CHAPTER VIII
TRONDHJEM AND MOLDE; THE NORWEGIAN FIORDS
Aalesund, Norway,
August 31, 191—
Dear Cynthia:
My last letter to you was posted at Falun. Aalesund is well down the coast of Norway, so you see that I have zig-zagged quite a distance since last I greeted you.
My exit from Sweden’s back door was as pleasant as the entrance at the front. The long journey toward the northwest furnished the familiar—but never monotonous—alternation of grand forests, and tiny hay farms, and lakes and rivers filled with logs on their way to the saw mills. Bräcke is on one of these lakes, with the woods pressing close on the other three sides. Here we waited three hours, during which I breakfasted; and then we began our real climb toward the Swedish border where the mountains were more rugged and were flecked with snow. During the early part of the journey I shared a compartment of the car with a charming Swedish woman who busily knit white linen lace while she chatted with me. She was pleased to learn that I had been at Falun, and spoke with deep pride of Selma Lagerlöf. Strindberg’s best dramas, she hoped, were also known and appreciated in the United States. Some of his writings, it was true, showed traces of insanity; but didn’t I think “Swan-white” charming? The lady was very obviously a conservative, however, for she, as a woman, felt apologetic for Ellen Key, who is, however, I think, better known and appreciated in America than either August Strindberg or Selma Lagerlöf. She seemed inclined to attribute to Miss Key an unhealthy mind and questionable morals, which led me to recall the words the artist had put above Ellen Key’s portrait: “Could I but have represented your purity of soul!”
At Storlien (Great Line), very near the national boundary, we stopped for luncheon, which I obtained in the railroad restaurant all set forth in cafeteria style. The meal was as good as Swedish “home cooking,” and the cost was ridiculously slight as compared with the prices which one must pay in similar places at home.
As I was leaving the restaurant, whom should I see but my North Star lady! When we parted at Stockholm, she had remarked that she meant to cross the mountains to Trondhjem before returning to Gothenburg, but I had thought little about it, as I felt that there was no chance of our plans synchronizing. However, there she was, and I greeted her as an old friend. Her companionship added much to the pleasure of the remainder of my journey, and of my stay in Trondhjem. We secured a comfortable compartment and in a few minutes we had made our entrance into Norway, by Norway’s back door. Fröken Nordstern called my attention to the Great Line as we crossed it; it is a broad strip of deforested territory standing out in sharp contrast with the dark forest line on either side, and extends as far as the eye can reach over hill and dale to the north and south. This simple line separates the land of Sweden from the land of Norway; no blood-thirsty cannon punctuate its length. Preparations are being made to erect upon the boundary instead a fine monument in commemoration of the century of peace which is nearly complete between the two nations.
Soon the Norwegian customs inspector came into the car, but upon our assuring him that our suitcases contained nothing dutiable, he lifted his cap and passed on without asking to see their contents. I do not know whether his action was due to conviction of our honesty or of our poverty. Norwegians, however, like the other Scandinavians, are anything but liars; they generally tell the truth themselves and have a stimulating way of expecting the truth from others, and of getting it.
Do not let my calling the Storlien route Norway’s back door mislead you into the impression that the part of the land which we entered had the appearance of the average American backyard; on the contrary, it was grand. The Scandinavian Alps, which we crossed, remind me of my own Far Western High Sierras. They are not quite so rugged or majestic, but their beauty stirred me deeply, especially glorified as they were by the enchantment of the summer sun. The mountains not only offered the ever-attractive Scandinavian forests of evergreens and delicate birches and rowan with its cheerful bunches of red berries; there were also tender, golden-green ferns, strange sweet wild flowers—so near as almost to be plucked through the car windows—and trickling streams and waterfalls. That is, the streams trickled near their sources at the summit, but as our course descended, they united and widened and became Gudsaaen, which is, being interpreted, God’s Rivulet or River. And if the things of God are of especial beauty, the stream is well named. God’s River flows through Meraker Dal, or Valley, which, in the grip of bleak winter, is, I presume, anything but attractive. That golden afternoon, however, the place reminded me of Björnson’s “Synnove Solbakken,” and appealed so strongly that I wanted to stop off and spend a few weeks in one of the simple, homelike houses upon its sunny green slopes. Had I taken a vacation in Meraker Dal, I should have ridden over the mountain paths upon one of the shaggy little Norse ponies which frisked and played in the pastures. Perhaps I might have experimented upon the democracy of the Norwegian mind by milking one of the sleek cows!
