Unto A Good Land

I. A SHIP UNLOADS HER CARGO

— 1—

On the elongated island of Manhattan, in the Hudson River, the largest city in North America had sprung up, already inhabited by half a million people. Like an immense hippopotamus resting immobile in his element, Manhattan sprawled in the water, at the mouth of the Hudson. The hippopotamus turned his head toward the Atlantic, and back of his enormous snout lay the piers of the East River, where ships with emigrants from the Old World tied up.

On June 23, 1850, there arrived in the port of New York the brig Charlotta of Karlshamn — Christian Lorentz, Captain — carrying seventy passengers, emigrants from Sweden, nearly all of whom were farmers with their families. The Charlotta was several weeks overdue, delayed by contrary weather; this arrival completed her seventh voyage as an emigrant vessel. The brig tied up at the East River pier between a tall, coffin-shaped English bark and a low Norwegian schooner heavily loaded with iron. Besides the human cargo in her hold, the Charlotta also had pig iron and sundry items of freight.

One of Captain Lorentz’s first errands on American soil was to change his passengers’ money. During the last days of the voyage he had collected the emigrants’ cash and, carrying a leather sack, he now went to a bank on Wall Street to exchange Swedish daler and shillings for American dollars and cents. He did not accept paper money, only gold and silver coin; he knew nothing for sure about American bills, except that their value never was the same as the amount printed on them.

Sweating and puffing in the intense heat, he returned to his ship. Captain Lorentz had been in New York port during every season of the year; he was familiar with all North American weathers and disliked them all; this summer heat he abhorred. Down here by the docks there was at least some breeze from the Atlantic, but in the Charlotta’s hold the air was unbearably oppressive. To be tied up near Manhattan this time of year was one of his most distasteful duties as ship’s commander.

In his tiny cabin the captain pulled out the passenger list. After each name he had noted the sum entrusted to him, and now he must figure out how much each passenger was to receive in American money. It was an annoying chore, a chore for shop clerks. He was not a counting man, he was a seaman; but a captain on an emigrant vessel apparently must also be a scrivener and a money-changer. Like a father with his children, he must look after his passengers and see to it that they weren’t cheated or robbed.

And having sailed these Swedish peasants across the ocean from one continent to another, Captain Lorentz now felt so great a responsibility for them he wouldn’t even leave them to shift for themselves after they had landed. Hardly had his ship tied up at the pier when all those who made their living from the simplicity and inexperience of immigrants flocked around the gangplank like rapacious dogs at slaughter time. These runners and grafters and brokers, and whatever they were called in the language of this new country, watched for every newly arrived ship. There were agents from freight companies which the captain knew were fraudulent; there were men from taverns and quarters of ill repute; well-fed and well-dressed men in funny little round caps with large visors; lazy men who avoided honest work and whose presence was repugnant to Captain Lorentz. He would always place an armed guard at the gangplank to keep such rascals off his ship, for once on board they would steal all they could lay hands on, down to a single nail or a piece of rope. The rogues came from all lands, but they preferred to rob their own countrymen. By talking the language of new arrivals they gained their confidence and made easy victims of them. All European nationalities, it seemed, plundered and defrauded each other here on American shores: English robbed the English, Irish swindled the Irish, Germans preyed on Germans — while Americans plundered the immigrants from all countries, regardless of nationality. In this respect at least, thought the captain, the Americans honored equality among men.

The authorities in New York were too lenient. Lost and unsuspicious immigrants enjoyed no protection against the scoundrels lurking at the landings.¹

The passenger list stuck to Captain Lorentz’s rough, sweaty hands. His brain worked sluggishly in the infernal heat, and he lost himself in numbers as he figured daler into dollars. He was looking forward to evening, when he hoped to enjoy his supper and cellar-cool ale at Castle Garden. This tavern was conveniently close by, and it was the best eating place he knew of in New York — though not up to his standard in other ports. Its fare might do for the rich New York swine breeders who usually gathered there, but a man who sailed to Marseille, Bordeaux, and Barcelona had his own standards of good food. The Americans had lived such a short time in their country they hadn’t yet learned how to prepare their food properly. There were too many other things to attend to. For example, they were said to be particularly good at building churches; he had heard New York alone had a hundred and fifteen of them. And he recalled what he once had read in a book by a famous Frenchman: The French had one hundred different sauces, but only one religion, whereas the Americans had a hundred different religions, but only one sauce. Captain Lorentz had, unfortunately, not yet had the pleasure of tasting this sauce.

He could never reconcile himself to the strange customs and ideas he met in North America. Here people of many races mixed, and the classes were so turned about that one couldn’t tell which were the upper and which the lower. Lowly people considered themselves changed when they landed on American shores; they thought themselves equal to those of high birth and position. Every farm hand and servant wench assumed a conceited, disobedient, insolent attitude. Several times it had happened that able-bodied men of his crew had become so arrogant that they had boldly broken their contracts with him and had simply remained in America. Here, respect for authority and masters was disregarded, and consequently, the servant class was ruined. Here all felt at home, even those who smeared pork grease over their faces while eating, not yet having learned the use of a napkin.

The Charlotta’s captain counted and wrote numbers, and the sweat from his face dripped onto his paper. For each passenger he must deduct the landing fee — two dollars and a half — which must be paid to the city treasurer immediately on arrival; Captain Lorentz must rob each one of these poor devils of six riksdaler and twelve shillings. The emigrants themselves certainly needed every penny, but the money went to the lean purse of New York — which no doubt also could use it. Here landed thousands of impoverished wretches, and when completely destitute, they were forced to remain in the harbor until provided for by that lean purse. Europe emptied her workhouses and literally shoveled the inmates over onto America; how long would the Americans meekly accept these discards from the Old World?

Including these passengers on his latest voyage, Captain Lorentz had sailed five hundred of Sweden’s inhabitants to North America. A whole little town his brig had moved across the world ocean. Which one of the two countries ought to be more grateful to the Charlotta and her commander — the kingdom of Sweden or the North American Republic? Sweden got rid of her religious fanatics and other troublesome, law-breaking citizens, but at the same time she lost many useful and capable men. On every voyage, the Charlotta’s human cargo was nine-tenths thrifty peasants. The lazy and useless ones, the rogues and the deserters, came mostly from other countries, on other ships. Also, of course, many enterprising Europeans found their way to New York; the captain had heard of some who immediately on arrival bought trunkfuls of guns and continued westward to seek a new way of living.

The gentlemen from the Commissioners of Emigration who pried about his ship as soon as it docked used to say that the North American Republic wanted healthy, work-willing, moral immigrants. But no one prevented the sick, lazy, immoral ones from landing, as long as they could walk ashore. The captain was responsible only for the incurably sick and was required to put up a bond. This time, he had to confess, the Charlotta’s living cargo was badly damaged by seasickness, and scurvy too, after ten stormy weeks at sea. Some of his passengers, during their first weeks in America, would no doubt be unable either to work or to lead immoral lives.

And this time, on arrival in port, Captain Lorentz had been met by a new proclamation: Captains carrying passengers must keep them on board for three days after docking.

The Charlotta’s gangplank was already lowered, and some of her passengers had gone ashore when the health officer arrived with the new order and sent them back aboard. His question indicated how things stood: Had there been cholera on board the Charlotta?

New York again was seized by the fear of cholera. Last summer the epidemic had frightened the inhabitants out of town, and this year, with the intense heat, it had flared up again. The authorities thought cholera was brought by emigrant ships from the Old World, and now every ship from a foreign port must be carefully inspected by health officers before the passengers were allowed to step onto American soil.

Crossed-out names on the Charlotta’s passenger list indicated to the inspector that eight passengers had been buried at sea, but Captain Lorentz could assure him with a clear conscience that none had died of cholera. He once had had that Eastern pestilence on board his ship, and he knew well the signs of the sickness: severe diarrhea, violent vomiting, and a thirst which burned like fire. But his passengers on this voyage had been free from these symptoms. And the inspector himself looked at those still sick and ascertained that the Swedish brig was not bringing cholera to New York. But he warned about an English merchantman, the bark Isaac Webb of Liverpool, arriving the same day as the Charlotta; on this ship the Oriental pest had raged so horribly that seventy-seven of the passengers had died.

Yes, Captain Lorentz had always known it, human beings were the most annoying and unhealthy cargo in the world.

There were now many additional troubles and complications in getting rid of this cargo. He must keep the passengers on board for another three days, for which he would receive no thanks from those crowded into the hold in this heat. Fortunately, now as always, the sick got well as soon as it was time to land; even the weakest wanted to look their best. Only one passenger caused him real worry and concern, a sixty-five-year-old farm wife from Öland. He had expected her to die before they reached port, he had been so sure of it he had made a mark after her name — like a small cross. He noticed it now as he read the passenger list: Fina-Kajsa Andersdotter. She had become a widow on the North Sea, where he had read the funeral service over her husband. The old woman was so weak from scurvy he had not believed she could survive. If she now were to be taken from ship to hospital, the commander of the Charlotta must post a bond of three hundred dollars with the mayor of New York.

Why in hell would a farm woman go out to sea at such an age? Why should the shipping company be expected to pay three hundred dollars for an old, worn-out hag-body? One way to avoid the bond, perhaps, would be to keep her on board as long as the brig remained in port. While they unloaded the pig iron and other freight, the old woman would no doubt die, and then the health officer would come and fetch the corpse, and the captain wouldn’t even have to think about the funeral.

It was always easier to get rid of dead cargo than living.

— 2—

The passengers were now coming to the cabin to collect their money. A tall, husky man hit his forehead against the cabin ceiling as he came down the ladder. The captain said, “Look out for your skull! You might need it in America.”

An unusually large nose protruded from the man’s face; Captain Lorentz need not ask the name of this farmer, he remembered him well. One night during the voyage — while the worst tempest was raging — he had stanched a hemorrhage for this man’s wife. The peasant had thanked him and said that his wife owed her life to the Charlotta’s captain.

He consulted the passenger list: “Karl Oskar Nilsson. Paid 515 rdr. bko.”

At the exchange rate of one dollar for each two and a half daler, the farmer had two hundred and six dollars coming to him. But from this sum the captain must deduct the exchange fee and the landing fees for man, wife, brother, and three children.

He told the farmer, “You have to pay thirty-seven and a half daler for six people.”

“Is that the entrance fee to America?”

“We might call it that. There is also the exchange fee. Four dollars — that is, ten daler.”

Lorentz counted and deducted: Balance to pay — a hundred and eighty-seven dollars. He counted out this sum in twenty-, ten-, and one-dollar coins, gold and silver, which he gave to the young farmer, who himself counted the money slowly and carefully. Then he put the coins, one at a time, into a homemade sheepskin belt which he carried around his waist under his shirt. The captain gave the hiding place a nod of approval.

The big-nosed farmer, having received his money, still remained standing in the cabin.

“Do you think you’ve been cheated in the exchange?” the captain asked.

“No. No, it isn’t that. But I would like to ask you about something, Mr. Captain.”

“Yes?”

Karl Oskar Nilsson continued: There were fifteen of them, eight full grown and seven children, all from Ljuder Parish in Småland, who had undertaken the voyage together to this new country. Now they had been delayed at sea, the summer was already far advanced, and they were anxious to reach their destination as soon as possible, so as to be able to find land and get something planted before winter set in. All of those from Ljuder Parish intended to go to Minnesota, where land was said to be reasonably priced for people with little money. Now they wanted to continue their journey without delay; would the captain be kind enough to advise them how to get started inland?

“Have you any definite place in mind?”

“Yes. Here is the name.”

From his purse Karl Oskar took out a soiled, worn piece of paper, once part of an envelope:

Mister Anders Månsson.

Taylors Falls Påst Offis

Minnesota Territory

North-America.

“Who gave you this address?” asked the captain.

“An old woman on board the ship. Månsson is her son. She’s going to him and we’ll all be in the same company; they say there’s good land where her son lives.”

“You rely on the woman? What’s her name?”

“Fina-Kajsa. She is from Öland; her husband died in the first storm.”

Captain Lorentz suddenly straightened. “You mean the old woman who is so sick?”

“She is better now, she says; she feels so well in her body she’ll be able to go with the rest of us.”

“Then you’ll take the old woman in your company and be responsible for her?”

“Yes. She has money for her journey. And we’ll look after her as best we can. When we get there, perhaps her son will help us find land.”

The captain’s face had suddenly lightened; it was not the first time Providence had helped him out of a difficult dilemma. This time, apparently, Providence had chosen the farmer to get him out of his difficulty with Fina-Kajsa Andersdotter, and thus save his company three hundred dollars.

He handed the important piece of paper back to Karl Oskar.

“It’s a long way to the territory of Minnesota. About fifteen hundred English miles, I believe.”

“Is it so. . so. . far away?” Karl Oskar’s face fell, and he scratched his head with its unkempt hair, yellow as barley straw, grown very long during the voyage from Sweden.

“Of course, it’s only two hundred and fifty Swedish miles,” the captain hastened to assure him. He did not wish to frighten the farmer by dwelling on the journey’s length, but rather to encourage him to undertake it. He continued: Every time he had transported farmers in search of land he had advised them to go as deep as possible into America; the farther west they went, the richer the soil was, and the broader were the regions to choose from. Most of the distance they could travel on river steamboats.

“Two hundred and fifty miles! It isn’t exactly next door.”

The infinitely long road which had worried Karl Oskar at first had shrunk to one-sixth, but it was still two hundred and fifty times the distance from Korpamoen to Ljuder church. He thought to himself, he must be careful how he spoke of the distance to others in his company; it might dishearten them.

“I will arrange the contract for the journey,” Captain Lorentz assured him. “Including the Widow Andersdotter, there will be sixteen in your company?”

Karl Oskar had never seen this taciturn, unobliging man so talkative and willing to help as he was today. The captain spoke almost as to an equal: Yes, he often arranged contracts with honest companies for transportation inland. His conscience bade him help immigrants leave New York as soon as possible; they couldn’t stay here in the harbor, they couldn’t settle in Battery Park. And he knew an honest Swedish man in New York whom he often asked to guide the immigrants and act as their interpreter. The man’s name was Landberg, he had once been carpenter on this very ship, the best carpenter Lorentz had ever had. But several years ago, when the captain was transporting a group of religious fanatics from Helsingland, followers of the widely known prophet Erik Janson, Landberg had been so taken by their religion that he had left the ship in New York and joined the group. After half a year, Landberg had lost faith in the prophet, who had plundered him. The poor man had been forced to flee from Janson’s tyranny penniless and practically naked. Landberg now earned his living by acting as interpreter and guide for Swedish immigrants. He spoke English fluendy, and it was Captain Lorentz’s custom to send for him as soon as the ship docked in New York. This time also he had notified the one-time carpenter, and Landberg had been given a pass by the health officer to come aboard the brig.

“How much would the interpreter cost?” Karl Oskar asked.

“It depends on the distance he must accompany you. I believe he charges three dollars for each grown person as far as Chicago.”

“Hmm. . Well, we can’t manage by ourselves. None of us can speak this tongue.”

The captain thought, to leave these poor, helpless peasants to shift for themselves would be almost like driving a flock of sheep into a forest full of wolves. He said, “If you would like speedy transport inland, you must take the steam wagon from Albany. Landberg will get contracts with all the companies concerned.”

“Thank you, Captain, for your great help.”

It had been reported to the captain during the voyage that this big-nosed peasant had been dissatisfied with his quarters, had complained of the small ration of water, and had been insubordinate to the ship’s officers. But Lorentz no longer disliked the man: Karl Oskar undoubtedly had a good head; and then, he was the tool of Providence.

“. . And you think the old woman is strong enough to be moved?”

“She says she is. She was on her feet again today.”

It was indeed strange; a few days ago the Widow Andersdotter had been shaking in every limb with the ague, fallen off to the very bones from diarrhea. But such miraculous recoveries had happened before, and even though Lorentz had little use for the customs of the North American Republic, he had to admit that the mere sight of the country worked like magic on people; one day they were lying in their bunks sighing and crying and ready to die, unable to lift head from pillow, and the next day they were on their feet again. When semi-corpses saw the shores of America, they returned to life.

— 3—

As Karl Oskar felt the new money in his belt, it seemed to him that a hundred and eighty-seven dollars was a poor exchange for five hundred and fifteen daler. His property had somehow shrunk on his arrival in America. And what he now carried in his belt was all he and his family owned in worldly possessions; it was all they could rely on for their future security.

He went to tell his fellow passengers that the captain would arrange for their continued journey; all were anxious to get away from the crowded ship’s quarters and were disturbed over the delay on board.

On the deck he met Jonas Petter of Hästebäck, the oldest one in their company; he should really have been the one to plan the journey, to act as leader for the group, rather than Karl Oskar.

“Ulrika is stirring up the women,” Jonas Petter told him.

On the foredeck, next to the watchman whose duty it was to prevent anyone from going ashore, stood unmarried Ulrika of Västergöhl, the Glad One, talking to a group of women, gesticulating wildly, loud, upset.

“She insists our captain is a slave trader,” Jonas Petter said.

What had the Glad One started now? Karl Oskar had long been afraid she might bring shame on their company.

He went to Ulrika; her cheeks were blossoming red and her voice was husky with anger.

“So it’s you, Karl Oskar! Now I’ve found out the truth! Now I know why they won’t let us land!”

“It’s because of the cholera,” said Karl Oskar.

“No, it’s not! It’s the captain! He keeps us confined here because he is going to hold an auction and sell us! He is going to sell us as slaves to the Americans!”

The women around Ulrika listened fearfully. They might have been listening to the auctioneer she predicted calling for bids on them; one woman had folded her hands as if praying God for help.

Karl Oskar seized Ulrika by the arm. “Come and let’s talk alone.” He pulled her away from the others and they walked over to the mainmast.

“Don’t spread such lies,” he warned her. “You might have to pay for it.”

“It’s the truth,” insisted Ulrika. “We’ve been swindled! We are to be sold on arrival — that’s why the captain keeps us penned in on the ship!”

“What fool has put such ideas into your head?”

“You don’t have to believe me if you don’t want to. But I’m going to run away; I’m not going to stay here and be sold as a slave!”

Ulrika’s eyes were flashing. As a little girl in Sweden she had been sold, she knew what it meant; she had been a four-year-old orphan when she was sold at auction, to the lowest bidder. The one who had offered to take her and bring her up for eight daler a year had been a peasant in Alarum, and he had raped her when she was fourteen. The only difference between Sweden and America was that in this new country you were sold to the highest bidder, instead of the lowest; perhaps it might be considered more flattering to be sold to a high bidder, but nevertheless she would have nothing to do with it; she had left that hellhole Sweden to get freedom in America. Now she was going to take her daughter with her and escape from the ship.

“But this is a lie!” exclaimed Karl Oskar. “The captain is not a slave trader.”

“Ask your brother if you don’t believe me! He is the one who told my daughter.”

“Robert? What do you mean?”

“I’ll fetch him. Then you can hear for yourself.” And Ulrika of Västergöhl hastened to find her daughter Elin and Robert, Karl Oskar’s younger brother, dragging them with her as she returned.

“Now tell Karl Oskar what you heard!” she demanded.

Elin looked trustingly from her mother to Karl Oskar. “Robert said the captain is keeping us on board until he gets permission to sell us to the Americans.”

The youth looked reproachfully at Elin. “I only said one of the crew told me so.”

Karl Oskar turned sternly toward his brother: “Now, tell the whole truth!”

Robert’s jaw fell in embarrassment and he looked down at the worn and splintered deck: he had asked one of the seamen why they weren’t allowed to land, and the man had said they must stay until the Americans came and got them; they were to be sold at auction. Last voyage, he said, the captain had sold all the passengers to the Turkish Infidel for ten thousand dollars; this time, he didn’t wish to rush things, and that was why he kept them aboard. Last time he had sold everyone except two old, worn-out hags who couldn’t be used for work or aught else. And no complaints had been raised, for no one had had any relatives in America on whom he could call for help.

The seaman had said he was telling all this to Robert because the captain had refused to share his ten thousand dollars with the crew. The seaman was angry that he couldn’t share in the profits from the slave trade in New York, and that was why he had warned Robert and other passengers to get away from the ship before the auction was advertised.

Robert admitted he had not believed the seaman; if the captain wanted to sell people to the Infidel, he would undoubtedly have sailed to Turkey, where the Infidel lived, and not to North America. There was no sense in shipping people back and forth across the Atlantic. Moreover, Robert knew from a book he owned—Description of the United States of North America—that it was forbidden to sell white-skinned people as slaves; a person had to have curly hair, and black skin to boot, before he was allowed to be sold.

Robert had told the seaman’s story to Elin only because it struck him as funny.

“But you didn’t say it was a lie,” Elin protested.

“I thought you would know I wasn’t serious,” Robert explained in embarrassment.

Thus Karl Oskar killed the rumor. And he urged Ulrika to quiet the anxiety she had aroused in the other gullible women. Neither she nor anyone else on board need fear slave chains or sale at auction in North America. The captain was an honest man who was doing all he could to help them, he had even promised to help them get started on their way inland.

Ulrika now turned her anger on Robert: “You brat! You’re responsible for this! Karl Oskar, better keep your brother in line from now on.”

And Robert was severely reprimanded by Karl Oskar for sowing lies in the mind of a credulous girl. Suppose these stories reached the captain; then there would be trouble. Now they must go and find the man who had started the rumor.

“He isn’t on the ship any longer,” Robert said hastily.

“You just come and show me the liar!”

“I can’t find him. They say he has run away.”

Karl Oskar gave his brother a stern look; it had happened before that Robert had been caught in a lie, and it did seem strange that the man had vanished. But this time Karl Oskar let Robert off with a strong warning: If he didn’t stick to the truth he might get himself and others into great danger. He was now seventeen years old and he must begin to have some sense of responsibility; he must remember that here in a foreign land unknown dangers awaited them.

Robert felt he had been betrayed by Elin. He had told her this story about the slave trade in strict confidence. The way it had happened was this: Not far from the ship stretched a park, a real manor-house park, with tall, green, thick trees, below which lay cool shadows. But Robert was not allowed to go there, he must remain here, on this rotten ship, in the burning sun. So he had just had to talk to someone to make the time pass more quickly. This he could not explain to his older brother, but he thought Elin might have understood. He certainly would tell her no more stories if she must run to her mother and repeat them.

— 4—

The Charlotta’s ex-carpenter entered Captain Lorentz’s cabin, stooping so as not to hit his head against the low ceiling. Long Landberg, as he was usually called, was the tallest man ever to sign on this vessel — almost seven feet. His lengthy arms hung loosely against his narrow body. A well-trimmed full beard half hid his healthy smile.

The captain greeted him with a warm handshake. “Any news since last time? This infernal heat is the same.” He could easily see that the man he had sent for was eager to unburden himself, and even before Landberg sat down he began: “Yes, I have news this time. You haven’t heard, then, Mr. Captain? Wheat-flour Jesus is dead!”

Lorentz stared at him.

“Yes, it’s true. Wheat-flour Jesus was murdered. Last month.”

“Whom are you talking about, Landberg?”

“Erik Janson, of course. A prophet even in the old country, where he traveled about and sold wheat flour. That’s why they called him Wheat-flour Jesus.”

“The prophet Janson? Murdered?”

“Yea. He was shot like a dog at Cambridge, in the court where he had brought suit. The defendant shot him.”

The captain was not surprised by the news. He thought he had some knowledge of the handling of legal matters in this country. Perhaps, tacked to the wall of the courtroom, was the same notice he had seen in a saloon in New York: “Shoot first! Live longer!”

But he realized that the Charlotta’s old carpenter was much excited by the happening.

Long Landberg, the apostate, continued: Erik Janson was the worst scoundrel ever to tramp the ground of North America. Landberg had seen him daily during many months and he knew the prophet’s creed. Janson called himself the new Christ and had chosen as his apostles twelve befuddled louts whom he kept in attendance, like a tyrant king. Indeed, he had been a cruel tyrant to his followers, plaguing them enough to make angels weep, if there were tears in heaven. No doctor was called for the sick; when one of the disciples lay at death’s door, unable to move toe or finger, Janson ordered him to rise up and be healthy, and if the sick one could not, Janson condemned him for sin and lack of faith. Janson, of course, was free from sin and righteous in all ways.

Once, Landberg had defended some poor sick sectarians against this tyranny, with the result that Janson had seized everything he owned, including most of his clothes. Without means, he had been unable to bring suit against the prophet. Janson had said that he was equal with God. . Well, the fact was, humanity could thank the man who had shot Wheat-flour Jesus; through this splendid deed he had freed North America from a beast. Janson, a raw, presumptuous peasant boor! Yes, said Landberg, he even looked like the Evil One, his teeth were like tusks, no doubt he was possessed by an evil spirit and had been sent into the world by the devil.

Captain Lorentz, when he had transported some of Janson’s followers, had heard them speak of their leader as a Heavenly Light, lit for them in the dark heathen land of Sweden. They had been honest in their faith; to them he had been the returned Christ. And now, after his murder, they would undoubtedly say that, like Christ, he had sealed his religion and faith with his blood.

Was Erik Janson sent by God or by the devil? Perhaps by neither; who could tell? One had to be satisfied that God Himself knew.

Now Lorentz asked his former carpenter how things were with these sectarians; how were they getting along in that vast prairie land of Illinois where he had heard they were settled?

“Janson said he founded a new Jerusalem,” Landberg retorted with derision. “But the fact is, he founded a new hell.”

It was true that the community which Janson had built and named Bishop Hill, after his home parish Biskopskulla, had been called Bishop Hell by the Americans, and letters so addressed had reached their destination. But the Janson followers, Landberg admitted, were fine, industrious farmers; they had greatly improved their situation; no longer did they live like beasts in earth huts, but had built themselves houses of bricks, which they made. Nor were bricks the only things they made: though in Sweden they had been temperance people, in Bishop Hill they had built a still, operated by steam and capable of making three hundred gallons of brännvin a day. When they got drunk, they blamed this on the Holy Ghost “filling them,” as they called it.

Last spring the sectarians had sent a group of their men to California to dig for gold in the name of God. Even two of their apostles had been sent. Could anyone imagine Saint Peter or Saint Paul digging for gold? But Janson did not seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; he was said to have grown so rich that he had the tusks pulled out of his evil mouth and replaced by pure gold. Could a mortal here on earth descend to lower depths of vanity and conceit?

Landberg continued: The people in Bishop Hill believed Erik Janson would rise from the dead in the same manner as his predecessor, Christ. They went about their chores now, making their brick, distilling their brännvin, while waiting for their master’s return. Jesus arose on the third day, but six weeks had already elapsed since Janson was shot, and nothing had been heard from him so far as anyone knew.

And this much Landberg said he wished to add: Should Wheat-flour Jesus return to the American continent alive, there were many who would be glad to shoot him a second time.

