Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845

"A romance might be constructed out of these four letters. Thus: – Lucy is sitting at her window, when a well-known messenger brings her a bouquet. She joyfully exclaims, 'Ja so!' and presses the flowers to her lips. A friend comes in; she shows her the flowers, and the friend utters an envious 'Ja so!' Soon afterwards Lucy's lover hears that she is faithless; he gnashes his teeth, and vociferates a furious 'Ja so!' He writes to tell her that he despises her, and will never see her again; whereupon she weeps, and says to herself, between two tears, 'Ja so!' She manages, however, to see him, and convinces him that she has been calumniated. He clasps her in his arms, and utters a 'Ja so!' expressive of entire conviction. Suddenly his brow becomes clouded, and muttering a meditative 'Ja so!' he remembers that a peremptory engagement compels him to leave her. He seeks out the man who has sought to rob him of his mistress, and reproaches him with his perfidy. This rival replies by a cold, scornful 'Ja so!' and a meeting is agreed upon. The next day they exchange shots, and I fully believe that the man who is killed sighs out with his last breath 'Ja so!' His horror-stricken antagonist exclaims 'Ja so!' and flies the country; and surgeon, relations, friends, judge, all, in short, who hear of the affair, will inevitably cry out, 'Ja so!' Grief and joy, doubt and confidence, jest and anger, are all to be rendered by those two words."

The province of Dalarna, or Dalecarlia, which lies between Nordland and the Norwegian frontier, and in which Miss Bremer has laid the scene of one of her most recent works, is spoken of at some length by Mr Boas, who considers it to be, in various respects, the most interesting division of Sweden. Its inhabitants, unable to find means of subsistence in their own poor and mountainous land, are in the habit of wandering forth to seek a livelihood in more kindly regions, and Mr Boas likens them in this respect to the Savoyards. They might, perhaps, be more aptly compared to the Galicians, who leave their country, not, as many of the Savoyards do, to become beggars and vagabonds, by the aid of a marmoset and a grinding organ, but to strive, by the hardest labour and most rigid economy, to accumulate a sum that will enable them to return and end their lives in their native village.

"The dress of the Dalecarlians (dale carls, or men of the valley) consists of a sort of doublet and leathern apron, to the latter of which garments they get so accustomed that they scarcely lay it aside even on Sundays. Above that they wear a short overcoat of white flannel. Their round hats are decorated with red tufts, and their breeches fastened at the knees with red ties and tassels. The costume of their wives and daughters, who are called Dalecullen, (women of the valley,) is yet more peculiar and outlandish. It is composed of a coloured cap, fitting close to the head, of a boddice with red laces, a gown, usually striped with red and green, and of scarlet stockings. They wear enormous shoes, large, awkward, and heavy, made of the very thickest leather, and adorned with the eternal red frippery. The soles are an inch thick, with huge heels, stuck full of nails, and placed, not where the heel of the foot is, but in front, under the toes; and as these remarkable shoes lift at every step, the heels of the stockings are covered with leather. On Sundays, ample white shirt-sleeves, broad cap-ribands, and large wreaths of flowers are added to this singular garb, amongst the wearers of which pretty faces and laughing blue eyes are by no means uncommon.

"The occupations of these women are of the rudest and most laborious description. They may be literally said to earn their bread by the sweat of their brow, and their hands are rendered callous as horn by the nature of their toil. They act as bricklayers' labourers, and carry loads of stones upon their shoulders and up ladders. Besides this, it is a monopoly of theirs to row a sort of boat, which is impelled by machinery imitating that of a steamer, but worked by hand. These are tolerably large vessels, having paddle-wheels fitted to them, which are turned from within. Each wheel is worked by two young Dalecarlian girls, who perform this severe labour with the utmost cheerfulness, while an old woman steers. They pass their lives upon the water, plying from earliest dawn till late in the night, and conveying passengers, for a trifling copper coin, across the broad canals which intersect Stockholm in every direction. Cheerful and pious, the bloom of health on her cheeks, and the fear of God in her heart, the Dalecarlian maiden is contented in her humble calling. On Sunday she would sooner lose a customer than miss her attendance at church. One sorrowful feeling, and only one, at times saddens her heart, and that is the Heimweh, the yearning after her native valley, when she longs to return to her wild and beautiful country, which the high mountains encircle, and the bright stream of the Dalelf waters. There she has her father and mother, or perhaps a lover, as poor as herself, and she sees no possibility of ever earning enough to enable her to return home, and become his wife.

