A Danish Parsonage Part 19

"I should like to see how you drive; may I come up and sit beside you?" said Helga.

After they had gone a little way, Hardy said to her, "Take the reins and drive. I have bought these horses for my mother, and she will drive them herself, and you can drive them. Draw the reins gently to the horses' mouths and let them go as you wish them. To slacken speed, draw the reins firmly but gently, and they will obey."

Helga drove the carriage to the parsonage.

"Little father," said Helga, "I have driven you all the way from the entrance gate at Rosendal."

"I am glad," said the Pastor, "you did not tell me that before, as I should have been in great anxiety."

"But Herr Hardy was sitting by me, little father," said Helga, "and there was no danger when he is near."

CHAPTER XVI.

"The trout and salmon being in season have, at their first taking out of the water, their bodies adorned with such red spots, and the other with such black spots, as give them such an addition of natural beauty as I think was never given to any woman by artificial paint or patches."

--_The Complete Angler._

John Hardy had tied a couple of casting lines with the flies he usually fished with on the Gudenaa, and came down a little before three the next day.

Karl and Axel yet slept, but their sister called them, and after the accustomed cup of coffee and rusks they went out to fish on the Gudenaa. Of late Hardy had hired a flat-bottomed boat, and a man called Nils Nilsen rowed or punted it with a pole, as on the Thames, or he went ash.o.r.e on the towing-path and pulled it up the river with a towing rope, while a minnow was cast from the boat.

Hardy had taken a travelling rug for Helga to sit on, and Nils Nilsen towed the boat up the river, while Hardy fished with a minnow and caught a few trout. When they reached the shallows, which Hardy usually fished with a fly, he sent the boys on land to cast from the bank, and Nils Nilsen took the pole to punt the boat slowly down the stream. The trout rose freely for about an hour, and Helga had charge of the landing-net, and lost for Hardy several good fish, to Nils Nilsen's great disgust. She saw the long casts Hardy made, the light fall of the fly on the water, while a slight motion of the line threw the flies repeatedly on the surface of the river like real flies, and as soon as a trout rose the line was tightened with a sudden motion, and the trout drawn gradually to within reach of the landing-net.

"May I try, Herr Hardy, to throw the line for the Fish?" asked Helga.

"Certainly," replied Hardy, and he shortened the line to allow her to do so.

Her first attempt was to hook Hardy's cap; her next was to hook Nils Nilsen by the ear.

"It seems so easy to do," said Helga, as she handed Hardy the rod, who showed her how to cast the line as well as he was able.

"You will fish better from the bank, where it is not necessary to cast such a long line," said Hardy. "We will try a little lower down."

Helga followed his instructions, and at length hooked a trout, which Hardy picked out with the landing-net.

"I do so like this sort of fis.h.i.+ng," said Helga; "it is the way a lady should fish, if she fished at all."

"Many English ladies are good fly fishers," said Hardy; "and I have seen them catch salmon in Norway. I will, with pleasure, leave my rods and tackle here, if you would like to fish with Axel; he can show you how to attach the flies to the line, and anything else necessary."

"Thank you so much!" replied Helga; and as she raised her eyes to his, with her handsome face lit up by exercise, Hardy saw how beautiful she was. Her manner towards him had changed. She talked freely to him now, and without reserve.

"We will put a mark on the trout you have caught," said Hardy, "that we may know it again after it has been in the frying-pan. The Herr Pastor does not often eat fish of his daughter's catching. It weighs just half an English pound."

"How can you tell?" asked Helga.

"I guess it to be so; but we will soon see," replied Hardy, as he took a little spring balance out of his pocket, and held it up to her with the trout on it. "That little line is the half-pound, and the fish pulls the spring to that line."

"What a pretty thing to weigh with! Is it silver?" asked Helga.

"Yes, it is silver," replied Hardy. "I will leave it with you, with the rest of the fis.h.i.+ng gear, on the condition that the first time you catch a trout weighing one pound you write and tell me all about it."