Captain Lorentz thought to himself, Janson had undoubtedly been in many ways a fine man. But he realized how important it was for Landberg to give vent to his feelings, so he had not interrupted him. Now he returned to their business at hand: “Now you must again help me unload my human cargo.”

“Gladly, Captain. I am free at present.”

Landberg was pleased to get a new commission; his income had been poor lately, since no emigrant ship had arrived from Sweden for some time. For a while he had helped English captains. But most immigrants this year were German or Irish. If only he had known German, then his income would have been better. It was hard this year to earn an honest living, he told the captain. The swindlers and the runners were as fast as ever, but an honest agent was recognized by all captains: a thin man!

“And tall as a mast,” added Captain Lorentz.

“Precisely, Captain! And how large is the cargo this time?”

“Seventy. Most of them are going inland.”

“Fine. The immigrant transfer, Isaac Newton, runs now every second day up the Hudson to Albany.”

The two men began to go over the list of passengers and their destinations. While so occupied, Landberg remembered that he had a message to the captain from a well-known countryman: The Methodist pastor, Olof Hedström, on the Bethel Ship here in the harbor, sent his greeting and intended to pay a call the following morning.

“Hmm. So Pastor Hedström is still preaching on his old ship. Tell him he is welcome. A fine fellow; he might help the people a great deal.”

Through fortunate circumstances, the Swedish Methodists in New York had been permitted to unrig an old ship and turn it into a church. Lorentz had been on board the Bethel Ship after she had been converted into a God’s House and he had liked it there. Now that the Charlotta was beginning to rot, perhaps some other sect might buy his ship and make a church of her, here in New York Harbor. He mused that it might mark great progress for Christianity if all old, worn-out ships, those nests of sin, could be stripped of their rigging and turned into churches.

Pastor Hedström undoubtedly was coming to invite the immigrants to a sermon and Holy Communion aboard his Bethel Ship. And Lorentz thought he must ask the minister to make it clear to the passengers that he belonged to the Methodist religion before he gave them the Sacrament. After the Charlotta’s previous voyage, some of the Lutheran immigrants had received the Lord’s Supper on the Bethel Ship, and only later had it been made fully clear to them that they had been given the Sacrament by a sectarian minister, a teacher of heresy. They had been thrown into great anguish and fear of eternal judgment; they had prayed to God that He might let them throw up the false tokens of grace, but their prayers had not been heard. Yes, even the souls of the emigrants were the responsibility of the captain of an emigrant ship.

“Yes, my old carpenter — three days from now you’ll get another load of Swedish farmers for the North American Republic.”

And on June 26, early in the morning, when the three-day quarantine was over, the brig Charlotta of Karlshamn could at last discharge her living cargo on the pier near Castle Garden in New York Harbor.

NOTE

1. Not until 1855 was an official reception station for immigrants opened at Castle Garden.

II. BATTERY PARK

After seventy days at sea, the seekers of new homes were again on solid ground — though the restlessness of the Atlantic Ocean remained a while within them. As they set foot once more on the trustworthy, immovable earth, they were well satisfied to part with those great masses of water which the Creator on the Third Day had called Sea, and they blessed in their hearts that dry part which He had called Earth. They gave thanks to the Lord God Who in His mercy had helped the brittle planks to carry them over the terrifying depths to the longed-for harbor.

On an outjutting tongue of land in the East River stood Castle Garden, the old fort, now transformed into an amusement place, and near by, separated from the river piers by a broad walk, Battery Park spread its greenery. This piece of wooded land so near the harbor resounded daily with heavy peasant tramping and foreign tongues. The Old World people, having passed through the portals of the New World, found here their first resting place on American soil. Battery Park was to the immigrants a cool and shaded grove on their day of landing.

Here they sat down and refreshed themselves in the comforting shade of spreading elms and linden trees, here rested side by side men, women, children, and aged ones, surrounded by their possessions — chests, baskets, bags, and bundles, filled with essential belongings. As many knapsacks and bundles as they had been able to carry they had clutched in their hands when walking down the gangplank, holding them so tight that their knuckles whitened, and their cheeks reddened with fear lest hustling foreigners snatch their belongings from them. Never during the whole journey would they leave these important possessions out of sight, these inseparable bed companions during the transport across the ocean.

Rough, broad-shouldered peasants, their faces marked by all the seasons of the year, stood here with hands behind their backs, their eyes appraising the new land. On their bodies hung heavy wadmal clothes, wrinkled and baggy. (These woolen garments — such splendid protection against the bitter cold of the North Sea — were now drenched with sweat and a burden to their wearers on America’s sunny shores.) There was a constrained lust for action in these men’s hard muscles and sinews; their bodies were power restrained. Crowded in narrow ship’s space for many weeks, their hands had had no chores to perform. They had arrived on a new continent anxious to resume accustomed duties, their hands eager to hold the familiar ox thongs and plow handles. Their hands possessed much knowledge, acquired from childhood, inherited through centuries. When now again they stood on solid ground, they felt the lust for work spring up after the painful time of inactivity. But yet a while must their forced rest last, yet a while must they carry their hands behind their backs.

Mothers sat leaning against tree trunks in the park, feeding their babies from the breast; the women emptied their scrawny breasts without filling the stomachs of their babies. The milk gave out long before the babies’ hunger, and the little ones cried and fretted, irritated by the heat and discomfort of the heavy woolen garments in which they were bundled. And the mothers rocked their children on their knees — mother-love’s cradle, the softest and most comfortable cradle on earth — and tried to lull them to sleep. But the babies whimpered, they wanted to stay awake; now that their eyes saw for the first time the land their parents had chosen for them, it seemed as if they wanted to take in everything; this was the land where they were to grow up, the land that was to be their home.

A five-year-old boy, wrapped in a coat that hung to his ankles, sat on his haunches in the grass, chewing a crust of rye bread, a coarse, dark loaf; spots of mildew testified to the fact that this bread had not been baked yesterday, nor on this continent; it came from an old oven in a hidden, stony part of Europe. The boy chewed ravenously and swallowed with determination; the bread in his hand disappeared until only a few crumbs were left; these he tossed into his mouth. The loaf was finished but his hunger remained, and the child looked questioningly at his empty hand: Why did food end before hunger? Mother said: “It is the last loaf I have, the last one from home; now you will never get any more bread from home.” And the boy pondered this. . Why no more bread from home?

In Battery Park the immigrants took stock of their food baskets; they counted their loaves of bread and scraped away the mildew; many were those who ate their last slice in confidence that the soil of the new country would feed them from now on.

An even stream of people moved along the river road which separated Battery Park from Castle Garden: these were the inhabitants of New York, the people who lived in the greatest city of North America. Here walked leisurely men in tall, black hats, dressed in tail coats and tight-fitting trousers which enclosed their legs almost like cloth skin. Here walked women in bonnets and tightly laced waists from which hung skirts of generous proportions, reaching the ground. Others had skirts spread out like birds’ beautiful tail feathers, and of all colors: red, white, green, and gold; checkered skirts, polka-dotted and striped. Over their heads the women held parasols in bright colors, like small-paned canopies of heaven. The men carried Spanish canes.

The walkers paid no attention to the people camping in Battery Park. The appearance of immigrants under the trees in the park was neither new nor unusual — they saw immigrants almost every day when walking along the river. Shiploads of immigrants arrived daily and would continue to arrive; the people landed, waited in Battery Park for inland transportation, moved on and were gone. A new group arrived in their place — new people gathered here constantly, waiting under the trees. This was the endless train of aliens, outsiders; the immigrants were one of the permanent sights for promenading New Yorkers; they would always be there, they were part of the park, they belonged to it, like the leaves on the trees and the grass on the ground. The immigrants, it seemed, would always wait there, under the trees in Battery Park.

The immigrants came from places where they knew everyone and were known; they had seldom seen a stranger. Now they had arrived in a land where everyone was a stranger; the inhabitants of New York were a new and strange sight to the immigrants. The people in the park looked at the stream of people on the road: the newly arrived looked at those who were established here; these were the Americans, settled, comfortable, having found their place in the new land, able to move unhindered, walking in security, free of worries, and able to speak to any one they met. The immigrants were strayed wanderers, seeking a place to live and work; the others had found what they were seeking; the homeless observed those who had homes.

The home seekers stopped a moment in Battery Park, alien, confused, bewildered, insecure. They were overtaken by surprise at their first meeting with the unknown country. But they were to participate in the breaking of the land and the changing of the character of the country they had just entered, these waiting here in the cool grove on the East River.

III. MILK AND WHITE BREAD

— 1—

The day they left Sweden the emigrants from Ljuder Parish had counted sixteen in their group. For one of them a watery grave had opened during the voyage, but as Fina-Kajsa from Öland had joined their company, they were still sixteen when they gathered together on the American shore in Battery Park.

Danjel Andreasson of Kärragärde sat by himself, a little to the side of the others, next to his America chest. He was reading in his psalmbook, his head was bent down, and his bushy, brown beard swept the book, open at Hymn 344—”At the Death of a Mate.” A dried flower, a reseda, lay as bookmark between the leaves; it had grown in the flower bed at home, cared for and tended by his wife. The page with the psalm was badly worn from much use.

O Death, why hast thou snatched away

My bosom Love from me?

In sorrow and despair I pray,

But comfort flees from me. .

Danjel Andreasson had arrived in the new land to which the Lord had guided him with four motherless little children. He had lost Inga-Lena, his dear wife and earthly helpmate; the Lord had stricken him and trampled on him; he was now only a wretched human worm, wriggling under the heel of the Lord.

He had searched his inner self and arrived at a new understanding: he had sinned the sin of self-righteousness. In his presumption he had considered himself better than others and had believed that his sins once and for all had been washed away and tied up in Christ’s napkin cloth that bound His head at burial. He had held himself righteous, unable to sin any more. But on the ship, as he had lain in all his wretchedness covered with his vomit, listening to the tempest and feeling the depths below him, he had learned that he had been found wanting in the eyes of the Lord.

In his vanity he had believed that when he reached the harbor he would be able to praise God in the foreign language; in his conceit he had considered himself an equal of Christ’s apostles who were visited by the Holy Ghost on the first Whitsuntide, and he had thought that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit would take place in him so that he would be able to use the American tongue. His Creator had already given him a speaking tongue, and this in itself was so great a miracle that it was presumptuous to expect God to give him the ability to use this tongue for all languages.

Sitting here now, he heard the buzz of this foreign language which he had expected his ears to understand and his tongue to imitate. But his ears recognized no sounds and his tongue remained dumb. The words of the language he heard did not reach him, he could not use them in his mouth. No outpouring of the Spirit filled him, no cloven tongues appeared, no visions were seen. He could not prophesy in the new language; his ears were closed and his tongue lame.

Danjel Andreasson entered North America a mute and lost stranger among all other strangers in this multitude of people, races, and tribes here gathered. Once, in Babel, the Lord had confused human language so that men could not understand one another; because each was a sinner, his tongue was capable of his native language only. And because Danjel had thought himself righteous, the Holy Ghost had failed him in the new land; he was not worthy of spiritual outpouring.

Danjel was stricken to the earth, God had chastised him, left him naked in all his frailty and faults. He beheld one vision only, a terrifying one: Man was smaller than the worm, because he was the food for worms — he, Danjel Andreasson of Kärragärde, was food for crawling creatures of the earth.

Once he had conceived this picture of himself, he ceased to explain God’s word to his fellow travelers on the ship; how could he explain Holy Writ when he hadn’t rightly understood it? How could he advise and admonish others when he himself had committed the grossest of sins? How could he be a spiritual guide for others if he were unable to guide his own soul?

“At the Death of a Mate”—Danjel knew this hymn by heart and he closed the book and laid it on the ground. Then he knelt down and folded his hands over the lid of his America chest: “In Thy presence, Father in Heaven, I crawl in the dust.”

On the ship Danjel had given a promise to the Lord — he would build an altar of thanks in the new land. The old clothes chest from the loft of Kärragärde became a Lord’s altar on American soil, and next to it now knelt a crushed man, praising and thanking God; with a full heart he thanked Him for the trial which had been sent for his betterment; he thanked the Almighty Who had snatched away Inga-Lena, taken from him his earthly helpmate; he thanked the Lord Who had taken the mother from four little children; he blessed and praised the Lord God for the ills, sufferings, and persecutions he and his beloved ones had had to endure; he thanked his Creator with the warmth of his heart for all the evils which had been bestowed upon him.

God had sought out Danjel Andreasson who now bent like a worm under His foot. At his entrance into the new, young, and healthy world, he prayed for a rebirth, he prayed to be washed clean from that vanity and self-righteousness which clung to him from the Old World. And he felt that God had come close to him now, closer than He had ever come to him in the country he had left.

— 2—

Kristina lay with her head on the bulging knapsack; it was a hard and knotty pillow but to her it seemed the softest down; the knapsack had come with them from home — it was something intimate and friendly. She lay still; she was weak from her severe illness, every limb was weak and weary. If only she could rest, rest a long time; if only she could lie like this, quite still, stretched out on her back in the grass, without having to move even a little finger or a little toe. Such were the delights she desired. If she could remain still, perfectly still, then the tiredness would leave her body. But as yet she could only find momentary rest, soon they must move on again.

A few feet away from her another woman was sleeping, no doubt more tired than she — old Fina-Kajsa lay there with open and gaping mouth. She had pulled up her skirt in a roll around her waist, exposing a worn-out, mended, dirty petticoat which once must have been red. In her arms, tight against her chest, she held a wooden casket decorated with green and yellow dots. It contained her most treasured possessions. The casket had no lock but was tied with heavy string, and the sleeping old woman held it close to her breast the way a mother holds her little child. Through her pointed, toothless mouth, which opened like a black hole, Fina-Kajsa snored. At her feet stood her iron pot, now wing-broken and crippled, one leg lost during the voyage. No wonder people had ill endured the crossing when even iron vessels were broken.

Uncle Danjel’s large white linen sack, once Inga-Lena’s pride, was now frayed and dirty, having fared badly on the ship. Ulrika of Västergöhl, who was looking after Danjel’s belongings now he was a widower, had just opened the sack and was searching for something in it. She was dressed today in Aunt Inga-Lena’s best dress; she and her daughter had divided the dead one’s clothes. Kristina never spoke to Ulrika more than was absolutely necessary; for her uncle’s sake Kristina had endured Ulrika’s company, but Karl Oskar had promised that they would separate themselves from the former parish whore as soon as possible. Kristina did not begrudge the Glad One her aunt’s clothing; both she and her daughter must have something to cover themselves with, and they had earned the garments now that they were taking care of the poor children who had lost their mother.

The dress Elin was wearing had also belonged to Inga-Lena, and it was too big for the sixteen-year-old girl. It flowed in large billows and bags about her lithe body. She sat with a small chip basket on her knees and it reminded Kristina of berry-picking time. What kind of berries might there be to pick in this country? Wild strawberries, so sweet to taste, and with such delicate white flowers in the spring? Blueberries which colored the fingers black in summer. Fiery red cranberries on the tussocks in autumn? Elin held the handle of her basket firmly, as if just about to go out into the berry lands — she held on to it as one holds to a single worldly possession.

And Kristina sat up, the better to keep an eye on her family belongings. There stood their chest — five feet long and three high — reinforced with broad iron bands which had held it together unharmed across the Atlantic; only one corner of the lid was scraped a little. On the front of the chest glowed the letters, still red, painted there before departure: Home-owner Karl Oskar Nilsson, North America.

And there stood their sacks and their food basket. The small bundle next to Kristina moved at times, it was alive — in it slept little Harald, the baby. Karl Oskar had gone back to the ship to pick up something forgotten and he had the two other children with him.

From where she sat among the trees Kristina could see the harbor and the long row of ships at the piers. Right in front of her was a tall, yellow-green house with a round tower which it carried like a crown. The house was built on an islet, and people went to it across a bridge. High up on the wall over the entrance there was something written in tall black letters, visible from where she sat: CASTLE GARDEN. It was, of course, the name of the house, whatever it might mean. In front of the round house on the same isle there was a smaller and lower house, one wall of which was almost covered by an inscription: LABOR EXCHANGE; the name of that house was painted in the largest letters she had ever seen.

They put names on the houses in America. And the incomprehensible writing she saw reminded her that she was now in a land where she understood not the smallest word of what people said; they might speak into her very ears, yet she wouldn’t hear them; she might talk, and they would not hear her. From the first moment here in America she suffered from two defects — deafness and dumbness; she must go about among strangers a deaf-mute.

It was gentry she saw walking about there near the big house with the tower; the women had umbrellas like the ladies at home in Sweden. But it wasn’t raining, it was entirely clear, the sun shone in a cloudless sky. Why did the women carry umbrellas today? Perhaps they had brought them along for show.

Yes, the sun was shining, there was an unmerciful heat in America. The air was oppressive and she breathed with difficulty; she had the sensation of inhaling pungent steam while bending over a pot of boiling water. But her happiness in being on the earth again was so great that it almost obliterated the discomfort of the American heat. On the ship she had believed that she never more would get out into God’s clear daylight; she had felt she would end her life enclosed in the dark hold; she had thought she would never again see a patch of grass or a green leaf. But now she lay here on the green earth in the sun. She could just as easily, like poor Inga-Lena, have been lying on the bottom of the ocean, her body lowered for monsters of the deep to devour. But she had been saved from them, she and her loved ones — what else mattered?

To go out on the ocean in a fragile ship with three small children — she felt it had been to tempt the Lord God. In a long and fervent prayer she thanked her Father in Heaven Who in His mercy had let them reach solid ground in health.

She almost felt as if she had been dead and awakened to life again, as if a miracle had happened to her. How wonderfully still everything about her seemed! The joy of lying here on the peaceful, quiet earth could only be fully appreciated by one who had long lived in a constantly moving and heaving bed, one who had been tossed about on high, restless billows. At last she was liberated from the ship’s swing which had thrown her up and down, she was free from the dizzy journeys to the top of the waves and into their valleys. She had always loved to play with a swing but never again would she be tempted by the swing of the sea; with this she was sated for life. Never again would she desire to see this terrifying ocean, never again would her feet leave solid ground.

She felt thirsty, her tongue was parched, and her appetite was returning now that she was on land; she must eat well now that she had one more life to feed.

She put her hand against her abdomen: again she could feel the stirring within her. Many days had passed since the last time she felt the child move, and she had begun to wonder if it still could be alive. It would not have seemed strange to her had it died, so ill and weak she had been from seasickness and scurvy. A joy filled her as she now felt it stir: once having conceived a child, she wished to bear it alive; a stillborn child was a shame and God’s chastisement — the woman was not worthy to carry into the world the life He had created within her.

When was it due? She counted the months on her fingers: she had conceived it sometime in the middle of February — March, April, May, June — she was already in her fifth month. July, August, September, October, November — her childbed would be sometime in the middle of November.

About half the time left until she was in childbed. Would they have a bed by then, a bed in which she could bear her child?

The child was alive. A life that had traveled free across the ocean had come into the land. It stirred and moved in its hidden nest, stronger than the mother had felt it before. Not only had she herself come to life again, the child within her seemed to have gained new life, now that she had carried it into the New World.

— 3—

“Are you asleep, Kristina?”

She had dozed off. Karl Oskar stood by her side, wiping his sweaty face with his jacket sleeve.

“What a heat! They can fry bacon on the roofs here!” He took off his wadmal coat and threw it on the ground. Johan and Lill-Märta came rushing to their mother.

“Guess, Mother! Father has bought something!”

“Guess what Father bought!”

In one hand Karl Oskar carried a paper bag, in the other their own large pitcher. He held up the bag to Kristina’s nose. “You want to smell something?”

“Look in the bag, Mother!” shouted Johan. “Father has bought sweet milk and wheat bread!”

“Sweet milk and wheat bread!” Lill-Märta repeated after him.

Kristina inhaled a pleasing odor which she had not smelled for a long time. She stuck her hand into the bag and got hold of something soft: fresh, white rolls, wheat rolls!

“Karl Oskar — it isn’t true.”

“Look in the pitcher!”

“Mother! It’s sweet milk!” shouted Johan.

Karl Oskar held up the pitcher, so full of milk that it splashed over.

“Be careful. Don’t lose any,” she warned.

“Now you must eat and drink, Kristina.”

“Karl Oskar, I don’t believe my eyes. How could you buy it?”

“The Finn helped me. Eat and drink now. We have already had some.”

Sweet milk! Fresh milk! When had she last tasted it? Not one drop had they been able to obtain on the ship. It was in their quarters in Karlshamn that she had tasted milk last time; long, long ago, in another world, in the Old World.

Kristina took hold of the pitcher with both hands, carefully; she mustn’t let it splash over. Tears came to her eyes; she had to see what milk looked like, she had forgotten. This milk was yellow-white, thick and rich; no spoon had skimmed off the cream; and it smelled as fresh as if it had just been milked into this pitcher.

Karl Oskar opened the knapsack and took out a tin mug which he filled with milk from the pitcher. “Drink — as much as you are able to. You need it to get well.”

Kristina held the mug. “But the children? Have they had enough?”

No mother could begin to eat and drink before her children had been given food and drink. But Karl Oskar told her that Johan and Lill-Märta had eaten themselves full and drunk until their thirst was quenched back there at the store where he had bought the food.

Kristina drank. She emptied the mug in a few swallows, and Karl Oskar filled it again; she drank until she felt satisfied; never before had she realized that milk could be so good. She herself had sat on the milking stool and pressed out hundreds of gallons of milk from cow udders, she had strained milk for her children morning, noon, and night, she had fattened calves on milk, she had brought up piglets on milk — during her whole life she had never longed for milk until she started on this voyage. Now she accepted the pitcher of milk as a gift from God; she felt she would cry.

She said the milk was cream-rich and good. Then she took a roll from the bag and looked it over; this roll was almost as big as a small loaf at home.

They still had a little left in their food basket. The ship’s fare had been rancid, bitter with salt, smelling of old chests and musty barrels; Kristina still had a taste in her mouth from the dried, hard rye loaves. Toward the end of the voyage there had been worms in the bread, and they had been forced to soak it in water and fry it in pork fat before they could eat it; much of the fare they had been given on the ship had been little better than pig food.

After those hard loaves, how delicious it was to bite into a soft, fresh wheat roll! The rolls looked a little puffy, but she soon saw that they were well filled under the crust. At the very first bite she felt that she was eating festival food.

“They bake mighty fine bread in America,” said Kristina.

“Here they eat wheat bread on weekdays as well as on Sundays,” said Karl Oskar.

“I’ve heard so. Can it be true?”

Kristina was a little skeptical. To her, wheat bread had always been a food for holidays and festival occasions. She used to buy a few pounds of wheat flour for a baking at Christmas, Easter, and Midsummer. Then she counted the loaves and locked them in the bread chest so the children couldn’t eat them unless allowed; such food had to be carefully portioned out, each one getting his share.

“It’s swarming with people here in New York,” she said. “Is there enough wheat bread for all of them?”

Karl Oskar said, that, according to what he saw with his own eyes, there must be plenty of food in this country; in several stores he had seen quantities of wheat loaves, piled high like stacks of firewood at home, and he had seen whole tubs full of sweet milk. He was sure that both she and the children could eat and drink all they needed to regain their strength.

The bundle at Kristina’s side began to move and a sound came from it; Harald had awakened and cried out. The mother picked him up and his cry died as soon as he felt the sweet milk in his mouth. The little one swallowed the unfamiliar drink in silence, he simply kept silent and swallowed: surprise overwhelmed him.

It hurt Kristina’s heart to see how fallen off her children were, how pale their faces, how sunken their cheeks, how blue their lips, how tired and watery their eyes. When she took them in her arms their bodies were light, their arms and legs thin, the flesh on their limbs loose; it was as if muscles and bones had parted from each other. They had dwindled this way from having been kept so long in the dark unhealthy hold below decks. How often had she worried about them when she lay sick, unable to care for them, while all three of them crawled over her in her bed. How often had she reproached herself because of her inability to give them a single bite of fresh food, or a mouthful of sweet milk. How she had longed for the moment when she could walk on shore with Johan, Lill-Märta, and Harald. These poor, pale, skinny children certainly were in need of America’s good sweet milk and fresh wheat rolls.

Johan had been told to guard his father’s coat lying there in the grass, and he said impatiently: “Father, you forget the apple! The apple for Mother!”

From the pocket of his father’s coat he took a shining red apple, almost as big as his own head. The boy handed it proudly to his mother.

“Have you ever seen such a big apple?” said Karl Oskar. “I got it for nothing!”

Near the pier, he told her, they had met a woman carrying a large basket filled with beautiful apples. Johan and Lill-Märta had stopped and looked longingly at the fruit. The woman had spoken to them, but they had not understood a word. Then she gave the children each an apple, which they immediately gulped down. He, too, had received an apple — which he had saved for her.

“Karl Oskar — you’re good. . ”

She weighed the large apple in her hand; it must weigh almost a pound, she thought; it was the largest one she had ever seen. The children’s eyes were glued to the fruit in their mother’s hand, and Kristina asked Karl Oskar to cut it in four equal pieces, so that all would get even portions. He pulled out his pocketknife and divided the apple carefully; each quarter was as big as a whole apple at home.

And the immigrant family ate and enjoyed their first American fruit, which was full of juice and cooled their mouths.

“Is it a new apple?” exclaimed Kristina when she tasted it.

“Yes, doesn’t it taste like one?”

“I thought it was fruit from last summer.”

“Here in America the apples ripen before Midsummer,” said Karl Oskar.

Yes, the sour-fresh taste in her mouth convinced Kristina. It must be true what Karl Oskar said — she was eating a fruit of the new crop; yet it was only Midsummer.

Midsummer — the holidays had passed, a Midsummer no one had celebrated. Enclosed on the ship, they could not celebrate, they could only talk of the Midsummer holidays in the land they had left.

Just a little more than a stone’s throw from where she sat Kristina could see the pier where the Charlotta was still tied up, discharging the rest of her cargo. She recognized the Swedish brig by its familiar flag. After unloading, it would sail back again. The ship would once more have to find her way across the restless, endless water. It had been a bleak and misty spring day when she left the Swedish harbor; perhaps it would be a bleak and misty autumn day before she returned to the same harbor. Then their ship would be at home. At home—the thought cut Kristina to the quick, and she chewed more slowly on her piece of apple.

Midsummer at home — Father putting young birches on either side of the door, Mother serving coffee at their finest table, which had been moved out into the yard and placed under the old family maple; Maria and Emma, her sisters, picking lilacs and decorating themselves for the village dance. The house would smell of newly scrubbed floors, smell clean, inside and out, smell of lilac blossoms and flowering birches. And when they gathered around the table under the family maple — the guardian tree of their home — they would all be dressed in their Sunday best, and there would be much fun and much laughter. At home it was always so for Midsummer.

