Hyys hyys Hymylään!Kun et sitäkään tiedä.
Hyys hyys Hymylään!Kun et sitäkään tiedä.
Meaning, "Well, well, off you go to Coventry as punishment for ignorance."
Then the poor delinquent is made to play the fool. He is set on a chair in the middle of the room, dressed up as fancy pleases the audience. His face is often absurdly painted, and after enduring every indignity, to the amusement of his friends, he is escorted from the room to ponder over the answers to the riddles. How they chaff him. Does heenjoyHymylä? Are the dogs howling and the children running away? If he wants to come back he had better harness a mouse to his carriage, find a cat to act as coachman, and a saucepan for a sledge. He must wash himself with tar and paint himself with feathers.
And so they chaff and laugh on during those long winter evenings, in their badly-lighted homes, where books are still rare.
Every one in Finland can read to-day, but the first Finnish book was published in 1542, byMikael Agricola, the Bishop who made the first translation of the New Testament; but they cannot read much in their dimly-lighted houses during the long winters, and therefore it is that they sing so constantly, and repeat mythical rhymes, or riddles and proverbs, which our host and hostess declared they loved.
TheirSavupirttiand land did not belong to them, the latter told us. The actual owner was a farmer who let it out in varioustorps. Our particular friend, thetorppari, paid him one-third of all he made off his holding, and gave him besides eight days' work during the year—being called upon for this manual contribution whenever the farmer was himself most pressed.
This particular little chimneyless house lay eighteen kilometres fromIisalmi, where the nearest shops were to be found. The poor old woman told us that she had had nine children, out of which number she had lost seven. When we considered the smallness of her home, the terrible want of ventilation and sanitation, the poverty of the people,and the hardness of their lives, we were not in the least surprised at her statement, but we marvelled much at the mother having survived all she must have gone through.
She made a wonderful picture as she sat on the wooden bedstead, her bare feet playing a tattoo on the wooden floor, while her clean clothes seemed absolutely to shine against the darkness of the wall behind her.
Although so far removed from civilisation, and from luxuries of any kind, the old couple knew how to read, and they had one or two treasured books. Poor as they were, they, like every other native peasant, possessed aPiplia(Bible), aKatkismus(catechism), aVirsikirja(hymn-book), and anAlmanakka(almanac).
We ventured to ask the good soul if she ever read them. "Of course," she replied, "or what should we do at thelukukinkerit?"
"And what may that be?" we asked, surprised; only to learn that in the winter months the priests travel about by means of sledges from one big peasant's house to another, where the smallertorpparisall assemble, and there hold an examination of the people in order to ascertain their holy knowledge.
The peasants rather dread theselukukinkerit, as the priest asks them difficult questions, which it is considered an absolute disgrace not to be able to answer satisfactorily. As we know, this was formerly the custom in Scotland, and severe punishments were given to those who could not answerrightly, and prove themselves thoroughly versed in Bible history. This custom is now practically done away with in Scotland, although the examination for the communion, which takes place twice a year in the Highlands, partakes somewhat of the same nature. In Finland the winter examinations are very serious matters, and therefore it is that the Bible, prayer-book, and hymn-book are to be found in every peasant's home, while a profound knowledge of their contents is general.
Besides examining the folk on religious subjects, the priest also severely tests their reading capabilities, for no one can be married in Finland unless he be able to read to the satisfaction of his spiritual adviser. This means that all Finland can read. Yet in Russia, near by, only a quarter of the population know how to read, and far fewer can write, and they still count by beads.
As we turned to leave the little homestead, we noticed some apparently dead birch-trees planted on both sides of the front door, and knowing the birch and ash were still considered more or less sacred by the peasant, we wondered what such a shrubbery could signify—why, when the trees were dead, they had not been thrown away. Everything else looked fresh and green, so we were more than surprised to notice their crumpled brown leaves, and eventually asked how it came about that these two young trees were dead.
"It was my husband'sNimipäivä(name-day) lately," said the old body, "and of course we went to the forest and cut down two birch-trees, andstuck them into the ground by the front door to bring him luck."
The name-day, be it understood, is an important event in Finnish family history, a festival equivalent to our birthday rejoicings; and in the case of the father or mother, the children generally all assemble on their parent's name-day. The richer folk have a dinner or a dance, or something of that kind—the poor a feast; but all decorate their front door with birch-trees, in honour of the occasion, while those who have the means to do so exchange presents.
Our dear old lady was almost tearful when we left, and, asking our names most affectionately, tried again and again to pronounce the queer-soundingTweedieandHarley. A bright idea struck us; we would show her the words written, and thereupon we gave her our cards. This was too much joy. Fancy any one actually having her name on a card. Then she turned the extraordinary bits of pasteboard over and over, and seizing our hands, kissed them to show her gratitude. Afterwards she went to her cupboard, and producing a white handkerchief, one of those she kept for conveying her Bible to and from church, carefully wrapped the cards round and round, and promised to keep them always in remembrance of her strange visitors.
It was really wonderful, driving along the roads, how near our threekärrakept to one another; sometimes, indeed, they were so close that we could all converse conveniently. This answered very well, but when, by chance or design, they got about twentyor thirty yards apart, the dust kicked up by the horse in front was so fearful that we suffered much, and it was really amusing at the end of each day to see how completely our hair was powdered, and note the wonderful gray hue our faces had assumed, eyelashes, eyebrows and all. I was wearing a black dress, on the lapels of which it afforded amusement to my companions to play a game ofnoughts and crosseswith their fingers amid the accumulated dust. It was extraordinary, considering the thickness of the sand, for it was more sand than dust that lay upon the roads, that our ponies could go so well; and when the sun was at its height the heat was so fearful, and the number of mosquitoes and horseflies so appalling, that this inconvenience, coupled with the dust, still made it absolutely impossible at times for us to pursue our journey during the mid-day hours; but those glorious northern evenings made up for all the discomfort.
The roads themselves were wonderfully straight, and as there is a red post every kilometre (or half mile), we could tell how far we went without even turning our heads, because we could count five or six posts at the same time, so straight was the way.
As we proceeded farther North the country became more hilly, and our little animals would stop and walk up steep inclines; having reached the summit, however, they were wont to gallop full speed to the bottom.
We reached a most charmingmajatalo. It was near midnight, and, as it is one of the best in Finland, it was decided that we should there spend a night. Itwas only the pretence of a night, however, for the coachman declared it would be quite impossible to drive during the heat of the following day, and, consequently, We must start again on our way at four in the morning at the very latest.
Here at last, thank heaven, we found amajatalowhich wasproperly inspected. There were iron bedsteads and clean mattresses, and, having suffered so terribly as we had done, it seemed very bad luck that we could not enjoy more than three hours' rest in such delightful quarters. While our supper, which consisted of milk, coffee, eggs, and delicious butter, supplemented with the white bread we brought with us, was being prepared, we had a look into the large farmhouse where our host himself lived.