"It was in this province that I now found myself, and its inhabitants pleased me greatly. Nature has made them hardy and intelligent, for their life is a perpetual struggle to extract a scanty subsistence from the niggard and rocky soil. Unenervated by luxury, uncorrupted by the introduction of foreign vices, they have been at all periods conspicuous for their love of freedom, for their penetration in discovering, and promptness in repelling, attacks upon it. Faithful to their lawful sovereign, they yet brooked no tyranny; and when invaders entered the land, or bad governors oppressed them, they were ever ready to defend their just rights with their lives. From the remotest periods, such has been the character of this people, which has preserved itself unsophisticated, true, and free. It is interesting to trace the history of the Dalecarlians. Isolated in a manner from the rest of the world amongst their rugged precipices and in their lonely valleys, it might be supposed they would know nothing of what passed without; yet whenever the moment for action has come, they have been found alert and prepared.

"At the commencement of the fifteenth century, Eric XIII., known also as the Pomeranian, ascended the Swedish throne. His own disposition was neither bad nor good, but he had too little knowledge of the country he was called upon to reign over; and his governors and vice-gerents, for the most part foreigners, tyrannized unsparingly over the nation. The oppressed people stretched out their hands imploringly to the king; but he, who was continually requiring fresh supplies of money for the prosecution of objectless wars, paid no attention to their complaints. Of all his Vögte, or governors, not one was so bad and cruel as Jesse Ericson, who dwelt at Westeraes, and ruled over Dalarna. He laid enormous imposts on the peasantry, and when they were unable to pay, he took every thing from them, to their last horse, and harnessed themselves to the plough. Pregnant matrons were compelled at his command to draw heavy hay-waggons, women and girls were shamefully outraged by him, and persons possessing property unjustly condemned, in order that he might take possession of their goods. When the peasants came to him to complain, he had them driven away with stripes, or else cut off their ears, or hung them up in the smoke till they were suffocated.

"Then the men of Dalarna murmured; they assembled in their valleys, and held counsel together. An insurrection was decided upon, and Engelbrecht of Falun was chosen to head it, because, although small of stature, he had a courageous heart, and knew how to talk or to fight, as occasion required. He repaired to Copenhagen, laid the just complaints of his countrymen before the king, and pledged his head to prove their truth. Eric gave him a letter to the counsellors of state, some of whom accompanied him back to Dalarna, and convinced themselves that the distress of the province was inconceivably great. They exposed this state of things to the king in a letter, with which Engelbrecht returned to Copenhagen. But, on seeking audience of Eric, the latter cried out angrily, 'You do nothing but complain! Go your ways, and appear no more before me.' So Engelbrecht departed, but he murmured as he went, 'Yet once more will I return.'

"Although the counsellors themselves urged the king to appoint another governor over Dalecarlia, he did not think fit to do so. Then, in the year 1434, so soon as the sun had melted the snow, the Dalecarlians rose up as one man, marched through the country, and Jesse Ericson fled before them into Denmark. They destroyed the dwellings of their oppressors, drove away their hirelings and retainers, and Engelbrecht advanced, with a thousand picked men, to Wadstena, where he found an assembly of bishops and counsellors. From these he demanded assistance, but they refused to accord it, until Engelbrecht took the bishop of Linköping by the collar, to deliver him over to his followers. Thereupon they became more tractable, and renounced in writing their allegiance to Eric, on the grounds that he had 'made bishops of ignorant ribalds, entrusted high offices to unworthy persons, and neglected to punish tyrannical governors.' The Dalecarlians advanced as far as Schonen, where Engelbrecht concluded a truce, and dismissed them. His army had consisted of ten thousand peasants, all burning with anger against their oppressors, and without military discipline; yet, to his great credit be it said, not a single excess or act of plunder had been committed.