Did they speak this year of one who had been among them before? Did they mention her name — Kristina, who had moved away with Karl Oskar to North America? Did they ask how it was with her this moment, this afternoon, this Midsummer Eve?

She knew how it was at home, but those at home did not know how it was here.

She had traveled a long road, almost endlessly long; she knew the sea that separated her from her homeland, that incomprehensibly wide water which separated home and here. She would never again travel that road, never again traverse the sea. So she would never again be with them at home.

Now for the first time she began to think deeply into this: Never again be with them at home.

The thought suddenly disturbed her profoundly, not less because she could still see the ship, over there in the harbor, the ship that was to turn about, to sail home again. This ship on which she had suffered so horribly, what did it mean to her now? Did she want to go back with it again? Did she want to stay another ten weeks in a pen in the dark hold? No! No! Why was it then that her tears were breaking through? Why? She did not understand it.

Karl Oskar sat down and wiped the perspiration from his forehead with his sleeve; even in the shade the heat was melting.

“We are to board a ship and ride on the river this evening,” he told her.

She was thinking of the road behind them — he was thinking of the way ahead.

“We are late getting started,” he said.

He was afraid they might have arrived too late in the season. No one could have imagined they would sail the sea until Midsummer. He had expected them to reach their place of settling by now and have time to hoe some land, sow some barley, plant some potatoes. What would happen to them next winter if they didn’t get something into the earth before it was too late this year to grow and ripen?

Karl Oskar agreed with what Kristina had said, and it worried him: this town of New York swarmed with people; perhaps the whole country was already filled up. No one in their group had ever seen so many human beings in one place. Great numbers must have come before them, this they could see with their own eyes, and every day new ships arrived, with great new flocks of people. Perhaps they had been deceived, perhaps it was too late, the best land already taken; perhaps America was entirely filled up with new settlers.

But he must not disturb Kristina with these thoughts on their very first day in the new land. He must, rather, try to cheer her up, she was so weak and depressed after her illness. He had just given her a foretaste of the delicacies offered them on entering an American store, and he must assure her that all he had seen and heard so far was promising.

“I think America is a good land. We need have no regrets; that I must write home.”

Kristina swallowed hard and turned her head. Karl Oskar must not see her tears today, their day of landing. And why did she cry, after all? She was on solid ground, she had all her loved ones around her. They were drinking sweet milk and eating fresh white bread — what more did she want?

Karl Oskar continued: For the past three evenings he had been writing a letter to Sweden, and now while they were waiting here in the park he must finish it. He could write on the lid of the America chest, it made a good table, then he could send the letter back with the ship. It would be September before it reached home, it would take from spring until fall before the nearest ones at home would hear anything about their voyage.

Kristina had not spoken for a long while; she had not said a single word since he had told her that American apples ripened before Midsummer. Could that have surprised her so much? He turned and looked at her. Something must have made her sad. But he would not ask her — whatever it was, a question now would only increase her sadness.

He handed her the bag with the bread: “Eat some more, Kristina.”

“It tasted awfully good. If you think there’ll be enough for. .”

She ate one more white roll. And her first day on American soil was ever after to be a memory of sweet milk and fresh bread — milk and wheat rolls.

IV. A LETTER TO SWEDEN

North America, 26 Day of June, 1850

Dearly Beloved Parents and Sister,

That you may Always be well are my Deep Wishes to you.

I will now let you know about the journey from our Fatherland. We completed it in 10 Weeks and arrived in the town of New York. The Swedish Ship reached the American strand safely on Midsummer Eve.

There was great Joy among us as we beheld the New Land, the Americans are noble folk, letting all foreigners through their Gates, none asked us One word about our Situation, no one is denied Entrance. We were not asked if we were Poor or Rich.

All in our family are with Life and Health. The Sea heaved considerably but we endured the Journey well. I must tell you that Danjel of Kärragärde was stricken by the great Inconvenience that out at Sea He lost his wife Inga-Lena. Her time was up. But it would be too cumbersom to describe our Journey.

New York is a large town and the Houses are large and high. It swarms with People of all kinds of the known World, Black, Brown, and Colored in Skin. But they are People. We are met with kindliness by all.

The Americans are Thin and Pale, they say it comes from the Heat. The air is warmer here than at home.

All strange Phenomena can be seen here — they can not be described in a Letter. They say the Time in North America differs six Hours with the Time in Sweden in such a Way that all Clocks and Watches have been turned back Six Hours. Swedish Paper Money is not allowed to be changed here, except with the Captain on the Ship, but Gold and Silver have their value here the same as at home. Our Swedish money is less in value than American money.

Carry no Sorrow for me, kind Parents. Here we are well taken care of. I left satisfied my Fatherland. If Health and Strength remain with me I shall fairly well take care of Myself and Mine here in North America. When I get something to work on with my Own Hands I shall look well after it, I think it will not be hard to get along here.

On our Arrival we met a Nobel Woman who gave us Apples from her basket. Apples in America are uncommonly large. Many Fruits are offered here but not Planted in Sweden. The Americans eat wheat Bread at nearly every meal and use Good food.

Our dear Children are healthy and well, they talk much of you. Go with Our Greeting to Kristina’s Beloved Parents and Family in Duvemåla, say to them their Daughter has arrived in America with health and Satisfaction.

Our Ships Captain has bespoken a Boat which will freight us deeper into the land. On the enclosed piece of Paper I have written down a Place where we intend to Stop and settle. Will you, Sister Lydia write to your Brother, we wish next time to hear of the changes at Home.

Be kind and let us know the date when this letter arrives in Sweden so that I may figure out how long Time it takes from North America. Do not Pay the Freight for the Letter, then it is more sure to Reach us.

I send my Greetings to all friends and relatives in Our Parish, we are alive and well bodily and Our Souls, Nothing in this world is Wanting Us.

Written down in great haste by your Devoted Son

Karl Oskar Nilsson

V. THE MOST BEAUTIFUL STREET IN THE WORLD

— 1—

It had been generally understood on the brig Charlotta that about half the inhabitants in the town of New York were loose people — thieves, rogues, robbers, and criminals. Consequently, none of the immigrants dared go alone on the streets of this town. But the second mate had promised Robert and Arvid, who was Danjel Andreasson’s servant, that he would go with the boys and show them New York as soon as they arrived. And on the afternoon of the day of landing he had to do some errands for the captain and invited the boys to accompany him through the city.

The second mate had been kind and helpful to them during the voyage. They had never heard his real name mentioned — when anyone spoke to him, he was called Mr. Mate; when anyone spoke of him, he was referred to as the Finn. He was a talkative man and the only one of the ship’s officers they had come to know.

The Finn now went with the two youths, walking by the long row of ships tied up at the piers; on the East River there were piers along the whole shore, it seemed. And the Finn pointed and explained: In this port flew all the flags of the world, side by side; over there lay a frigate with the American flag, strewn with stars and stripes. They must learn to recognize this flag, now that they were to settle here. This vessel was an East Indiaman, as seafolk called it. It had a beautiful sail. American ships had nice hulls. The ship over there, the one like a barge, was a Dutchman; nothing fine about that one; it was called a smack. And that long ship loaded with planks was Norwegian, or half Swedish, for after all the two countries had the same king. But they had better not mention that to any Norwegians they met, they might get their heads knocked off.

On the broad river arm the ships were crowding each other, steamboats, sailing ships, sloops, rowboats, ferries, and barges in one great galaxy. In the middle of the river, boats moved with the aid of sails; nearer the shore, wheels under the water drove them. The tall narrow smokestacks of the steamers rose like a forest of black, burned tree trunks over the harbor. The Hudson and the East River, with their bays, estuaries, and canals, flowed around the city of New York, encircled it in their arms, and the city of New York pushed its piers and embankments into the rivers and broke them up. Smoke from house chimneys and steamer funnels flowed together into great clouds, floated by a weak westerly breeze toward the Atlantic.

A small vessel without sail, wheels, or oars moved with great speed across the water and aroused Robert’s interest. He asked what made it move so speedily. The Finn said it was a steam ferry. Didn’t they see the smoking funnel from a small house in the center of the ship?

The Charlotta’s second mate pointed out and explained things to the boys; he spoke of barks and smacks, schooners and galleasses, but of this they understood little. From the deck of a large sailing vessel came song and loud, gay voices. A group of men in broad-brimmed hats, apparently passengers, were making merry on the ship. The boys wanted to stop and listen to them; they were quite curious.

The Finn said that this was a clipper ship from California, ready to sail for San Francisco. The ship was a new, fast sailer, sheathed in copper; the men on board were California bound, to dig for gold.

The ship’s name was Angelica, and from her prow hung a red, flapping pennant with jolly words: Ho! Ho! Ho! For California! This pennant did not resemble the flags on other ships, nor did the passengers resemble other ships’ passengers; these men were laughing, noisy, singing lusty songs. It seemed to the boys as though the ship had no command.

The Finn further informed the boys that a shipload of women, both white and colored, was to sail from New York for the gold fields. There was a scarcity of women throughout America, in San Francisco there were only fifty, and the gold diggers were said to be languishing from lust. Cases of attacks on mules and mares had been reported — woman hunger could drive men insane.

But there was plenty of gold out there, it grew in the earth as potatoes grow in Sweden. In the rivers they could fish for gold lumps, big as eggs. The Finn himself had seen samples of twenty-three carat California gold right here in New York. Beggars in California, of course, went about in rags, as did beggars the world over, but California beggars were dressed in glittering golden rags. A hundred ships had arrived in the port of San Francisco, and every crew member had run away to the gold fields. The gold would soon be spread all over the world, and in a few years the whole world would be rich.

But very few men returned alive from the gold fields. The Finn had heard that the passengers on the Angelica had ordered their tombstones in New York and were taking them along — this to save money, since it was cheaper to have them engraved here.

Robert came to new life, seeing and hearing about this clipper ship; he looked wonderingly and longingly at the Angelica. She wasn’t like the Charlotta, either in name or otherwise. She was a happy ship with happy passengers; as soon as the men finished one song they immediately started another:

Blow, boys, blow for California!

There’s plenty of gold,

So I’ve been told

On the banks of the Sacramento. .

The men waved, hats in hand, to the crowd on the pier. The passengers on the Swedish Charlotta also had sung, but mostly hymns, funeral hymns, and seldom had any of her passengers laughed. And while Robert didn’t understand the words of the songs from the Angelica, he didn’t think her passengers were singing hymns. Yet these singing gold diggers were traveling with their own engraved tombstones. How could people be so boisterous and happy, sailing with their tombstones? Perhaps, thought Robert, they were happy and sang because they were doing the wisest thing people can do in this world: their course might be perilous, but anyone wanting to get rich in America must, danger or no, head for the place where gold could be picked from the earth itself.

“They have fun on that boat,” said Arvid with a touch of envy.

“The men on the gold-rush ship are drunk,” explained the Finn. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they drink up their tombstones before they leave.”

The Angelica—Robert looked at the clipper ship’s stern where the name was painted. Angelica and Charlotta were two women’s names. Charlotta was heavy, hard, dour, stern, harsh, and commanding; Angelica easy, soft, light, and gay. Charlotta sounded like the name of a fat farm mistress, authoritative, masterful; Angelica like a tender, delicate girl, like a bird’s twitter in a flowering meadow early in spring; there was joy and freedom in that name.

The next ship he would travel on must have such a name.

Now the passengers on the clipper ship began jumping about in wild leaps.

“Those men must be dancing the polka,” said the Finn.

“What kind of dance is that?” asked Robert.

“It’s a new Hungarian war dance; in fact, an unchristian whore dance. Let’s get on, we’ve lots to see today.”

Reluctantly, Robert left the Angelica with her fluttering red banner; there were many hundreds of ships in the New York Harbor, but only one he wished to board.

They left the piers and turned off to the left, cut across the Battery, and went into town. If they wished to get a good view of Manhattan, the Finn said, they must go over to Weehawken; unfortunately, he didn’t have time to go with them, but once up there they could see thousands of houses and hundreds of churches; up there they could feel they were really seeing the world.

In his description book Robert had read about New York, and he knew it was the New World’s largest, most active town, that houses were six stories tall, and streets sometimes seventy-five feet wide. Now he wondered whether it were true that half of the inhabitants were murderers, robbers, and swindlers.

“It’s a little exaggerated,” said the Finn. “Only one-tenth are criminals.” And he added: It might be better to put it this way: every fourth house they passed was a saloon, every fifth woman they met was a whore, and every fifth man a criminal. Perhaps it would be better not to say exactly, but rather thereabouts, as far as a visiting seafarer could judge.

Robert began to inspect the people they met on the street more closely, particularly the younger women.

“Every fifth woman a whore, Mr. Mate?”

“Yes, maybe thereabouts, yes, just about.”

The Finn continued: There were in this town twenty thousand known and public sluts, besides all the private ones whom only God could count. There were two thousand whorehouses, open day and night, seven days of the week, except for the hours of service on Sundays. There were ten thousand saloons, and every saloon keeper had in his pay an undertaker, who came with his cart and dragged away the corpses of those who drank themselves to death. The American brännvin was the strongest in the world, and some saloon keepers even put a pinch of poison into the drink to make it smoother and more tasty; from childhood Americans had hardened themselves to spiced and poisoned drinks, but a foreigner might fall dead on the floor as he stood at the bar. In the most notorious nests, like the Old Brewery at Five Points, the saloon was on the first floor, the whorehouse on the second, and the morgue in the cellar. The guests got drunk in the saloon, then went upstairs to the girls, where they were robbed, murdered, undressed, and pushed through a chute to the morgue in the cellar. Yes, it was true, there were places here in New York where one was served speedily and efficiently. The police never dared go near such places. One den at Five Points had been demolished a few years ago when more than a thousand corpses were found.

Robert and Arvid felt their scalps tingle at the Finn’s stories. But, fortunately, remembered Robert, he carried nothing of value with him, and if you didn’t carry anything on a walk, you couldn’t be robbed. His inheritance had been used for the voyage, and only a few Swedish coppers remained in his purse.

But Arvid clutched the watch chain which hung across his vest and whispered into Robert’s ear: He had brought along his watch, perhaps it was risky, what should he do about it? Robert didn’t even have a watch; no one could rob him even though each tenth person was a thief.

The boys from Ljuder knew very little about towns. Before coming to New York, they had passed through only one town, Karlshamn. (Arvid had not even read about towns, as he couldn’t read; before Robert had shown him a geography schoolbook, he had thought the whole world consisted only of Sweden.) But the boys did not wish to appear ignorant, as though unused to people. Robert therefore asked the Finn, with an intonation reflecting familiarity with the subject: Were the women in the New York whorehouses born in this country or were they immigrants?

The Finn answered that nearly all such women were born in the Old World; some had fallen into sin while crossing on the ships; others, perhaps, ran out of traveling money when they reached New York, and when they couldn’t get beyond the pier, they sold that which could be sold most easily and quickly. But a whore’s life in North America lasted only four years at the most. Then came death. That is to say, if she were healthy and sound at the beginning. Most of them became venereal cases, their bodies covered with stinking sores, their limbs rotting away, falling off one after the other. The poison buried itself inside their bones, he had heard; there it reproduced itself, from generation to generation. In this way God’s law was fulfilled, as it was written in the commandment of the catechism: the sins of the fathers were visited on the children, unto a third and fourth generation “of them that hate Me.”

When they rounded a corner, their guide stopped and pointed to a stone pedestal near the street: “On that foundation stood the last king who reigned in America.”

The mass of stone was at least twenty feet high. Robert asked: “What was the king’s name?”

“I don’t remember. He was an English king. He was made of lead!”

“Oh, I understand; it was a statue?”

“That’s right, boys! It was a lead statue of a king!”

The Finn explained: The English king reigned so poorly and so tyrannically that the Americans went to war to get rid of him. But they had a scarcity of bullets for their guns, so they melted down this leaden image of their king. When the English came to chastise the obstinate Americans, they were greeted by pieces of lead from their own king. The fine bullets hit them right between the eyes! So the Americans won the war and became a free people. That’s what happened to the last king in America.

And who could tell — perhaps the European people one day would put their king statues in pots, and boil and melt them and make bullets of them. Then they too might be free.

Robert nodded; he understood: because kings were forbidden in America, one might speak as one would about them.

Now they turned right and entered a wide street. In great pride the Finn held both his hands out over the street as though to show something particularly his own, something his hands had made: this was Broadway, the most beautiful street in the world!

They had been sucked into a solid mass of people moving slowly about their errands, as it was impossible to hurry, giving way always to the right to avoid bumping against one another. So the boys did likewise. The walkers did not look each other in the face when meeting, no one stared in curiosity at anyone else. Robert and Arvid kept as close to the Finn as they could; they were jostled and pushed a little when they failed to give way fast enough, and they felt dizzy and bewildered in this multitude, faced with the endless horde passing on this street, said to be the world’s broadest.

Robert tried to estimate the breadth of Broadway and he thought it must be more than seventy-five feet wide. The Broad Way, he knew the meaning of the name from his language book. Once he had seen a picture with the same name, and this picture had illustrated the road Man walked through life, crowded with people indulging in sin. That road had led to the Gates of Hell. On this street, also, wherever it led, was a jostling crowd. Most people he saw had white-skinned faces and were shaped like his own people. But the great difference in dress surprised Robert. Here walked men in elegant, well-brushed, expensive clothes, with clean, white-shining linen around their necks and polished boots on their feet. He saw other men, too, in worn-out, ragged garments, dirty shirts, and with their feet wrapped in old rags; some even went barefoot; they must burn their feet on these hot stones. He thought those poorly dressed men must be new arrivals in this country; they had not yet had time to get rich.

He saw many Negroes, all going about free and unchained. He had thought that black people held as slaves were in chains and led by guards, like dogs on leashes. He noticed Negroes laughing so broadly that their teeth gleamed white against their dark lips; but others looked so sad, shy, and downtrodden that the sight of them hurt him deep inside. He guessed that those who laughed had kinder masters than the others.

The Finn said the houses on this street were the highest ever built in the world. Some were, indeed, as tall as six stories, and taller houses could not be built.

“Danjel says we have arrived at the Tower of Babel,” volunteered Arvid.

“Babel’s Tower fell long ago,” Robert informed his friend.

They looked at the houses along Broadway; some were built of wood and stone, and painted in many colors — white, clear red, black, and yellow. Some houses even had walls with white stripes of plaster; this was a curious sight, striped houses.

In the middle of the street rode men in black coats and high hats, their horses well fed, newly curried, with flanks shining. Wagons rolled by, gilded spring wagons bearing women in fine clothes; there were plain carts loaded with ale barrels, carriages with white teams, cabs, gigs, clumsy wagons drawn by oxen, light vehicles drawn by horses small as colts, four-wheelers, two-wheelers, big and small wagons, light and heavy ones. Everything that could be put on wheels and pulled by animals rolled by on this street.

Arvid pointed in amazement at a small, gray, long-eared, long-haired animal which stood quite still between the shafts of a cart: “That thing is neither horse nor ox!”

“It’s an ass,” said the Finn.

Robert hurried to show what he knew: “One can ride on them too,” he said. “It’s told in the Bible that Jesus rode on an ass into Jerusalem.”

“On an animal like that?” asked Arvid. “How could he sit straddle-legged on such a puny creature?”

They slowly continued their walk up Broadway. A great fat sow with a litter of pigs was poking about in the gutter on their side of the street. The mother sow was as long legged as a calf, but her teats hung so low they almost reached the ground; the little piglets were light brown, almost like whelps, and ran between the legs of the walkers so that Robert almost tripped. Arvid counted fourteen in the litter and observed that American swine were longer legged than Swedish.

Robert said the Americans didn’t seem afraid to lose their pigs, letting them run around at will, but the Finn informed him that every owner marked his swine with an ear cut; moreover, there were so many swine in America, no one cared much if an occasional litter were lost. All garbage and sweepings were thrown into the streets, and the swine kept the town clean, he added. Here slops were lying in piles, and some of the houses they passed smelled as though more slops were being prepared inside.

But the street smell of pigsties was familiar to the two youths from Swedish peasant communities. In Sweden or North America, in Ljuder Parish or New York City, they could find no noticeable difference in the smell of swine dung.

From time to time the Finn stopped and peered into windows as though he were looking for some particular place. Arvid and Robert stopped also, but as far as they could judge, every house was a shop, and every entrance had something written over the door in large, gilded letters.

At last the Finn stopped in front of a small house, not much bigger than a shed; it could be a shop, but there were no shop articles in the window. The Finn pointed to a placard nailed to the door:

NOTICE!

This shop is closed in honor of the King of Kings,

Who will appear about the twentieth of October.

Get ready, friends, to crown Him Lord of All.

“Now we’re near the place I’m looking for,” said the Finn. “This same notice was on the door last fall when I was here.”

Robert, who had begun to learn English from his book during the voyage, tried to read the notice on the door. He recognized some of the words but could not understand their meaning; he wanted to ask the Finn, but Arvid took the question from him: “What do the words say?”

The Finn explained: It had been predicted that the Day of Doom would take place in New York during October last year, and the owner of the shop had closed in advance to honor Christ on His return. The King of Kings had not appeared, but the shop still remained closed; perhaps the owner had starved to death by now.

There was another notice a little lower on the door, and the Finn bent down to read it: Muslin for Ascension Robes. Muslin to meet the King of Kings. 20 cents a yard.

The boys wanted to know what this notice said.

“Oh, just that the storekeeper sold wedding gowns for Christ’s brides,” said the Finn.

And now the Finn must attend to the captain’s errands. He told the boys to find their way back to the ship alone; it was not difficult, only turn right about and then to the left. And if they wanted to go to the end of the street, they could do so. Broadway was about three miles long and ran right through Manhattan. They would not lose their way if they stayed on Broadway.

The Finn nodded good-by and they saw him enter a saloon with the name Joe’s Tavern on the window; it was next door to the little shop which had been closed for the arrival of the King of Kings.

— 2—

Arvid and Robert continued alone up Broadway. It was only today that they had been released from their long imprisonment. A feeling of unaccustomed freedom filled them now that they were free to move unhindered on solid ground. Boldly they decided to walk to the street’s very end, however far it stretched. Then they would turn straight about and walk back to the harbor and their fellow passengers.

And so they continued along the most beautiful street in the world; they stopped and looked at the tall houses, they examined inscriptions over doors: Store, Steak House, Coffeehouse, Lodging House, Brown’s Store, Drugstore. They tried to interpret the inscriptions and guessed at their meaning. Could this be a tavern? Was that a hawker’s shop? Or an apothecary? The word store in particular impressed them, it appeared on one building after another. At last Arvid espied a small house, which he thought must be an outhouse, and he pointed for Robert to look, and laughed: “Look at that one! They call that a store too!”

“They must be bragging,” said Robert. But he did not mind this exaggeration; it was always true that the smaller you were the more you needed to seem bigger.

He tried to understand words and sentences he overheard, but everything was unintelligible, senseless jabber; not even one word, not a single syllable, was he able to recognize from his language book. He felt discouraged and disappointed. When he had stepped ashore he had thought he knew enough English to understand what he heard, even if he couldn’t answer properly; he began to think they had cheated him in Karlshamn by selling him an unreliable book.

The boys arrived at an open square where many booths had been erected, and they thought this must be a market day. Here they stood long and gazed; Robert had said they shouldn’t stand and stare because they might be laughed at, but this market fascinated them.

Wooden barrels stood in long rows, running over with potatoes, turnips, cabbages, carrots, peas, beets, parsnips, and many other roots which they saw for the first time; barrels in great numbers were filled with fruit — yellow, red, green, striped — apples, cherries, plums, and other fruits and berries which they never before had seen and the names of which they did not know. Between the barrels were long rows of baskets full of eggs and tubs full of butter, so fat that it seemed to perspire; on poles hung yellow, round, fat cheeses, big as grindstones; carcasses of animals, legs of pork, steaks, shortribs, and sides of bacon were stacked like firewood in high piles. Sizable, well-stuffed sausages hung in lines over tables on which stood vessels of ground meat and salted hams. There were booths with fowl: chickens, ducks, game birds; other fowl were stacked in hills of feathers, of all earthly bird colors, with a sprinkle of blood here and there on heads, necks, and wings. Four-footed beasts of the wild hung here in great numbers, hairy bodies of stags and does, hares and rabbits, known and unknown animals. In other stands were large tables with fish, long and short, broad and narrow, fat and spindly, black and white, red and blue; fish with striped bodies, misshapen fish, all head and protruding eyes, fish with ravenous jaws and sharp teeth like dogs’, fish with fins as sharp as spears, and fish with long tail fins by which they hung on hooks, swinging like pendulums as the shoppers brushed against them. On the ground stood wooden boxes in which crawled and crept shellfish, horrible-looking sea monsters, lizardlike creatures, frogs, crayfish, mussels, snails, animals in shells that opened up like caskets, and shellfish that crawled about and resembled who knew what; nothing they had ever heard of, seen, or known, now or ever in all their living days.

The barrels, baskets, tubs, tables, boxes, and buckets in this market place were filled to overflowing; the whole place seemed flooded with fruit and meat, pork and lamb, fins and feathers, shell and hides, flooded with food of endless variety. People shopping here tramped in food, hit their heads on food, were enveloped in food, tumbled about in food. Who would skin all these animals, pluck all these birds, scale all these fish? For strangers and new arrivals, there was a booth in the market offering samples of all the food products which the new land offered its inhabitants. Here they saw the Creator’s many gifts, fruits and berries, roots, herbs, and plants; they saw crawling, flying, swimming creatures, and meat from the cattle and beasts which God had created on the Sixth Day, before He created Man.

The two youths beheld the earth’s abundance in a market next to the most beautiful street in the world. This much they understood: there was food in sufficiency in North America; it would be enough for them too, and for the seventy immigrants who had arrived with them today; they knew, from what their own eyes told them, that they had entered a new world.

— 3—

The day was nearing its warmest hour, the heat lay like a heavy weight over the city, making breathing difficult for the crowds on the street. People sought the shade and sat with their backs against house walls, drowsy, resting with their eyes closed; little babies slept at their mothers’ breasts, women sat leaning their heads against men’s knees. A half-naked Negro boy with a shoebrush in one hand and a jar of shoe blacking in the other strolled about, calling: “Black your boots! Black your boots!”

Robert and Arvid dragged their steps, burdened by their heavy wadmal clothes. Their hair, grown long during the voyage, felt sticky and uncomfortable. They pushed their way among brown pigs poking in the gutter, they squeezed themselves in between the carts of fruit sellers; now and again they were hailed by peddlers offering them wares; once a man stopped and spoke directly to them. Robert had learned what to say when accosted by an American: he had the sentence ready on his tongue, he was glad to use it now for the first time: “I am a stranger here.”

But the man only stared at him. Robert repeated the words, carefully, clearly, he pronounced each syllable as directed in the language book. But the man only shook his head.

How could this be possible? He had practiced this sentence so many times. Yet the American failed to understand him. The book must be wrong.