Instead of the family being in bed, as in an ordinary English farm they would be at midnight, a girl was sitting in the corner making butter with an old-fashioned churn of the wooden-handled type, which you pull up and down to use. There had evidently been a great baking that day or the day before, for the farm kitchen seemed to contain hundreds of loaves, which were stacked on the floor, piled on the table, and strewn on benches, not yet having been suspended by means of strings from the ceilings and rafters.
We thoroughly enjoyed that evening meal, sitting on the balcony, or rather large porch of the little annexe kept for strangers; one and all agreed no nicer butter, sweeter milk, or more perfect cream—of which they brought us a quart jug—could be found anywhere, and that travellers must indeed be hardto please who could not live for a few days on such excellent farm produce, even though they might have to dispense with the luxuries of fish, flesh, and fowl.
ThreeA.M.is a little early to turn out of bed, but when one is travelling through the wilds one must do many trying things, so we all got up at that hour, which, judging by our feelings, seemed to us still midnight. The sun, however, was of a different opinion, he was up and shining brilliantly long before any of us.
We had previously told our Finnish student the joke of having tried to order hot water over night, and, after much explanation and many struggles to make her understand, how the girl had returned with a teacup full of the boiling liquid, and declared that the greatest trouble we were forced to encounter in Finland was to get any water to wash with, more especially warm.
He smiled, but was not daunted. We heard him up early, and imagined he was arranging things with the coachman and ordering breakfast—for we cannot ever be sufficiently grateful to our Finnish friends for their kindness and thoughtfulness in managing everything for our comfort from the first day of our stay in Finland till the last; but he had done more than this, and apparently made up his mind that we should never, while he travelled with us, have cause to accuse Finland again of being unable to produceHett vatten!
At threeA.M.a knock came at the door—a most unusual form of proceeding in a country where everyone walks in without this preliminary—and, having opened it in reply, we found a buxom maid standing with an enormous jug of boiling water, and a yet more enormous wooden pail, such as one might require for a family wash, full of the same boiling liquid, and a tub outside the door from which volumes of steam were rising. It was for the English ladies, she said.
Our student had paid us out, and we felt ashamed and sorry.
As we sat at breakfast we watched a girl drawing water from the well. Every house in Finland, be it understood, has its well, over which is a raised wooden platform something like a table with a hole in the middle for the bucket to pass through. A few feet back a solid pillar stands on the ground, through the fork-like top of which a pine-tree trunk is fixed, generally about thirty feet long. It is balanced in such a way that at the one end of it a large stone is tied to make it heavy, while suspended from a fine point, standing in mid-air, appear a series of wooden posts joined together by iron hasps so as to form a long chain or cord, to the bottom end of which the bucket is attached. Thus the bucket with its wooden string is, when filled with water, equivalent in weight to the stone at the other end of the pump. In fact, the whole thing is made on the principle of a pair of scales.
The girl seized the empty bucket, pulled it over the hole, and, hanging on to the jointed poles with all her weight, sent the bucket down some thirty feet into the well below. By this time the stone atthe far end of the pole was up in mid-air. When she thought the bucket was full she let go, and immediately it began to rise at the same time as the stone at the other end began to descend, and in a moment the beautiful well-water reached the surface. Such pumps as these are to be found all over Finland, and their manufacture seems a speciality of the country.
We had considerable fun over the coffee cups at breakfast, for every one of them had written round its border love passages and mottoes in Finnish—another instance of how the love of proverbs and mottoes is noticeable everywhere throughout the country. Our gentleman friends had great jokes over these inscriptions, but they unkindly refused to tell us what they really meant.
We had learnt a good deal of Finnish from sheer necessity, and could manage to order coffee or milk, or to pay what was necessary, but our knowledge of the language did not go far enough for us to understand the wonderful little tales printed round the coffee cups from which we drank. Again we were given silver spoons.
For once we really started at the hour named, and at four o'clock, with a crack of the whip, our ponies galloped out of the yard of the most delightfulmajatalowe had ever slept in. On we drove through the early hours of the morning, everything looking fresh and bright, the birds singing, the rabbits running across the road. As we passed fields where the peasants were gathering in their hay, or ploughing with an old-fashioned hand-plough, such as was used in Bible days and is still common in Morocco, wewondered what Finnish peasants would think of all our modern inventions for saving labour, especially that wonderful machine where the wheat goes in at the top and comes out corn at one end, chaff in the middle, and straw, bound ready for sale, at the other. We drove on till nine o'clock, by which time we were all ready for another meal. Jogging along country roads aids digestion, and by nine we had forgotten we had ever eaten any breakfast at all. We had really arranged to spend some hours at our next halting-place, in fact not to leave until the cool of the evening, so as to rest both our horses and ourselves, and be saved the glare and the heat. But tired as our animals seemed, and weary though we were, that station proved impossible. We had to stay for a couple of hours, for it would have been cruel to ask the ponies to leave sooner, but we were indeed thankful that we had not arranged to spend the night in such an awful hole. To relate the horror of thatmajatalowould be too fearful a task. Suffice it to say everything was filthy, and we felt sick at heart when drinking milk and coffee at the place. Worse still, our white bread had come to an end, and we had to eat some of the native rye bread. The housewife and all the women in the house being terrible even to look upon, it seemed perfectly awful to eat bread that they had made, but yet we were so hungry. Reader, pity our plight.
Though the sun was blazing, we dare not sit inside, for the little tufts of hair tied round the legs of the tables a foot and a half from the floor found here practical use. These fur protectors are often used inSuomito keep insects from crawling up the legs of the table, but, in this case, when we bent down to look at the bit of ba-lamb's fur so tied, we saw to our horror that it was full of animal life. Calling the attention of one of our Finnish friends to this fact, he told us that there was a saying that none of these creepy things would come acrossfilbunke, and that a friend of his, travelling in these Northern parts, had on one occasion been so pestered that he fetched a wooden mug offilbunke, and with a wooden spoon made a ring on the floor with the soured milk, inside which he sat in peace, the crawling things remaining on the outside of his charmed circle.
"And," he added, laughing, "we will go and fetchfilbunke, if you like, and then you can all sit inside rings of your own."
"No," we replied, "instead of doing that, let us get away from here as quickly as possible."
Out we sallied, therefore, to ask the coachman how soon he could be ready to drive on toKajana.
How typical. There was one of the lads, aged thirteen, lying on his back, flat out on the wooden steps of the house, smoking hard at a native pipe; his felt hat was pulled down over his eyes, his top boots were standing beside him, and over them hung the rags he used for stockings.
"Go on," he said. "Oh! we cannot go on till this afternoon, it's too hot."
"But," remonstrated Grandpapa, "it is not so very far toKajana, and the ladies are anxious to get to the end of their journey."
"Quite impossible," he replied, "the horses must rest."
Wherein he certainly was right; the poor brutes had come well, and, after all, whatever the horrors and inconveniences may be to oneself, one cannot drive dumb animals to death, so, therefore, at thatmajatalowe stayed, weary and hungry prisoners for hours. Only think of it!