"On hearing of these disturbances, the king repaired in all haste to Stockholm, whereupon Engelbrecht again summoned his followers, and marched upon the capital, in which Eric entrenched himself with various nobles and governors, who had burned down their castles, and hastened to join him. Things looked threatening, but nevertheless ended peaceably, for Eric was afraid of the Swedes. He obtained peace by promising that in future the provinces, with few exceptions, should name their own governors, and that Engelbrecht should be vögt at Oerebro. As usual, however, he broke his word, and, before sailing for Denmark, he appointed as vögt a man who was a notorious pirate, a robber of churches, and abuser of women. For the third time the peasants revolted. In the winter of 1436 they appeared before Stockholm, which they took, the burghers themselves helping them to burst open the gates. Engelbrecht seized upon one fortress after another, meeting no resistance from King Eric, who fled secretly to Pomerania, leaving the war and his kingdom to take care of themselves. Several members of the council followed him thither, and, after some persuasion, brought him back with them.

"In the midst of these changes and commotions, Engelbrecht was treacherously assassinated by the son of that bishop whom he had formerly affronted at Wadstena. With tears and lamentations, the boors fetched the body of their brave and faithful leader from the little island where his death had occurred, and which to this day bears his name. The spot on which the murder was committed is said to be accursed, and no grass ever grows there. Subsequently the coffin was brought to the church at Oerebro, and so exalted was the opinion entertained of Engelbrecht's worth and virtue, that the country people asserted that miracles were wrought at his tomb, as at the shrine of a saint."

It was nearly a century later that Gustavus Vasa, flying, with a price upon his head, from the assassins of his father and friends, took refuge in Dalecarlia. Disguised in peasant's garb, and with an axe in his hand, he hired himself as a labourer; but was soon recognised, and his employer feared to retain him in his service. He then appealed to the Dalecarlians to espouse his cause; but, although they admired and sympathised with the gallant youth who thus placed his trust in them, they hesitated to take up arms in his behalf; and, hopeless of their assistance, he at last turned his steps towards Norway. But scarcely had he done so, when the incursion of a band of Danish mercenaries sent to seek him, and the full confirmation of what he had told them concerning the massacre at Stockholm, roused the Dalecarlians from their inaction. The tocsin was sounded throughout the provinces, the Danes were driven away, and the two swiftest runners in the country bound on their snow-shoes, and set out with the speed of the wind to bring back the royal fugitive. They overtook him at the foot of the Norwegian mountains, and soon afterwards he found himself at the head of five thousand white-coated Dalecarlians.

The Danes were approaching, and one of their bishops asked – "How many men the province of Dalarna could furnish?"

"At least twenty thousand," was the reply; "for the old men are just as strong and as brave as the young ones."

"But what do they all live upon?"

"Upon bread and water. They take little account of hunger and thirst, and when corn is lacking, they make their bread out of tree-bark."

"Nay," said the bishop, "a people who eat tree-bark and drink water, the devil himself would not vanquish, much less a man."

And neither were they vanquished. Like an avalanche from the mountains, they fell upon their foes, beat them with clubs, and drove them into the river. Their progress was one series of triumphs, till they placed Gustavus Vasa on the throne of Sweden.

The last outbreak of the Dalecarlians was less successful. On the 19th of June 1743, five thousand of these hardy and determined men appeared before Stockholm, bringing with them in fetters the governor of their province, and demanding the punishment of the nobles who had instigated a war with Russia, and a new election of an heir to the crown. They were not to be pacified by words; and even the next morning, when the old King Frederick, surrounded by his general and guards, rode out to harangue them, all he could obtain was the release of their prisoner. On the other hand, they seized three pieces of cannon, and dragged them to the square named after Gustavus Adolphus, where they posted themselves.

"There were eight thousand men of regular troops in Stockholm, but these were not all to be depended upon, and it was necessary to bring up some detachments of the guards. A company of Süderländers who had been ordered to cross the bridge, went right about face, as soon as they came in sight of the Dalecarlians, and did not halt till they reached the sluicegate, which had been drawn up, so that nobody might pass. It was now proclaimed with beat of drum, that those of the Dalecarlians who should not have left the city by five o'clock, would be dealt with as rebels and traitors. More than a thousand did leave, but the others stood firm. Counsellors and generals went to them, and exhorted them to obedience; but they cried out that they would make and unmake the king, according to their own good right and decree, and that if it was attempted to hinder them, the very child in the cradle should meet no mercy at their hands. To give greater weight to their words, they fired a cannon and a volley of musketry, by which a counsellor was killed.