"Yes, that I will!" said Helga. "I write my father's letters, and shall have to write to you for him about Rosendal."

At breakfast, Helga described to her father all the little incidents of the morning, and her bright fresh look testified to the benefit of early morning exercise.

"I think, Helga," said the Pastor, "that when Karl is gone, you had better go fis.h.i.+ng in the morning with Axel; you look the better for it."

When the tobacco parliament was opened that evening, and the Pastor had finished puffing like a small steam launch to get his porcelain pipe well lit. Hardy asked him if there was anything in the superst.i.tions of Jutland, corresponding to those of the sea, about the rivers.

"Yes," replied the Pastor. "Our Danish word for river is 'Aa'

(p.r.o.nounced like a broad _o_). Thus, the Gudenaa is the Guden river.

The tradition is that each river has its Aamand or river man, who every year craves a life; if a year pa.s.ses without a victim, he can be heard at night saying, 'The time and hour are come, but the victim is not yet come.' Sometimes the Aamand is called Nkken."

"That is the Norsk name," said Hardy. "In Scotland they have a superst.i.tion as to changelings; that is, a human child is stolen and a child of the Trolds subst.i.tuted. This is referred to by Sir Walter Scott in one of his poems. Does anything of the sort exist in your Jutland traditions?"

"There are several varied stories," replied Pastor Lindal. "One is of a couple who had a very pretty child; they lived near a wood called Rold Wood. The Trolds came one night and stole the child, leaving one of their own in its place. The man and his wife did not at first notice any change, but the wife gradually became suspicious, and she asked the advice of a wise woman, who told her to brew in a nutsh.e.l.l, with an eggsh.e.l.l as beer barrel, in the changeling's presence, who exclaimed that it had lived so many years as to have seen Rold Wood hewn down and grow up three times, but had never seen any one brew in a nutsh.e.l.l before. 'If you are as old as that,' said the wife, 'you can go elsewhere;' and she took the broom-stick and beat the changeling until it ran away, and as it ran he caught his feet in his hands and rolled away over hill and dale so long as they could see it.

This story has a variation that they made a sausage with the skin, bones, and bristles of a pig, and gave the changeling, who made the same exclamation, with the result as I have before related. There is also another variation, where the changeling is got rid of by heating the oven red hot and putting it into the oven, when the Trold mother appears and s.n.a.t.c.hes it out, and disappears with her child."

"The superst.i.tion would appear to have arisen from children being affected with diseases which were not understood," said Hardy.

"We can only speculate," said the Pastor, "in these subjects; the origin is lost in the mists of time. There is one story of a changeling that has some graphic incidents. When a child is born, a light is always kept burning in the mother's room until the child is baptized, as the Trolds may come and steal it. This was not done at a place in North Jutland, because the mother could not sleep with the light burning. The father therefore determined to hold the child in his arms, so long as it was dark in the room, but he fell asleep; shortly after he was aroused, and he saw a tall woman standing by the bed, and found that he had two children in his arms. The woman vanished, but the children remained, and he did not know which was his own. He consulted a wise woman, who advised him to get an unbroken horse colt, who would indicate the changeling. Both children were placed on the ground, and the colt smelt at them; one he licked, but the other he kicked at. It was therefore plain which was the changeling. The Trold mother came running up, s.n.a.t.c.hed the child away, and disappeared."

"The advice of the wise woman was clever. It is, as you say, a graphic story," said Hardy. "But who were the wise women?"

"There were both men and women. They were called Kloge Maend and Kloge Koner, or wise men and wise wives. They pretended to heal diseases, to find things lost or stolen, and the like. They were often called white witches, as in England. There was a man called Kristen, who pretended to have wonderful powers. A certain Bonde did not believe in him, and one day told him that he had a sow possessed with a devil. The sow was simply vicious. Kristen at once offered to drive the devil out of the sow. He instructed the Bonde and his men not to open the door of the stable in which the pig was, even if they saw him (Kristen) come and knock and shout, as the devil would take upon him his appearance, to enable him to escape better. Kristen went into the stable and began to exorcise. The sow, however, rushed at him and chased him round the stable, and every time Kristen pa.s.sed the door, he shouted to the Bonde and his men to open it, but they, pretending to follow his instructions, would not. At last, when Kristen was nearly dead with fatigue, they opened the door. Of course, Kristen never heard the last of that sow."