Oh, how glad we were to shake the dust of that station from our feet, and how ridiculous it seemed to us that such dirty untidy folk could exist in the present day, to whom "Cleanliness is next to godliness" was an unknown fact.
We found some amusement, however, for the family had just received in a box-case a sewing-machine—a real English sewing-machine. A "traveller" had been round even to this sequestered spot, possessed of sufficient eloquence to persuade the farmer to buy his goods, and it certainly did seem remarkable that in such a primitive homestead, with its spinning-wheel and hand-loom in one corner, a sewing machine and a new American clock should stand in the other.
On we jogged; but, be it owned, so many consecutive days' driving and so few hours' rest, in carts without springs or seats and without backs, were beginning to tell, and we were one and all finding our backbones getting very limp. The poor little ponies too began to show signs of fatigue, but luckily we at last reached a hilltop which showed we were drawing close to the end of ourkärrajourney. We pulled up for a while to give the poor creatures time to breathe,and for us to see the wide-spreading forests around. The view extended for miles and miles, and undulating away to the horizon, nothing appeared but pine-trees.
No one can imagine the vastness, the black darkness, the sombre grandness of those pine forests of Finland.
Then the descent began; there were terribly steep little bits, where the one idea of the ponies seemed to be to fly away from the wheels that were tearing along behind them. We held on tightly to the blue knitted reins, for the descents in some places were so severe that even those sure-footed little ponies were inclined to stumble—fatigue was the cause, no doubt;—but if our own descent were exciting, it was yet more alarming to look back at thekärrafollowing, too close for comfort, behind us, literally waggling from side to side in their fast and precipitous descent, encircled by clouds of dust.
Kajanaat last. What a promised haven of rest after travelling for days in springless carts, happily through some of the most beautiful and interesting parts of Finland.
Tar hardly sounds exciting; but the transport of tar can be thrilling.
We were worn out and weary when we reachedKajana, where we were the only visitors in the hotel, and, as the beds very rapidly proved impossible, we women-folk confiscated the large—and I suppose only—sitting-room as our bed-chamber. A horsehair sofa, of a hard old-fashioned type, formed a downy couch for one; the dining-table, covered by one of the travelling-rugs, answered as a bed—rather of the prison plank-bed order—for number two; and the old-fashioned spinet, standing against the wall, furnished sleeping accommodation for number three. We had some compunctions on retiring to rest, because, after our luxurious beds had beenfixed up, as the Americans would say, we discovered there was no means whatever for fastening the door,—it was, as usual, minus bolts and locks; but asKajanawas a quiet sleepy little town, and no one else was staying in the hotel but our own men-folk on the other side of the courtyard, weary and worn out with our jolty drive, and our waterfall bath, we lay down to rest. We were all half asleep when the door suddenly opened and in marched two men. They stood transfixed,for of course it was quite light enough for them to see the strange positions of the three occupants of the sitting-room; and the sight scared them even more than their appearance surprised us, for they turned and fled. We could not help laughing, and wondering what strange tales of our eccentricities would enliven the town that night.
Descending the rapids of theUleåborgriver in a tar-boat is one of the most exciting experiences imaginable. Ice-boat sailing in Holland,skilöbnung(snow-shoeing) in Norway, tobogganing in Switzerland, horse-riding in Morocco—all have their charms and their dangers—but, even to an old traveller, a tar-boat and a cataract proved new-found joys. There is a vast district in Finland, about 65° North latitude, extending from the frontier of Russia right across toUleåborgon the Gulf of Bothnia where tar plays a very important rôle; so important, in fact, that this large stretch of land, as big or bigger than Wales, is practically given over to its manufacture and transport.
After leavingKuopio, as we had travelled Northwards towards Lapland, the aspect of the country altered every twenty miles. It became far more hilly, for Finland, as a whole, is flat. The vegetation had changed likewise, and we suddenly found ourselves among tracts of dwarf birch so familiar to travellers in Iceland.
As we had driven on towardsKajanawe had repeatedly passed pine-trees from which part of the bark was cut away, and, not realising we were now intar-land, wondered at such destruction.
The history of the tar, with which we are sofamiliar, is very strange, and not unmixed with dangers. Pine-trees, growing in great forests where the bear, wolf, and elk are not unknown, are chosen for its production. The first year the bark is carefully cut away from the ground as high as a man can reach, except on the northern side of the tree, where a strip two inches wide is left intact. Now this strip is always the strongest part of the bark because it faces northwards, and it is, therefore, left to keep the tree alive and to prevent it from drying. All the rest of the trunk remains bare, shining white and silvery in the sunlight, and forms a thick yellow juice, which oozes out of the tree, and smells strongly of turpentine. This ultimately makes the tar.
The next year the same process is repeated, except that then the bark is peeled higher up the tree, the strip on the northern side always being left as before to keep the sap alive. The tenacity of the life of bark is wonderful, as may be seen at a place like Burnham Beeches, where, in many cases, all the inside of the tree has practically gone, and yet the bark lives and the tree produces leaves.
This treatment goes on for four, and sometimes five, years, until most of the tree is stripped. It was in this naked condition the pines first attracted our attention, for a barkless tree covered with a thick yellow sap, to the uninitiated, is an unusual sight. In October, or early in November, of each year the selected pines are duly cut down, and later, by the aid of sledges, they are dragged over the snow through the forests to the nearesttervahauta(kiln), there to be burnt into tar.
So cold is it in this part of the world during winterthat the thermometer often drops to 30° or 40° Fahr. below freezing-point, and then the hard-worked little horses look like balls of snow, the heat from their bodies forming drops at the end of their manes, tails, and even their long coats, for their hair grows to an even greater length than the Shetland ponies. At last their coats become so stiff they are not able to move, so they often have to be taken indoors and thawed by the oven's friendly warmth.
These sturdy little beasts gallop over the hardened forest track, dragging their wood behind them—for without the aid of snow to level the roads, or ice to enable the peasants to make short cuts across the lakes, little trade could be done. The winter comes as a boon and a blessing to man in those Northern realms; all transport is performed by its aid, sledges travel over snow more easily than wheels over roadless ways, andsuksetor ski and snowshoes traverse snow or ice more rapidly than the ordinary summer pedestrian.
Suffocated with heat and dust, we were ourselves bumping along in a springlesskärra, when our attention was first arrested by—what? let us say a huge basin built on piles. This was atervahautaor tar-kiln, which looked like an enormous mushroom turned upside down, standing on a thick stem of wooden piles, only in this case the mushroom was ninety or a hundred feet in circumference, and the stem at least fifteen feet wide.
As we have nothing at all like it in England, it is difficult to describe its appearance. Think of a flattened basin or soup-plate made of pine-treesand covered over with cement, so that an enormous fire may burn for days upon it. In the middle, which slopes downwards like a wine funnel, is a hole for the tar to run through into a wooden pipe, which carries it to the base of the kiln; passing along to the outside, the wooden pipe is arranged in such a way that a barrel can be put at the end to receive the tar. This vast basin has to be very solidly built in order to withstand the weight of wood—sometimes over a hundred trees at a time—and also the ravages of fire, therefore it is securely fastened and supported at the edges by whole trunks of trees bound together with cement. Once built, however, it lasts for years, and, therefore, most tar-farmers have atervahautaof their own.