A man in fiery red pants and a tall black hat kept following them. On a leash he led two sharp-nosed, starved-looking dogs. “You want to buy a dog?” Robert did not understand these words. He looked at the dogs whose long, red tongues were hanging out of their mouths; they seemed fierce and dangerous. Robert was afraid of the obtrusive man; now he had taken his arm. He did not know what the man wanted, but he wanted to get away. At last he managed to free himself from the man’s grip, and he and Arvid hurried their steps until the stranger was lost in the crowd.

Now Robert began to contemplate their situation, and he became fearful: here they walked about, entirely alone, in a town where everyone was a stranger, every tenth man a criminal; they were unable to say anything to anybody, they understood nothing that was said to them. If danger should overtake them they could not even call for help. Perhaps the Finn had exaggerated, probably only one man in twenty was a robber, but even so it was unpleasant. They did not know what robbers in America looked like, but they had seen many faces behind which an evil and treacherous soul might be hidden. He suggested that they return to their company. He did not wish to scare Arvid, he only said the others might be apprehensive if they stayed away too long. He was not afraid for his own sake, nor did he think Arvid had anything to fear; still—

“I have my nickel watch,” Arvid reminded him, and began nervously fingering the broad, yellow brass chain which hung on his vest.

When Arvid left home his father had given him this watch, his dearest and most expensive possession. The father had said that the watch must be considered his paternal inheritance, given to him at this time because of his emigration. It was of fine nickel and had cost twelve riksdaler with the chain. During the forty years Arvid’s father had worked as cotter under the manor of Kråkesjö, it was all he had been able to save as inheritance for his son. The cotter would not have given Arvid his inheritance in cash, even if he had had any; he would have been afraid Arvid might spend it on snuff and brännvin. But a watch he would always keep with him: he had admonished his son never to sell or lose his Swedish inheritance.

Now Arvid was walking about in the dangerous town of New York, surrounded by robbers and swindlers, and he was carrying the watch with him.

“Put it in your pants pocket,” advised Robert. For it occurred to him that the shining brass chain on Arvid’s stomach might attract robbers. Arvid unhooked the chain and put the watch in his trousers pocket.

So they continued their walk up the street. Arvid wanted to go farther, he was happy today; Robert had never seen him so excited and gay. Arvid said that as long as he was back on land again, he wanted really to use his legs, he wanted to walk all the way to the end of the street. Now that they were in America and could go anywhere dry shod, he was willing to walk the whole way to where they would settle, however far it was. He was sure he could walk there, because he was one of those who could use their legs.

A blond girl in a red dress held out a basket of fruit to the boys — black-red, juicy cherries. Robert shook his head; in vain he tried to remember a suitable English word from his language book; he would have liked to tell the girl (even if it was not true) that he had just bought a bagful of cherries.

But the girl remained standing in front of them, smiling at them in a kind, friendly way, and they each took a handful from her basket, as though wishing to taste her cherries before deciding whether to buy. The girl said something that sounded rather kind and went on her way. The boys were a little ashamed of their daring, and Robert regretted that he hadn’t at least said “Thank you.” That much he knew in English.

The juicy cherries were a treat to their dry mouths, and they ate them eagerly and spit the stones about them. A fat woman offered big loaves of wheat bread for sale. The loaves had been made in the form of rings, and she carried them hanging around her arms; the boys thought this quite ingenious: to use one’s arms for bread poles. The smell of the fresh bread aroused their appetites — they felt hungry.

A black-haired, ragged little man, carrying a hand organ on his back and holding a monkey on a leash, stopped them with a stream of words. But they understood not a single syllable issuing from his mouth. Neither one of them had ever seen a monkey before. The creature went on two legs like themselves, and it had a hairless behind, red and swollen like an open wound. Arvid, in great disbelief, stared the monkey in the face and said with great emotion: The creature looked impudent — it was inexcusable of an animal to resemble a human being so closely.

A cart loaded with fruit turned over in the gutter with much noise and commotion. Large, yellow, and bigger than apples, the fruit rolled into the horse and swine spillings of the street and was allowed to remain there. The driver turned his vehicle back on its wheels and drove on, his cart empty. None of the walkers paid any attention to the accident, none made the slightest move to pick up the fruit. Only Arvid and Robert remained standing there a few minutes, but they were afraid to gather any of the beautiful unknown fruit.

The sight of so many edibles increased their hunger. But they had no money, they must wait to eat from their own food baskets — Robert would have to eat with Karl Oskar’s family, Arvid with Danjel Andreasson’s.

The boys would not admit to each other that their stomachs were calling loudly for food, nor would they disclose their astonishment during this walk. They had never imagined that all these things existed in the world, these tall houses, these shops with inscriptions over their entrances in glittering letters, all these valuable things that were hung or spread in the store windows: glittering jewelry, gold, silver, precious stones, watches, rings, chains of gold and silver; expensive materials, cloth of gold and of silver, linen, wool, silk, velvet in quantities that could have covered this whole, long street; the expensive, gilded carriages, the light-footed, agile horses in glittering harnesses; all the things with names and uses they did not know, which they could only look at, admire, and guess about.

Before they recovered from one surprise, another even more amazing met their eyes. Two tall men in striped green and white coats and trousers, each carrying an upright pole with a placard on its upper end: See the Anaconda! See the Serpent Charmer! See the Great Boa Constrictor! Five Cents! The men stopped at the corner, calling loudly, and Robert tried to interpret their message. From his book he recognized the word boa constrictor. And in an open place near by he espied a reddish tent with the same inscription; then he understood what it meant and explained to Arvid: Over there in the tent one could see the boa constrictor, the most dangerous snake in the world, it might be as long as forty feet; it cost only five cents to go in and see. .

The boa constrictor? ruminated Arvid. Hadn’t Robert once read to him from his History of Nature about this peculiar crawling reptile? He seemed to remember: “. . the boa constrictor can be dangerous because of its great size and strength; it has happened that it has crushed and swallowed people; it grows to be almost forty feet long. . ”

“If only we each had five cents!”

It hurt Robert that they must miss this opportunity to look at the world’s greatest snake; a snake forty feet long that swallowed people, to be seen for only five cents. .

“Is the beast bound?” asked Arvid.

He looked toward the tent where a crowd of people thronged; he was not as anxious as his comrade to see the man-eating snake. From the very beginning, he had been worried about American reptiles; in his nightmares, America had been filled with hungry, hissing snakes, a veritable snake nest. He now wondered if it could be healthy to look at a snake that big. For himself, a snake five, six feet long would satisfy him, he wasn’t so interested in snakes. Perhaps they could see part of the snake, maybe its tail; that might be cheaper.

Robert said it didn’t matter, since they had not even one cent. He suddenly felt depressed and disappointed. All day long he had seen beautiful things for sale, and it had bothered him that he was unable to buy anything; now he actually suffered from having to leave the tent with the large snake.

Truly, on this, the most beautiful street in the world, there was everything one might strive for in this world, all one’s heart might desire was here. And Robert felt that the street would have been still more beautiful had he a purse full of American money.

But the very thing he lacked, he had come here to earn; he had come to America to be free — but in order to be free, he must first become rich.

— 4—

The humming in Robert’s left ear suddenly began again, so intensely that it drowned all the street sounds. It was an echo from that box on the ear received at home in Sweden many years ago; it was a reminder of the servant law—”suitable chastisement.” This his master had given him for laziness in service. The windy weather at sea had worsened his ear injury, and again a yellow, malodorous fluid ran from it. The humming sound, which sometimes increased to a roar, was constantly and depressingly with him. It had followed him from Sweden to North America, he could not lose it. Something was hurt inside the ear.

The hum carried with it a memory from his farm-hand service, a memory which troubled him day and night, year after year. Because of this memory he did not wish to serve as farm hand ever again; he did not wish ever to have a master; he wanted to be free.

He had tried to reconcile himself to the throbbing, had tried to make friends with the sound; it was a voice in there, wishing him well, comforting him when something went wrong, warning him when danger lurked. He had noticed that the hum began when something was happening to him, or about to happen; perhaps his friend in the left ear now wanted to comfort him because he had been unable to see the forty-foot, man-eating snake. .

Suddenly the sound was drowned by a loud outcry from Arvid: “Look, Robert! Look over there!”

“What is it?”

“A corpse! Look!”

“What?”

“Can’t you see — there’s a man lying there dead!”

They crossed the street and saw a man lying stretched in the gutter on his back; he was half naked, dressed only in a pair of worn-out pants which hardly covered his legs. His upper body was black with dirt or paint, but the skin of his face was white; he was not a Negro. His eyes were closed and his mouth open, disclosing toothless gums.

Arvid bent down over the body, bustling and excited: “He’s dead! The man is dead! Stone dead!”

Robert, too, looked closer. The man’s chest did not heave, his mouth did not move, he did not seem to breathe. With his foot he lightly touched the foot of the man; he did not move. “I believe he is dead.”

Here a corpse was lying in the street, and people went by without noticing. Living people passed by the dead man, stepped over his outstretched legs, but no one paid any attention, no one noticed he was dead. It was extraordinary. Robert thought this must be because of the great size of the population: there were so many living people jostling each other here in America that no one could pay attention to the dead ones, who were so silent and so still. He and Arvid noticed the body because they were new in the country and not accustomed to seeing corpses lying about.

They looked at each other in consternation: What should they do? Perhaps they should report their discovery, but how? They probably ought to call the police, but they did not know where the police were, and they could not talk, could not ask. Robert remembered there was a sentence in his language book to be used when calling the police. But that was in case of attack on the street. . And he couldn’t remember the sentence, anyway, either in Swedish or English. And the police might wonder about them, perhaps even suspect them of having murdered the man lying there in the gutter. It seemed he had only lately died, the corpse was still warm, and it didn’t smell as might be expected in this heat. Perhaps the man had been murdered. Yes, Robert was sure they would be suspected. And they couldn’t say a word, couldn’t deny it, couldn’t defend themselves. No doubt they would be put in prison for murder. It would be best to forget about calling the police. They might stop a passer-by and point to the corpse, and then let him fetch the police. But in that case they might be held as witnesses. It would be best just to walk on and let the dead one lie there.

“We’ll pretend we haven’t seen anything,” advised Robert. “Come, let’s go!”

But Arvid remained leaning over the man. He had made a new discovery: “He smells of brännvin!”

He poked the man carefully between his naked ribs: “Yes, I believe he is—”

Next moment Arvid jumped backward with an outcry: the man had suddenly risen from the ground like a Jack-in-the-box. In front of them stood a heavy-set giant, a living man, swiftly resurrected and roaring furiously.

At this threatening apparition Robert crouched in fright, and Arvid, in his backward jump, almost landed on top of him. They grasped each other’s hands.

Arvid never had time to finish his sentence that he thought the man was alive. Nor did he need to: they could see it — they heard it; they saw and heard a furious, insulted giant standing on his feet, though a little shaky. He took a few steps toward them, and from his enormous, red throat flowed a stream of words which the boys did not think were of a friendly kind. A few words Robert thought he understood: Damned — thieves — bastards. Never in their lives had they heard such terrifying sounds come from a human throat.

The passers-by stopped in the street, people began to gather around them, attracted by the resurrected one’s roaring. The boys held each other’s hands as they backed away. The man so suddenly sprung from the ground spurted spit and fury, he bent forward as though ready to spring at them; something gleamed in his right hand, it flashed in the sun.

Arvid cried out at the top of his voice: “A knife! He’ll stab us — Run, run!’’

The boys took to their heels and ran. They ran into the middle of the street, still gripping each other’s hands, down the street the same way they had come; they ran until they lost their breath and felt a burning in their lungs; they ran past riders and wagons, carts and carriages, horses and asses, they slid between animals and vehicles, they ran for their lives — to get away from the man who sprang at them with a flashing knife in his hand, from the dead man who had come back to life. They had no trouble finding their way, they knew it — all the way down the broad street, the whole length of Broadway, until it ended, then a turn to the left where they would see the harbor and the ships.

During their race they josded people, and angry voices were heard from the crowd. At last Robert held Arvid back: they must slow their pace and be more careful or people would become suspicious of them.

As they reached the market place they stopped for a moment and looked back, puffing and breathless. No one was following them, they were saved. And they resumed their leisurely walk, protected and hidden by the crowd.

“He was a dangerous man,” said Arvid, still shaking. “He might have killed us!”

In a flash Robert could see himself and Arvid lying there stretched out in the street, knife slashes through their throats, like pigs at slaughter time, their blood gushing like ale through a bunghole; their legs kicking a last, weak kick, a helpless kick against death; a feeble twitch of their limbs — then death overpowering them. And there they would be lying, dead in the street, people walking by, no one noticing or taking care of their corpses, nor shrouding them, nor burying them, nor grieving over them here in a foreign country. And when they began to rot and smell, they would at last become food for the swine in the street. So it might have happened.

Robert had seen something glitter in the man’s hand but now, as he recovered his breath, he thought it might not have been a knife; it looked more like glass, perhaps a small bottle. But Arvid insisted he had seen the gruesome man pull out a slaughter knife, a real sticking knife with a point as sharp as an awl.

Robert was still trembling a little, and now he felt ashamed of it and wondered if they hadn’t run simply because of their own fear. He told Arvid they must agree never to let fear overtake them here in America.

“Silly to run away! If the man had touched us, we could have reported him to the police.”

He had just remembered from his English instruction book how to call the police in case of robbers and murderers on the street: Please listen to me, Mr. Policeman! I appeal for your protection against this unfriendly person who is annoying me. This was a long sentence, requiring much time to say. . He thought one would have to be very quick if one were to finish the whole sentence before being murdered. He realized he must learn English as soon as possible; he must know the language in order to save his life in case of sudden attack, if for no other reason. He had forgotten, earlier, that he had something of value he might lose; now he remembered: his own life!

But what had happened was really Arvid’s fault: “I told you to let the man alone!”

“I thought he was dead from drinking. He stank of brännvin.”

“But why did you poke him in the ribs?”

“I like the smell of brännvin, and I thought a corpse couldn’t be dangerous.”

Robert lectured him. He had been foolish and curious, and as a result almost got them killed. Finally Arvid agreed that he had been careless; but he had felt happy and reckless today, walking along this broad, beautiful street. Now he became dejected and sad; he promised on oath, using God’s holy name, that it would never happen again. If he found droves of corpses here in America, if people lay dead in piles on every street and road, he would never bother to stop. No, he wouldn’t even cast a glance at a single one of the corpses, no one could ever persuade him to look at dead men, or poke at them — even if they smelled of brännvin ever so much. He and Robert shook hands on this.

They were a little disappointed not to have reached the farther end of the street, not to have seen where Broadway ran — either to the portals of Heaven or Hell. But now they trailed dejectedly and cautiously back to its beginning, where they had started out, near the green grove, the manor park. They went back to join their families, both of them anxious to tell the others about their walk on the most beautiful street in the world, where they had almost been robbed of the only thing they owned — their lives.

Arvid soon consoled himself, and his happiness returned as he stuck his hand into his trousers pocket and felt his watch still there.

VI. JOURNEY WITH THE STEAM WAGON

Contract for Transportation of Immigrants

The undersigned agrees to carry the immigrants, who have arrived on the Swedish brig Charlotta of Karlshamn, from New York to Chicago, on the following conditions:

1. From New York to Albany by steamer, from Albany to Buffalo by steam wagon, and from Buffalo to Chicago by steamer.

2. For every adult person the fare is 8 dollars, children under 3 years free, children between 3 years and 12 years half fare.

3. The same fare entitles the traveler to 100 lbs. baggage free, and 150 lbs. on the steam wagon.

4. The baggage of the passengers is transferred free of charge from the vessel in New York to the steamer, and likewise in Albany and Buffalo, the whole way through to Chicago.

New York, June 26, 1850

— 1—

The immigrants traveled up the Hudson from New York to Albany on one of the largest steamboats plying the river, the Isaac Newton.

The steamer left New York at eight in the evening, loaded to capacity with passengers and baggage. The immigrants were crowded together on the lower deck, while their belongings were piled almost as high as the smokestacks of the steamer on the upper deck toward the bow.

This was a night without rest for the travelers; there were no sleeping accommodations, and the immigrants sat or stood on deck, so closely packed together that no one could lie down. Parents held their children in their arms, older children and grownups stood upright. When they were tired, they tried to find rest by leaning on each other. Fortunately, they were to travel on this boat for only one night.

And this night they might have been able to sleep without concern for their lives if only there had been room to stretch out; this was not a dangerous voyage over a heaving ocean, violently pitching and rolling; this was a steady, easy passage on a calm, protected river. The Hudson stretched serenely before them, dotted with islands and inlets, following its furrow in quiet power. Through the night, mist towered over the high, steep shores. They were like secret dark fortress walls or silent sentinels, which guarded their water passage on either side. The journey on this water, where they could see land on the right and on the left, was to these ocean travelers almost the same as a trip on solid ground.

The Isaac Newton was driven forward by its great stern wheel, which dug deep into the river, stirring up whirls of foam; the wheel twirled the water like a giant egg whisk. The Hudson’s even current slowed the progress of the heavily laden, deep-lying vessel. The stern wheel cut a deep furrow through the white foam, a wheel track in the water, evened out, obliterated, and gone as soon as its wake had passed. Behind the vessel the river flowed as before, calm, slow, even, majestic, on its way to the Atlantic.

One hour after daybreak the Isaac Newton tied up at the pier in Albany. Tired, limp, worn-out by lack of sleep, the immigrants left the boat and were divided into groups by their guides and interpreters, who marched with them on a road along the river to the railway station. They were shown into a large hall in the station house, and here the different groups — the English, the Irish, the Germans, the Swedes — were told by their respective guides in their own languages to remain absolutely still; no one was allowed to move from his indicated place. They were not told why they must stand so still, but gradually they learned: two American inspectors went about among them, pointing their fingers at each one, counting them. The men came back, pointed and mumbled once more, and again the immigrants were told by their guides to remain absolutely still; a few had moved and confused the inspectors in their counting.

The immigrants were counted like sheep in a pen, their numbers must check with the numbers in the passenger contracts. Then they were let out of the station to board the steam wagon.

— 2—

At home, the immigrants from Ljuder had heard stories about these newly invented wagons, which were driven by steam and rolled along on iron bars strung over the ground. But until now none of their group had seen or used the railroad. To them this newfangled method of transportation seemed dangerous, possibly disastrous. But Karl Oskar had said that the steam wagon was the fastest means of transportation inland, and as their interpreter had told them the same, they had agreed to try the new way of traveling.

They considered themselves lucky in obtaining so tall a Swede to be their interpreter and guide; the ex-carpenter Landberg was a whole head taller than anyone in this great multitude of travelers, and wherever he happened to be, they could easily see him, they would not be likely to lose him. And Landberg was careful not to lose any of them. He stayed close to the group from the Charlotta, explained things, and was helpful in all ways. Now he led them up to the steam wagon and told them to be careful when climbing on board, so as not to fall and hurt themselves.

Some twenty wagons, high and covered with roofs, were tied together in a long row, and the immigrants gaped at them wide eyed, half from fear and half from curiosity. Each wagon was built on eight iron wheels and had windows. They thought it might be strong and steady. The wagon at the forward end was unlike the others; as it was first, it must be the one that was to pull, the real steam wagon. It had only four wheels, but these were three times as large as the wheels on the other wagons. Then there were two small wheels, in the very front end. The steam wagon had a tall chimney, broad at the opening and narrowing downward; it sat there like a huge funnel stuck in the throat of a bottle. At the fore end this wagon had iron bars twisted together to form a large scoop or shovel.

Thick, black smoke belched from the chimney and sent red-glowing sparks whirling into the air. The steam wagon had fire inside, it burned there, and this worried the immigrants.

They had always been taught to be careful with fire, to carry burning candles cautiously, to handle lanterns and firesticks with utmost wariness; they harbored a fear, implanted in them from childhood, of fire on the loose. And now they must ride in a row of wagons drawn by one with fire burning inside it; it smoked, crackled, sputtered, and sparks flew from the wagon’s bowels. How easily one spark could fall on the roof of a following wagon and ignite it! They realized that they were to be exposed to continuous fire hazard, at least while the fire burned inside the steam wagon. They had also heard that a steam wagon might easily explode and fly to pieces in the air.

Robert had read about steam engines in his History of Nature and tried to explain to the others: Inside the steam wagon they were boiling water in a great big kettle, and it was that kettle which pulled the whole row of wagons. But he did not know what purpose was served by the large iron scoop in front of the steam wagon, and he asked Long Landberg about this. Their guide said that this contraption shoveled away wild animals if they stood between the rails and threatened to overturn the train.

Ulrika of Västergöhl said she wanted to ride as far away from the burning wagon as possible. She expressed the desire of all in their group.

When they were ready to take their seats, the guide showed them into the fifth wagon from the engine; they were disappointed not to be farther away from the fire. They climbed a small ladder, slowly and cautiously. Their wagon was about fifteen feet long and half as wide. A bench had been built on either side with a narrow passage in the middle. The seats were made of carelessly nailed-together rough boards. Two more groups, somewhat smaller than their own, were to share this wagon with them. Their knapsacks, food baskets, boxes, and bundles took much room, and they had to crowd together in order to find space for all. Those unable to find room on the benches stood or lay down on the floor. The immigrants felt as though they had been packed into a good-sized calf coop.

On the end of one bench a place was made for old Fina-Kajsa, so that she might ride half-sitting; she was weaker than she would admit and could stand on her legs only a few minutes at a time. For the third or fourth time she inquired of the guide about her iron pot, and for the third or fourth time she was given the information that the pot rode with the chests and other heavier pieces in a special wagon.

“But where is the grindstone?” asked Fina-Kajsa. “Where is it?”

The grindstone, brought along by her husband who died on the voyage, had, through carelessness at the New York unloading, fallen into the harbor, and all said this was good luck for Fina-Kajsa, who need not now pay the expensive inland freight for it. But she thought they were telling her a lie. Her son Anders in Minnesota had written home that grindstones were scarce in America, and now she thought the Americans had stolen her stone as soon as they laid eyes on it.

And Fina-Kajsa kept on complaining: “Oh me, oh my! What an endless road! We’ll never arrive!”

In great harmony the immigrants shared the wagon space with each other; no one tried to spread out, all made room; they had learned on this journey to live closely packed in narrow quarters, and they endured it good-naturedly. In the wagon, too, they had more space in which to move than they had had on the river steamer. But the air in the wagon seemed thick and stuffy after a score and a half people had pushed their way into it. At daybreak a heavy shower had fallen and cooled the earth, but now the sun already felt burning, in spite of the early hour, and they understood that the day was to bring intense heat, hard to endure.

As yet the wagon stood still, and the passengers were quiet in silent anticipation and wordless worry: What would happen when they began to ride? Unknown dangers lurked on this journey; what mightn’t take place when the wagon with fire inside it began to move? They had heard that some persons could not stand being freighted along on the railroad; it was said to be so hard on them that they fainted and lay unconscious for hours.

Kristina had heard the same as the others; she sat in a corner of the wagon with Lill-Märta and Harald on her knees. Johan had climbed up on the knapsack standing between the bench and her feet. The oldest boy had also wished to sit on her knees, and she would gladly have let him if she had had three knees. But Johan wouldn’t understand that she had only two. The boy had grown impatient and troublesome since they landed.

He pulled his mother’s arms: “Aren’t we going to live in a house now, Mother?”

“Yes, soon — I’ve told you so.”

“When is soon? When shall we live in a house?”

“When we arrive.”

“But Father says we have arrived in America now.”

“Yes, we have. Please keep quiet.”

“It isn’t true, Mother! You said we would live in a house when we got to America. Now we are in America — aren’t we going to live in a house?”

“Yes, yes — please keep still, can’t you, boy?”

Johan tired her beyond endurance, and she didn’t know what to do with him, except to let him be until he tired himself. After the night on the river steamer without a moment’s sleep, she was too exhausted to answer her children. All she wanted was to stretch herself out somewhere and rest; she wanted to lie still, still, and sleep, sleep. But there never seemed any rest on this journey, no real rest, no satisfying sleep; now that they were to travel on this dangerous steam wagon there would be no sleep tonight either.

Karl Oskar stood pressed against the wall near her and talked to Jonas Petter and Danjel about the new form of transportation. Danjel said that now the prophesy had been fulfilled which said that toward the end of the world wagons would move without horses.

Danjel had asked himself if it could be God’s will that His children use the steam power as beast of burden; if this power were something good and useful, why had the Lord kept it secret from man ever since the creation of the earth — nearly six thousand years? It might be that the steam power emanated from evil powers. But thus far the Lord had helped them on their journey. On the steam wagon they were still in His hands.

Kristina remembered Dean Brusander’s words at a catechism examination, to the effect that the steam wagon was a wicked human device, tending to estrange the soul from its Creator, and, like all mechanical contraptions, leading to disaster for poor and rich alike. Steam power weakened and undermined soul and body, encouraging idleness, fornication, and immorality. The dean had therefore prayed God to spare them this curse and prevent steam wagons from ever being used in Sweden.

Kristina wondered if they sinned against any of God’s commandments by riding the steam wagon; she thought, if she had understood the dean rightly, it must be the sixth commandment.

She knew nothing in advance of what might happen on this steam journey, but as she and her loved ones were in the clutches of the wagon it was too late to regret it. She felt as though she had stepped into a conveyance which had been harnessed to a wild, untamed horse in the shafts for the first time; a romping, ferocious beast capable of anything, which might run off the road, bolt, or roll over on the ground in play. She could not forget the belching sparks from the steam wagon’s bowels; she felt that this was the most perilous part of their journey thus far. As yet nothing dangerous had happened to them in America, but they hadn’t got far from the shore: anything might still happen.

Danjel had opened his psalmbook to the “Prayer before Starting a Journey,” and when Kristina saw her uncle fold his hands, she did the same. She, her husband, and children already had risked their lives at sea, now they must do it on land as well; in silent prayer she invoked her Creator’s protection.

— 3—

In each end of the wagon was a narrow door, and over both doors were identical inscriptions in tall black letters:

DANGER!

WATCH YOUR STEP!

Karl Oskar had seen the same inscription near the pier in New York and as he now recognized it he asked their interpreter to tell him the meaning. Landberg said that these four words warned of dangerous places; when they saw the sign they must watch their steps and look carefully where they set their feet. Inexperienced travelers could easily take a false step when entering or leaving the wagon, and fall off.

Karl Oskar in his turn explained the words to Kristina, who said it was thoughtful to nail up placards in dangerous places in America; she too was going to keep in mind the four words signaling danger, they were so black and threatening she could never forget them.