"That is not a bad story," said Hardy.

"You have read Holberg's comedies?" said the Pastor. "In one of them you will recollect a thief is discovered from amongst the other domestics of the house, by their being ranged behind the man who had been asked to discover the thief, and who tells them all to hold their hands up. He asks if they are all holding their hands up, as his back is towards them. They all reply, 'Yes;' and the man then asks if the person who has stolen the silver cup is holding up his hand. The thief replied 'Yes,' thus discovering himself. There is a story of a watch being stolen in a large household in Jutland. The white witch was sent for, and he discovered the thief by ranging the domestics round a table and making each domestic put a finger on the table, over which he held a sharp axe. He asked each if they had stolen the watch, as the axe would fall and cut off the finger of the one who had. He detected the thief by his at once removing his finger."

"Verily a wise man," said Hardy. "In Norway I used to meet with the word 'Dvaerg,' as applied to supernatural beings.

"Dvaerg is dwarf in Danish," replied the Pastor; "but there are many stories of them, and in a superst.i.tious sense. Dvaerg are a.n.a.logous to Underjordiske, or underground people. The tradition of their origin is, that Eve was one day was.h.i.+ng her children at a spring, when G.o.d suddenly called her, at which she was frightened, and hid two of the children that were yet unwashed, as she did not wish Him to see them when dirty. G.o.d said, 'Are all your children here?' and she replied, 'Yes.' G.o.d said, 'What is hidden from Me shall be hidden from men;'

and from these two children are descended the Dvaerg and Underjordiske.

The most striking story of a Dvaerg is that in the Danish family Bille, who have a Dvaerg in their coat of arms. There was, many hundred years ago, such a dry time in the land that all the water-mills could not work, and the people could not get their corn ground. A member of the family of Bille was in his Herregaard, and was much troubled on this account. A little Dvaerg came to him, who was covered with hair, and had a tree in his hand plucked up by the roots. 'What is the matter?'

said the Dvaerg. 'It is no use my telling you' said Bille; 'you cannot help me.' The Dvaerg replied, 'You cannot get your corn ground, and you have many children and people that want bread; but I will show you a place on your own land where you can build seven corn-mills, and they shall never want water.' So Herr Bille built the seven mills, and they have never wanted water, winter or summer. The Dvaerg gave him also a little white horn, and told Herr Bille that as long as it was kept in the family, prosperity would attend it. This legend belongs to Sjaelland."

"I suppose there are many traditions in families in Denmark?" said Hardy.

"Very many," replied the Pastor. "There is a story of Tyge Brahe, or, as you call him in England, Tycho. He was at a wedding, and got into a quarrel with a Herr Manderup Parsberg, and it went so far that they fought a duel. Tyge Brahe lost his nose. But he had a nose made of gold and silver, so artistically correct that no one could see that it was any other than his own nose, and of flesh and blood; but to be sure that it should not be lost, he always carried some glue in his pocket."

"I never heard that story of the great astronomer," said Hardy.

"There is a story also of a Herr Eske Brok, who lived in Sjaelland. He was one day walking with a servant, and was swinging about his walking-stick, when suddenly a hat fell at his feet. He picked it up and put it on, when he heard an exclamation from his servant Then said Brok, 'You try the hat;' and they found that whoever had the hat on was invisible to the other. After a while, a bareheaded boy came to Brok's house and inquired for his hat, and offered a hundred ducats for it, and afterwards more. At last, the boy promised that if he gave him the hat none of his descendants should ever want. Brok gave the hat to the boy; but as he went away he said, 'But you shall never have sons, only daughters.' So Eske Brok was the last of his name."