The felled timber, having been sawn into pieces about a yard long in order that they may be conveniently packed on the sledges, arrive at the kiln before spring, so that by June all is ready for the actual manufacture of the tar itself. Thetervahautabasin is then packed as full as it is possible to stack the wood, which is always laid round the middle in order to leave a hole in the centre free to receive the tar. By the time the mass is ready it looks like a small hillock, and is made even more so in appearance by being thickly covered over with turf, that it may be quite air-tight, and that a sort of dry distillation may go on. Fires are then lighted at different points round the edge, to the end that the interior may catch fire, the process being aided by a train of old tar which runs from the burning point to the centre, as dynamite is laidprior to an explosion. By this means the whole huge bonfire shortly begins to smoulder.
The fire burns for ten days and nights, during which time it is never left, a man always staying beside thetervahautato see no accident disastrous to the tar happens. As the heat inside increases, the tar gradually begins to drop through the wooden pipe into barrels below, and from sixty to two hundred of them may be extracted from one kiln load. Needless to say, one man cannot move the filled barrel and replace it with an empty one, so, whenever such a change becomes necessary, by means of a shrill whistle he summons a companion to his aid; at other times he sits alone and watches for hours together the smouldering flames.
Making the barrels is another Finnish trade, and the peasants, who manufacture them in winter, get from eightpence to tenpence each, for they have to be very strong. It is, indeed, much more difficult to make a tar-barrel than a water-cask.
Here ingenuity has to come to the peasant's aid; each barrel, when filled, weighs about four hundred pounds, and has to be conveyed from the forest country to the nearest waterway or town. Finns rise to the occasion, however. They take thick pieces of wood, on to which a kind of axle is securely attached, and adjusting them by means of ingenious pegs fixed at both ends of the barrel, where the side pieces of wood project beyond the actual top and bottom, the cask itself practically becomes its own wheels. Wooden shafts are fixed from the axle to the horse's collar, and though,with his queer load, the little ponies are not beauties to look at, they are marvels to go, trotting along over tree trunks and stony boulders to the nearest waterway, the barrels following—carriage and wheels in one.
After many vicissitudes this tar arrives at the end of its land journey—but if that be on the frontier of Russia, it may still have two hundred and fifty miles of river, lake, and rapid to traverse before it reachesUleåborg, where it is transhipped to England, America, and Germany.
It had been arranged that we were to descend the wonderful rapids fromKajanatoUleåborg, a day and a half's journey; but we wanted to taste something of the ascent as well,—there is nodownwithout anup, and we thought we should like to try both. The tar-boats that go down theOulunjokiriver, heavily laden with their wares, take two or three days, and have to come up again empty; this is the heaviest and most tiring part of the whole performance to the boatmen, and cannot be accomplished under two or three weeks. They sometimes bring back five hundred or six hundred pounds of salt or flour, for although they take down twenty-five or thirty times as much as this in weight, they cannot manage more on the return journey, when, to lighten the boat as much as possible, they even take off the top planks or bulwarks and leave them behind atUleåborg, putting new bulwarks a foot broad made of half-inch plank before the next downward voyage.
A tar-boat is a very peculiar craft, and, whenone sees it for the first time, it seems impossible that anything so fragile can travel over two hundred miles by river, rapid, lake, and cataract. The boats are generally from thirty-five to forty-five feet long, but never more than four feet wide, or they could not be steered between the rocks of the swirling cataracts. They are pointed at both ends like a gondola, but it is not the narrowness and length that strike terror into the heart of a stranger, but rather the thinness of the wood of which they are built. The boat is made of the planks of well-grown trees, which planks, though over a foot wide, are sawn down to three-quarters of an inch thick, so that in the strongest part only three-quarters of an inch divides passengers and crew from the water, that water being full of rocks and swirling whirlpools. Four planks a foot wide and three-quarters of an inch thick, as a rule, make the sides of a tar-boat, not nailed, be it understood, but merelytiedtogether with pieces of thin birch twig! Holes are bored, the birch threaded through, securely fastened, and then, to make the whole thing water-tight, the seams are well caulked with tar. This simple tying process gives the craft great flexibility, and if she graze a rock, or be buffeted by an extra heavy wave, she bends instead of breaking.
From all this it will be inferred the boat is extraordinarily light, or it could never be got home again—but when twenty-four or twenty-eight barrels, each weighing four to five hundred pounds, are in it, the water comes right up to the gunwale,so an extra planking of a foot wide is tied on in the manner aforementioned, to keep the waves out, and that planking is only half an inch thick. Therefore the barrels are only divided from the seething water by three-quarters of an inch, and the waves are kept back by even a slighter barrier.
It is amazing that such a long fragile craft can survive that torrent of water at all.
When the last boats go down in October, ice has already begun to form, and they frequently suffer very much from its sharp edges, for which reason the perils of those late journeys are often hideous. When the tar-barrels reachKajanafrom the forests they are only worth from twelve to eighteen marks each, and if one considers the labour entailed to get them there, it seems remarkable that any profit can be made out of the trade. Very cleverly the heavy tubs are lifted by a crane into the boat, which is just wide enough to take them in twos and twos lengthwise—three or four perhaps being placed on the top of all. The biggest cargo consists of twenty-eight barrels. Before the tubs are really shipped they are tested, as wine is tested, to see that the quality is all right, and that they are worth the perilous carriage. So many of these boats ply backwards and forwards during July, August, September, and October, that sometimes as many as a hundred will passKajanain one day. This gives some idea of the industry and its enormous importance to that vast tract of country. Indeed, from 50,000 to 70,000 barrels find their way down theUleåborgriver alone during these months.
Owing to the courtesy ofHerr Fabrikor Herman Renfors, to whom the Governor of the Province had kindly given us an introduction, we went a mile and a half up the rapids and through a couple of locks in his private tar-boat, just for the experience. The heat being tropical, we did not start till sixP.M., when we foundHerr Renforswaiting at the entrance to the first lock, as arranged, in a real tar-boat, which he was steering himself, for, being an enthusiastic fisherman, he goes out alone for days at a time, and can steer up or down the rapids as well as any pilot. No one who has not seen a rapid can realise the nerve this requires. Seats had been roughly put in for us to sit on, otherwise, as a rule, except for the oarsmen's bench and the barrels, these boats are absolutely empty. Our friend, the steersman, sat at the bow, and with a sort of oar, held in position by a rope of plaited straw fixed a little on one side, guided the fragile bark. First we had to go into a lock. Any one acquainted with a nice wide shallow Thames lock may think he knows all about such matters; but in reality he does nothing of the kind. For this Finnish lock, and there are two of them close together, is very long, forty-five feet being required for the boat alone, and nearly as much for the rush of water at each end to prevent that single boat being swamped. As the rise of water is over twenty feet, the lock is some forty feet deep and only six or seven feet wide. The walls are tarred black, and, although the sun blazed outside, when we entered this long narrow vault the air struck chill and cold, and itwas so dark and weird that it seemed like going into an underground cellar, or an elongated coffin. As those massive wooden doors closed behind us, we felt as though we were about to be buried alive in a well, or were enacting some gruesome scene fitted for Dante's wondrous pen when dipped in ink of horror. The gates slammed. The chains grated. The two oarsmen steadied the boat by means of poles which they held against the sides of those dark walls, the steersman with another pole kept her off the newly shut massive wooden door—and then—oh! we gasped, as a volume of water over ten feet descended a little in front of us, absolutely soaking the oarsmen, and showering spray over every one.
