Visit to Europe.—Reception in England.—Company in Charge.—Starts for Sweden.—Stockholm.—The Dangerous Ride.—The Severe Cold.—Arrival in Lapland.—First Experience with Canoes and Reindeers.—Becomes a Lapp.—The Extreme North.—The Days without a Sun.—“Yankee Doodle.”—The Return.—Study in Stockholm.—Return to Germany and London.—Embarks for Norway.—Meets his Friend at Christiania.—The Coast of Norway.—The Midnight Sun.—Trip across Norway and Sweden.—Return to Germany. Without bringing the living into a notoriety which they certainly do not seek, and which might be unpleasant for them, we cannot give an extended account of that summer trip of Mr. Taylor and his friends in the countries of Europe, already so familiar to him. He devoted himself to the welfare of his companions, and appeared to enjoy himself exceedingly. England appeared brighter and more attractive than he supposed it possible; and his pleasure in visiting historical places was doubled by the fact that he had others to appreciate and enjoy it with him. His sisters inherited enough of that same instinctive comprehension of vegetable nature, and enough of that fellowship with kindred human nature, to regard the landscapes and the people as he had regarded them, and made, as he wrote to his friends in Philadelphia, wonderfully RUSSIAN SLEDGES. However, the needs of the present crowded out the dreams of the future, as they so often do in the lives of others, and after a delightful summer in the lands he loved, and a visit to those who were now dearer than the most gorgeous landscapes, he determined upon a trip to the frozen regions of Lapland. He undertook that journey with evident reluctance. His communion with the best minds of America and Europe had taught him that of the works which he had published his Hence, that indescribable lack which his readers have so universally found in his books of travels published after that date. He could not rid himself of the burden, nor cease to ponder upon the subjects which seemed worthy of a great poem. Starting from Germany Dec. 1, 1856, and embarking on a steamer which ran between Lubec and Stockholm, he entered upon an undertaking more hazardous and uncomfortable than anything he had ventured upon before. But his experience taught him to fear nothing and to move on so long as any other living The steamer from Lubec was a rough, uncouth, inconvenient craft, and the sea-sick voyage which Mr. Taylor and his friend made to Stockholm was not an auspicious beginning for a tour so long and so dangerous. But he relapsed into his old habit, acquired in Asia, of regarding no delay with surprise or impatience, and refusing to feel certain of anything until he possessed it; and as neither carelessness, neglect, lack of sleep or food was allowed to disturb him, he made the company cheerful under the most distressing circumstances. LAZARETTO CHRISTIANSAND. On his arrival in Stockholm he could not speak a word of the language, and had to depend mostly upon his own common-sense in the selection of an outfit. But his quick ear and tractile tongue soon caught up words and phrases, the meaning of which he learned by their effect when spoken, and when he started northward With the thermometer varying from zero to forty degrees below he traversed the wildest part of Lapland, At Kautockeino, far beyond the Arctic Circle, he found friends, through the letter of a mutual acquaintance, and recorded with his usual kindness of heart, how good and how generous they were to him. There, too, he saw the day without a sunrise, which he had promised himself to see, and his description of the white earth, the blue sky, the saffron and orange flushes of the morning, and the crimson glow of the evening, all combined in a few moments of time as the sun approached the line of the horizon and sank again without peeping over it, is one of the most charming and graphic paragraphs to be found in literature. There, too, he saw the moon wheel through her entire circuit, without a rising and without a setting. There he made sketches of the dwellings and the people which, after so much practice, he was able to take in a very accurate and artistic manner, and which served afterwards for illustrations in the pages of a magazine. There he met a Lapp by the name of “Lars,” and meeting the name often afterwards, suggested the name for that poem of “Lars,” now as popular in Norway as in the United States. There, in that extreme north, in the house of a native missionary, he found a piano, and was half beside himself with joy when the kind-hearted ministers wife played “Yankee Doodle.” She had heard Ole Bull play it at Christiania, and caught the tune in that way. His return to Stockholm was more tedious and dangerous than his northward journey, for the weather was colder and the storms more severe. But his reception at the miserable huts along the route, where he had stopped on his journey northward, was always so hearty and friendly that he felt no longer in a strange land. It was a repetition of his experience elsewhere. He was loved at sight, and has not been forgotten to this day by the humble friends he made. Nothing shows the whole-souled manner in which he threw himself into the feelings and habits of the people, better than the expressions which he used in his letters concerning the scenery. He felt so much like a Swede, that he loved the landscapes with the devotion, of a native. Notwithstanding he had used all the superlative terms which our language furnished, in which to describe the scenery of the tropics, yet there he went further and declares with great enthusiasm, that the South had no such beautiful scenery as the ice-bound forests and mountains of Sweden. To him, when he saw them, there were no landscapes to compare with those before him. The