"Orders were now given to the soldiers to fire, but they had pity on the poor peasants, and only aimed at the houses, shattering the glass in hundreds of windows. But the artillerymen were obliged to put match to touch-hole, and a murderous fire of canister did execution in the masses of the Dalecarlians. Many a white camisole was stained with the red heart's-blood of its wearer; fifty men fell dead upon the spot, eighty were wounded, and a crowd of others sprang into the Norderström, or sought to fly. The regiment of body-guards pursued them, and drove the discomfited boors into the artillery court. A severe investigation now took place, and these thirsters after liberty were punished by imprisonment and running the gauntlet. Their leader and five others were beheaded.

"The Dalecarlians are a tenacious and obstinate people, and their character is not likely to change; but God forbid that they should again deem it necessary to visit Stockholm. They were doubtless just as brave in the year 1743 as in 1521 and 1434; but though they had not altered, the times had. Civilization and cartridges are powerful checks upon undisciplined courage and an unbridled desire of liberty."

Returning from Dalecarlia to Stockholm, Mr Boas takes, not without regret, his final farewell of that city, and embarks for Gothenburg, passing through the Gotha canal, that splendid monument of Swedish industry and perseverance, which connects the Baltic with the North Sea. He passes the island of Mörkö, on which is Höningsholm Castle, where Marshal Banner was brought up. A window is pointed out in the third story of the castle, at which Banner, when a child, was once playing, when he overbalanced himself and fell out. The ground beneath was hard and rocky, but nevertheless he got up unhurt, ran into the house, and related how a gardener had saved him by catching him in his white apron. Enquiry was immediately made, but, far or near, no gardener was to be found. By an odd coincidence, Wallenstein, Banner's great opponent, when a page at Innspruck, also fell out of a high window without receiving the least injury.

On the first evening of the voyage, the steamer anchors for the night near Mem, a country-seat belonging to a certain Count Saltza, an eccentric old nobleman, who traces his descent from the time of Charles XII., and fancies himself a prophet and ghost-seer. His predictions relate usually to the royal family or country of Sweden, and are repeated from mouth to mouth throughout every province of the kingdom. And here we must retract an assertion we made some pages back, as to the possibility of our supposing this book to proceed from any other than a German pen. No one but a German would have thought it necessary or judicious to intrude his own insipid sentimentalities into a narrative of this description, and which was meant to be printed. But there is probably no conceivable subject on which a German could be set to write, in discussing which he would not manage to drag in, by neck and heels, a certain amount of sentiment or metaphysics, perhaps of both. Mr Boas, we are sorry to say, is guilty of this sin against good taste. The steamer comes to an anchor about ten o'clock, and he goes ashore with Baron K – , a friend he has picked up on board, to take a stroll in the Prophet's garden at Mem. There they encounter Mesdemoiselles Ebba and Ylfwa, lovely and romantic maidens, who sit in a bower of roses under the shadow of an umbrageous maple-tree, their arms intertwined, their eyes fixed upon a moonbeam, piping out Swedish melodies, which, to our two swains, prove seductive as the songs of a Siren. The moonbeam aforesaid is kind enough to convert into silver all the trees, bushes, leaves and twigs in the vicinity of the young ladies with the Thor-and-Odin names; whilst to complete this German vision, a white bird with a yellow tuft upon its head stands sentry upon a branch beside them, the said bird being, we presume, a filthy squealing cockatoo, although Mr Boas, gay deceiver that he is, evidently wishes us to infer that it was an indigenous volatile of the phœnix tribe. Sentinel Cockatoo, however, was caught napping, and the garrison of the bower had to run for it. And now commences a series of hopes and fears, and doubts and anxieties, and sighings and perplexities, which keep the tender heart of Boas in a state of agreeable palpitation, through four or five chapters; at the end of which he steps on board the steam-boat Christiana, blows in imagination a farewell kiss to Miss Ebba, of whom, by the bye, he has never obtained more than half a glimpse, and awaking, as he tells us, from his love-dream, which we should call his nightmare, sets sail for Copenhagen.

