A SKI-RUNNER
GUNNAR HALLSTRÖM.
MARS 1904 Björnö
The Swedes are also taught to be cleanly. Everywhere can be seen a great many lakes, and in the bright summer days the children bathe and learn to swim in them. In the winter this is impossible, as the cold is very great and the lakes are frozen over. In some schools a large room is set apart as a bathroom. There is no large bath or swimming pond, but a very simple arrangement of a number of tubs in a circle. A child goes into each. They wash and scrub one another. It is a method for securing cleanliness easily carried out, and does not cost much. The result is health. The children never look shabby. A Swedish mother may be poor, but she takes a pride in seeing her children neat and tidy.
Nor does she forget to teach them politeness. Every boy is taught to be very respectful to his elders. On the street he lifts his cap to anyone he knows, whether he be rich or poor.
When the boy is fifteen, he may choose to go to a trade, or to a higher school with a view to entering a learned profession.
At this age, if he intends to become a Government servant, lawyer, doctor, or minister, he must be confirmed. This is a very important step in his life. On the day of confirmation he is examined in the church, and has publicly to answer questions. It is a great day for him. He is now a man, and is very proud of being looked upon as such.
After he has been at the higher school for some years, and wishes to enter the University, he must pass a very hard examination, and when he learns that he has been successful, he is very happy and bright. He comes out of the school wearing the white cap which all students have, and decked with wreaths and flowers bestowed on him by doting parents and admiring friends.
There are large Universities in Sweden both at Upsala and Lund. The former is the larger and older of the two, but they are both well known. The student has the same long and hard course as at school. Very few students finish their course till they are between twenty-five and thirty years of age, and up to this time, if they wish to be successful, must be faithful to their study. There are no very young doctors in Sweden. They generally do not begin to practise till they are about twenty-eight years of age. Still, they find some time for social life at the University towns. They enter into the gaiety of the place, and are great favourites with the townspeople. The students from each district or nation have a club-room for social gatherings. They are very proud of their own district, and in processions march together with a banner in front. They are very fond of singing. The students of Upsala have a world-wide reputation, as at the Paris Exhibition of 1897 they took the first prize when choirs from every part of the world were competing.