The Modern Vikings

“Ready!” shouted Nils, advancing toward the edge of the slope: “One, two, three!”

And like an arrow he shot down over the steep track, guiding his course steadily with his staff; but it was scarcely five seconds before he was lost to sight, looking more like a whirling snow-drift than a man. With strained eyes and bated breath, Ola stood looking after him. Then, nerving himself for the feat, he glanced at his skees to see that they were parallel, and glided out over the terrible declivity. His first feeling was that he had slid right out into the air – that he was rushing with seven-league boots over forests and mountain-tops. For all that, he did not lose hold of his staff, which he pressed with all his might into the snow behind him, thus slightly retarding his furious speed. Now the pine-trees seemed to be running past him in a mad race up the mountain-side, and the snowy slope seemed to be rising to meet him, or moving in billowy lines under his feet. Gradually he gathered confidence in himself, a sort of fierce courage awoke within him, and a wild exultation surged through his veins and swept him on. The wind whistled about him and stung his face like whip-lashes. Now he darted away over a snowed-up fence or wood-pile, shooting out into the air, but always coming down firmly on his feet, and keeping his mind on his skees, so as to prevent them from diverging or crossing. He had a feeling of grandeur and triumphant achievement which he had never experienced before. The world lay at his feet, and he seemed to be striding over it in a march of conquest. It was glorious! But all such sensations are unhappily brief. Ola soon knew by his slackening speed that he had reached the level ground; yet so great was the impetus he had received that he flew up the opposite slope toward his father’s farm, and only stopped some fifty feet below the barn. He then rubbed his face and pinched his nose, just to see whether it was frozen. The muscles in his limbs ached, and the arm which had held the staff was so stiff and cramped that the slightest movement gave him pain. Nevertheless, he could not make up his mind to rest; he saw the light put in the north window to guide him, and he caught a glimpse of a pale, anxious face behind the window-pane, and knew that it was his mother who was waiting for him. And yet those last fifty feet seemed miles to his tired and aching legs. When he reached the front door, his dog Yutul jumped up on him in his joy and knocked him flat down in the snow; and oh, what an effort it took to rise! But no sooner had he regained his feet, than he felt a pair of arms flung about his neck and he sank, half laughing, half crying, into his mother’s embrace.

“Cheer up, laddie,” he heard someone saying. “Ye are a fine chap and a brave one!”

He knew his father’s voice; but he did not look up; he was yet child enough to feel happiest in his mother’s arms.

One of the most popular winter sports in Norway is skee-racing. A steep hill is selected by the committee which is to have charge of the race, and all the best skee-runners in the district enter their names, eager to engage in the contest. The track is cleared of all accidental obstructions, but if there happens to be a stone or wooden fence crossing it, the snow is dug away on the lower side of it and piled up above it. The object is to obtain what is called a “jump.” The skee-runner, of course, coming at full speed down the slope will slide out over this “jump,” shooting right out into the air and coming down either on his feet or any other convenient portion of his anatomy, as the case may be. To keep one’s footing, and particularly to prevent the skees from becoming crossed while in the air, are the most difficult feats connected with skee-racing; and it is no unusual thing to see even an excellent skee-runner plunging headlong into the snow, while his skees pursue an independent race down the track and tell the spectators of his failure. Properly speaking, a skee-race is not a race – not a test of speed, but a test of skill; for two runners rarely start simultaneously, as, in case one of them should fall, the other could not possibly stop, and might not even have the time to change his course. He would thus be in danger of running into his competitor, and could hardly avoid maiming him seriously. If there were several parallel tracks, at a distance of twenty to thirty feet from each other, there would, of course, be less risk in having the runners start together. Usually, a number fall in the first run, and those who have not fallen then continue the contest until one gains the palm. If, as occasionally happens, the competition is narrowed down to two, who are about evenly matched, a proposal to run without staves is apt to result in a decisive victory for one or the other.