Of the various places visited by Mr Boas during his ramble, few seem to have pleased him better than Copenhagen, and he becomes quite enthusiastic when speaking of that city, and of what he saw there. The pleasure he had in meeting Thorwaldsen is perhaps in part the cause of his remembering the Danish capital with peculiar favour. He gives various details concerning that celebrated sculptor, his character and habits, and commences the chapter, which he styles, "A Fragment of Italy in the North," with a comparison between Sweden and Denmark, two countries which, both in trifling and important matters, but especially in the character of their inhabitants, are far more dissimilar than from their juxtaposition might have been supposed. Listen to Mr Boas.

"On meeting an interesting person for the first time, one frequently endeavours to trace a resemblance with some previous acquaintance or friend. I have a similar propensity when I visit interesting cities; but I had difficulty in calling to mind any place to which I could liken Copenhagen. Between Sweden and Denmark generally, there are more points of difference than of resemblance. Sweden is the land of rocks, and Denmark of forest. Oehlenschlägel calls the latter country, 'the fresh and grassy,' but he might also have added 'the cool and wooded.'

"The Swedish language is soft and melodious, the Danish sharp and accentuated. The former is better suited to lyrical, the latter to dramatic poetry.

"When a Swede laughs, he still looks more serious than a Dane who is out of humour. In Sweden, the people are quiet, even when indulging in the pleasures they love best; in Denmark there is no pleasure without noise. In a political point of view, the difference between the two nations is equally marked. Beyond the Sound, all demonstrations are made with fierce earnestness; on this side of it, satire and wit are the weapons employed. On the one hand shells and heavy artillery, on the other, light and brilliant rockets. The Swedes have much liberty of the press and very little humour; the Danes have a great deal of humour and small liberty of the press. As a people, the former are of a choleric and melancholy temperament, the latter of a sanguine and phlegmatic one.

"Whilst the Swedish national hatred is directed against Russia, that of Denmark takes England for its object. Finland and the fleet are not yet forgotten.

"The Swede is constantly taking off his hat; the Dane always shakes hands. The former is courteous and sly, the latter simple and honest.

"If Denmark has little similarity with its northern neighbour, neither has it any marked point of resemblance with its southern one. It always reminds me of the tongue of a balance, vibrating between Sweden and Germany, and inclining ever to that side on which the greatest weight lies. Thus its literary tendency is German, its political one Swedish.

"The best comparison that can be made of Denmark is with Italy; and to me, although I shall probably surprise the reader by saying so, Copenhagen appears like a part of Rome transplanted into the north. In some degree, perhaps, Thorwaldsen is answerable for this impression; for where he works and creates, one is apt to fancy oneself surrounded by that warm southern atmosphere in which nature and art best flourish. When he returned to Copenhagen, it was a festival day for the whole population of the city. A crew of gaily dressed sailors rowed him to land, and whilst they were doing so, a rainbow suddenly appeared in the heavens. The multitude assembled on the shore set up a shout of jubilation, to see that the sky itself assumed its brightest tints, to celebrate the return of their favourite.

"I had been told that I should not see Thorwaldsen, because he was staying with the Countess Stampe. This lady is about forty years of age, and possesses that blooming embonpoint which makes up in some women for the loss of youthful freshness. She became acquainted with the artist in Italy, and fascinated him to such a degree that he made her a present of the whole of his drawings, which are of immense artistical value. She excited much ill-will by accepting them, but at the same time it must in justice be owned, that Thorwaldsen is under great obligations to her. He had hardly arrived in Copenhagen, when innumerable invitations to breakfasts, dinners, and suppers were poured upon him. Every body wanted to have him; and, as he was known to love good living, the most sumptuous repasts were prepared for him. The sturdy old man, who had never been ill in his life, became pale and sickly, lost his taste for work, and was in a fair way to die of an indigestion, when the Countess Stampe stepped in to the rescue, carried him off to her country-seat, and there fitted him up a studio. His health speedily returned, and with it the energy for which he has always been remarkable, and he joyfully resumed the chisel and modelling stick.