It was a wonderful sensation; we were walled in, we were deep in the lock, and as the water poured down in two falls, for there was a platform half way to break its tremendous force, our boat bobbed up and down like a cockle-shell. We felt an upset meant death, for no one could possibly have climbed up those steep black walls, still less swum or even kept his head above such volumes of water.
Up, up, up, we went until we had risen over twenty feet, which dwindled to nothing when the door opened at the end of the waterfall and we glided out into the world of sunshine, to see our friend the old castle before us again, the pine-trees on the banks, and the funny little wooden town on our right. Verily a transformation scene—a return to life and light and air, after water and darkness.
Before us was a small rapid, and, having rowed up under the lee of the land, it was perfectly marvellous to see how the boat was suddenly turned right across the bubbling water, and steered like a gliding eel in and out of waves and spray to the other side, which we reached by means of hard pulling, without losing more than thirty or forty feet by the strong current. Here came another lock, and several minutes were again spent in rising another twenty feet, before we were at a level to continue our course. Then came a stretch which could be rowed, although, of course, the stream was always against us; but two stalwart Finns sitting side by side pulled well, and on we sped until the next rapid was reached, when out we all had to bundle, and the fragile craft had to be towed, as the strength of the water made it impossible to row against it. There was a path of rocky boulders, uneven and somewhat primitive, such a towing path being always found beside the rapids, as the oarsmen have to get out and tow at all such places. Therefore, when returning home fromUleåborg, the sailors have to row either against the stream (one long tract, however, being across a lake where it is possible to sail), or else they have to walk and pull. No wonder it takes them three weeks to make the voyage.
Having landed us, the two oarsmen pulled with a rope, but as the boat would have been torn to pieces on the rocks beside the bubbling water, the steersman had to keep her off by means of a long pole; and hard work he evidently found it, bendingthe whole weight of his body in the process, straining every nerve at times. It is terrific exertion to get even such a light thing as a tar-boat over such places, and in a mile and a half we had to get out four times as well as pass through the two locks (there are but four on the whole river), and we only reached the pilot station after working a whole hour and a half, which gave us a good idea of the weariness of toiling up stream, and the wonders of coming down, for we retraced the same route in exactly fourteen minutes.
We crossed the famous rapid, described inKalevalaas the scene where one of the heroes went swirling round and round; we watched women steering with marvellous agility and skill, and there, on the bank, we saw a stalwart Finn, with an artistic pink shirt, awaiting our arrival to pilot us down again, our host preferring to employ a pilot for the descent when he had any one on board besides himself.
The pilot was a splendidly made young fellow of twenty-four; a very picture, with his tan trousers, and long brown leather boots doubled back under the knee like a brigand, but ready to pull up to the thigh when necessary. On his felt cap he wore a silver badge with the letters L.M. clearly stamped. "What do they mean?" we asked.
"L.M. is an abbreviation forlaskumiesor pilot—it means that he is a certified pilot for this stream," repliedHerr Renfors, "and as there are ladies here I am going to get him to take the boatdown—ladies are such a responsibility," he laughed, "I dare not undertake the task."
We soon entered into conversation with this picturesque Finn, and found his father was also alaskumies, and that as a boy he always went with him, steering the boat down when he was fourteen, although he did not get his badge till he was eighteen years of age. As soon as he got it he married, and now had two children. These pilots only receive their badges after careful examination from the government, and, the pay being good, and the position considered a post of honour, they are eagerly-sought-for appointments.
"How wildly exciting it is," we exclaimed, as we whirled round corners, waves dashing into our boat only to be baled out with a sort of wooden spoon.
"I make this little journey sometimes twenty times in a day," he replied; "but I can't say I find it very entertaining."
Sometimes we simply gasped—especially when nearingKajana, and we knew we had to go under the bridge before us, while the youth was steering apparently straight for the rocks on the shore. Destruction seemed imminent, the water was tearing along under the bridge at an awful rate, but he still steered on for the rocks; we held our breath—till, at the eleventh and three-quarter hour, so to speak, the pink-shirted Finn quietly twisted his steering pole, and under the bridge we shot and out at the other side quite safely.
We breathed again!
Pilots are only necessary for the rapids, and they receive one mark for the shorter and two marks for the longer stretches, one of which is thirteen miles in length, so that a boat betweenKajanaandUleåborghas to pay ten marks for its pilots, which they are bound by law to carry. On some of the stretches there are as many as twenty-four pilots to each rapid.
Our experience of a tar-boat but whetted our appetite, and we looked forward, all pleasurable anticipation, to our descent to the coast.
The next morning at sevenA.M.we leftKajanain a very small steamboat to cross the greatOulujärvilake, and arrived about twelve atWaala, where our own tar-boat was awaiting us. We were struck, as we passed over the lake, to see a veritable flower-garden upon the surface of the water. The lake is so wide that at times we quite lost sight of one shore; yet these small flowers, something like primroses, only white, with their floating roots, were everywhere, looking almost like snow upon the water! We passed boats sailing down with tar, the wind being with them, and we passed empty boats rowing up. They never go home the entire way under three weeks, and even coming down the rapids, if the wind is against them, they may take several days to reachUleåborg. Whereas, with wind to help them across the lake, they can go down laden in a little over two days all the way from Russia. Once started on the downward route they seldom rest until their journey is completed, for it is important for eachboat to do three voyages from Russia during the season, if possible, and more, of course, from shorter distances.
We were horrified to find that a large number of women and children were employed on the water. Rowing or towing such heavy boats is a serious matter; and to see a couple of women, or a woman and a child, doing the work, the husband, brother, or other male relative steering where no professional pilot is necessary, made us feel sick at heart. Such work is not fit for them, and in the case of young girls and boys must surely be most injurious. When returning home the poor creatures often pull their boat out of the water and, turning her on one side, spend the night under her sheltering cover.
The tar-boats ply a dangerous trade; but our own experiences must be described in another chapter.