It can hardly be conceived how exciting these contests are, not only to the skee-runners themselves, but also to the spectators, male and female, who gather in groups along the track and cheer their friends as they pass, waving their handkerchiefs, and greeting with derisive cries the mishaps which are inseparable from the sport. Prizes are offered, such as rifles, watches, fine shooting equipments, etc., and in almost every valley in the interior of Norway there are skee-runners who, in consequence of this constant competition, have attained a skill which would seem almost incredible. As there are but two things essential to a skee-race, viz.: a hill and snow, I can see no reason why the sport should not in time become as popular in the United States as it is in Norway. We have snow enough, certainly, in the New England and Western States; neither are hills rare phenomena. If I should succeed in interesting any large number of boys in these States in skee-running, I should feel that I had conferred a benefit upon them, and added much to their enjoyment of winter. But before taking leave of them, let me give them two pieces of parting advice: 1. Be sure your staff is strong, and do not be hasty in throwing it away. 2. Never slide down a hill on a highway, or any hard, icy surface. It is only in the open fields and woods and in dry snow that skees are useful.

THE SKERRY OF SHRIEKS

I

People live even within the Polar Circle, although grown-up folks are apt to think it a poor sort of life. But to boys the “land of the midnight sun” is a veritable paradise. Every season of the year has its own kind of sport; and as schoolmasters are rare birds so far north, the boys are to a great extent left to follow their own devices until they are old enough to be sent away to school in the cities. From morning till night the air is filled with a screaming host of birds, which whirl in through the fiords like an approaching snow-storm. The eider-ducks lie gently bobbing upon the water, the black surf-scoters dive in the surf and make short work of the young whiting, and the puffins sit in long soldier-like rows on the rocks, and plunge headlong into the sea at the first signal of danger. In this glorious region the fish and fowl from all quarters of the globe seem to have appointed an annual meeting about New Year’s; and the Norwegian peasants, who are dependent upon the inhabitants of the sea and the air for their living, are on the lookout for them, and hasten to the coast to give them a fitting reception.

Harry Winchester’s motive, however, for visiting the Arctic wonderland was quite a different one. He had made the acquaintance of the Birk boys during the previous summer, and he had struck up a warm friendship with one of them, named Magnus. His parents, who lived in New York, had permitted him to accept the invitation of Mr. Birk to spend the winter with his sons, and Harry was so completely fascinated with the sports and adventures which every day offered in abundance that he would have liked to prolong his stay indefinitely.

Hasselrud, the estate of the Birks, was a fine, old-fashioned mansion, which peeped out from the dense foliage of chestnut and maple trees. Mr. Birk conducted a large business in fish and lumber, and manned every year several boats and sent them to the Lofoten fisheries. His three sons, Olaf, Magnus, and Edwin, were brisk and courageous lads, who had been accustomed to danger from their earliest years, and could handle a gun and manage a sail as well as any man in that region. Olaf was nineteen years old, and wore the uniform of a midshipman in the navy, and by courtesy was styled lieutenant; Magnus, who was sixteen, was a fair-faced, curly-headed lad, with frank blue eyes, a straight, handsome nose, and a singular talent for getting into mischief. Edwin was but twelve years old; but, as he does not figure conspicuously in this narrative, there is no need of describing him. But altogether the most important person at Hasselrud, next to Mr. Birk, was Grim Hering-Luck, a hoary, bow-legged fisherman, who was Mr. Birk’s right-hand man and captain of his boat-guild. Grim had a stern, deep-wrinkled face, framed in a wreath of grayish whiskers. He had small, piercing eyes, and bushy, gray-sprinkled hair. On his head he wore a sou’wester. The seat and knees of his trousers and the elbows of his coat were adorned with great shiny patches of leather. The leathern girdle about his waist did not quite fulfil its duties as suspenders, but allowed the trousers to slip down on his hips, leaving some four inches of shirt visible under the border of the waistcoat. Grim was a gruff old customer, but it was commonly believed that his bark was worse than his bite. He liked the bright American boy better than he cared to confess, and therefore neglected no opportunity for quarrelling with him. In fact, everybody admired Harry’s enterprising spirit and was entertained by his lively talk. Olaf was fairly dazzled by his knowledge and experience of the world, and little Edwin copied his walk and his picturesque recklessness to the extent of his small ability; but among all the family there was no one who was more ardently attached to Harry than Magnus. The two were inseparable; from morning till night they roamed about together, setting traps for hares and ptarmigan, spearing trout in the shallows of the river, trawling for mackerel in the salt water, and sometimes tacking in and out of the fiord in a furious gale. At such times, however, they were sure to have Grim in the boat, and Grim was a capital man to have in a boat in case of an emergency. Thus they spent the beautiful autumn months until the November storms began to blow, the snow began to fall, and the air, when they looked out the fiord, was thick and the sky threatening. The great trees bent in agony and howled in the blast with voices of despair. Then Grim would begin to investigate and to mend the nets which hung in long festoons along the walls of the boat-houses, and, with his friendly grunt, he would say in reply to Magnus’ queries:

“Wal, Mester Yallertop, the Lord he looks out fer them as they look out fer themselves. He puts the cod in the sea, but I never heared of his puttin’ it in yer mouth fer ye. He made the land poor up here, but he made the sea rich, jest fer to make the average right in the end. He lets ye starve like a toothless rat if ye have a taste fer starvin’. But thar ain’t no call for anybody to starve here north, ef he can bait a hook and ain’t afeared of bein’ late to his funeral.”

“Being late to your own funeral, Grim!” Magnus would exclaim, in amazement; “how can a man be late to his funeral?”

“Wal, now, Mester Yallertop, that I’ll tell ye. Fur that ain’t no uncommon case here north. Suppose ye go out in the mornin’ with the fishin’ fleet, and it blows up right lively, and ye don’t never come back again. Then after a week or so the parson reads the sarvice over yer name and prays fer ye, and the next mornin’, likely as not, yer legs drift ashore, quite independent-like, jest because the cod found yer tarred top-boots indergestible.”

“And do such things ever happen, Grim?” the boy would ask, shuddering at the ghastly picture which his friend’s words suggested.

“Do they ever happen? Wal, I reckon they do. I might jest mention to ye that I ain’t in the habit of tellin’ no lies. My father – God ha’e mercy on his soul – he sent only his legs fur to represent him at his funeral; and my grandfather – wal, the cod turned the tables on him; he had meant to eat them, but – it ain’t no use bein’ squeamish about it – they ate him. It war in the great storm of the 11th of February, 1848, when five hundred fisherman cheated the parson out of his funeral fees.”

“How terrible, Grim! How can you go to the fisheries every winter, when both your father and your grandfather lost their lives there?”

“Wal, now ye are puzzlin’ me, Mester Magnus,” Grim replied, taking his clay pipe from the corner of his mouth, and looking up seriously from his labor; “but I’ll tell ye a yarn I heared when I was young. I reckon it is true, because I have never heared nobody say it warn’t. Some city chap axed a fisherman purty much what ye have axed me, and the fisherman says, says he: ‘Whar did yer father die?’ ‘Why, he expired peacefully in his bed,’ said the city chap. ‘And yer grandfather?’ axed the fisherman. ‘Wal, he had jest the same luck,’ says the city chap. ‘And yer great-grandfather?’ ‘He, too, turned up his toes in the same style.’ ‘Wal, now,’ says the fisherman, ‘if I were you I wouldn’t never go to bed again, sence all yer forbears come to their death in it.’ Now, I reckon that is the way with all of us. Ef the Lord wants us he will know whar to find us, wharsoever we be.”

When the Christmas holidays, with all their old-fashioned hospitality and sports, were over the question was seriously debated whether the boys should be permitted to accompany Grim and the housemen (tenants) to the Lofoten fisheries. It was decided that three boats should be manned, and Grim was as usual elected captain of the whole guild. The “tokens” had been uncommonly good this year, and a profitable fishery was expected. Mr. Birk, who well knew the dangers connected with this enterprise, was very unwilling to let the boys start out in the open boats, and suffer the discomforts which were inseparable from the life on these barren islands, where thousands of people were huddled together in booths and shanties, and quarrels and fights were the order of the day. Harry, however, argued that such an experience would scarcely offer itself to him a second time in his life, and that it was easy to avoid danger while still observing all that was interesting and instructive in the lives of the people. Olaf and Magnus, too, added their powers of persuasion to those of Harry, and in the end Mr. Birk (after enjoining a hundred precautions) had to yield, stipulating only that Edwin should remain at home. Grim promised to keep a careful look-out over the movements of the boys, but he refused to be responsible for their safety, because, as he remarked, “they were too lively a lot to be controlled by a stiff-legged old crab like himself.”