But the train rolled on at a good speed toward the west, carrying me along. And soon we were near Trondhjem, which, five centuries ago, before Norway went into her four-hundred-years’ bondage to Denmark, was the Norwegian capital. The old saga accounts frequently mention the place as the destination or starting point of Norse chieftains, for Trondhjem Fiord, around which the city curves in a crescent shape, forms an excellent harbor.
Fröken Nordstern and I secured rooms at the same hotel, and were up bright and early the next morning ready for a busy day. We first went to the cathedral, a fine granite building in Gothic style, which was badly damaged by the Swedes in 1814, but is now being gradually restored. The cathedral is noted for the great number of gargoyles decorating its exterior and interior—hideous, grinning, fascinating faces which peer out at one from roof, and wall, and lofty, vaulted ceiling. Far above the high altar is a colored image of Christ. It is very common to see such images in the Scandinavian Lutheran churches; they are simply one of the relics carried over from Roman Catholic days.
Both of us were much interested in the Industrial Museum, to which we went from the cathedral. Like museums in Sweden and Denmark, this one contained rooms furnished in the Norwegian styles of past centuries. There were quaint old utensils, too, hand-carved cheese tubs and painted antique smoothing boards—the remote ancestors of modern electric flatirons. The boards somewhat resemble carpenter’s planes. Round rollers, which were placed under them, evidently took some of the wrinkles out of the clothes. One room which was a real joy to my heart contained a rare display of the most exquisite Scandinavian porcelain. But I was especially attracted to the woven woolen tapestries which are copies of George Munthe’s paintings of the scenes from the sagas. The weaving stitch, as I remarked of the stitch used for hand weaving in Sweden, very much resembles that used by the Navajos in their blankets; but the work is much finer in texture and color.
My look at the artistic contents of the Industrial Museum was as near as my limited time permitted me to get to the fine arts of Trondhjem. I only recently learned that the three famous Sinding brothers, Christian, Otto, and Stephen—the musical composer, the painter, and the sculptor—were born in the ancient capital. I think, however, that most of the paintings and sculptures produced by Otto and Stephen are to be found farther south in Norway.
King Haakon and Queen Maud spend a month or two of every year at Trondhjem, living in the Residential Palace. This palace, which is said to be the largest wooden building in Europe, is painted white, with the coat-of-arms of Norway emblazoned over the doorway, and has numerous Norwegian national flags—red, with a cross of white and blue—flying from the roof. About sixty of the one hundred rooms are furnished, and we saw a large number of them. A nice old Norwegian, with a smooth-shaven face and a fringe of beard under his chin, which reminded me of the sailor in the “life buoy” soap advertisements, showed us around. He took a tremendous pride in every detail of the furnishings, and seemed to love the king and queen as much as if they were his own children.
The palace was really very plainly furnished. Some of the walls, it is true, were covered with silk brocade, which the guard lifted aside the protective hanging to display; but many were merely covered with ordinary paper. The furnishings of most of the rooms were no more elaborate or expensive than those of most middle-class houses in the United States. In the bathrooms, for instance, were plain white enameled tubs of the conventional American type. One unusually dainty and charming apartment was the Queen’s boudoir, which was furnished in pale blue. Here and there, upon the walls and about the room, were pictures of Olaf, the little crown prince, smiling and happy. The old guard called attention to these pictures of the little boy with a delightful grandfatherly air which was truly touching. Some of the pine floors were bare, and remained so, the guard said, even when the royal family was in residence. In fact, the guard appeared to take pride in the simplicity of the palace as well as in its elegance.
The ballroom was rather richly furnished. Gleaming crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling; the walls were covered with brocade; and against them were arranged chairs and sofas upholstered in crimson silk plush. At one end of the room were the seats of the king and the queen, of the same general style as the others, but larger, and embroidered with gold. When we reached the royal seats, the friendly old guard said, “Now you may be queen for a while.” So Miss North Star and I took turns at sitting in the Queen’s chair. Queen Maud would not have objected, I am sure.
In the evening, over a final cup of coffee, we discussed the sterling qualities and the widening future of the Norwegians. Then Fröken Nordstern went down to see me off on the Haakon Adelstein, which was to leave for Molde at eight o’clock. As she waved good-by from the pier, I knew that I was parting from one of the finest souls in the whole Scandinavian land. It is through the efforts of my Lady of the North Star, and others like her, that these lands of the far north are coming to be the greatest in Europe. And when true greatness—that of superiority of character and intellect—shall be made the test of national worth, instead of political power gained through commercial control and militarism, Scandinavia will come to her own. I say this, Cynthia, not as a descendant of the Scandinavians, but as an American of the Americans, born and bred—one who has had opportunity in her own land as well as in theirs to become acquainted with the Scandinavians.