In our case it took twenty-nine hours without sleep to descend the rapids, for we leftKajanaat sevenA.M.on Thursday morning, and only reachedUleåborgat mid-day on Friday. The journey is perfectly wonderful, but should only be undertaken by people blessed with strong nerves and possessed of iron constitutions. FromKajanatoUleåborgone travels down the splendidOuluriver and across theOulujärvilake, joining the river again on the other side ofWaala.
It was indeed an experience, in more ways than one. The first hours we spent in a small steamer, too small to carry a restaurant, so, let it be understood at once, provisions must be taken for the whole journey, unless the traveller wishes starvation to be added to his other hardships.
TheOulujärvilake is a terror to the tar-boats, for it is one of the largest lakes in Finland, and when there is a storm the fragile tar-boat is forced to hug the land for safety, or draw up altogether and lie-to until the storm has spent itself. Many of these small craft have been taken unawares when out in the middle of the lake, and come to signal grief accordingly. Then again, in times of deadcalm, the heavily-laden boat does not even have the benefit of the quickly-running water to bear her on her way, and the three occupants of the vessel have to row the entire distance, for the steersman, no longer requiring to guide her with his enormous pole, ships it and rows at the side with one oar,—with which at the same time he guides. These steering poles are really remarkable; they are about twelve or fifteen feet long, and are simply a solid trunk of a pine tree as wide as a man's hand can grasp at the thinnest end, broadening out, and trimmed in such a way that they form a kind of flat solid paddle at the other end. The weight of these poles is overpowering, even when slipped through the ring of plaited tree branches which keeps them in place, and makes them easier to hold securely. When the cataracts are reached, even these strong poles shiver with the force of the water, and the steersman has all his work to do to combat the rushing waters; his whole bodily weight must be brought to bear in order to fight those waves and steer his craft safely through them. Every muscle is strained to meet the power of those swirling waters.
No praise we can give is too high for the skill of the pilot of the rapids, no admiration too great, for it is to that and his physical strength, to his power and calmness, to his dexterity and boundless knowledge of hidden dangers and unexpected horrors, that the safety of our lives is due, and, when we peeped occasionally at our steersman as we flew over the great rapid, where for over anhour every nerve, every fibre of his body was strung to agonising pitch, we looked and wondered. His eyes were fixed steadfastly before him, and as he flung all the weight of his body on to his pole, the whole boat trembled, but in a second obeyed his bidding and twisted whither he wished. Second, did we say? half-second, quarter-second, would be more accurate, for the bow of the boat was guided at giddy speed to within a few feet of a rock, and just as she was about to touch, twisted off again for us to ride over some crested wave, or fly down some channel which just cleared the death-trap.
By such means we zig-zagged from side to side of the river, which at the cataracts is generally nearly a quarter of a mile broad, and in the calmer stretches widens out to half a mile and more.
Speaking of pilots and their wondrous skill, in the autumn of 1912, by Imperial decrees, the Finnish Pilot Department was transferred to the Russian Ministry of Marine. So marvellous, so dexterous has been the work of the Finnish pilots for generations of inherited knowledge, that an Englishman can but quake at the advisability of such a change. Finland was so indignant that half the pilots stationed on the coast and the islands—about five hundred men—resigneden bloc. The famous pilot school atHelsingforsno longer exists.
These pilots used to mark out the ship routes every spring so cleverly that shipwrecks were rare; but in the summer of 1912 the new Russian staff made such endless mistakes and omitted so manyrisky channels that a great many disasters followed on the coast, though not serious ones. Luckily, the regular Finnish passenger steamers have not suffered, as they all carry their own pilots.
Strategical considerations have been officially adduced for the Russification of the Finnish pilot service; but the wisdom of this strategy may be open to doubt. In time of war the passages nearer the coast will naturally be of the greatest strategic importance, and it would seem highly unsafe to confide the navigation of war-vessels to the new Caspian pilots, who cannot possibly in a few years acquire an intimate knowledge of these extremely difficult waters. The new measure dispenses with the services of those men who, born and bred on the spot, and having the advantage of generations of traditional knowledge, can alone with safety do pilot service, especially in time of war, when guiding beacons and rock-marking poles and buoys are removed, and there is nothing to guide the navigator except that knowledge which has become second nature to the pilot trained to do service in his own home waters.
But we are digressing.
We arrived atWaala—a cluster of small houses—about 11.30, and, landing from our little steamer, found that although our tar-boat had been ordered and everything was ready owing to the kindness of the inspector of the district, who himself came to see us off, we could not get really under way before one o'clock. All the luggage had to be packed into the boat,—not much luggage, be it said,for, beyond the reach of the railways, one bag or suit-case per person is all that is possible (less is preferable), as that can go into one of the littlekärra(carts), or can be carried by a peasant when necessary. Travelling through the interior and northern parts of Finland is roughing it indeed, and when it comes to being away from the post-stations (where carriages and horses are procurable, and generally fairly good), and sleeping in a real peasant's house, then one realises what discomfort means, and for cleanliness prefers to sit on a hard wooden chair all night for safety's sake.
At last we were, all six (for this number composed our party), seated, some on Gladstones, some on an enormous rug case, some on nothing, or something equally uncomfortable, but all of us as low down as possible, such being the inspector's orders, as our weight steadied the boat, and, being below the water's level, kept us from getting wet from the spray, although we found, by experience, it did not prevent our shipping whole seas, and getting thoroughly soaked.
"The wind is against you," remarked the inspector, "which is a pity, as it will occupy much longer time, and you will get more wet, but by threeA.M.(fourteen hours) you ought to reachMuhos, where you can snatch a few hours' sleep before going on in the little steamer that will take you down the last stretch of the river toUleåborg."
It was bad enough, in theory, to sit fourteen hours within the cramped precincts of a tar-boat with one's knees up to one's chin, like an Easternmummy, but it was nothing to what in practice we really endured. However, we luckily cannot foresee the future, and with light hearts, under a blazing sun, we started, a man at the stern to steer, a woman and a boy in the bow to row, and ourselves and our goods securely stowed away—packed almost as closely as herrings in a barrel.
Directly after leavingWaala, within a few minutes in fact, we came to theNiska Koskirapid. Six miles at flying speed; six miles tearing over huge waves at break-neck pace; six miles with a new experience every second; six miles feeling that every turn, every moment must be our last.
No one could dream of the excitements of speeding six miles in such a long fragile craft, in which we crouched so low our faces were almost level with the seething surface of the rapid. Turning here and twisting there between rocks or piled-up walls of stone, absolutely seeing and feeling the drop of the water, as one bounded over a fall—such an experience cannot be described. As those massive waves struck the boat, and threw volumes of water into our laps, we felt inclined to shriek at the speed at which we were flying. Wildly we were tearing past the banks, when, lo!—what was that? A broken tar-boat; a mere scattered mass of wooden beams, which only a few hours before had been a boat like our own.
In spite of the marvellous dexterity of the pilots, accidents happen sometimes; and that very morning, the wind being strongly against the boats descending, a steersman venturing a little too near a hiddenrock, his frail craft was instantly shattered to pieces. The tar-barrels, bubbling over the water like Indian corn over a fire, were picked up many miles below; but, as the accident happened near the water's edge, the crew were luckily saved.