It was a gray morning in January that the long eight oared boats were made ready, the chests containing provisions and clothes were placed in the stern, and the sails with a rattling noise flew up and bulged before the wind. The sky had a peculiar whitish-gray color, which has always an ominous look and promises squalls. Yet it was a glorious sensation to feel the boats shooting away over the crests of the waves, dashing the spray like smoke about them and yielding like living things to the slightest prompting of the rudder. Grim himself sat in the stern of the first boat, which the boys had named “The Cormorant,” holding the tiller in his left hand and the sheet in his right. Magnus had found a rather elevated seat in the prow, from whence he could observe the captain’s manœuvres and take lessons in seamanship. Harry and Olaf sat on the middle bench, watching the horizon and seeing the squalls dash down from the mountains and sweep their trails of smoke across the fiord.

“It must be dangerous sailing here, Grim,” Harry observed, uneasily.

“It ain’t no joke – fer goslings,” answered Grim.

“I should think, on the whole, it would be more comfortable for goslings than for men,” retorted Harry, carelessly. “They wouldn’t mind a ducking half as much as I should.”

“If ye are afeard just say so, and I’ll put ye ashore,” said Grim, sternly.

“Afraid!” said Harry, indignantly; “not much, old man; guess I can give you odds any day if you want to try my courage.”

“I want to try ef ye can hold your tongue,” was the captain’s ungracious reply. “I ain’t much for gassin’ on the water.”

Harry, thinking that perhaps the situation was graver than he supposed, failed to resent the snub, and fell again to watching the horizon. They shot away at a tearing speed over the waves, and sometimes “The Cormorant” careened heavily to leeward and shipped a sea, but Grim still made no motion to reef the sail. The other Hasselrud boats, which had kept bravely in the wake of their leader, were now falling behind, and the blinding spray often hid them completely from sight. The fiord was growing wider, and the long “ground swell” showed that they were nearing the ocean. The stormy petrel was seen skimming lightly, half flying, half running, over the tops of the billows, and her shrill scream pierced like a sharp instrument through the deep bass of the wind. The boats round about them multiplied, and a whole fleet of reddish-brown sails was seen steering toward the Lofoten Islands. The day passed without any incident, and when about three o’clock in the afternoon the darkness came rolling in like a gray curtain from the west, Grim put into port and the boys devoured between them a five-pound cod, whereupon they all crawled into the same bunk in a fisherman’s lodging-house and slept the sleep of the just.

The next morning they were aroused before daybreak, and after a frugal repast of coffee and sandwiches were hurried into the boat. The wide ocean now stretched out before them, rolling with a mighty thundering rhythm against the rock-bound coast. A light mist was hovering over the water, but the wind was fair, and hundreds of boats were already scudding northward toward the rich fishing-banks. As soon as the fog rose and was scattered, the invisible sun sent a faint semblance of light up among the low clouds, and immediately thousands of gulls and auks and cormorants were on the wing, and whirled with a wild confusion of screams in the wake of the fishing-fleet. When toward noon the wind slackened a little, Magnus swung out a trawling-line and had almost in the same moment a bite which sent the line whizzing over the gunwale.

“Gracious! I am afraid I have caught a whale,” he shouted, standing up in the boat, and holding on to the line with all his might; but being unable to keep his footing, he flung himself prone across the row-bench and would inevitably have been pulled overboard if Harry and Olaf had not caught hold of him by the legs and told him to let the line go.