Outside their window was a tall, white-painted signpost with several lines of foot-high letters:

SAFETY SIGNALS FOR TRAINS

A WHITE FLAG BY DAY

A WHITE LAMP BY NIGHT

SHOWS

ALL CLEAR

Karl Oskar wondered what this placard might mean; no doubt it concerned the travelers, therefore they ought to know. And it annoyed him that he understood not a single syllable of the new language, that he couldn’t decipher a word. It was like the first day at school, when Schoolmaster Rinaldo had held the ABC book to his eyes for the first time. But now he was a full-grown man, twenty-seven years of age, with three children of his own; yet in this country he felt like a schoolboy once more; he must learn to spell all over again, he must learn to recognize words. His inability to read the language did not seem so bad, but it vexed him not to understand the spoken words; it hurt him to hear people speak in his presence without understanding them; he felt inclined to believe they were talking about him, and he was ashamed and annoyed to be talked about before his face, disregarded. Here in America one could stand face to face with people who insulted one, yet one couldn’t do a thing about it; only stand there and stare, awkward, helpless, dumb. Since stepping ashore in America not many hours ago, he had felt foolish more often than during his whole life in Sweden.

But he refused to believe his intelligence had suffered from the emigration.

Their guide Landberg was standing at the entrance, his tall head concealing the inscription; he was speaking English to a man in a blue coat with yellow buttons; the man had a yellow sign on his cap, he must be one of the American guards, or steam-wagon officials. Karl Oskar surmised they were talking about the travelers inside the wagon. He listened with his ears open, trying to understand something that at least reminded him of words he understood. But the language of the interpreter and the American did not sound like human speech, rather like the buzz of a bumblebee in his ear; the sounds were distorted, mixed up, crazy through and through. The men twisted their mouths and made knots of their tongues in order to emit strange sounds; it seemed they imitated each other, made faces at each other as children might in play. To Karl Oskar’s ears the American language seemed an unaccountable mixture of senseless sounds, and he grew more depressed each time he listened to it; he would never be able to teach his mouth to use this tongue.

The official left the wagon after he had seen to it that both doors were closed, and now Landberg spoke in Swedish: “Hold on to your seats, good people! Our train is starting to move!”

The warning was followed by a long-drawn-out, piercing, evil yell from the first wagon. The immigrants had never heard the like of this horrible howl, produced by neither beasts’ nor human beings’ throats, but by a lifeless thing and consequently much more terrifying. When it stopped, there was silence in the wagon, a silence of fear and apprehension. Faces turned pale, hands grasped hands, the travelers clutched each other or sought support against benches and walls, against anything within reach.

The moment had arrived; the steam wagon was moving. They could hear the wheels thunder under them as they rolled along on the iron bars, they could see through the windows that they had started ahead.

Their wagon jolted and shook, it cracked and creaked. A minute passed, and two, it pulled still harder, and the wagon rolled and leaned over a little to one side. Some of the travelers crouched in terror to weigh down the other side with the weight of their bodies; Fina-Kajsa shrieked to heaven. It was like the shriek of a dying person; she said she was being choked. Ulrika of Västergöhl hurried to her and loosened her vest, and soon she grew quiet and breathed more easily.

“It’s turning over!” Johan screamed and gripped his mother’s legs. “It’s tipping over, Mother!”

“Keep quiet, boy!”

“I’m afraid!”

“Don’t be afraid! It isn’t dangerous!” Karl Oskar reassured the boy. “Lill-Märta and Harald aren’t crying. You’re the biggest, you mustn’t cry.”

Johan wanted to crawl up onto his mother’s knees, already occupied by the smaller children, but the closest he could get was to cling to her legs; he held on with all his strength while the wagon rolled on, and great tears rolled down his pale cheeks.

Kristina was as much afraid as the child holding on to her, but she forced herself not to cry out. As she looked through the window and saw houses, trees, and the very ground itself move backward, she felt nauseated, her eyes blurred, her throat closed, her head swam. She wanted to see nothing, feel nothing — she closed her eyes and clenched her teeth. She must drive away this dizziness. She held her children closer to her, she clenched her teeth still tighter, she mustn’t faint. . Perhaps she might escape it by sitting quite still, eyes closed. .

And while the train increased its speed, faster and faster, Kristina sat with her eyes closed. The engine blew out smoke and sparks from its interior, it belched and sputtered, it drew its breath heavily, in and out. The wheels rolled, creaked, and thundered, the wagons rocked and jerked, pulled and shook. And the people closed up inside sat in tense turmoil, each moment anticipating calamity.

But their wagon did not leave the rails, nor did it turn over, nor catch fire; nothing happened.

After a long while Kristina opened her eyes. She saw through the window how trees, bushes, hills, fields rushed by her with dizzying, indescribable speed, and her feeling of faintness returned. They were traveling with frightful speed, she could not endure to see how fast they moved, her head could not stand it; she was forced to close her eyes again.

And the immigrant train continued inland. Pale, silent, serious, the travelers felt they were moving with the speed of the wind.

Karl Oskar said, perhaps they were the first from Sweden to ride on a steam wagon.

— 4—

The passengers gradually grew calm, they began to talk to each other and move about. But they suffered sorely from the heat that pricked their skins with a thousand invisible pin points. As no air was admitted, it grew more and more oppressive inside the wagon, breathing became almost impossible; the children grew restless and irritable.

Karl Oskar turned to their guide: “Couldn’t we open the windows ever so little?”

“The windows are nailed and cannot be opened.”

“Couldn’t we open the doors, then?”

“The doors are locked. They won’t be opened until we stop.”

And Landberg admonished the travelers to be calm and to rely on him; they were in his hands and he would look after them the way a shepherd watches his flock.

Landberg continued: It had happened that traveling immigrants had fallen off the wagons during the journey and been killed; it was in concern for their lives that the doors had been locked. But he would see to it that they got the air they needed during the journey. He knew that locked doors, too, could be dangerous. Last year a gruesome disaster had happened to an immigrant train. When it had arrived in Buffalo, and the doors of one windowless freight car had been opened, five travelers were dead of suffocation. Three of those stifled had come from Sweden. All the other passengers were far gone. They had cried and begged to have the doors opened, but no one had understood them as there was no interpreter in their company. So, Landberg pointed out, the travelers could readily see how useful a guide was to newcomers. Since that tragedy, the railroad companies had been instructed to open the doors every time the train stopped. Landberg would see to it that sufficient air was admitted to keep his flock alive; no one would suffocate on this journey.

And the ex-carpenter, their tall countryman, smiled encouragingly at them. He had a mouthful of teeth which glittered white and handsome, and his cheeks were covered with a black, well-kept beard. He was a man whom women looked at. When unmarried Ulrika of Västergöhl asked him a question, she stuck her finger in a buttonhole of his coat so as not to let him get away. Long Landberg was kept busy answering questions, as they had no one else to ask, no one else to hear complaints; but he was never impatient or short.

Hardly had the passengers got their promise of fresh air than they were disturbed again: the sound from the wheels had suddenly grown more intense and hollow. They looked out and saw water streaming on either side of the wagon. They were riding over a bridge that crossed a broad river. The Americans had laid the iron bars for the railroad right across the water! The guide said the Americans were very daring people; above all, they liked to risk their lives; they did it frequently, as a matter of course.

Robert and Arvid sat together on the wagon floor and spoke to each other in low voices. Arvid did not feel well, he had a toothache; he wished he had continued the journey on foot. The first day on land he had had the motion of the waves in his legs and had felt as though he were walking over a quagmire; now when all his limbs were in good order again he must sit locked up in this calf coop. He was sure the wagon had been used for cattle transport — under one bench he had found dry cow dung. Robert showed this to Landberg, who said yes, maybe the wagon had been used for freighting cattle before it had been turned into an immigrant wagon.

Arvid asked if they could trust the wheels to follow the iron bars all the way. Robert told him there were rims on the wheels which forced them to follow the bars. It might, of course, happen that a wagon would lose a wheel, particularly as they drove with this terrible speed; they must be going eighteen miles an hour, or three times as fast as an ordinary spring wagon. That was how fast and strong the steam was.

Arvid looked at him in disbelief: “They say steam is nothing but mist?”

“Ye-es. The kind of mist one sees when water is boiling.”

And Robert explained the power of steam to his friend: Once he and some other boys had picked up an old, discarded gun pipe; they had plugged one end, filled the pipe with water, and then plugged the other end too; they had made a fire in the forest and laid the gun pipe over it; soon it became red hot and blew up; it made a terrific explosion, and the pipe burst into a thousand pieces. One of the boys had had three fingers torn off — so strong was steam power when loosed.

If they were unlucky, it might well happen that the steam in this train would break loose and tear all of them to pieces like a mash of meat so intermingled that flesh scraps and bone chips could hardly be separated.

Arvid chewed one of his knuckles, as was his custom when uneasy. “You think the steam will break loose?”

“No. I said, only if we are unlucky.”

Robert meant to recount all he had read in his History of Nature about iron roads and steam power, so that his friend might feel comfortable and safe on this journey. But Arvid’s face showed that his mind was in a turmoil. He whispered: “Do you remember what we promised each other? Always to stick together. Whatever happens, we must stick together.”

“That we must, Arvid.” Robert suddenly became very serious. “I do not forget a promise. Whatever happens to us in America, we must be friends.”

Once, in their farm hands’ stable quarters, back in Sweden, they had clasped hands and promised always to stand by each other. After their lives had been endangered on New York’s broadest street, they had renewed this pledge.

Robert nodded toward his elder brother, he told Arvid he did not care for Karl Oskar’s masterful ways, he did not like masters, he would rather be in Arvid’s company. To be such friends as he and Arvid were counted more than blood relationships.

The train was slowing down, and soon their wagon stood quite still. Landberg kept his promise: the doors were opened at both ends of the wagon, and fresh air came in to ease their breathing. Through the windows they could see a few tall houses along a street and many small houses clustered near by, some no larger than woodsheds.

At last Kristina dared open her eyes and she gazed out as long as their wagon stood still. Karl Oskar asked how she felt after this first stretch.

“Not too bad. A little dizzy.”

“It’s because the wagon runs so fast, of course.”

Across from Kristina sat Ulrika of Västergöhl, who had been looking out the window ever since they left Albany and did not seem to have suffered from dizziness. She was still as rosy cheeked and healthy as when she left Sweden, she had suffered no inconvenience during the long voyage, she had not missed a single meal at sea, she had never been seasick for one minute, nor had she thrown up one bite of all the food she had eaten. Scurvy did not attack her, lice did not come near her. No other passenger had remained as well as she. It had been given to her to step ashore in America in full health, with all her strength intact. And now she sat here, unruffled by the terrifying speed; it agreed with her to ride behind the steam wagon.

Kristina wondered how this woman was created, what she could be made of. Most remarkable of all was the fact that twenty years of whoring had left no visible marks on the Glad One. Since embracing Danjel’s teaching she no longer followed her profession, and lately Kristina had begun to believe that Ulrika’s nature had improved; she was kind to Danjel’s motherless children and took good care of them; this everyone had remarked on. Perhaps she wanted to expiate her life of whoring. Surely, in God’s redemption book much was written concerning Ulrika of Västergöhl; each time her body had been used for fornication was noted. (Ulrika, however, thought that Christ’s blood had washed her clean and that her sins, like a bundle of soiled linen, were tied up in the Saviour’s napkin cloth.)

It had always bothered Kristina that she was forced to use the same privy as Ulrika; she could never forget the great number of men the Glad One had consorted with. In one end of the wagon was a small booth serving as a call-of-nature room for the passengers. Someone was always waiting near the booth, as the immigrants suffered from a severe diarrhea, which had attacked them after landing. But diarrhea was to be expected when they first arrived in America, said their interpreter; it was a special kind of immigrant diarrhea, caused by the change of country and different weather conditions; hardly one newcomer escaped it. Now all of them had been running to the privy this last day, at least once an hour — all except Ulrika of Västergöhl. She seemed to have normal, undisturbed bowels. She had escaped all ills and evils, even the diarrhea. God had verily shown her great patience, even though she was so deeply sunk in sin; yet He had severely tested Uncle Danjel, who always strove to live righteously. The ways of the Lord were inscrutable. But Kristina was grateful that Ulrika did not often use their privy here in the wagon.

For the third time since boarding the train Jonas Petter emerged from the little stall at the end of the wagon, fumbling with his trousers. He had lost weight during the crossing, and his face was pale and sunken. He complained to Karl Oskar: “This plagues one’s bowels!”

“Diarrhea is not dangerous to life; it will pass as soon as the bowels are accustomed to the climate.” And Karl Oskar pulled out his knapsack: “I heal myself with pepper-brännvin. Have a swallow, Jonas Petter.”

He poured the brännvin from its earthen jug into a tin mug, and from a small bag added pepper until the brännvin looked as black as dung water.

“Pour it down fast!”

Jonas Petter emptied the mug of dark pepper-brännvin and made a wry face. “It’s like swallowing burning coals.”

“But it closes the hole. Take another drink in the morning — then you won’t be forever running.”

Jonas Petter said it was a strange invention to sit on a wagon and ride while attending to one’s needs. What would the people at home say if they knew how comfortable they were, traveling with such a contraption! He admitted Americans were smart. This invention saved much time; should the train have to stop each time someone needed to cleanse his bowels, they would have traveled scarcely more than a stone’s throw a day. But he wondered if anyone collected all this human dung so that the earth and the crops might benefit. Or perhaps American soil was so rich that no manure was needed.

Karl Oskar offered some of the pepper-brännvin to Kristina, but she refused it, thinking it too strong for her; she had tried it on the ship but threw it up again. Perhaps this was because of her pregnancy, which also caused her to suffer more than the others from the heat. She had often wondered why God inflicted so many miseries on pregnant women when He Himself created the human lives inside them.

As half her time had passed now, it would soon begin to show that she was with child. No one in their company except Karl Oskar knew as yet how things stood with her. But it couldn’t be kept secret much longer. It was the women who first made such discoveries in each other; they always noticed the signs. Indeed, probably Ulrika already knew — she had seen the shameless creature, from time to time, look searchingly at her body, and even before they left Sweden the Glad One had said to Kristina, in a meaningful tone, that seasickness was much like being in the family way. Kristina had no hiding garment to don; she had not found time to sew herself a forty-week apron before they started out on their journey, and she did not think she would have opportunity to sew one here in America; she had a needle and thread, but not the smallest piece of cloth.

At home it was the custom for a woman to hide her pregnancy as long as possible. But why should she need a forty-week apron far away in a foreign country where she didn’t know a single person and no one knew her? And perhaps no one in this country was offended by women showing their pregnancy. Perhaps they had different customs in North America. She had heard that no one cared how other people lived here or what they did.

But there sat Ulrika staring at her again, as if wondering in which month she might now be. This look on Ulrika’s face angered her; she had a full right to be with child. She lived with her husband in a Christian marriage, she had a known father for her child. But how had it been with Ulrika’s own brats? Who was father to Elin, the girl next to her, now looking after Danjel’s children, sitting this moment with little Eva on her knee? There had been rumors about tramps; the churchwarden in Åkerby had also been mentioned. And who had been the fathers of those children she had lost? Their fathers were known only to God. Ulrika ought to remember this before she stared at honest women.

Kristina would have liked to sew a forty-week apron — if for no other reason than to irritate Ulrika.

— 5—

The immigrants from Ljuder rode on the steam wagon through a green and fertile country. From their train they saw vast fields covered with a thick fell of beautiful crops; in other fields the crops already had gone to seed. They saw meadows with tall fodder grass where cattle grazed in great numbers; in places the grass was so tall that they saw only the animals’ backs. They thought the cattle here must tramp down more grass than they ate; they counted as many as fifty cows together and wondered if such large herds might belong to one single owner. They passed through forests of tall, lush leaf-trees and recognized oaks, maples, elms, and birches. They saw groves of unknown, low trees and wondered what the name of such beautiful little trees might be. Danjel Andreasson thought they might be fig trees, of which Jesus often had spoken in parables and which grew also in the land of Canaan.

They passed through a smiling landscape — it was a fertile world they saw here. A verdant ground promised food for both man and beast, ample crops, and security. Where the earth grew green, there life throve; it marked a good place for people to live.

They were looking for such green places with rich growth in which to build their own homes — here they would have liked to stop and settle, if others hadn’t arrived before them.

Karl Oskar was pleased with what he saw: the earth here seemed rich, and his eyes did not discover a single hindering stone in the fields. As he looked out over the cultivated land he remembered the picture of a wheat field in North America which he had seen in a newspaper at home; the picture had spoken the truth — the American fields lay before his own eyes now, as vast and stone free, as even and fertile, as they had been in the picture. And it was said that still vaster fields existed farther inland.

At times they passed through poorer regions, they saw hills and mountains, morasses, plateaus, and forests of pine trees. But Karl Oskar had not expected the whole American continent to look like the picture of the wheat field.

The journey on the steam wagon was long, hour after hour passed, and new landscapes came into view, new fields, new pastures, new forests, new crops, and new meadows with more large herds of grazing cattle. Karl Oskar noticed that the cows were larger than those in Sweden, they were white or light yellow in color, like milk and butter; at home they were red or sometimes black. The American horses too were taller than those in Sweden; he wondered if they might be wild horses that had been tamed. The sheep were black and white, fat and round, with bodies like barrels. He saw black and red-brown pigs in the pastures; but the hogs were lean and long legged, not at all resembling those at home. Thus he observed that cattle in the New World were not shaped like the kine at home: cows and horses were larger, sheep fatter, with shorter legs, hogs leaner with longer legs.

Seldom did he see workers out in the fields or forests. There seemed to be a scarcity of people but an abundance of cattle. Seeing the multitude of people in New York, Karl Oskar had begun to worry that America already was overcrowded, that they had arrived too late. He now discovered that his worry was groundless. This country was so vast that it still had room for many more; it wouldn’t be filled up tomorrow, or next year. And he recalled how crowded it had been at home, people had even said there wasn’t enough room for his big nose, and perhaps they had been right. But here there was room for all in his group, here he was sure he would find a place to settle, large enough to turn about in and do as he pleased, and where others would not be disturbed by him or his big nose.

Danjel Andreasson had long been silently watching the green fields on either side of the railroad. At last he said, “This land is fertile and fruitful. It is a good and broad land, a blessed land. We must humbly thank the Lord God for His grace in letting us enter it.”

— 6—

Landberg said that when all went well, about twenty-four hours were required for the journey on the steam wagon to Buffalo. But delays were likely to occur. Once, for instance, the steam wagon had been delayed six hours because the iron rails were covered with a thick layer of grasshoppers.

Ulrika was disappointed that their journey on the steam wagon would come to an end so soon. In her whole life she had never before experienced pleasure like this. The poor back home in Sweden were never treated to such entertainment. Most of them were not allowed to ride on any kind of wagon until they were picked up by the corpse cart. And the gentry in Sweden would have preferred to see them walk to the grave as well.

Their guide nodded to her with a broad smile: “You, my dear Fru, will ride on the steam wagon many times in America.”

He had several times called her Mrs., and it sounded strange to those in her company. She had always been called Unmarried Ulrika of Västergöhl. Under that name she was registered in the church book, and everyone called her so. It was as if it ought particularly to be emphasized that she was unmarried, and it sounded as if she were more unmarried than any other woman. Now they could all see that Ulrika sat there, greatly enjoying it that the first man she met in America raised her to a married state, nay, even to the level of gentry, by calling her Mrs.

She guessed what the others were thinking and she said, half mockingly: “Perhaps I ought to change my name as well.”

It happened often that Swedes changed their names when they came to America, Long Landberg replied. Many took entirely new names. Those named Andersson and Larsson at home had here assumed high-sounding names like Pantzarskiold, Silverkrona, or Lejonstjerna. But it was, of course, mostly rogues who felt in need of changing their names; it was of no use to an honest person, nor did it help a useless one, for here no one got along better because of a noble name, as people did in Sweden.

That was exceedingly just, Ulrika of Västergöhl remarked, although she wouldn’t mind being called Mrs. Ulrika von Lejonstjerna. For a lonely, poor woman, a noble name would be a comfort. But she was sure menfolk would find nothing different in the body of a noble lady than in a simple woman: each was made in the same way.

Landberg laughed heartily, but the members of Ulrika’s group who knew her past did not smile. They were familiar with her talk. And now she was making up to their guide, who couldn’t know what she actually was.

From his bag the guide now took out a number of medicine jars which he was accustomed to sell to immigrants during his trips. Painkiller was the name on the jars, and he explained what it meant. These were pills which healed all ailments attacking newcomers during their first weeks in America. Painkiller healed fatal diseases as well as small wounds and scratches: cholera, red soot, diarrhea, fever, ague, yellow fever. A jar cost one dollar, leaving Landberg with a profit of only five cents. But he was not one to take advantage of his countrymen.

Danjel and Jonas Petter had bought a jar of the Painkiller, mostly to be agreeable to the seller. Karl Oskar declined; his family was in good health at the moment and not in need of medicines. Landberg kept urging him — it would be well to have a jar handy in case of sickness; there were many fatal diseases in America, neither young nor old could be sure of tomorrow. But Karl Oskar could not forget how the money in his skin pouch had shrunk; he had paid twenty-four dollars for their passage to Chicago; if they were to have any money at all left when they arrived in Minnesota, he must confine himself to buying the food his family needed on the journey.

Arvid complained of his toothache to Danjel, who bought another jar of Painkiller for his servant. Landberg told Arvid that in case the pills didn’t help the toothache he could have all his teeth pulled painlessly with the aid of gas at only twenty-five cents a tooth. Then he could buy new teeth. A professor here in America had recently discovered how to make teeth of gutta-percha; they were comfortable and indestructible; they cost only ten dollars a row, or a dollar apiece. He advised Arvid to get a whole row, since this was cheaper.

Danjel again opened his purse with the broad brass lock and took from it a new silver dollar. He looked carefully at the strange American coin before he handed it to Landberg: on one side was an eagle with extended wings and searching eyes; the bird held some silver branches in one talon and some sharp arrows in the other; turning the coin, he saw a bare-armed woman dressed in flowing robes; she held bunches of flowers in her hands and sat there like a queen on her throne, surrounded by a wreath of beautiful silver stars.

“They have nice money in America,” said Danjel. “It’s decorated with the stars of heaven.”

“The stars represent the first thirteen states,” explained Landberg.

“What does the searching eagle represent?”

“I don’t know. The Americans have no king to put on their money. Perhaps they find a bird of prey more suitable.”

Karl Oskar also had taken out a silver dollar to inspect; it might be well to familiarize himself with the coin of the country.

“There is writing under the throne where the woman sits,” he said. “Mr. Landberg, can you interpret it?”

“Yes, that I can. It says ‘In God We Trust.’”

“What are you saying, man!” exclaimed Danjel. “Is our Creed printed on the money?”

“Yes, that’s so. These words are printed on all money in this country.”

A ray of happiness lit Danjel’s eyes, and he began to examine his silver dollar with renewed interest and wonder: “Can that really be true? They have faith in God, those who make the money in this country. That’s good to hear; no heathenism exists in this country.”

And Danjel of Kärragärde was pleased and satisfied as he sat there inspecting the shining coin in his hand; at home the coins carried only the picture of King Oskar I and his name; in Sweden they thought it sufficient to serve and worship an earthly ruler. But those in charge of money matters in America knew that no coin could be reliable and sound without God’s name stamped on it; here they put their foremost trust in the heavenly king.

“In God we trust,” he repeated to himself.

To Danjel Andreasson this silver dollar had gained a new and greater value through its four-word inscription; he had come into a land where the rulers had imprinted on the country’s coins the uttermost tenet of their faith. Now he knew that North America had a God-fearing government, that it was a Christian land. He understood now that the Americans in a faithful, humble spirit remembered the Lord God each time they held a dollar in their hand. They were thus ever reminded that gold and silver were only dust, to be eaten by worms and corroded by rust, and that they themselves in the presence of their Creator were the like of worms. “In God we trust!” In a land where such coin passed, honesty and confidence between fellow men must rule, and no one could be tempted for sordid gain to cheat his fellow brethren.

Danjel held the coin up to the window so that it glittered in the bright sun: “Behold! God’s silver dollar!”

Then he gave the interpreter the coin as payment for Arvid’s medicine, and Landberg collected his jars of Painkiller and walked on to offer them to other passengers.

Arvid had become very curious about the American coin and he asked Karl Oskar if he might see it. He showed it to Robert and asked who the beautiful woman in the flowing robes might be: “Could it be the queen of America?”

“When they don’t have a king, they couldn’t have a queen,” Robert instructed him.

“Hmm. That’s so. They have a president instead.”

“And the woman has no crown either.”

Arvid looked once more at the picture; then he exclaimed in great excitement, “Now I know who she is — the president’s wife, of course!”

Robert supposed his friend had made the right guess. The bare-armed woman in the flowing robes, sitting on her throne among the stars, with flowers in her hands — she couldn’t be anyone except the wife to the president of the North American Republic.

— 7—

The children whined for food, and for the third time since leaving Albany Kristina brought out the food basket. By now there was not much left of their provisions from Sweden — a couple of rye loaves, a dried sausage, the end of a cheese, and a piece of dried leg of lamb. But these were precious scraps and must be carefully rationed. They could buy no food in the railroad wagon; those without food baskets must starve.

From Karl Oskar’s purchase in New York Kristina had saved two wheat rolls for the children, from one of the rye loaves she cut slices for her husband, brother-in-law, and herself, and among them she divided the sausage the best she could. The rye bread was dry and hard, and she had been unable to scrape away all the mildew. But they all ate as if partaking of fresh Christmas bread.

Jonas Petter also took out his food basket and began to eat. Danjel’s two boys, Olov, fourteen, and Sven, eleven, sat next to him and looked longingly as he chewed and swallowed. And now Kristina remembered that she had not seen her uncle or anyone of his family eat a bite today.

“Aren’t you going to eat, Uncle Danjel?”

Danjel looked shamefacedly at the wagon floor and said they had not the slightest crumb left in their food basket.

This was poor management, thought Kristina, as she remembered what an enormous food basket Inga-Lena had brought along — a score of big breads, many fat cheeses, half a side of pork. Yet, her family couldn’t sit here and eat their meal and let Danjel’s motherless, hungry children look on. She could see the boys following every bite with their eyes and she knew how starved they must be.

She cut the rest of the loaf in slices and divided them among Danjel and his four children. A piece of the cheese crust she gave to Arvid, to whom Robert already had given some of his portion. But because of his toothache Arvid wasn’t very hungry and stuck mostly to his jar of pain-killing pills.

Kristina’s hand, still holding the bread knife, fell on her knee: there were two hungry people in her company who had nothing to eat, Ulrika of Västergöhl and her daughter Elin. They belonged to Danjel’s household and had shared his food throughout the journey. But now their food basket was empty, now Ulrika and her daughter must sit and look on while others ate their meal.

Kristina’s hand, a moment before so busy cutting and dividing the bread, lay now quite still upon her knee. Not for one moment would she entertain the preposterous thought that she should divide her food with the Glad One — no, certainly not.