That journey was a marvellous experience; one of the most exciting and interesting of the writer's life; not only did it represent a wonderful force of nature, but an example of what skill and a cool head can do; for what man without both could steer a boat through such rapids—such cataracts? Those rapids at Montreal seemed far less imposing to me afterwards.
At times the waves looked as if they were really returning upon us, yet in reality we were going with the stream, but the rocks below made them curl back again. Along the stream several crews were toiling and straining at their towing ropes to get their empty boats toKajana. Oh, what work in that heat! No wonder they all dreaded that return journey. Toiling along the bank were the wretched men and women making their way back towards Russia. The strangely uneven stone wall along which they pulled their tar-boat looked as if it would cut their poor bare feet to pieces. Two generally tugged at the rope, a third keeping the boat off the wall by means of a long pole; and for a fortnight or three weeks they tugged and pulled their empty boat, or in calmer stretches sailed or rowed back the route along which we were now flying at such lightning speed.
Then came two hours of calm rowing along abeautiful stretch of river, where rocks and pine-trees rose straight from the water's edge, and queer little gray houses denoted peasants' homesteads, peeping out among the almost yellow rye-fields, or the newly gathered hay crops. Small black and white curly sheep gambolled in the meadows—those very sheep whose coats are so famous asKajana Lambs, rivalling even Russian Astrakhan.
Imagine a fall of two hundred feet of water in a long, thin, fragile boat; yet such is possible atPyhäkoski, another of the rapids, during a stretch of cataract about thirteen miles long—as an average, these wondrous falls are about a quarter of a mile broad, sometimes more, sometimes less. They are indeed most truly marvellous.
It was a perfect evening as we nearedPyhäkoski. The wind had fallen, and when, after passing a rapid, we drew up by the bank to enjoy our evening meal, the sun at 9.30 was just beginning its long set. We had leftWaalaat 1.30, and been travelling in the boat cramped by the position all the time, so were beginning to feel the pleasant pangs of hunger. With a pine wood behind us, where bilberries, just ripening among the ferns, covered the ground, we six friends—four Finlanders and two English—made a very happy party. Oh, the joy of stretching our limbs and standing erect once more. We cooked our tea by the aid of a spirit-lamp, ate hard-boiled eggs and some most delicious cold trout, devoured whole loaves of white bread and butter, and were feeling as happy as possible—when suddenly the glorious golden orb shining through the skies of evening,was reflected in flaming colour nearer home, for, lo! the lamp in the tea-basket exploded with a terrific bang and a tongue of flame which brought us all to our feet in an instant. Here was a calamity to occur on such a dry night, in a long rainless summer, and in a pine forest, too, where if the trees once ignited, flames might spread for miles and miles, causing incalculable damage. We all knew the danger, and each prepared to assist in putting out the fire. Grandpapa, with the agility of a cat, seized the burning basket and threw it and its contents bodily into the river—great was the frizzle as it touched the water, and greater the noise as plates and spoons clattered into the stream. They were of little value in comparison to the prevention of a forest fire.
Poor man, he was wet to his knees standing in the water, and he looked almost as if he had been taking a mud bath by the time he succeeded in rescuing what was possible of our crockery and plate. But, undoubtedly, he prevented much serious damage of valuable property by his prompt action. The remainder of our meal was lost, and our delightful basket, that had travelled in many lands, destroyed. It had never failed before—but we afterwards unravelled the mystery. TheApothek, whom we asked to supply us with some methylated spirit, not understanding our request, had substituted something which did not suit the lamp.
"All's well that ends well," however, so we will say no more about his mistake, save that we lost our second cup of tea, and went hungry to bed.
Never, never did any one behold more wonderful reflections than were to be seen that night on theUleåriver. As the empty boats passed up a quiet reach sufficiently shallow to permit of punting, the reflections of the coloured shirts and poles, of the old brown boats and the cheery faces on board, were as distinct in the water as the things themselves. Every blade of grass found its double in that mirror-like stream, every rock appeared darker and larger below than it did above the water; but our admiration was distracted by mosquitoes,—when we drew up at a smalltorpto take up a fresh pilot, who was to steer us safely over the famousPyhäkoskirapids. By this time it was 10.30 on an August night, and the sun just above the pine tops, which seemed striving to soar high enough to warm themselves in its glorious rich colourings, and we feared it might be too late, and the mist too dense, to attempt such a dangerous passage. Half a dozen pilots assembled on the bank—their day's work being over—declared it was perfectly safe, as safe at least as it ever can be, therefore, after shipping our man, away we rowed—the river having broadened again to three-quarters of a mile, so that it looked like a lake.
A small child offered us a little wooden tub of luscious yellow berries,suomuurain(Finnish),Hjortron(Swedish), for a mark—the same would have cost about eight marks atHelsingfors—which we gladly bought and ate as we drifted along. Those delicious northern delicacies, with a taste of the pine-tree, greatly refreshed us. We had made up our mindsearly in the day, that as we could not take more than four or five hours' rest, to sleep on the bank, and make a large fire to keep away the mosquitoes. The weather was all that could be wished; indeed, the heat of the day had been so great we had all sat with white pocket-handkerchiefs hanging from under our hats and down our necks to keep off the blazing sun, no parasols being possible when correct steering meant life or death. In fact, we had decided to manage the best sort of "camp out" we could with a coat each and a couple of Scotch plaid rugs among us all. The prospect seemed more pleasant than a one or two-roomedtorpshared with thetorppari'sfamily; for we had suffered so much in strange beds already, and had woefully regretted many times not having brought hammocks, which we might have slung out of doors on those splendid June and July nights, and slept in peace under the daylight canopy of heaven. Accordingly, a camp on the bank had been voted and passed by unanimous acclamation.
No artist's brush could reproduce such a scene. In the foreground a roaring seething mass of water denoted strength and power, beyond lay a strange hazy mist, like a soft gauze film, rising in the sudden chill of evening from the warmed water, and the whole landscape was rendered more weird and unreal in places by the wild white spray which ascended, as the waves lapped some hidden or visible rock lying right across our course. Farther on, the river was bordered by pine and fir-trees, through the stems of which the departing sun shone, glintinghere and there upon the bark; the warm shades of the sky dappled with red and yellow, painted by a Mighty Hand, were well in keeping with the "Holy Stream," as this rapid is called by the peasants living along its shores.
A mystic scene of wondrous beauty; more and more the vapours rose, until a great soft barrier seemed erected before us, almost as high as the trees; dense at their roots, tapering away to indistinctness at their tops, where the sunset glow lay warm and bright upon their prickly branches.
It reminded one of glorious evenings in Switzerland, where snow-clad peaks soar above the clouds, their majestic heads rising as it were from nothingness. That night on theUleåriver, this strong, strange, misty fog was very remarkable—such a contrast to the intense heat of the day, so great a contrast to the marvellous clearness which had preceded it, so mystic after the photographic distinctness of a few hours before.
