Through Finland in Carts Part 36

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 right across 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 upon _terra firma_ and 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 the _Pyhakoski_ rapid, 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 gra.s.s 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 walked round 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, it _was_--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 kitchen fire 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 s.h.i.+ning copper coffee-pot, the dark obscurity on the top of the oven.

The low ceiling with its ma.s.sive wooden beams, the table spread for the early breakfast--or maybe the remnants of the evening meal--with a beer-hen full of _Kalja_, a pot, rudely carved, filled with _piimaa_ or 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 a _kantele_, 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 coa.r.s.e white s.h.i.+rt--the b.u.t.tons 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 and sentiment, and the romance of our midnight arrival seemed to kindle all the imagination in this man's nature. While he played the _kantele_, 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.

We were indeed amazed when we were each handed a real silver spoon--not tin or electro--but real silver, and very quaint they were too, for the bowls were much bigger than the short handles themselves. These luxuries were in keeping with the beautiful linen on the beds, made by the old woman, and the wonderful white curtains in front of the windows, also woven by the housewife, who had likewise crocheted the lace that bordered them.

They had not those things because they were rich; for, on the contrary, they were poor. Such are the ordinary Finnish farmers' possessions; however small the homestead, linen and window curtains are generally to be found. So many comforts, coupled with the bare simplicity of the boards, the long benches for seats, and hard wooden chairs, did not lead us to expect the comic tragedy to follow.

It was one A.M., and we were all feeling quite merry again, after our warm coffee and milk, as we spread one of the rugs on the floor of the kitchen for the gentlemen--the boatmen lying on the boards--and carried our larger rug into the second room for the ladies, rolling our cloaks up into pillows, for the heat from the oven was so great that we did not want them. We lay down in our steaming clothes, which we dare not take off, to s.n.a.t.c.h a few hours' sleep, until the fog should kindly lift and enable us to get a couple of hours farther on our way to _Muhos_, from which place the little "cataract steamer" was to start at seven A.M. for _Uleborg_.

"Good-night--not a word," the last caution added because every one wanted to say how merciful it was that we had found such delightful shelter, warmth, and even food.

Obediently we settled down and prepared to enjoy our much-needed rest. A quarter of an hour pa.s.sed; first one turned uneasily, and then another; the first one sighed, and then the second; first one spoke, and then another; first one rose and went to the window, and then another. Could it be? No--yes--no! Oh the horror of it! the place was alive!

Only a quarter of an hour, yet we were bitten nearly to death, for we had made the personal acquaintance of a species of pest too horrible to name. It really was too much, we felt almost inclined to cry, the situation was so terrible. We could not go outside, for malaria and ague seemed imminent; we could not go on in our boat, for the rapids were dangerous in fog, death-traps in fact--what, oh, what were we to do?

We heard movements in the kitchen. We called. The answer said "Come in, certainly," and we entered to find our men's hair literally standing on end as they stood, rug in hand, scanning the floor, over which a perfect zoological garden was promenading as coolly as flies on a hot summer's day over a kitchen ceiling--and we had no shoes or stockings on.

There were small red animals creeping sideways, there were little brown animals hopping, there were huge fat round beasts whose death left an unpleasant odour, there were crawling gray creatures, and every one was an enormous specimen of its kind, and--yes, 'tis true--they were there in millions.

It seems loathsome to write, but it was worse to see and feel, and one must write it, for the would-be traveller among the peasant homes of Finland ought to know what he may expect. Enchanting as the country is, interesting and hospitable as are its peasantry, the Finns must learn how to deal with such a curse, or no one will dare to enter any dwelling, until the tourist club opens shelters everywhere and supplies iron beds and good mattresses, and a capable woman to look after them all and keep them clean. Even the enthusiastic fisherman could not stand such bedfellows.

Six wooden chairs were placed in two rows in the small porch, and there in the cold wet early morning air we sat as quietly as circ.u.mstances would permit, for leaving the heated rooms did not mean leaving our tormentors.

We drew our coats round our s.h.i.+vering forms, we blew upon our chilled fingers to get up the circulation, we stared out at blank gray fog thick with malaria and ague.

Now came a revelation. The occupants of this house never slept in it during the hot weather. Why? Simply because they could not. Even they themselves could not stand the vermin, and therefore, like many other peasants of Finland, they lie in the hayloft in the summer months for preference, and that was where our friend had come from to give us help and succour, as we fondly believed, when he appeared like a benevolent apparition in that darkened door-way.

During all our horrors the farmer slept.

"We must not tell the people of the house what has happened," said our good-hearted student; "they would be most awfully offended, and there is no knowing what they might do with defenceless travellers in such an out-of-the-way spot."

"But we must pay them," I observed.

"Of course," agreed Grandpapa, "but we need not tell them that we have sat up on these chairs surrounded by a carpet of hay all night."

"But they will know," I ventured to remark. "We cannot clear away all this hay even if we move the chairs."

"I have it," said the student, after a long pause, during which we had all sought an excuse to enable us to depart without hurting the farmer's feelings, "I will tell them that we sat up here because the ladies wanted to see the sunrise."

"Just so," we all a.s.sented, gazing abstractedly towards the _west_ at the black wall of the opposite barn, which totally obstructed all view of any kind, even if the fog had not made a sunrise an absolutely ridiculous suggestion. But we were all so weak and worn out that if any one had suggested the _sunset_ at three in the morning, we would still have said, "Just so."

Luckily, one forgets the disagreeables of life unless they have an amusing side as this had.

Pleasant memories linger.

First one of us got up and went to see if there was the slightest chance of the mist clearing--another peeped at a little baby calf standing alone in a shed, where it nearly had a fit with fright at the unexpected sight of visitors--another walked round the house to see if the mist was clearing on the opposite side, and then all sat down dejectedly in a row again on those hard wooden seats. At last, when it was really time to leave, with an effort of will we made up our mind to go back to the bedroom to fetch an umbrella and a hat which had been left behind. It was lighter now, and as we stooped to pick up the umbrella, that had fallen upon the ground, we started back in horror, for a perfect colony of every conceivably sized and shaped crawling beast was walking over the floor. Gathering up our skirts we flew with winged feet from that haunted chamber, but not before we had seized upon the hat, which had lain upon the table, and out of which hopped and crawled enormous--well--we left that house as noiselessly as we had come, left it surrounded in fog, without waking a soul, after putting the money upon the table in payment for our night's lodging. We left, glad to shake its dust and its _etceteras_ from our feet; but it will ever remain in our minds as a bad dream, a dream of another world, the world of insect land, into the mysteries of which we never wish to peep again.

The most wonderful bit of our journey was yet to come. The waves were too short and jumpy for the waves of the sea, and the boat too fragile for a sea boat, yet we did not even gasp now, we had got so accustomed to drenchings, and our nerves were steadier, if over-wrought, as we danced and plunged over these waters.

For some four or five miles the _Pyhakoski_ rapid is narrower than those higher up the river, and sheer rocks rise straight from the water's edge and pine-trees skirt these on either side, literally growing out of the boulders without any apparent roots. It is a grand and wonderful pa.s.sage waterway: and one the return boats cannot manage at all, there being no towing path, so that the oarsmen have to put their boats on carts and drive them across the land. This is not an easy job, because the length and fragility of the boats mean risk of breaking their backs. Great care is therefore required.