Ulrika was looking out the window, gazing at the landscape they were passing as if she weren’t aware that the others were eating. Elin had picked up her little berry basket in which she found a dried bread crust; this she chewed with an expression of contentment, as if she were sitting at an overloaded table. Neither mother nor daughter seemed aware that they were being left out of the meal.

Kristina reflected that Ulrika had taken charge of the family food basket at Inga-Lena’s death. But she was not one to save or be stingy with the possessions of others; she had been so generous with the food that already it was gone; she had only herself to blame.

But it was true that the Glad One’s healthy body required much food, and she never willingly missed a meal. As she had put nothing in her stomach the whole day, she must be thoroughly hungry, must ache with hunger, even more now that she saw the food the others were eating. Kristina could not help feeling sorry for her; as she now shared her food with all the others, could she pass by Ulrika and her brat? It said in the Bible to break one’s bread with the hungry.

Kristina had only one bread loaf left, one single loaf. Must she cut this for the Glad One’s sake? She had a hungry husband, brother-in-law with a heavy appetite, and three small children, lean and pale, who needed regular meals. She did not know when they might be able to buy more food. Could God mean that she ought to take the bread from her own poor children and give it to a person like Ulrika, a harlot, an evil creature? How she had insulted other women, this Ulrika of Västergöhl! How detested and looked down on she had been in the home parish! And how Kristina had suffered from being forced to travel in her company! If she now offered the infamous whore food from her own basket, then it would be as if she invited her as a guest to her own table. It would be accepting her as an honorable woman, and equal. Giving her food would be like taking her hand; it would be a humiliation to Kristina, a debasement, if at last she gave in to the Glad One, as though wanting her for a friend.

One could hand a piece of bread to a beggar. But Ulrika had never begged; she was proud, she was more than proud, she was haughty. When she was in prison for breach of the sacramental law, she had refused to eat; she had spit in the porridge, it was said. She would accept nothing unless it was offered to her as to an equal. And Kristina did not wish to consider her an equal.

Her hand with the bread knife was quiet on her knee. Mixed with the rumbling of the rolling wheels she could hear the sound of eagerly chewing jaws; but she who had divided the food had not yet begun to eat.

Kristina’s heart beat faster, so greatly was she perturbed. Should she cut the last loaf — or should she save it? She had a vague feeling that what she did now would be of great importance to all of them. She had a foreboding that fundamental changes awaited them in this new land, everything seemed different from home, they were forced to act in new and unaccustomed ways. And as they now were driven through strange country, with everything around them foreign and unknown, they were more closely united — it seemed more and more as if they were one single family. Then they must try to endure each other, at least not irritate each other. Otherwise, how would things work out for them?

Ulrika suffered hunger, and any one able to give her food but withholding it increased her suffering. Could Kristina be so cruel as to let another human being suffer when she could help her? She had many times asked herself why people plagued each other so mercilessly in this world; now she put the question to herself: Ulrika is hungry — why do you let her suffer? You say she is proud — what are you? Is it not from haughtiness that you pass her by?

Kristina’s hand took a firmer hold of the knife handle — but this was the children’s bread. They were weak and needed every bite. She thought, you cannot take it away from them! To cut that bread is like cutting your own flesh. The Glad One is big and strong, vulgar and forward, she will always manage, she’ll never starve to death. It’s different with your helpless little ones. If there were plenty of food, more than they needed, then. . Now — never!

But it couldn’t go on like this. They couldn’t continue to hurt each other. They were all of them poor wretched creatures, lost in the New World; no one knew what awaited them in this new country, no one knew what they might have to suffer. One loaf would save no one’s life in the long run. And if one could help another. . Help thy neighbor! The Glad One too was her neighbor; she too had been given an immortal soul by her Creator. He had from the beginning considered her as worthy as others; she too was made by God, Who must care for her as for others. Kristina felt He would see to the little children also, so they needn’t starve. .

She took out the last loaf, cut generous slices, and handed them to Ulrika of Västergöhl and her daughter: Wouldn’t they please share her bread? It was old and dry, but she had scraped off the mildew as best she could. .

Mother and daughter accepted gratefully. “Thank you very much,” Ulrika said, and this sounded strange when all she got was hard, old bread. Nor did Ulrika seem surprised at the offer; she only looked grateful, truly grateful. And Kristina also handed them the knife and the smoked leg of lamb that they might cut themselves meat for the bread. They both chewed slowly, with restraint, but it was apparent they did so with effort, trying not to reveal their ravenous hunger.

Kristina herself began to eat and she wondered: What would the people at home think of this? What would they say, if they could see her cut her last loaf from home in order to share with Ulrika of Västergöhl, the parish whore?

— 8—

In the evening the twilight was short, and soon it was dark as a potato cellar outside the windows of their railroad wagon. Everything went faster in this country, even the twilight passed more quickly than at home. And the thick darkness which now fell over them on a night so near Midsummer surprised the travelers. At this hour it would still be full daylight at home. But it seemed as if everything American was opposite to Swedish: here they had dark summer nights instead of light, white cows instead of black.

Their train stopped and remained standing a long time. At least an hour passed, and still they did not move. They could no longer see the landscape outside the windows; perhaps this was one of the towns where the interpreter had said the train stopped for a long rest: Schenectady, Utica, or Syracuse. Those were difficult and unusual names for towns, almost like Biblical names, towns in Canaan. Then some of the company with good eyes reported that they were in the middle of a wild forest — there were huge, thick tree trunks on either side. Their guide had gone to another wagon, and they had no one to ask.

Perhaps the train couldn’t go on during the night when it was so dark; perhaps they had to stay here until daybreak.

No light was lit inside the wagon, and the passengers couldn’t see each other’s faces, but they sat close to one another and each knew where his own family and his belongings were. They were not in need of light and they were thankful to have air; those in charge of the train had opened the doors at both ends of their wagon as soon as it stopped; the cool night air refreshed them. But none of the travelers dared step outside.

One more hour passed, and the immigrant train still stood there. They began to grow restless, they wondered and worried. Outside the windows they could see sparks from the steam wagon, whirling about in the dark like a swarm of fireflies, and this increased their anxiety. They began to fear that some accident had befallen their vehicle, or was about to happen. Why hadn’t their guide returned? Someone suggested that perhaps Landberg had deserted them.

They could hear the wheezing and hissing from the steam wagon in front, and they saw the flying sparks; they were in the depths of a dark forest, and here they sat clustered together, blind, like chickens perched in darkness, and could not even ask anyone if they were in danger. They knew nothing, therefore they feared everything.

At last they began to confer with each other: shouldn’t they elect someone to step out onto the ground and try to discover what was the matter with their unmoving train? Even if he couldn’t talk, he might learn something with his ears and eyes.

They were talking this over when the doors suddenly slammed shut, and the train started up with such a jerk that the passengers tumbled against each other. And suddenly the man they had missed stood among them; Long Landberg had returned, friendly and calm, and he explained: There was a steep, difficult hill ahead of them on the railroad, and one more steam wagon was required to pull them uphill. Their train had been waiting for the extra steam wagon, and now it was added to the back of their train, and would help push the wagons up the steep hill.

So their journey continued; the immigrant train pushed on through the night, seeking its way into North America. As yet nothing dangerous had developed, but anything could happen, they did not even know what to fear.

VII. VOYAGE ON THE LAKE STEAMER

— 1—

In the forenoon of the next day the immigrants arrived at Buffalo. That evening they started across Lake Erie on the steamer Sultana. The whole remaining part of their journey was to be on water — across lakes, up rivers, and through canals. Just ahead of them lay three great lakes over which they must pass. They had embarked on a vast, restless, inland water, but on this voyage they at least could see land on one side of the ship. At intervals, the Sultana touched shore to discharge or take aboard passengers, cargo, and firewood for her engines.

The Sultana was a fairly large steamer with one water wheel on either side; she was overloaded with people and cargo. The immigrants were given quarters below, on the middle deck, and when they were sent to their quarters, they learned another English word, steerage. Cabins were built in three rows in the hold, each one four feet wide, and each one accommodating two full-grown persons of the same sex, or a married couple. Two children under eight years of age were counted as one grown person; children under three years of age were transported free of charge, but no one asked the little ones’ ages, and all children carried aboard by the parents were allowed free passage, however old they were.

Kristina took charge of Harald while Karl Oskar carried Johan on one arm and Lill-Märta on the other. Johan was four, but tall as a six-year-old. Other parents carried children even larger, never before had such big two-year-old babies been seen. But it seemed as if all Americans loved children: they brightened and smiled as soon as a child came near them, and no one spoke harshly when the youngsters were noisy or caused trouble; children were the most welcome of all immigrants, it seemed.

Kristina was uneasy each time she boarded a new means of transportation — she was afraid her family might be separated during the journey; she wanted them to hold on to each other all the time.

The American steamer was new and the middle deck roomier, lighter, and drier than the immigrants’ living quarters on the old Swedish ship; nor did this vessel smell musty. But when all had gone aboard and packed themselves in down there, it was just as crowded and uncomfortable as it had been on the Charlotta. The passengers’ belongings were stacked together helter-skelter on the lower deck, and the owners had to look after them and watch that nothing fell overboard. On the Charlotta they had been allowed the unrestricted use of the upper deck in fine weather, but here they were confined to the lower deck. Yet they could see there was plenty of space on the upper deck, where only a few passengers walked about. The immigrants enviously watched these fellow travelers who had their individual cabins and more room than they needed: why was that deck up there in the fresh air and daylight reserved for only a few, while such a great number of people must stay below, packed together?

Long Landberg explained that the upper deck was first class, which cost much more than a berth in steerage, and the ladies and gentlemen up there were wealthy travelers on a pleasure excursion.

Kristina noticed that the passengers on the upper deck were dressed like the people she had seen walking about near the harbor in New York: the women in silk skirts and velvet shoes, the men in tall hats and long coats of costly cloth. And here, too, the women went about with open umbrellas even though it wasn’t raining. Those passengers up there were not, like themselves, traveling to find homes; they already had homes. Why did they travel when not forced to? How could anyone, of his own free will, roam about on lakes and seas? If Kristina ever found another home in this life, she would certainly stay there.

And these passengers who traveled just for fun were allowed to keep the whole upper deck to themselves, while the immigrants, forced to find new homes, were crowded and jostled down here. Kristina thought that the passengers in first class were like the gentry at home in Sweden, and she asked her brother-in-law Robert, who had learned so much from all kinds of books, to explain this: Hadn’t he said that the inhabitants of North America were all alike and not divided into gentry and ordinary people?

Robert tried to make himself clear: He had only said that different classes did not exist in the New World, no one was born into a class. But there was, of course, a difference between people, in that some were rich and others poor; some could afford to spend more, others less; some could afford first class, others could not. There were only two kinds of people in North America: those who had lived here long enough to grow rich, and those lately arrived and still poor.

There was no other difference between people, Robert insisted. Kristina could observe for herself — did she see anyone who took off his hat or cap to another? Did she see any man bow or any woman curtsy? Here one didn’t stand on ceremony, the poor didn’t kowtow to the rich as they did at home in Sweden.

The ship’s fare was ample, even abundant, but to the Swedish peasants it seemed oddly prepared and peculiarly flavored. American food consisted mainly of things mixed together, and one’s tongue was unable to distinguish one kind of food from another; the immigrants did not always know what they were eating. But still more foreign than the food were their fellow passengers in the hold. They were lodged with other immigrants, people who, like themselves, came from countries of the Old World, each speaking his own language. Their fellow passengers were dressed in outlandish clothes, they laughed and sang and behaved in the strangest ways, and they were loaded down with an amazing variety of things: axes, hoes, spades, harnesses, saws, tubs, barrels, cradles, clocks, pots, yarn winders, ale kegs. The Swedish immigrants began to feel that they had arrived empty handed in North America when they saw what these others carried along. Many of those who crowded the ship with their belongings were Germans, the guide told them; a German was wedded to his possessions and would not part with them when emigrating. But when they saw a spade with a six-foot handle, said Landberg, they might be sure the owner was Irish: the Irish were too lazy to bend their backs while digging; at work they stood upright.

He pointed out some tall men in skin jackets who carried guns and hunting sacks and had knives in their belts. They were fur hunters on their way to the forests of the West for autumn game.

But strangest of all the steerage passengers were two Indians. The immigrants studied them with timid wonder. The two men were draped in pieces of red-striped woolen cloth which covered them from head to knees and which they usually held closely around themselves; they wore trousers reaching the middle of their thighs and held in place by strings to a belt around their waists; on their feet they wore skin shoes but no socks. From the Indians’ ears hung beautiful glittering silk bands; the color of their faces was sooty brown, and their sloe-black eyes lay deep in their skulls, lurkingly under their brows.

Most of the time the Indians sat immobile, staring moodily before them, each holding his blanket tight around his body as if this garment were his only possession. No one addressed the brown-hued men, and they themselves seemed inclined to silence. When they spoke to each other they used a language which sounded like a series of short grunts. These Indians could not be wild, as they were allowed to travel unhindered among white, Christian people. But they sat apart from the other passengers, who walked by them in silence and with some uneasiness; perhaps they were heathens after all; one couldn’t know for sure; there was something dark, threatening, and cruel in their looks, something inspiring fear. The immigrants did not know what to think of or expect from these curiously draped figures.

The steamer had a large crew — bosuns, engineers, stokers, and deckhands. Negroes served in many capacities; those black men with hair like wood shavings prepared the food and served it, loaded the ship, cleaned it, and busied themselves everywhere. The black crewmen were free, but among the passengers in steerage were two Negro slaves shackled in foot chains, because they were said to have wild tempers.

Kristina felt pity for the two black-skinned men sitting there chained together, unable to move. Why were people put in chains and foot irons when they had done no wrong? The slaves’ owner was among the pleasure travelers on the upper deck: Kristina would have liked to ask him to unshackle the poor Negroes, had she been able to speak his language.

Little Johan watched the Negroes for a long time in silence. Then he asked his mother: How long had their faces been so terribly black?

“They have always been that way.”

“Are they black both morning and evening?”

“Yes. Negroes are always black.”

“But, Mother — how can they know when they need to wash themselves?”

“I don’t know. . Quiet, now.”

But the boy insisted: “Tell me, Mother, how do the Negroes know when they are dirty?”

Kristina was unable to give Johan this information. She herself was deeply disturbed by the dirty white passengers in steerage. No Negro could help it that the Lord God had made him black, but when God had given people white skin, then they owed it to their Creator to keep it white. Children and menfolk seemed to crave a little dirt for comfort’s sake, but Kristina demanded more from women. Here she saw womenfolk who were sorely in need of a thorough scrubbing in boiled lye-soap, and their children appeared never to have touched water since they were baptized. Fina-Kajsa, to be sure, wasn’t very clean, and washed herself unwillingly, but compared to these foreign women she stood out as clean as an angel. They were probably too lazy to keep dirt from them; slothfulness bred uncleanliness and uncleanliness bred vermin; among these people they must be careful or they might again become lice infested.

In the hold there were no spittoons, which seemed strange; one would expect to find them in nice places, among cleanly people. The deck soon was awash from the tobacco-chewing menfolk’s spittle, and Kristina had to hold up her skirts as she walked over it; she was horrified to see little children crawling and creeping about on their hands and knees on this bemired floor; only with great effort was she able to keep little Harald away from it.

Washing buckets were set up for the steerage passengers, but the water was never changed. After a score of people had dipped their hands and rinsed their faces in the tubs, the water became as thick and black as though blood sausage had been boiled in it. And the same towel passed from one hand to another — there was only one for this multitude. Perhaps the ship’s command felt: If fifty people have dried themselves on the towel before you, then it’s good enough for you too! But Kristina washed neither herself nor her children in water used by dirty fellow passengers. The very first morning on board she asked their guide for help, and as soon as the steamer touched shore he managed to get her a tub of clean water. Then she used her own towels, which she had brought along and laundered during the voyage.

But in spite of her annoyance at this lack of external cleanliness, Kristina was unable to dislike her fellow passengers. These foreign people — poor, dirty, and badly dressed — appeared so friendly; only kind eyes and smiling faces were turned on her and her children. When strangers spoke to her, Kristina realized they spoke no evil, but rather something kind and cheering, wishing her only well. She felt ashamed that she could not answer them with the same kindness, that she could not make herself understood by them. All she could do was to smile back as broad a friendliness as she could and shake her head for the rest. She longed to enter into conversation with them; she suffered from being unable to do so and felt as though she were doing the strangers a rudeness. Besides, here she could have found honest friends, and these friends she turned away, again and again, through her silence.

Kristina suffered and worried over the lot awaiting her in the new land: to walk like a deaf-mute among other people.

— 2—

It had been agreed that the interpreter Landberg was to accompany the immigrants to Chicago and from there return to New York.

While he still was with his countrymen he tried to advise and inform them about the things they needed to know. Landberg said he had traveled all the great seas, he had seen much of the world, on land and water, but he had found himself most at home in North America. Nowhere had he been less disturbed by the authorities, nowhere had he been so free to make his own decisions, nowhere were people so helpful to each other as here. His deepest needs — freedom to move as he pleased, and sufficient food — he had found in North America. Yes, more freedom and cheaper food than anywhere else on the globe. Just as an example — pork could be bought for three Swedish shillings per pound, pork so tasty and fat that the grease spurted between the jaws while one was eating it. Long Landberg called the North American Republic the Land of Liberty and Fat Pork.

But, he reminded them, they must remember that here, as elsewhere in the world, people were good and evil, industrious and lazy, generous and greedy, honest and crooked. They must be particularly on their guard against two types: the runners, who wanted to rob them, and sectarians, who wished to snare them into their fold. Among the latter he warned them against the Jansonites, who had come earlier from Sweden. Their prophet, Erik Janson, had been a plague to humanity, a torturer of his followers. First he had forbidden marriage in his sect, as childbearing interfered with the women’s work, but when his adherents grumbled at this, he was forced to allow it, and prepared a wedding for fifty couples at one time. But the sectarians were allowed no will of their own; when a married man wished to sleep with his wife, he must announce his wish to the prophet far in advance and obtain his permission. And when the tyrant gave his assent to the bedding, he insisted also that husband and wife must perform it in full view of all the other sectarians. Many hesitated at this. Landberg himself had for a while been a member of this sect, but he had soon left it, with many others, who, like himself were unable to put up with Janson’s demands.

They must also be on the lookout for the Shakers, who served God by making their bodies shake and shiver, nay, even danced and hopped about, singing and howling until, exhausted, they would fall to the ground and faint. The dancing and the shaking themselves into insensibility were supposed to illustrate the ascent into Heaven by the saved ones. These sectarians maintained that the praising and blessing of the Lord should not be confined to the tongue only — the whole body, head, and limbs had the same right to share this joy. (To this point Landberg was inclined to feel there was some reason.)

Another dangerous sect was the Whippers, who exorcised evil spirits by beating each other with scourges until their bodies were a bloody mass. Sometimes the evil spirits might resist the mistreatment and remain in the body until the soul had left it. Yes, these sectarians actually whipped each other to death.

Landberg himself had by now returned to the church of his forebears, the Evangelical-Lutheran religion, and he earnestly begged the Swedish immigrants to remain in the faith of their fathers, to stick to the only right God here in America; they must not allow themselves to be led astray by irreligious and false prophets. He was pleased to see that they had brought along their Bibles and psalmbooks, so that they could hold their own services.

Kristina asked how it would be possible for Swedish Lutherans to partake of the Sacrament out here. Their last Sunday in Sweden, before they started out on their fateful journey, she and her husband had received the Lord’s Supper. At that time she had felt as if she were undertaking a death journey. Now again she was in great need of the Sacrament. At home they went to the Lord’s Supper table every month; three months had already elapsed since they had enjoyed the Sacrament, and man sinned in many matters daily. How much time they’d had to sin in the last ninety days! Idleness breeds sin, according to the old saying, and they had long been idle. Kristina had lately felt the burden weighing on her, disturbing her mind and soul. Original sin clung to her like an invisible, loathsome mange; it was a degradation. She longed to be cleansed in Christ’s pure blood, and no doubt there were many in their company who were in need of forgiveness for their sins, and absolution; how long would it be before they might again enjoy the Sacrament? The Swedish pastor who had come aboard their ship in New York had promised them communion, but when they heard he was a Methodist, not one among them had dared follow him to his altar.

Long Landberg answered: In Chicago there was a Swedish Lutheran minister by the name of Unonius; he was an upright man and a true Christian. Landberg said that a few ministers of the right religion were to be found also in Andover and in Moline, both places in the state of Illinois. When they arrived in Chicago, he would himself look up Pastor Unonius, who surely would be happy to give the Sacrament to all wishing to partake.

Landberg said that he intended to leave Chicago as soon as he had performed his duties there. This town was the only place in North America he detested. But it was the gateway to the West, which all travelers must pass through, although most thanked the Lord they could journey farther. Chicago was a swamp hole and a blowhole, built on the low shores of a lake and a river. On one side was the lake and on the other the prairie, with no protection against the winds, which blew so intensely that eyebrows and hair were pulled off people’s heads. The town had only three decent streets: Chicago Avenue, Kinzie, and Clark Streets. Yard-high stumps still stood in the other streets, and almost all the surrounding country was desolate wasteland where cows grazed. The houses were newly built, yet gray, dirty, and unpainted, for the hurricanes blew the paint off the walls. And the whole town stank from the mud and ooze of the swampy shores. Pools of water abounded, filled with crawling snakes and lizards and other horrible creatures. Thirty thousand people lived in Chicago, and of these, several thousand earned their living as runners, robbing immigrants passing through. Grazing was fine in Chicago, and cattle lived well in that town. But honest people, non-runners, could ill endure an extended visit in the place. Landberg thought Chicago would within twenty years become entirely depopulated and obliterated from the face of the earth.

Pastor Unonius worked zealously advising all his countrymen to settle in Chicago, but the guide thought that on this point the minister had wrongly interpreted God’s will.

Landberg was indeed like a father to the immigrants, and all agreed he had well earned the three dollars each person was to pay him.

“He is an upright man and an honest guide,” was the way Karl Oskar summed up their feeling. And he worried a little about their future when they would no longer have an interpreter to help in their dealings with the Americans.

Landberg had given Robert a new English textbook: A Short Guide to the English Language. This book had a chapter entitled “Instruction in Pronunciation for the Swedes.” Here were enumerated those English words in common use, as well as advice in general for immigrants. Landberg’s gift was quite a small book, hardly bigger than the almanac; Robert could carry it in his pocket and take it out when he needed it. Landberg had explained Robert’s difficulty with his first language book. The Swedish youth had been unable to comprehend why the sentences in English were spelled in two entirely different ways, one sentence always within parentheses. Now he was informed that the words were to be pronounced according to the spelling within the parentheses. Robert had learned English altogether wrong from the very beginning.

The first thing he had tried to say to the Americans was: “I am a stranger here,” and he had pronounced the words carefully, according to their spelling and Swedish pronunciation. But people had only stared at him, he had been unable to make a single soul understand that he was a stranger. From this new book, he learned how the words were supposed to sound: Aj äm ä strehn’djër hihr.

And Robert began at once to practice the pronunciation of the twenty-six letters of the English alphabet. He hurried his study of the language, in order to help himself and to lend his mouth to others of his group when their interpreter left them. He must show the others what he could do, and they would then value him the more and show him the respect due to learning. From now on he read in his language books every free moment, and always without Elin’s company. He told her, somewhat sarcastically, she was supposed to know English already; hadn’t the Holy Ghost filled all the reborn ones?

After her disclosure in New York of his secret concerning the captain’s “slave trade,” there was no longer the same intimacy between them. Moreover, Elin had difficulties with the foreign language, she moved her lips too much and pushed out her tongue too far while speaking English. How many times he’d told her to keep her mouth still and pull her tongue back; but she did not obey him. Not all people were so fortunately born as to be able to learn a new language; not even the rebirth seemed of any help to Elin.

Robert had been in danger of his life and he knew the importance of learning English. Moreover, Landberg now told him of a terrible thing that had befallen a newly arrived farm hand from Sweden: the boy had been one month in America when he met a cruel, heartless, cunning woman who inveigled him into going with her to a priest, who married them. The farm hand understood what was happening but he didn’t know one word of English, he couldn’t even say “No” at the wedding, and this the wicked woman knew. And now her victim had been ordered by the court to support her for the rest of her life. So Robert understood that there were many reasons why it was necessary to learn the language — in order to escape the many dangers that lurked in this land.

— 3—

Karl Oskar and Kristina were standing at the starboard rail where they could keep an eye on their belongings — their bulky linen sacks and the great America chest — stacked with other movables against the ship’s wheelhouse. The lake heaved moderately, the breeze was cooling, the heat did not seem a plague when the steamer was in motion. Karl Oskar complained of the slow speed: he was constantly worrying lest they arrive at their place of settling too late for sowing and planting. If they were unable to gather any crop this summer, they would be in ill circumstances. Now he was a restless man, he would not be at peace till the day when he could start to work.

Kristina watched the purring drive wheel, whipping the water like a dasher in a churn full of cream. When she used to make butter, the cream would splash up in her face, and now, as the wheel threw water against the side of the ship, the spray splashed on her face and into her eyes; it felt refreshing.

Ulrika of Västergöhl came up to them hurriedly. She addressed Karl Oskar in agitation: “Now I know the truth! Just try to explain this away!”

He turned slowly toward her: “What is it this time?”

“You have deceived us! You’ve swindled and cheated us and made us travel this long way!”

“What in hell are you accusing me of?”

“You said it was only two hundred and fifty miles!”

“That’s what the captain of the Charlotta said.”

“But our guide says it’s fifteen hundred miles! Six times as far as you said! Landberg doesn’t lie, but you’ve lied to lure us along! Now comes your day of reckoning, Karl Oskar!”

Ulrika’s lips quivered, her eyes flamed, her whole body shook with anger: “Because of your notions the rest of us have to travel many hundreds of miles unnecessarily! Because you lied to us, Karl Oskar! Why have you deceived us? Answer me, you — you — lying—” She called him an obscene name.

His cheeks paled at this insult, and Kristina grew frightened lest he lose his head.

Ulrika did not give him time to reply. She continued to rant: How could he be so low, such a scoundrel, as to cheat his own countrymen in a foreign land, so shabby as to lure them all this way, so deep into America? Not one of them would have followed him had they known what an eternal distance it was. He was certainly the most selfish and cruel and false of all the menfolk she had met. They must sail sea after sea, only because of him! They were all tired to death of this endless traveling! They wanted to settle down somewhere, they wanted to arrive! But now he couldn’t deceive them any longer, now it was over! Now his true colors were discovered! Now he was at an end with his smirking, his lying, his cheating! Now was the time of reckoning, now he must answer!