“You remind me of the Englishman at the siege of Quebec who had caught three Frenchmen,” said Harry. “I should say it was the whale who had caught you, in the present case, if a whale it is. Now I am going to try my luck,” he added, seizing the wooden frame to which the line was attached just as it was about to fly overboard. He braced himself against the mast and flung his body backward, but the line cut into his hands so terribly that he had to cry for help. Then Olaf was promptly at his side, and by their united efforts they succeeded in hauling in a couple of fathoms; but it was not until one of the boatmen added his strength to theirs that they made any sensible headway. Great was their delight when, at the end of five minutes, they caught sight of an enormous halibut, weighing some forty or fifty pounds, but, as well might be imagined, it was no easy job to get such a monster into the boat without upsetting it. The only way was evidently to tire him out until he lost all power of resistance, and as he had swallowed the metal bait with tremendous vim there was no danger of his escaping.

It was well on toward evening when they put into harbor on the northern coast of Lofoten, where they were to remain while the fisheries lasted. An endless double row of boats stretched along the shore, and behind these the so-called “Hjælder,” or drying-houses, rose in gaunt perspective against the dark sky. Thousands of boats were drawn up along the whole beach, and the smell of fish pervaded the air and seemed even to be borne in on the ocean breeze. Grim, followed by all the men from the three boats, marched up to the Hasselrud booth, which he unlocked, and ordered the temporary cook to make a fire on the hearth and to prepare supper. It was a large empty room, one wall of which was occupied by the hearth and two by rows of bunks, one above the other, resembling the berths in the steerage of an immigrant steamer. It looked cheerless, and the boys, whose expectations had pictured to them something quite different, shivered at the sight of the bare and sooty walls. Nevertheless when the fire had been lighted, and a couple of burning pine knots stuck into the wall, they took heart again and determined to make the best of the situation.

The next morning at daybreak they jumped into their clothes, pulling complete oil-cloth suits on the outside of their ordinary garments. Then fastening their yellow sou’westers under their chins, they surveyed each other with undisguised looks of admiration and began to feel like real fishermen. The breakfast was swallowed in haste, and they scarcely noticed how the hot coffee scalded their mouths, so eager were they to be off. Nevertheless, as they had no nets to draw as yet, they delayed their departure for several hours. It was a raw, cold morning, but the signals at the government station indicated fair but blustery weather. The whole fleet had already started, and the Hasselrud boats were among the last to set sail for the fishing-banks. It was glorious to see the wide ocean studded, as far as the eye could reach, with swelling sails, and the air filled for miles with a screaming host of great, white-winged sea-birds. Round about the whales were spouting, shooting columns of water into the gray light of the morning: and the auks were rocking upon the waves, and vanishing, quick as a flash, as soon as a boat approached them. The fresh sea-breeze blew into the faces of the three boys, and they felt like Norse Vikings of the olden time starting out in search of fame and adventures. It was about twelve o’clock when they arrived at the fishing-banks; the sails were lowered and the nets sunk by means of lead sinkers and stones attached to their lower edge. Wooden floats, similarly attached to their upper edge, held them in position in the water. Grim sat, grave and imperturbable, in the stern, issuing his commands in a voice which rose high above the rushing of the water and the whizzing of the wind, and every man obeyed with a promptness as if his life depended upon it. The sea was so packed with cod that the nets often stopped, gliding slowly over the backs of the fishes, and being again arrested by the myriads of finny creatures below. Often the same net had to be taken up and disentangled several times before it made its way to the bottom. The water was thick with spawn, which clung in long gelatinous ropes to the blades of the oars, and doubled their weight to the rowers. The boys, leaning out over the gunwale, could see the huge male cods winding themselves onward through the dense throngs of females which stood still with their noses against the current, moving their fins, and shedding their spawn. It seemed a positive mercy to haul up a million or so of them, just to make room for the rest.

“I understand now,” exclaimed Harry, “how the Canadians managed to cheat us out of so much money – six millions, more or less, I think – because we had encroached upon their fishing-grounds. I would myself pay a good round sum for sport like this; and the joke of it is that you are making money at it and have all the fun in the bargain.”

“And have ye fisheries in America too, lad?” Grim asked, with visible interest, as he let the last float slip from his hand.