A shriek from our steersman, and we found we were flying madly towards a sort of wooden pier; we held our breath, it seemed so close. In the mist we were almost upon it before we saw our danger; but when the pilot shouted, the oarsmen instantly shipped. Even when going through the rapids it should be explained that two men in the bows keep rowing continuously to help to steady the boat; but on the occasion in question, just when the agony point was reached, they lifted their oars, and we swung round a corner—not to sudden death as we fully expected, but into a comparatively calmstretch of water; where, lo! we found before us a white bank. It was vapour, mist, fog, what you will; but a cold evening, after a day of intense heat, had clothed the river in thick white clouds, impenetrable to the sight—cold, clammy, terrifying to a stranger.
"It is impossible," exclaimed the oarsman to our Finnish-speaking friends; "I thought I could get you toMuhosto-night, but until that fog lifts we can go no farther, it is not safe. I can do no more. It would mean death."
Here was a prospect. We had been eleven hours in the boat, for it was now midnight. We had been grilled all day and burnt with the heat, and now we were perished with wet from the wash of the waves, and cold from the damp chill air. We could not lie on the ground—no fire would ignite amid such soaking grass; what was to become of us we did not know.
We wanted experiences, and we had got them, more than we bargained for. Who could have imagined such a day would turn to such a night? Who indeed!
We all looked at each other, we all sighed. One suggested sitting as we were all bolt upright, with the boat moored to some bank—others thought a walk might prove an agreeable change—the wisest held their tongues, thought much, and said little.
We were in the middle of the stream, when, without a word of explanation, our steersman suddenly turned the bow of our frail bark rightacross the water, and with one rush her nose hit the bank; our speed was so great that we were all shaken from our seats, as the boat bounded off again, but the pilot was an old experienced hand, and, by some wondrous gymnastic feat, he got her side sufficiently near the bank for our boy, with a rope in his hand, to spring uponterra firmaand hold us fast, without shattering our bark completely to pieces with the force of our sudden arrival.
"Is this fog usual?" we asked the pilot.
"No, very unusual, only after such intense heat as we have had to-day. If I had not landed you at this spot and now, another yard would have made doing so impossible, for this is the top of thePyhäkoskirapid, the most dangerous of all, and it is thirteen miles long."
What a plight! Hungry, tired, miserable, cold, to be suddenly turned, whether we wished it or not, out of our only refuge and home.
"Close by here," he continued, "is a peasant's house—you must go there for some hours."
We looked; but the fog was so thick we could see nothing, therefore, without a word of remonstrance, we followed our pilot, plodding through grass soaked in moisture which reached to our knees, feeling very chilled, wet, and weary, but all trying to keep stout hearts and turn cheery faces to misfortune.
Yes, there—as if sent as a blessing from heaven—we saw a little house peeping through the fog.
We went to the door; we knocked, we knocked again. No answer. We shook the door; it was locked. We called; no one replied. We walkedround the house and tried the windows—all closed, securely closed. We knocked and called louder than before. Still no answer.
What disappointment! The house was deserted. On the very eve of shelter we were baffled. Was it not enough to fill our hearts with despair? We could not go back, for we had nowhere to go; we could not sit on the bank, for that fog brooded evil. Some one suggested bursting open the door, for shelter we must have, and began rattling away with that purpose, when, lo! a voice, an awful voice called "Hulloa!"
"It is haunted," exclaimed some one; "it is a ghost, or a spirit or something. Do let us go away—what a horrible place."
"It is a phantom house," cried another, "this is not real—come, come—come away."
But the voice again called "Hulloa!"
The sound seemed nearer, and looking round we saw a white apparition standing in a darkened doorway on the other side of the garden, a figure clad in white approached through the mist; it was very ghostly. Was it hallucination, the result of exhausted minds and bodies, weak from want of food, and perished with wet and cold, or was it—yes, itwas—a man.
We could have hugged that delightful Finn, our joy was so great at his appearance, key in hand ready to open the door. He did so; a delicious hot air rushed upon us—it seemed like entering a Turkish bath; but when a second door was opened the heat became even more intense, for the kitchenfire was still alight, and, as if sent as an extra blessing from above, the coffee-pot was actually on the hob, filled and ready for the peasants' early morning meal. Could anything be more providential—warmth and succour—food, beds, and comfort!
Like savages we rushed upon the coffee-pot, blew the dying embers into flame, took off our soaking shoes and stockings and placed them beside the oven, pattering barefoot over the boards; we boiled milk, which was standing near, and drank the warming, soothing beverage.
All this took time, and, while the others worked, the writer made a hurried sketch by the daylight of midnight at the "Haven of Refuge," as we christened our new abode.
The kitchen, or general living-room, was, typically Finnish. The large oven stood on one side furnished with the usual stone stairs, up which the family clamber in the winter months, in order that they may sleep on the top of the fireplace, and thus secure warmth during the night.
On the other side we noticed a hand-loom with linen in it, which the good housewife was weaving for her family. Before it was a wooden tub, wherein flour for making brown bread was standing ready to be mixed on the morrow; in front of it was a large wooden mortar, cut out of a solid tree trunk.
The light was dim, for it was midnight, and, although perfectly clear outside, the windows of the little gray house were so few and so small that but little light could gain admittance.
This but added to the weirdness of the scene. It all seemed unreal—the dim glow from the spluttering wood, freshly put on, the beautiful shining copper coffee-pot, the dark obscurity on the top of the oven. The low ceiling with its massive wooden beams, the table spread for the early breakfast—or maybe the remnants of the evening meal—with a beer-hen full ofKalja, a pot, rudely carved, filled withpiimääor soured milk, and the salted fish so loved by the peasantry—there all the necessaries and luxuries of Finnish humble life were well in evidence.
The atmosphere was somewhat oppressive, for in those homesteads the windows are never opened from year's end to year's end—indeed, most of them won't open at all.
In a corner hung akantele, the instrument to which the Finns sing their famous songs as described. This romantic chamber, with its picturesque peasant occupants and its artistic effect, merely wanted the addition of the music of Finland to complete its charm, and the farmer most kindly offered to play it for us.
In his white corduroy trousers, his coarse white shirt—the buttons of which were unfastened at the throat—and the collar loosely turned back, showing a bronzed chest, he looked like an operatic hero, the while he sat before his instrument and sang some of those wondrous songs dear to the heart of every Finn. He could hardly have been worthy of his land had he failed to be musical, born and bred in a veritable garden of song andsentiment, and the romance of our midnight arrival seemed to kindle all the imagination in this man's nature. While he played thekantele, and the pilot made coffee, the old wife was busying herself in preparing for our meal, and we were much amused at her producing a key and opening the door of a dear old bureau, from which she unearthed some wonderful china mugs, each of which was tied up in a separate pocket-handkerchief. They had various strange pictures upon them, representing scenes in America, and it turned out that they had been brought home as a gift to his parents by a son who had settled in the Far West.