His anger seethed within him so he could hardly speak. He burst out: “You accuse me? You insult me? You — you — you dirty old sl—”

He stopped short. But Ulrika egged him on: “Yes, say it right out! Say what you started—‘You old slut’! That’s what you meant — say the whole word! Say it quickly!”

By now both of them were shouting at the top of their lungs. Long Landberg hurried to them. Danjel Andreasson and Jonas Petter suddenly appeared.

“Ulrika accuses me of deceiving you about the distance!” Karl Oskar shouted.

Landberg explained soothingly: When Karl Oskar had said it was two hundred and fifty miles from New York to Minnesota, he had spoken the truth, because such was the distance measured in Swedish miles. And when he, Landberg, had told Ulrika that the distance was fifteen hundred miles, then he too had spoken the truth, for he had meant American miles. An American mile was only one sixth of a Swedish mile.

Both Karl Oskar and Ulrika were in the right; they might as well end their quarrel.

But the words uttered on both sides had been too insulting. Karl Oskar was deeply offended: “If anyone thinks I have lied and cheated our group — step up!”

Kristina held on to his elbow: “Be calm, Karl Oskar! It was only a misunderstanding.”

“No! Now I want to tell the truth!”

And Karl Oskar continued angrily: It concerned no one but his family that he had decided to settle in Minnesota. He had never asked anyone to accompany him; the others had followed of their own will. Why? Why did they ape him? They could go and settle wherever in hell they wanted — it didn’t concern him. He had never asked to be the leader of their group. But when they had come to him, he had done their errands gladly. And now he got his reward. Ulrika and the others need only say the word if they wanted to leave him and travel alone. He would not cry over their departure; he wouldn’t shed one single tear for those outside his family. It would be less trouble for him to travel alone with his wife and children. He wanted to hear one word only, if the distance was too great!

“Ulrika was excited, pay no attention to her,” advised Jonas Petter. “We rely on you, we’re grateful to you, all of us.”

Then Danjel Andreasson attempted a reconciliation: “There is no quarrel between the two of you. Shake hands, now!”

“Shake his hand!” sputtered Ulrika. “Did you hear what he called me?”

“You called me a lying—” Karl Oskar could not make himself repeat the obscenity in his wife’s presence.

“Take back your words, both of you,” urged Jonas Petter.

“Be Christian and forgiving,” admonished Danjel. “Forgive each other as our Lord Jesus forgives all of us.”

“If a group of immigrants want to succeed, they must live in harmony,” Landberg said.

Karl Oskar and Ulrika, surrounded by curious fellow travelers, stared fixedly into each other’s eyes, silent, immobile, neither one yielding an inch.

Robert and Arvid had heard the commotion too and approached the group as Long Landberg left, shaking his head and muttering that Swedish peasants found a peculiar enjoyment in personal quarrels, at home and abroad.

“Be at peace, good people,” Danjel entreated once more, deeply concerned. “Won’t you shake hands?”

Karl Oskar and Ulrika remained silent. Both had calmed down and each would have taken a proffered hand. Ulrika knew that Karl Oskar had acted in good faith, and that she had unjustly accused him of skulduggery. Karl Oskar regretted the words he had uttered; there was reason enough to call Ulrika of Västergöhl an old slut, but it was unnecessary and foolish to dig up dirt from home to throw at her in a foreign land. Both admitted inwardly that it would be right to retract; both were ready to shake hands in forgiveness. But neither one offered his hand, each feared the humiliation of refusal from the other.

And so no hand was offered. Danjel bowed his head in sorrow, his shaggy, unkempt beard sweeping his chest.

Elin called her mother from their cabin, and Ulrika departed with long strides, proudly.

Jonas Petter looked after her and said in a low voice to Robert and Arvid: Ulrika of Västergöhl was getting ill-tempered because of lack of close male company; what she needed most of all for a few nights ahead was a man.

Karl Oskar and Kristina walked over to the wheelhouse.

“I can’t stand the Glad One any longer!” he said. “We must part from her.”

“But she is part of Danjel’s family,” protested Kristina. “She is like a foster mother to the children. You don’t want to take her away from the poor motherless children?”

Karl Oskar kept silence gloomily, wondering what to do.

“And how can you get rid of Ulrika?” continued Kristina. “You can’t throw her into the lake.”

“You’ve always disliked Ulrika before. Now you defend the old whore!”

“I didn’t defend the way she acted just now. But I can stand her better in this country.”

Kristina pointed out that Ulrika had softened a little since sharing their food on the train the other day. She was more friendly and talkative, and the two women had these last days talked with each other as if no unfriendly feelings had ever existed between them. Ulrika had spoken many words both true and wise, and Kristina had enjoyed her company. Earlier, she had avoided the Glad One as one avoided vermin, she had thought her full of hatred and ill will, always trying to hurt others. But Ulrika wasn’t entirely wicked and evil; there must be something good in a woman who was so kind to Danjel’s offspring, poor little ones. And perhaps injustice had been done her at home in Sweden, ever since her childhood when they sold her at auction. That was why she always thought the worst of people. If they mistreated her and scorned her, then she acted the same way in return; and she could give ten for two; she could act like a viper if tramped on, biting, spurting out venom. If now they were to be considerate of her, if they made her feel one of them, perhaps. .

“There will be no peace in our group until we get rid of her,” Karl Oskar insisted. But what Kristina had said seemed to him worthy of thought, although he wouldn’t admit it now.

Kristina also harbored an opinion of her own, well hidden from Karl Oskar: she felt the same way as Ulrika about this long journey inland.

They had barely started; the guide said several weeks would elapse before they reached their destination. Why must they travel such an unfathomable distance? Why hadn’t they settled on a nearer place? It was Karl Oskar who wanted it that way, the responsibility was his, his will was being carried out. He had decided that they were to travel with the old woman, Fina-Kajsa, to her son in Minnesota. The others were willing to follow along: they thought what he did was best. He gave advice, and the others listened. But who could tell if he were right? Need they traverse so many lakes and rivers to find a home? Couldn’t they have found one nearer?

This was Karl Oskar’s great shortcoming: he never let well enough alone. All other men were satisfied at last, satisfied some time — never he. Many would have thought a move to another country quite sufficient — he wasn’t satisfied until they moved to another continent. To others it would have been enough to travel two, three hundred miles inland — he must travel fifteen hundred miles, five times as far; he must get as far inland as he possibly could, before he would be satisfied. He said he wanted to find the best soil. But was it so sure (he acted as though God had said so) that the best land lay farthest away? Such was Karl Oskar’s nature: things far away were better than those near by; what he couldn’t reach was better than what he had, and the best of all lay farthest away in the world.

And now they were on a ship again, even though it didn’t move by sail, but by steam and wheels. And she who had made up her mind never again to travel on water! The others too had come along. Ulrika alone had murmured, she was not afraid to speak her mind. Her unfair accusations against Karl Oskar were inexcusable, but what she had said about this eternal traveling could just as well have come from Kristina’s own mouth. It was well for him to hear it! He should know that there were those among them who were tired to death of this journey. Kristina was. Three long months had elapsed since that morning when she stepped onto the wagon in Korpamoen for a ride to the sea; she was still riding! And deep within her she marveled that her little children had survived this dangerous, unending journey; it would not have surprised her had it killed them all.

How intensely she longed for a place where she could stay. Where she could be by herself and make her own decisions, where she wouldn’t have strangers with her always, where she could rest in her own bed, under her own roof, where she could make a home for her husband and her offspring! How fervently her heart longed for a home again, how desperately she prayed that she might see the place where she was to live.

— 4—

The steamer Sultana entered a sound which soon turned out to be a river mouth; shortly they tied up at the pier in Detroit.

The immigrants were now approaching the northernmost boundaries of the United States. In this harbor the Sultana was to remain long enough so that anyone who wished to go ashore was allowed to do so.

Detroit was an old town, well built and of pleasing aspect. It was not a settlement village with streets crowded with cattle and tall tree stumps; it had well-ordered streets, almost like a town in Sweden, as Landberg said. From the boat it seemed that Detroit stood on a high bank along the river; they could see rows of well-built and well-looked-after houses, topped by church towers and steeples; next to the pier there was an extensive market place. Coming up the river they had seen vast orchards on either shore, filled with apple and cherry trees, their branches overloaded with delicious-looking fruit. The country around the town was fertile and good as far as their eyes could see.

Nearly all the Sultana’s passengers went ashore. Of the group from Ljuder, the two smallest children were left behind, Karl Oskar’s son Harald and Danjel’s little daughter Eva, and Fina-Kajsa also remained on the ship to take care of the babies.

The older children were much excited by the prospect of walking on solid ground again; they asked if they might go back to where they had seen the cherry trees, but the parents told them there would not be time. Kristina took Johan by the hand and Karl Oskar held on to Lill-Märta, so as not to lose them in the crowd. They walked about the town for a few hours, looking at many strange things, but it was surprising how soon both children and grownups tired from walking: they had been freighted about for so long that they had no strength to walk any distance. The heat was more infernal on land, too, and they were almost glad to return to the ship.

By the time the passengers were back on the pier, the Sultana had finished unloading her freight. A wide barge loaded with cattle was tied to the steamer’s side. Half a dozen sturdy men, their upper bodies bare and their heads covered with broad straw hats, were bringing the cattle from the barge onto the pier. Then an accident befell one of the animals: a large bull refused obstinately to walk onto the landing plank: he skidded and fell into the water. The river was quite deep near the pier, and only the head and back of the bull could be seen above the water. A curious crowd gathered immediately to see the beast rescued. The bull struggled in the water like a sea monster, snorting, bellowing, and squirting quantities of water through his nostrils, until the men finally succeeded in getting a rope around his horns and pulling him on shore.

While the others of their group went aboard, Karl Oskar and Jonas Petter had remained behind to watch the rescue of the bull. As Karl Oskar turned to climb the gangplank he was met by Kristina.

“Are you alone?” she asked.

“Yes. Is anyone missing?”

She stared at him, fear in her eyes: “Isn’t Lill-Märta with you?”

“No. I thought she was aboard.”

“She was with you. Only Johan came with me.”

“The girl is not on the ship?” Karl Oskar asked breathlessly.

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes — I told you, the girl was with you. Where is she?”

“She was on the pier when you went. .”

“You let her out of your sight?”

“I thought she went with you.”

“Lord Jesus! Where is Lill-Märta?” Kristina shrieked. “Lord in Heaven! The child is left behind somewhere!”

She rushed down the gangplank, followed by Karl Oskar. They ran back and forth on the pier, looking for their missing child. The men, a moment before busy with the drowning bull, turned their attention from the now safe beast to the man and woman who ran about on the pier, calling out their child’s name. No one answered. They looked everywhere for the little one, on the pier and near it, among the unloaded freight, behind barrels and boxes and sacks and coils of rope; they searched behind cords of wood and stacks of boards, they examined every place imaginable that might be a hiding place, every nook and corner where a three-year-old might have crawled. On the pier were only grownups, there was no child in the crowd. They looked up toward the market place and along the shores, as far as their eyes could reach. But there was no sign of Lill-Märta. Their child had simply disappeared.

She had been on the pier a short time ago, when Karl Oskar stopped to watch the bull in the water; he had thought she followed her mother aboard. But the child had been in his charge, he felt the blame was his.

The Sultana’s bell rang piercingly, it was time for the boat to leave. The bull responded with a long-drawn-out, angry bellow, as if wishing to chase the boat off, and Karl Oskar glared at him fiercely: if that damned beast hadn’t fallen into the river — if he hadn’t stopped to watch it. .

Kristina turned to the men who had done the unloading: “Have you seen a little girl, about three years old?” She grabbed hold of the arm of a bearded giant, wailing in despair: “A very little girl. . in a blue dress. . red ribbons in her braids?”

The man stared at her helplessly, mumbling some words in his own language. Kristina ran to the next man, she ran from one to another, and asked, and asked; she had forgotten that none of them understood a word: “A girl. . haven’t you seen her. . our little girl?”

Karl Oskar searched in silent anguish; he remembered that he was among strangers, that here he was no better than a mute.

Their child had disappeared, and they couldn’t tell a single soul that she was lost. No one could tell them if Lill-Märta had been seen, no one could tell them where she had gone, no one could help them, because they couldn’t ask anyone for help — no one could help them search for a little girl in a blue dress and red ribbons.

“Maybe she has fallen off the pier. . into the water,” he said to Kristina.

“It was you! You let her get away from you!” Kristina broke out accusingly.

“Yes. . it’s my fault. . I forgot. . for only a moment. . ” Remorse swept over him.

“Lill-Märta! Lill-Märta! Lill-Märta!” Hysterically, the mother called her child’s name, and no one answered. She broke into tears. “We’ve lost our child! She was with you!”

“Yes, Kristina. She was with me.”

“Our first girl. Anna. You remember?”

As Kristina mentioned Anna, their dead child, memories of the past flashed through Karl Oskar’s mind: He carried a small coffin in his arms, he was on his way to a grave, he walked with heavy steps carrying the coffin he himself had made, had hammered together of fine boards, the finest, knot-free boards he had been able to find. That was Anna, that was the other time, the other child whom they had lost.

The Sultana’s side wheels were beginning to churn, foam whirled about, the bell rang again, and a man on deck shouted, “All aboard!”

Some of the crewmen made ready to pull in the gangplank — no one was aware that two passengers had gone back on shore.

Karl Oskar stood on the pier as if paralyzed. But suddenly, at the sound of the bell, he came back to life: “The ship is leaving us!”

“We cannot leave Lill-Märta!”

“The boys are on the ship! All we own is on the ship!”

“I stay here on land. I must find our child.” Kristina sank down on a packing box among the freight, unable to move.

Karl Oskar looked wildly in all directions, searching for the lost child; he looked at the ship, ready to depart; he looked at his wife, sitting on the box, forlorn and shaking with sobs. In that moment he was a thoroughly bewildered, helpless human being, not knowing what to do next. Yet within the minute he must know, his decision must be made.

Two of their children were on board, one was here on land. If they went on board without the girl, they would never see her again. If they remained on shore, their sons would be left to themselves on the ship. What must they do?

He would never give up in despair, never consider all lost; he must do the best he knew how, he had always done so in critical moments, he must do so now.

He would rush on board and find Landberg; their interpreter might persuade the captain to delay the ship until they found. .

But now the gangplank was hauled in.

Karl Oskar made two jumps to the edge of the pier, waved both arms and shouted as loudly as he could: “Wait! Wait a little! Have mercy, people!”

A crewman came to the rail and shouted something back, something he didn’t understand. But suddenly he heard another voice, a voice he understood, a voice shouting in his own language, louder than all the noises of the ship, louder than any human sound around him: from somewhere on shore came a woman’s voice, a coarse voice, a penetrating, fierce, furious voice, rising above all the din and bustle on the pier: “Wait, you sons of bitches! I’m still on shore!”

A woman came running along a footpath that followed the shore, and she called, short of breath and angrily, while running, yet louder even than the bellowing bull: “Put down the gangplank, you bastards! I’m coming as fast as I can!”

Karl Oskar recognized the voice; it belonged to Ulrika of Västergöhl, who, it seemed, was also in danger of being left behind. But Ulrika was not alone as she came running to the pier, she carried a burden, she carried in her arms a kicking, obstreperous child, and because of this burden, and the fear of being left behind, Ulrika was short of breath and angry. In her arms the Glad One carried a little girl in a blue dress with red ribbons on her hair. Panting, she put the child down next to Karl Oskar and yelled once more toward the ship: “Those sons of bitches! Trying to get away!”

While Karl Oskar and Kristina fell upon their child, the gangplank was once more lowered.

“The girl was back there under the trees,” said Ulrika. “She was eating cherries.”

Near the shore, Ulrika told them as they hurried to the gangplank, she had seen a grove of cherry trees, and thinking their boat would remain a while longer, she had gone there to pick some fruit — her throat was dry in this awful heat. The child was already there, reaching for the cherries. But Lill-Märta had been unable to reach the branches, she was too short, so Ulrika had picked her a handful. The child had wanted to remain and eat cherries, and that was why she had kicked and fought so hard when Ulrika carried her back.

Lill-Märta was still restive; when Kristina pressed her hard to her breast, the girl began to cry: the mother had squashed one of the cherries which she still held in her hand.

The crewmen greeted Ulrika with happy smiles and gestures as the four belated passengers walked up the gangplank. Who knows, perhaps they would have been equally friendly had they understood the words she shouted at them a few minutes earlier.

Slowly the steamer Sultana glided out of the Detroit harbor, with none of her passengers missing.

As soon as they were inside the rail Karl Oskar held out his hand to Ulrika; he shook hers violently, he pressed it in his own, he would not let go of it for a long while: this was the hand that had brought back their child, had saved the little girl and — the parents. But he was unable to speak, not a syllable would cross his lips, not a sound. He felt something in his throat, something he couldn’t swallow. Only a few times before had he had this feeling, it came over him instead of tears.

Karl Oskar wept, wept inwardly like a man, with invisible tears.

— 5—

After six days’ sailing across the Great Lakes and the rivers and sounds which separated them, the steamer Sultana reached Chicago. Waiting for a river steamer, the immigrants remained three days in this town, lodged in quarters Landberg had found them. Meanwhile, their guide was busy making arrangements for their continued journey. Pastor Unonius, the Swedish Lutheran minister, unfortunately had gone to visit a new settlement outside the town; consequently, the immigrants were unable to participate in Holy Communion while in Chicago.

On July 6, early in the morning, Landberg escorted the group on board a steamer in the Chicago River which plied a canal to the Illinois River and which was to carry them to the upper Mississippi. With this last service the guide finished his obligations. Landberg bade his countrymen farewell, wishing them health and success in their new homeland. They were now entirely dependent on themselves, but he commended them all to the hands of Almighty God.

The immigrants had passed through the portals of the West. They were on a new ship, and on the new ship they met a new sea, a sea unlike any they had ever seen or traversed: the prairies’ own Sea of Grass.

VIII. PEASANTS ON A SEA OF GRASS

— 1—

Through the vast flat land the Creator’s finger had carved a crooked furrow and in this furrow flowed the river, carrying the vessel of the immigrants. The shores of the waterway lay close to them, just beyond the boat’s rail. The solid earth on either side gave the travelers a feeling of security. Fear for their lives, their constant companion on the ocean voyage, was no longer with them; they traveled on water, yet they were near land.

But their sense of being lost, astray in the world, remained with them on this river journey as it had during the ocean voyage.

They were passing through a vast level country, an endless emptiness of open, grassy, flat land. No more here than on the ocean could their eyes find a point of focus: no trees, no groves, no hills, no glades, no mountains. They saw one sight only — stretches of wild grass, herbs, and flowers, fields of tussocks, hollows of grass, billows of grass, springing from the ground on all sides, rolling forth in infinity; the same green billows extended all the way to that narrow edge where the flat land flowed into the globe of heaven, all the way to where the eye could see no farther. Like the Atlantic Ocean, this treeless expanse seemed to them one region only; nothing under the sun separated one landscape from another. The grassy tussocks swayed and sank and came up again from the hollows; the tussocks were like billows, always the same, everywhere; when they had seen one, they had seen them all. This unchanging, monotonous expanse was called the prairie.

For seventy days they had traversed the Atlantic Ocean — a sea of water. Now they traveled across the North American prairie — a sea of grass.

Here blossomed a hay meadow, vast as a kingdom, yet here no cattle grazed. Here was hay to harvest in such abundance that all the barns in the world would not suffice to hold it; here a haymaker could go forth with his scythe and cut one straight swath, day after day, mile after mile; he could continue his straight swath the whole summer long, the meadow was so vast he need never turn. Here were blossoming fields and grazing lands, here abounded flowers and fodder. Here, spreading before them, the travelers saw a verdant ocean which they might have walked through dry-shod, which they might have traversed without a ship.

This was not the sterile sea with darkness in its depths, existing below the firmament before dry land was seen: this was a growing and yielding sea where crops had as yet never been harvested.

Over this sea, too, the winds wailed, sweeping through the grass, stirring waves that rolled on endlessly. The fierce wind fell upon the grass, flattened it with all its power, rolled over it, pressed it down, so that it lay there as slick as if it had been combed with a comb. But when the wind lost its force and the pressure slackened, the soft grass rose again, straightening its blades. The sea of grass lay there again — living, irrepressible, billowing back and forth in its eternal way, unchanged since the creation of the earth.

The immigrants had lived in woodland regions in Sweden, they were at home in forests, they were familiar with trees, bushes, and thicket paths, they were intimate with valleys, glades, ridges, and hills. In the woodlands at home they had easily recognized familiar landmarks to guide them. But in this sea of grass they could find nothing to notice and remember: no roads, no wheel tracks, no paths, no cairns. In whichever direction they looked, from the deck of the river steamer they could see only a wild, untrampled expanse, where nothing indicated that man had passed. Without a guide, a wanderer over these flat lands would be lost, swallowed up; how could he find his way when one mile was forever like another?

The peasants from the forest regions passed over the prairie and shrank from the land opening before their eyes in all its incomprehensible vastness. They desired nothing more than to till smooth, level ground, but this prairie was not what they wanted. There was something missing in this flat land: God had not finished His creation. He had made the ground and planted the grass and all the other growing herbage, but the trees were missing, the bushes, the hills, the valleys, the swales. Moreover, this grass sea was too immense; it frightened them. Anything stretching farther than their eyes could see aroused fear, loneliness, a feeling of desolation. They feared the sea of grass because they were unable to see its end, they feared it in the same way that they feared eternity.

The prairie stung their hearts with its might and emptiness. The grassland lay on this side of the horizon and it lay beyond, continuing into the invisible, encircling them on all sides; they wanted to shrink and hide within themselves in their helplessness; the farther the earth stretched, the smaller man seemed.

Here was fertile soil, offering itself to the plow, a ground of potent growth. Where the earth is green, there people can live and feed themselves. And the rivers and brooks had cut into the land and watered it with their flow. What more could a tiller wish? Yet, here they would not like to settle, not under the best conditions; this land was not what they were seeking.

Born in the forest, they would never feel at home on the prairie. They wanted all of God’s creation around their homes; they wanted trees which gave shade and coolness in summer, warmth and protection against winds in winter. Here was not a single tree to fell for house timber, hardly a shrub to cut for firewood. They wanted to live within timbered walls, to gather high piles of wood for fires in their stoves. Settlers on the prairie must dig holes in the earth and live the life of gophers, and when above ground they must bend their backs because of the unmerciful winds. The woodland peasants would languish from the monotony of the unvarying, desolate, empty endlessness which would surround their homes if they lived here. They would wither away from loneliness and the sense of loss. Delivered into the infinity of this sea of grass, they would perish, soul and body.

No, the prairie was not a suitable place for permanent settlement. From the deck of their moving steamer they looked out over this flat land, satisfied to pass through it; they thought of the prairie as a thoroughfare, another sea they must cross.

Their journey continued in the river furrow, and more great stretches of prairie opened up. The new country was showing its size to them, and the more they saw of its vastness and immensity, the smaller they felt themselves; more than ever before during this long journey they felt lost and strayed in the world.

— 2—

At night, darkness was upon the face of the deep, and on this sea of grass. The wind held its breath and died down. From the ground rose a surge like dying billows on a calm water. Grass and wild flowers were veiled by the cloak of darkness, the verdant ocean was hidden by night. In the firmament — stretched over the earth by the Creator on the Second Day, and called by Him Heaven — the stars shone with clear brilliance. The world down here was great, but the heavenly firmament and the lights up there were greater still — so it seemed when night descended with darkness over the land, comforting those who felt too small for the great earth.

One evening at dusk, they saw a bright light in the sky ahead of the steamer. Somewhere far away a fire was burning, reflecting its gold-red flames in the heavens. On the earth a fire was throwing its flames so high that it wove red stripes into the gray clouds all the way to the top of heaven: the sea of grass was afire.

Far into the night the immigrants stood and gazed at this fire, so brilliantly reflected in the firmament ahead of the steamer. A wall of fire and flames rose into the sky, and they could discern thick clouds of smoke spreading above their heads like the wings of a black bird of prey. The stars faded away behind this red-glowing heavenly wall. A fire was sweeping the prairie, devouring the grass, feeding on a sea of fuel.

To the immigrants, watching from a distance, it seemed as if God’s heaven were burning this night, and a burning heaven is an awesome sight to see. Even the children noticed the fire in the heavens above them, and asked about the angels and wondered if they could fly away before their wings got burned.

The immigrants were reminded of the altar picture in their village church. It showed the Last Judgment and Christ’s return to earth. In the picture, too, fiery clouds and smoke belched forth, heavy and dark and so real one could almost smell the smoke. And from on high Jesus came riding down on a burning cloud, in snow-white mantle, surrounded by a host of white angels. The people who were to be judged stood in fear on trembling legs, while the earth was lighted by pale rays from a darkened sun. It was daylight, yet it was dark as night, because it was the Last Day, the Day of Doom.

And now they were seeing the heavens burn in a fire which spread a fearsome light over the earth: their village altar picture was now hanging before them in the firmament, immensely enlarged and brought into living reality.

As yet that part of the picture which gave meaning to it remained undivulged: as yet Christ remained invisible in the fire-wreathed clouds. Christ and His angels had not yet made their appearance.

But many among them would not have been surprised if during this night He had descended from on high, in the glare of the heavenly flames, to judge living and dead.

They recognized the signs, they saw them in the very skies: like this it must be on the last day of the world. The seas and the winds would make much noise, and the heavens would tremble. Any moment now the world’s Judge might descend from His heavenly throne, the burning skies lighting His way to the earth.

But even if this were only an earthly fire — the prairie turned into a burning sea — they were nevertheless drawing closer to this fire each moment. The steamer followed the river, and the river flowed right into the red wall of flames and smoke. They would have liked to ask the captain why their ship didn’t moor, why he continued to steer right into the fire. Did he with intention bring his boat into the flames, to destroy it with passengers and crew? But unable to speak the language, they could not ask. All they knew was that the fire appeared closer and closer, and the boat approached the fire: the boat and the fire must meet.

Would it be possible to pass through a burning wall and yet remain alive? The alarmed and anxious immigrants sought comfort in their Bibles, where the prophet Isaiah had written the Lord’s words: “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee.”

All stayed awake through this night; those who went to bed rose at short intervals to look at the burning skies; many prayed in anguish and despair; if it were so that their last day was upon them, hadn’t it come too suddenly? Would the heavenly King recognize them as His own, or would He say to them: “Depart from Me, ye cursed!”

Toward morning they could see the fire and the smoke far to the right of the steamer; during the night they had passed a turn of the river, to the left, and were drawing away from the fire.

In clear daylight, it paled and diminished, losing its terrifying effect on those who had taken it as a sign of approaching Doomsday. During the day, the flames gradually disappeared, and at dusk could no longer be seen from the deck of the steamer.

Far, far away they had seen a fire on the prairie. But all around them, all the way to the horizon, the flat land remained green and untouched by flames.