The sun sank behind the mountains just as the Haakon Adelstein left its moorings. There followed a succession of glory and gray in the sky, and of wonderful blues and purples in the mountain shadows. Darkness seemed to advance slowly and reluctantly; the mystical, silvery twilight lingered long; I could read ordinary print, as I sat on deck, until past nine o’clock.
When darkness had finally closed around, I went down to the women’s salon, where I found four women and a man—all Norwegians. One of the women was a Roman Catholic nun, and one of the others was traveling with her. The two other women were mother and daughter; the young man was evidently aspiring to become the husband of the daughter. All were so frank and friendly that we were soon acquainted. Though the man was a true son of the Vikings—tall and straight and fair, with strong features—I noticed what I must call, for want of something more descriptive, an “American” expression on his face; so I was not at all surprised when he told me that he had spent several years in Washington State.
“Do you like the United States?” I asked in English.
“You just bet I do,” he replied, in first-class American slang.
He expected to go back to the Far West, he said; and it was quite evident that he had no intention of returning alone.
After leaving Trondhjem Fiord, we followed the coast of Norway pretty closely. Norway’s shores, you will remember, are mountains which stand with their feet in the sea. And near the shores are detached mountains which rose as islands on our right hand. Before retiring I went on deck to take a good-night look at sea and sky, expecting to find sea and sky only; and I was surprised and given “quite a turn” by the effect of the huge, weird, black, shadowy-looking mountain masses to right and left, with the lapping, gleaming ocean waves between. There was something about the scene which suggested bats and owls in forsaken houses at night.
The next morning the fiords were still there, but before the glory of the summer sunshine the “spooky” aspect had fled, and the mountains stretched away green and purple and wholesome and living and real.
We reached Molde, which is on Molde Fiord, in time for a late breakfast, of which I partook at a charming “pensionat,” set both picturesquely and precariously upon the dewy, green hillside. Here was served a genuine Scandinavian breakfast, Smörgåsbord and all. But here I met also a new delicacy—goats’ milk cheese. It looks like brown laundry soap—only more opaque and inedible—but it is fit fare for the divinities of Asgard. At least, so thinks one who likes Scandinavian cookery.
Breakfast over, I explored Molde, which is called “the City of Roses,” and it is appropriately named, for roses as well as other flowers were blooming in great abundance. From the natural park far up on the hillside—rocky and woodsy, with an abundance of ferns and flowers—I gained a beautiful panoramic view. At my feet lay the little town, peeping forth from its setting of tender green, bright with blossoms; beyond lay the fiord, dotted with woodsy islands; and, blending with the wonderful colors of the fiord, were the rugged, encircling mountains, shading from greens and purples, flecked with snow, in the foreground, to misty violet, or dazzling white, marblelike peaks outlined against the summer sky.
On the way down the slope I crossed the cemetery, filled with neatly-kept graves covered with smooth, rank grass and flowers as delicate as maiden hair, with the morning dew still upon them. Near the walk down which I passed was a neatly-dressed old woman with a white kerchief upon her head, working among the flowers. The country cemeteries of Scandinavia seem never to fail of gray-haired, white-kerchiefed old women with characterful, dignified faces who work among the flowers in loving memory of their dead.
While in Molde, I learned that the original of Axel Ender’s “He Is Risen” was an altar piece in the Lutheran church there; so I went to see it. But it happened that a wedding ceremony had just begun in the church when I arrived, and the sexton did not want to admit me. I was immediately fired with a desire to see the wedding, however, and after some coaxing he good-naturedly said that I might take a seat in the rear of the church. The service had just begun, I found. The white-ruffed, black-gowned clergyman was launched upon a sermon rich with good advice to the contracting parties, and calculated to impress them with the solemnity of the step which they were about to take. The sermon was followed by the conventional questions and replies and the exchange of rings; the priest offered prayer; the clerk sang a chantlike song; hand shakes and congratulations came next; and then the bridal party made their exit.
For its very usualness the bridal party deserves special mention. When I asked permission to see the wedding, I had visions of a bridal pair in native costume; but what I saw possessed no element of the picturesque. The couple looked just like the figures one sees on wedding cakes in third rate baker’s windows in the United States. The groom was in the conventional black suit and had very waxed mustaches and very shiny shoes; the bride wore the orthodox silk dress and tulle veil, and carried the usual bride’s bouquet of white blossoms. The only witnesses to the ceremony, besides the interloper in the back seat, were four young men and a young woman who looked as if they might be relatives of the bride. They wandered out in the wake of the bride and groom. It was a very tame, uninteresting wedding.