“Have we got fisheries in America? Well, I should say we had, old man,” said Harry, fired with patriotic ardor. “You just tell me what we haven’t got in America. If you’ll come over and see I shall be happy to entertain you.”

“Ye are safe in invitin’ me, lad,” Grim retorted, biting a quid from his roll of tobacco. “A purty figger an old sea-dog like me would make in your ma’s carpeted parlor.”

Harry in his heart admitted the force of this remark, and he laughed to himself at the thought of Grim’s ungainly form seated in one of his mother’s spindle-legged blue satin chairs; but, for all that, he liked Grim too much to wish to offend him, and therefore stuck bravely to his invitation, insisting that it was sincerely meant. As they were amicably squabbling, the sun suddenly burst forth, and flung its dazzling radiance upon the ocean. The noise of the sea-birds grew louder, making the vast vault of the sky alive with countless varieties of screams. The fishes leaped, the whales spouted lustily, the stormy petrel danced over the crests of the billows; thousands of boats lay bobbing up and down on the waves, while the lines were being baited; a thousand voices shouted to each other from boat to boat; oars and rudders rattled, and the wind sang in the mast-tops. It was a scene which once seen could never be forgotten.

II

Long before the Hasselrud men had their lines set the whole fleet had rowed back toward land. But Grim’s boat-guild, which had just arrived, and had as yet no nets to draw, lingered for a while eating their dinner, which they had brought with them in the boats. They chatted and told stories about Draugen, the sea-bogey, who rows in a half boat, and whose scream sounds terribly through the tempest. Any man who sees him knows that he will never see land again. Draugen is only out in the worst weather; he has a sou’wester on his head, his face is white and ghastly as death itself, and his empty eye-sockets have no eyes in them. The boys shuddered at the horrible picture which was conjured up before them, and it was a relief to them when the time came for pulling up the lines, and the great codfishes were hauled sprawling into the boat; each one had plenty to do now in cutting out the hooks and in winding the lines upon their frames. A smart gale had sprung up while they were thus engaged, and Grim began to look wistfully at the lurid sunset.

“The sun draws water,” he said; “that means lively weather. Hoist the sails, lads, and let us turn our noses shoreward.”

He had hardly uttered his command when a thick curtain seemed to be drawn across the face of the sun, and the sea became black as ink.

“Clew up the sail!” he shouted, in a voice of thunder; “we are in for it.”

With a roar as of a chorus of cataracts the storm advanced, lashing the water into smoke which whirled heavenward, making the sky dense as night. The masts creaked, the boats tore away with a frantic speed, and the waves rose mountain-high, with steep, black gulfs between them.

“Cap’n,” one of the men ventured to remonstrate, “are we not carryin’ too much sail?”

Grim deigned him no reply, but, with a sharp turn of the tiller, ran The Cormorant closer to the wind. Forward bounded the boat, cleaving the coming wave with a blow of her bows which made her timbers groan. The spray was dashed fathoms high, and would have drenched every man on board if his oil-skins had not been water-tight. Of the other boats only two were visible, and it was splendid to see how they rose out of one sea, until half the length of their keels were visible, then buried their noses in the next, while great sheets of foam splashed on either side, and were torn into shreds by the gale.

“This is rather lively work, I should say,” remarked the midshipman. “I think I should prefer a man-of-war to The Cormorant in this sort of weather.”

“I confess to a weakness for Cunarders,” said Harry; “yet I dare say I shall enjoy this affair well enough when we get safely ashore.”

“You mean if we get safely ashore,” said Magnus, quietly. “This has rather an ugly look to me. Though I dare say Grim knows what he is about.”

He had scarcely spoken when a harsh voice bellowed, “Lay hold of the mast, lads!” and in the same moment they seemed to be flung to a dizzying height; a huge wave towered in front, showing a white whirling top which seemed on the point of breaking right over them. They had just time to clasp the mast when the boat, lying flat on her side, pressed down by her weight of canvas, plunged her nose into this mountain of water, but by some astonishing manœuvre righted herself, slid down within another black hollow, and again rose high on the crest of another wave.

“All hands bail!” roared the captain.