transparent crystals, the purity of the snow, the shape of the half-buried trees, the boundless plains of white, and the gleams of acres of diamonds when the frosty spirals greet the morning sun, all possessed a charm beyond the attractions of any other land, so long as he was their associate. He became a Swede, and knew, when his experience was over, just how a Swede lived and how he felt, what he On his return to Stockholm, February 14, he set about the work of learning the language and literature of the Swedes. For nearly three months he kept close to his books and his practice in the gymnasium, and although it seems almost impossible, it is said by his associates that he could then read fluently any work to be found in the Norse language. He left Stockholm on the 6th of May, taking a steamer for Copenhagen, from which place he purposed to take a steamer for Germany. At Copenhagen he met Hans Christian Andersen, the great Danish poet, by whom Mr. Taylor was received most cordially. Thus, one after another, the great men of the world were added to the list of friends found by this son of an humble American farmer. Andersen afterwards sent Mr. Taylor copies of his poems and essays before they were printed, and in many ways showed his regard for the American poet. There Mr. Taylor met Prof. Rafn, the archÆologist, and Goldschmidt, the author of the “The Jew,” and editor of a magazine. Prof. Rafn, gave Mr. Taylor his initiation into the beauties of Icelandic poetry, for the professor was an earnest admirer of northern lore, and loved to converse with any one who took an interest in it. Ho read some of the verses which he especially admired, for Mr. Taylor’s From Copenhagen Mr. Taylor hurried over to Germany to look after his friends, and after a stay of a few days hastened to London on business connected with his books. He left London about the first of July, after seeing his relatives depart for America, and taking a steamer at Hull, sailed for Christiania in Norway. The steamer stopped at Christiansand, where the rugged, broken promontories loom up so grandly over sea and bay. No harbor is more picturesque than that of Christiansand, and no coast more uneven. Perhaps the best description of the coast from Christiansand to Apendal, given by Mr. Taylor, is to be found in his poem of “Lars,” wherein Lars and his Quaker wife sailed from Hull for Apendal. “Calm autumn skies were o’er them and the sea Swelled in unwrinkled glass: they scarcely knew How sped the voyage until Lindesnaes, At first a cloud, stood fast and spread away To flanking capes, with gaps of blue between; Then rose, and showed, above the precipice, The firs of Norway climbing thick and high To wilder crests that made the inland gloom. In front, the sprinkled skerries pierced the wave; Between then, slowly glided in and out The tawny sails, while houses low and red Hailed their return or sent them fearless forth. ‘This is thy Norway, Lars; it looks like thee,’ Said Ruth: ‘it has a forehead firm and bold: It sets its foot below the reach of storms, Yet hides, methinks, in each retiring vale, Delight in toil, contentment, love, and peace.’” “‘To starboard, yonder lies the isle As I described it; here, upon our lee Is mainland all, and there the Nid comes down, The timber-shouldering Nid, from endless woods And wilder valleys where scant grain is grown. Now bend your glances as my finger points,— Lo, there it is, the spire of Apendal.’” Arrangements had been made with his intimate German friend, whom he first met in Egypt, and in whom Mr. Taylor then took such a deep interest, to meet him at the hotel in Christiania, from which place they purposed to start on a trip overland through Norway to Drontheim, and from that city by steamer to the northern capes of Norway, where the summer sun did not rise or set. Another “sacred triad” was formed—one German and two Americans—equally fortunate and equally pleasant with the former triad in Egypt. Their course lay through the rugged and drear landscape of Southern Norway, and at the time they made their journey the sky was overcast and the air loaded with moisture, giving every bleak cliff a bleaker appearance, and every barren waste a gloomier aspect. With all his poetical nature, Mr. Taylor did not find much to admire on his way to Drontheim. His sympathy was aroused for the poor farmers who dwell in such a solitude as seemed to envelop the land, and he was glad From Drontheim they sailed by the Hammerfest line on the 18th of July, following the coast so noted for its fantastic crags and startling cliffs. The coast scenery from Drontheim to Hammerfest is unquestionably the most broken and grand in the world. Its black towers, enormous arches, gigantic peaks, and resounding caverns excel anything in the way of sombre grandeur that travellers elsewhere have described. As they approached the Arctic Circle the mountains became capped with snow, and chilly winds blew off the land, and the days became so long that the evening and the morning succeeded each other with but an intervening twilight. Gradually the midnights grew brighter until, as they proceeded round the North Cape, the sun shone in all its splendor throughout the twenty-four hours. After several days spent in visiting the small fishing villages along the northern coast, they again turned southward and disembarked at Drontheim, from which place they took passage to Bergen. From Bergen they travelled on horseback and by boats, over the interior lakes to Christiania, and from that city through the interior of Wermeland and Delecarlia to Stockholm, where they arrived about the middle of September. There Mr. Taylor remained long enough to call on many of the friends whom he had made during the previous winter, and then the “triad” departed for Berlin and Gotha. |