Speaking of weddings calls to my mind a mystery which my North Star lady cleared up for me. I had been constantly surprised since reaching Scandinavia at the unhesitating way in which people to whom I was an utter stranger addressed me as “Fröken” (Miss) rather than as “Fru” (Mrs.) and had been roused to deep admiration at the perspicacity which enabled those people to decide after a mere glance that I was a bachelor woman. But when I expressed to Fröken Nordstern my appreciation for this evidence of the superior quality of the Scandinavian mind, she swept aside the delusion with: “Why, they look at your hands; all married women here wear wedding rings.”
In my disappointment over the conventional quality of the wedding, however, I did not forget what I went to the church for. The “He Is Risen” was in a good light, and I enjoyed seeing it. The facial expressions of the three women are fine I think; but I do not care for the angel. I am very particular about angels. You know the picture very well, I am sure, for copies are common in American homes. But you will be surprised to learn that the artist is a Norwegian and that the original is in little old Molde, high up along the fiord-indented coast. Ender did a work on the same subject for one of the churches of Christiania, but the Molde altar piece is generally considered much the finer of the two.
Outside the church were three little booths on wheels in which Norwegian girls with “ratted” hair sold tinted and plain photographic copies of Ender’s painting. Farther along, on the main street of the village, were several curio shops, in the windows of which were displayed objects calculated to attract the tourist:—tiny copies of Viking ships in silver; silver jewelry in imitation of old Norse handiwork; genuine Norse antiquities; Lapp slippers of reindeer skin; ancient furniture upholstered in the richly decorated Jutland leather; carved wooden bridal spoons joined in pairs with carved wooden chains, in imitation of the spoons with which in times past bridal couples ate their “wedding breakfast”; beautiful Scandinavian porcelain; and hideous mugs and other trinkets, made to sell to souvenir-collecting fiends—bearing the legend, “Hilsen fra Molde” (Greetings from Molde). All were jumbled in the windows together.
In the afternoon I left Molde by a little boat for Naes, on Romsdal Fiord. The beauty of the fiords will dwell with me always, for they are by far the most impressive scenery which I have viewed in Europe. Assuredly, the Swiss and Austrian Alps are grandly beautiful, but to one reared among the mountains of the Far West they seem little more than beloved old friends with slightly changed faces. Fiords, on the other hand, were something new in my experience, and I was tremendously impressed and delighted. The Romsdal I consider the most beautiful fiord that I saw, and, therefore, I will try to convey to you something of what it was like. You must bear in mind that, as our old geographies pointed out, fiords are “drowned valleys”; and the mountains rimming the valleys are frequently very sheer and high. Even upon the steepest of them, though, some vegetation manages to find a foot-hold. In many places I noticed trees growing out of what looked like solid rock.
Have you read that most charming first chapter in Björnson’s “Arne” on “How the Cliff Was Clad”? Repeatedly, when gazing admiringly up at some particularly daring tree clinging sturdily to the steep, rocky walls, I thought of this chapter—of the conference between the Juniper, the Fir, the Oak, and the Birch, which ends in the plucky little Birch’s exclaiming: “In God’s name, let us clothe it!”
Much of the pleasure of my fiord voyage came from the shifting of color. As the boat neared one shore the other receded, and golden green turned to blue-black in the deep shadows, and royal purple where there were high lights; and where the sun shone through the rifts in the mountains the slopes were transfigured into deep amethyst and rosy gold; and beyond these, near the high horizon, rose still loftier crests, of the faintest violet, misty and uncertain against the gray sky—like haunting ghosts of pre-glacial ranges. Waterfalls there were in abundance, tumbling over the dark, shadowy walls and sparkling where the sun found them out; perhaps dashed utterly into spray by the sharp ledges, but reuniting into torrents again before reaching the bottom. The deep water of the fiord, too, was beautiful, showing great patches of blues and greens, purples and blacks, and occasionally silver grays. Near the shore were brilliantly-colored jelly fishes, large as breakfast plates, tumbling about. I was sorely torn between my desire to watch these marine blossoms and the wonderful colors of the water, and my wish to absorb the beauty of the mountains. I will not presume to describe the sunset on the fiord; such an undertaking is too rash even for one with my daring.