäinämöinen.
.....
In the stable is a manger,
Fitting birth-place for the hero.
.....
Thereupon the horse, in pity,
Breathed the moisture of his nostrils,
On the body of the Virgin,
Wrapped her in a cloud of vapour,
Gave her warmth and needed comforts,
Gave his aid to the afflicted
To the virgin Mariatta.
There the babe was born and cradled,
Cradled in a woodland manger.
This shows Christian origin!
Wäinämöinen's place is gradually usurped by the "Wonder-babe," and the former departs in this stanza—