Earlier the immigrants had crossed the stormy sea and had safely reached shore. Now again they thanked their God Who had helped them: He had saved them from the burning sea.

— 3—

The river steamer brought them farther West, following the deep furrow which the Creator had cut through the land of grass, where the billows rose and fell under the wind’s persistent comb. Down in the river the drive wheel churned its circular way, hurling the glittering drops into the sunlight.

Since leaving their homes, the immigrants had traveled by flat-wagon and sailing ship, by river boat and steam wagon, by canal boat and steamer. They had been pulled by horses and transported by winds, they had moved by the power of steam. They were still traveling through night and day, traveling across this country which seemed to have no limit. And every moment drew them farther from the land that had borne them. Their native village was now so far behind them that their thoughts could scarcely traverse the distance from the point on the earth where their journey began, to the place where they now were. They shuddered when they tried to comprehend the whole distance they had traveled across land and water. Trying to remember, they were unable to reach back — not even their imagination could undertake a return journey. The distance was too overwhelming; the earth which God had created was too large and too wide to fathom.

A realization which their minds had long resisted became fixed in their hearts and souls: this road they could never travel again; they could never return. They would never see their homeland again.

IX. DANGER SIGNS ARE NOT ALWAYS POSTED

— 1—

A bell rang on the upper deck, the steering wheel turned, and the prow of the river steamer headed shoreward. The boat moored to a lonely bank deep in the forest; there were no signs of people or human habitation. The gangplank was thrown out, and two of the crewmen went on shore, carrying an oblong bundle between them. Two other men with shovels followed them. All four disappeared behind the thick wall of trees and bushes which grew to the water’s edge.

After a short while the men returned to the ship. But now they carried nothing except the shovels dangling in their hands. The bell rang again, the gangplank was pulled in, and the steamer backed into the river, resuming its course after this short, unscheduled delay.

These stops at wild and lonely shores took place every day, some days many times. Except for the ringing of the bell, the stops made not a sound, indeed, they happened so quietly and unexpectedly and were of such short duration that at first the passengers hardly noticed them. Otherwise they might have asked why the steamer made shore; no passenger disembarked, they saw no freight unloaded, no firewood or timber was taken aboard. And at the mooring places not the smallest shed could be seen, there were no piles of wood, no stacks of lumber; untouched wilderness was all that could be seen. Why was time wasted for these stops?

Only the most observant travelers had noticed that a bundle was carried ashore, they had seen the men with shovels, and on closer inspection had seen earth clinging to the shovels when the men returned to the boat. And so they had figured out that the men remained ashore long enough to dig a shallow grave.

Soon all had guessed the riddle of the frequent stops in the wilderness, so quickly and silently undertaken. Something — wrapped in a piece of gray cloth — was carried ashore. Some one of the passengers was taken on land, not alive, but dead. A corpse was removed from the boat, a funeral was performed during the brief interval while the steamer was moored to the bank.

Some passenger died every day; and there were days when several died. Soon all on board were aware of this and counted the number of times the bell rang and the men with shovels went ashore.

No one on board had died by act of violence or by accident, no one had starved to death, no one had frozen to death in this summer heat. A disease was killing the passengers, a disease which in a few short days transformed the healthiest person into a corpse. And the sickness which had stolen aboard the river steamer was so greatly feared that it could not be called by its name, it was the disease, nothing else. To call it by name would have been to challenge the dreaded scourge, make it appear sooner. People became sick from fear. In terror they watched for the signs: when the bodily juices dried up, when the skin turned blue-red and coarse, when the nose grew sharp, when thirst burned the tongue and the membranes of the throat, when the body could retain nothing, neither fluids nor solid matter, when the limbs felt cold and cramped, when the eyes sank into their sockets, when nasal slime and saliva stopped, when all tears dried up — then it had entered the body! And if the miracle didn’t happen — perspiration breaking out over the whole body within two hours of the seizure — then death had prepared his work well and would finish it within twenty-four hours.

It was a painful sickness. Yet it could be called merciful because it killed within a fairly short time: in a day — perhaps two — it forced the warmth of life from a body, leaving the chill of death in its place. The strongest and healthiest suffered the worst agonies, because the stronger and more capable of resistance life was, the more painful the death struggle.

The murderous disease was the Asiatic epidemic, the cholera.

For the past two years this disease from the East had been sweeping over North America. The Old World had given the New World its most deadly epidemic. It was a gift out of Bengal, from the Holy Ganges, the river of swampy death lands and poisonous waters. The emigrants from Europe had brought this pestilence with them, they carried it with them inland as their journey continued, it was spread from place to place, from boat to boat, from river to river: the pestilence of the East had come to the West.

No one had announced to the passengers that cholera was with them on the steamer: it was not registered in the passenger list, it was not entered on the list of cargo. Inconspicuously, hurriedly, the bodies of the victims were removed. There was need for haste — in this heat.

When the mysterious visits on shore had continued for some days, the name of the horrible disease began to be whispered among the passengers. Then not only the unrelenting pestilence but also the fear of it paralyzed all on board: here, in the midst of them, it had stolen in, invisible, yet it was everywhere; death was close upon them.

— 2—

Karl Oskar remembered the sign he had seen on the steam wagon, which their guide had translated for him, that sign which cautioned about places to be avoided, places where one must be careful: DANGER! WATCH YOUR STEP! He kept his eyes open wherever he went, he was always on the lookout for these English words of warning. But this sign was not posted in all dangerous places in America: he had not seen it on their boat. The passengers had boarded the steamer in confidence, unaware that it was tainted.

At home they had heard of the cholera as a scourge. But the pestilence had little power in Sweden, where the climate was cold. In the heat of this country, Karl Oskar realized that the pestilence might flourish and spread; the very air seemed to burn, it was the worst heat he had experienced since landing in America. He did not know how to combat it. Against cold weather he knew what to do; when the cold grew intense, one could put on heavy clothing. In hot weather one must remove one’s clothes, and here he went about as much undressed as he could without feeling ashamed. But it did not help. Even stark naked he would have suffered; it wouldn’t have helped to remove his skin!

Against cold one could light fires, one could crawl all the way into the fireplace, if necessary. But where could one flee to get away from the heat? There was no place to crawl into, nowhere to hide from it.

And in this melting heat the steamer fare seemed foul and dangerous. Sometimes the food smelled bad: the nose performed its duty and warned the mouth to refuse it. No fresh food would keep; the blowflies buzzed everywhere and laid their eggs, which hatched almost immediately. Worms crawled in newly slaughtered meat, and soon no one dared touch even the fat pork, swimming in its thick grease, and until now eaten greedily by all.

The cholera must be something living, something that entered one’s body through food or drink, some little worm or creeping thing. It might be a tiny creature floating about in the drinking water, perhaps a worm so small that the eye couldn’t see it. The cholera might hide in every bite they swallowed, in every drop of water they drank. The murderous pestilence might lurk in their eating vessels or drinking mugs — how could they avoid it when they couldn’t even see it? Never before had Karl Oskar felt death so close upon him; it was here everywhere, yet invisible to all.

Not all passengers ate the steamer fare; those who had money bought their own food. Karl Oskar noticed the travelers on the upper deck: each time the steamer stopped at an inhabited place, the first-class passengers went on shore and bought fresh food; they returned with heavy loads of bread, butter, milk, eggs, pancakes; even hens and chickens, which their Negro cooks prepared for them. The passengers up there could eat special, healthy food. And Karl Oskar recalled he had not yet seen a corpse carried ashore from the upper deck. But in steerage, a room for the sick has been prepared with beds all over the floor.

One day when the steamer sought shore three times to accomplish its hurried errand, Karl Oskar said to Kristina: “Those who leave the food alone keep healthy. From now on, we starve.”

Kristina agreed, and they let the meals go by; they could starve many days without endangering life. Their appetites had greatly diminished due to the heat, and in a few days they would leave the contaminated steamer. But thirst plagued them sorely, and they had to use the drinking water on the ship. They mixed some vinegar into it; vinegar killed all poisons in water, according to Berta, the Idemo woman who had healing knowledge.

But the best remedy against cholera was said to be a handful of coarse salt, taken a few times daily and washed down with brännvin. Karl Oskar had brought along some wormwood-seed brännvin, which had so far kept his body in good order. Now it was all gone. Fortunately, they had some camphor-brännvin left, and they drank this; Kristina gave the children spoonfuls of “The Prince’s Drops” and “The Four Kinds of Drops.” Fresh milk was also said to be good against the pestilence, but there was no milk on the boat, neither fresh nor sour. “All gone,” they were told, and Robert explained that this meant the milk had been drunk to the last drop.

Jonas Petter borrowed Karl Oskar’s bleeding iron and let his blood several times. He said he must get rid of his bad blood to be on the safe side. He also used the iron on Fina-Kajsa, who had long been asking for it. She, being the oldest in their group, was more afraid of the sickness than any of the others, and having lately been near death from another illness, she thought it would be unfair were she again to be laid down on a deathbed. She also tied one of her woolen hose around her throat and after this she felt comparatively safe. Arvid ate conscientiously from his box of Painkiller, and he shared the pills with Robert until not a single one was left. Ulrika of Västergöhl prepared plasters of mustard, which she placed across her stomach and Elin’s; these plasters would draw the pestilence poison from the entrails where its home was.

The only one of their group who used no remedy against the cholera was Danjel Andreasson; he did not fear the pestilence. He refused to believe that the epidemic was contagious. Who had contaminated the first person to die of cholera? Could anyone tell him? To Danjel, no contagion existed; the cholera was sent directly to each one by the Lord God. God was now visiting His people, already He had decided which ones among the passengers were to die. How could anyone believe this decision might be changed? Danjel saw his fellow immigrants, each one using his medicines and plasters, and he asked: Why not leave the healing to their Creator? Were they so weak in their faith as to doubt God’s omnipotence? And he asked his relatives Kristina and Karl Oskar: Did they actually believe they could escape if God had chosen one or both of them to die? Did they think they could hide from the face of the Almighty?

Kristina answered: Man should not sit with crossed arms and shovel everything onto the Lord. She believed God might be more inclined to look after her if she tried to help herself a little.

Danjel was more sad than ever when he learned that Ulrika, his obedient disciple, tried to protect herself against the pestilence with a mustard plaster. He reproached her for this and said she committed the heavy sin of doubt when she relied more on a plaster made by herself than on her God. Did she think, while preparing this plaster with her own sinful hands, that she could do more than the Almighty? She provoked the Lord with the mustard plaster on her stomach, and he entreated her earnestly to remove it.

After Inga-Lena’s death, Danjel had admitted to Ulrika that he himself had been mistaken in his belief that one reborn was rid of sin forever: no human being on earth could be free from sin as long as he remained in a mortal body; neither he, Danjel, nor anyone else. All were wretched sinners, burdened by fallen man’s body as long as they lived. There was no hope except through God’s grace and mercy.

When Ulrika heard this, she was deeply upset and perplexed; how could Danjel fail her thus? Weren’t all her sins washed away, once and for all? Did Jesus no longer live in her body? She had believed what Danjel had told her, and now he retracted what he had said. But she didn’t want her sin-body back, under no conditions did she wish her old corpse back. Nor had she sinned with any man since coming into Danjel’s house and eating his bread. She had been cleansed — why then did not Jesus wish to remain in her? Ulrika felt cheated and insulted: she had confidently relied on Danjel’s word, and she demanded that he, as the Lord’s prophet, stand by his word. She had long obeyed him and been subordinate to him in all things, but now doubt stole over her: Was Danjel too weak a man to be the Lord’s messenger? Yet he looked so much like a prophet, with his long, wild-grown beard.

Now Danjel tried to frighten her with God’s wrath because of the mustard plaster she had prepared. She felt irresolute, wondering what to do. But she was not convinced within herself that she had angered God because of such a little thing. She left the mustard plaster in its place.

— 3—

Every unfortunate victim chosen by the cholera sickened so suddenly that one moment he stood erect and strong, and the next, he almost fell to the floor. In the sickbed he immediately grew so weak that he was unable to lift his head, he shook in convulsions and moaned pitifully; some screamed in agony before they sank into the merciful depths of unconsciousness. After this the shrouding cloth was soon brought forth.

On the Charlotta, Kristina had not been conscious when anyone died; at the time of the deaths around her she herself had been desperately ill. But now she remembered the night on the ship when she nearly bled to death: a few times she had heard a woman’s weak voice: “The poor little ones! I don’t want to die!” It had been a low, moaning cry, and she had wondered whence it came. She had learned afterward that Inga-Lena had died that same night; it was Inga-Lena who had cried.

And as she now sat with her children about her, Kristina thought: “I do not wish to die and leave them!”

She had seen other creatures die: she had seen the animals at the slaughter bench. She had always had a feeling of compassion for them and had tried to avoid being present at the slaughter. But sometimes, when the men had no other help, she had been forced to hold the bucket for the blood. She had seen the dying animals suffer, she had heard their moaning and bellowing as they lay there, chained down, feet tied, and had seen their helpless kicking and struggling as long as they could move. She had often cried over people’s cruelty to innocent creatures who had never done them harm, and she was often aware of her own share in this as she stood at the slaughter trough and received the butchered animal’s blood in her bucket.

As she now heard the victims of cholera she was reminded of the times when she had helped with the slaughter. Now it was human creatures who suffered, and when their agony was over, they were hastily buried in unconsecrated ground in the same way as carcasses of diseased cattle were flung into shallow graves in the wastelands.

God must help her; He was the only one she could turn to. She herself would do all she was able to, and then God must help her.

The youngest one of their group, Danjel’s daughter Eva, who had not yet learned to walk, was suddenly seized by the pestilence one morning.

The child’s face turned blue, her small limbs were contorted with convulsions, her body twisted itself into a round bundle. It seemed as if the arms and legs of the little one had been pulled out of their joints. She cried pitifully, and at times lay still and moaned; she could not describe her pains, but if anyone touched her she screamed. Ulrika gave her all the medicines and pills at hand, but she refused to swallow anything, either dry or fluid. She lay in the vise of cramp, and no one could help her.

After a few hours the child’s moaning died down. She was still, now, as if in deep slumber. Her breathing could still be heard, her heart still beat in her little body, but her breast fluttered up and down so quickly the eye could not follow its movements. Her last sounds were like a little bird’s peep in a bush. In the late afternoon she grew entirely silent.

Eva Maria Emilia, not yet a year old, died in Ulrika’s arms. And Ulrika would not give up the little one after her breathing had stopped. She sat with the dead child in her arms, her weeping shook her whole body. Danjel sat next to her, immobile, his hands folded. He did not weep, he prayed. God had again touched him and he uttered his prayers of thanks for this: he had been too deeply devoted to this his youngest child, and because of this God had taken her away from him. He could not belong to the Lord soul and body while he loved a living creature here on earth. He had idolized little Eva, now the idol was removed, and he thanked his God that He had taken her.

Danjel was beyond human compassion, nor did he seek mortal comfort. It was Ulrika of Västergöhl who was in need of comfort at this moment, she who had been a good foster mother to Danjel’s tender daughter, this daughter who had left the earth before she had learned to walk on it. And Ulrika remained sitting with the dead child in her arms until one of the crewmen came and took the little body away from her, and wrapped it in a piece of gray cloth.

At sunset the bell rang on deck, the prow turned shoreward, the steamer moored at an outjutting cliff. Two men with shovels in their hands went on land, one man carrying a small bundle. A flock of half-grown wild ducklings were disturbed and lifted from among the reeds; they flew noisily in circles over the cliff; they were mallard ducks, with beautiful feathers in changing colors. While dusk fell the men dug a hole behind the cliff. Soon they returned on board with their shovels; only a small grave had been needed this time.

Little Eva’s funeral was over. And while the steamer put out again and darkness quickly fell over land and water, the flock of ducklings, still disturbed, kept crying plaintively as they flew about over the promontory behind which was the newly dug baby grave.

— 4—

Their group had now lost one of its members. When, after this, they spoke to each other about the terrible pestilence, there was always in the mind of each: Who will be next?

Ulrika, up till now free from all pains and ailments, began to complain of diarrhea and aches in her legs; she hoped it was only the usual immigrant diarrhea that bothered her; and so it seemed. Karl Oskar suggested that she use the bleeding iron and get rid of some of her blood. Kristina had lost so much blood during her sickness on the Charlotta that she did not consider it necessary to be bled, nor did she think they should bleed their children; the little ones were so pale, they probably had no more blood in their bodies than they needed.

Kristina interpreted the smallest discomfort in herself or her children as a sign of the pestilence. All except Danjel kept away from the unhealthy ship’s fare and starved themselves. The grownups went about starving in silence, but the children begged for food. Children could not starve day after day; yet they mustn’t eat the food either. Kristina said they must get fresh food, at least milk, for their offspring; they still had the means with which to buy it.

The silver in Karl Oskar’s skin pouch had melted away during their journey inland, and he had less than a hundred dollars left. Their transportation from Chicago to Minnesota had cost more than he had figured, and they had spent more for food than they had expected. How much would be left on arrival?

One night little Johan was seized with intense vomiting. It continued until green bile came up. Except for pain in his stomach he did not suffer, but Kristina watched in anxiety for the usual sign: the thin limbs twisting in convulsion.

Next morning the steamer made shore at a settlement where firewood for the engine was to be loaded. This stretch of the river flowed through a forest region, and groves of evergreens and leaf-trees grew on either side. A group of bearded, long-haired men met the boat at the pier; they were woodcutters, waiting to load the steamer. These men of the forest had revolvers and knives in their belts and did not look very kind.

A narrow strip of land had been cleared along the river, and behind tall stacks of firewood and piles of lumber a row of houses could be seen. People lived here, so it should be possible to buy food. Kristina entreated Karl Oskar: “Go on shore! Try to get some milk for the little ones.”

Karl Oskar picked up their large tin pitcher and went on shore. Robert had seen a map and he said that this was a town, but to Karl Oskar it seemed no more than an out-of-the-way farm village. Not much building had taken place; there were a few houses on the cleared strip, recently built of green lumber, and a little farther away, near the edge of the forest, he could see some primitive huts, not larger than woodsheds; probably the woodcutters lived there. All the houses seemed to have been hammered together in a hurry. A road had been staked out through the village, and work on it begun, but it looked more like a timber road; it was uneven and full of ruts, winding its course between piles of logs and stumps many feet high. Karl Oskar had noticed these tall stumps in many places: apparently the timbermen in America did not bend their backs but felled the trees while standing upright. This left ugly stumps and wasted lumber.

He looked at the row of houses, trying to find a store where food could be bought. He had made up his mind not to return to his children with an empty pitcher.

The biggest house had a sign painted in yard-high letters on the wall toward the river: BANK. Karl Oskar spelled the word twice to be sure, b, a, n, k. A word from his own language was painted on a house far away in the American wilderness! How could this be? Was it done to help arriving Swedes, unable to understand English? Or was the owner a Swede? Robert was not there to inform him that bank was spelled the same in both languages. Karl Oskar decided to go in and ask the bank master where he could buy some milk and wheat bread.

The door below the sign was locked. Karl Oskar knocked, but no one answered. Not a single person was in sight, neither inside the house nor near it. He walked farther, and through a window noticed some men standing at a counter of packing boxes. Behind the counter were shelves, and he thought perhaps this was a store.

Upon entering he immediately realized his mistake: on the counter stood a keg with a tap in it; a man in a white apron behind the counter was pouring a dark-brown drink from the keg. Karl Oskar recognized it as the American brännvin. The men at the counter were drinking, the shelves were filled with bottles, but there was no sign of food. He had entered a saloon.

He did not want to buy brännvin, he wanted milk. He turned in the door, mumbling something about being in the wrong place. It vexed him that he couldn’t ask where to buy fresh food and milk for his children. It was pitiful the way he had to act — like a suckling, not yet able to speak, unable to ask for food when he was hungry.

But the few words Karl Oskar mumbled as he left the store had an unexpected result. One of the men at the counter followed him through the door and called after him: “Hallo! Are you Swedish?”

Karl Oskar turned quickly. At first he only stared, the Swedish words surprised him so much.

Many Swedes had moved to North America before him, but it was the first time in this country a stranger had spoken to him in his own language.

“You are Swedish, aren’t you?” the man repeated.

The stranger was about his own age and size, somewhat thin, with large hands and feet. He was dressed in a red-striped woolen shirt and well-worn skin trousers, held up by a broad, richly ornamented belt. A wide-brimmed straw hat hung on the back of his head; his cheeks were puffed out as if swollen with a toothache or mumps, but his tobacco-spotted chin and lips divulged the secret of the swollen cheeks: they were filled with tobacco quids. Karl Oskar had seen many Americans dressed similarly and equally tall, gangly, and swollen cheeked; the stranger did not look like a Swede.

“I’m a countryman of yours!” the man said.

“Did you come from Sweden?” Karl Oskar was still dubious.

“Yes! Can’t you hear me speaking Swedish?”

The stranger wasn’t speaking exactly the way Karl Oskar did, but perhaps he had forgotten some of his Swedish. And Karl Oskar was well pleased to have met someone he could converse with.

He pointed to the sign on the building near by: “Are you the Swede who owns the bank?”

The man laughed: “No, I’m sorry. Mr. Stone owns the bank. My name is Larsson. I came from Sweden five years ago.”

Karl Oskar listened carefully — yes, the man must be Swedish.

The stranger smiled, he had dancing brown eyes, lying deep under his forehead, and his grin exposed a row of long, grayish-yellow, pointed teeth, spaced far apart.

“What can I help you with, countryman?” he asked. “I guess you came with the steamboat?”

Karl Oskar told him there was a group of Swedish immigrants on board. He was careful not to mention the cholera, he only stated his errand on shore: “I want to buy some food for our children. They can’t stand the ship’s fare.”

“Oh, yes, I understand. I’ll show you a store.”

“Have they milk and bread?”

“As much as you and your children can eat. Come along, I’ll show you. If you have no money, I’ll pay for it.”

“I can pay for myself,” said Karl Oskar. He wanted to make it clear to the stranger that he could pay for anything he got. He was no beggar, he told Larsson; he had been a farmer at home, all his life he had been able to meet his obligations and he intended to do the same in America.

“But it’s hard here for a new settler,” Larsson said kindly. “We immigrants must stick together, we must help each other.”

Karl Oskar was in need of aid; he needed someone to show him the way to a store; and for once luck seemed to be with him.

“I have a wagon over here. Come along!” said Larsson.

They turned a corner and found Larsson’s horse, harnessed to a kind of gig, a two-wheeler with a double seat and the driver’s seat behind. The vehicle reminded Karl Oskar of similar contraptions in Småland, called “coffee roasters.” Larsson untied the horse and asked Karl Oskar to climb in while he himself mounted the driver’s seat.

“Is it a long way?”

“Only five minutes.”

“I don’t want to miss the boat.”

“The steamer loads here for several hours,” Larsson told him. “You’ll have plenty of time.”

His new acquaintance kept addressing Karl Oskar with the intimate Swedish thou, something a stranger in Sweden never would have done, and Karl Oskar found it difficult to be equally familiar.

The gig turned onto the rutty road. The horse was a black, powerful, ragged animal, with dried-up dung clinging to his flanks and legs and a long, uncombed tail. Karl Oskar asked if he were young, and the driver confirmed it: “He’s just been broken in; hard to handle.”

The two-wheeler hopped about and shook on the rough road, though they drove quite slowly. They left the row of houses and, as the road turned away from the river, passed the small huts so much resembling woodsheds. Heavy logs were piled high on either side of the road, the ruts became deeper, the stumps more numerous, and as they passed the last shed, the thick forest lay only a few hundred yards ahead of them.

“Is the store in the wood?” asked Karl Oskar, puzzled.

“Just inside; only three minutes more.”

Then Karl Oskar began to be suspicious. Why would they build a shop in a wild forest, far away from the other houses? How much did he know about the stranger who had offered to take him to the store? Landberg, their honest guide, had warned the immigrants particularly to beware of their own countrymen, who could cheat and rob them the more easily because they spoke the same language. “Never confide in the first stranger you meet just because he speaks your language!” Landberg had said that more than once. Yet Karl Oskar had confided in this man he had just met and had climbed into his carriage. He had been careless enough to say that he had money; in the sheepskin belt next to his body he carried all he had left in cash.

A robber wouldn’t commit his crime near houses. He would wait until they were in the forest where no one could see them; in the forest Karl Oskar would be alone with the stranger.

He glanced back at the unknown man sitting behind him on the driver’s seat. In America he had seen many men with guns, pistols, or knives, but Larsson had no weapon in sight. Karl Oskar would have felt more comfortable had a weapon been carried openly. As it was, he didn’t know what kind of arms the man might have hidden on him. He himself had only an old pocketknife in his hip pocket.

He looked about — perhaps it would be best to jump off the gig while he still could see the houses back there by the river.

The vehicle rolled along, the driver tightened the reins and squirted tobacco juice quite calmly into the wheel tracks: “Where do you intend to settle, countryman of mine?”

“In Minnesota, we had thought.”

“Don’t know that country. Why don’t you stay here — you can make two dollars a day in the forest.”

Larsson went on: He had helped many Swedes find good jobs. But not all of them had been reliable, he had been cheated and robbed by Swedish crooks when he himself had first arrived in America. As a good friend he wanted to warn Karl Oskar: he must never rely on or confide in anyone; he must be careful.

Karl Oskar felt slightly embarrassed: his new acquaintance seemed to guess his thoughts.

But Larsson seemed as friendly as before, he laughed and talked with the same geniality that he had shown earlier. Judging by his looks and speech, he must be an honest man. And why should Karl Oskar think he was a bandit? Nothing indicated he had evil intentions. One shouldn’t think ill of a stranger only because he seemed anxious to help. He felt a little ashamed of his suspicions; he was here for his children’s sake, to get them food which might save their lives. Yet he was full of fear and suspicion when he met a helpful countryman. It wasn’t like him to be so timid. His father used to say, if you weren’t afraid within yourself there was nothing to be afraid of in the whole world. Of course he dared drive a short distance into the forest with this man!

They had reached a stream and were about to cross it over a newly laid bridge of wooden planks, when the driver reined in his horse; on the bridge stood a man holding up one hand and saying something in English. The driver greeted him with a broad grin and a stream of English words. It seemed that the man wanted to ride along with them, and he climbed in and sat next to Karl Oskar.

“Max is an American friend of mine; he is coming to pay me a visit. I have not seen him for a long time,” Larsson said and again showed his thin, sharp teeth in a broad grin.

The two-wheeler drove on across the bridge, and now three men were riding in it, two in the low seat and one on the driver’s box.

The newcomer was a thickset man with a round face and curly, black hair. He spoke English rapidly and smiled broadly at his neighbor on the seat, as though in Karl Oskar he had met a close relative after long separation.

And the fact was that Karl Oskar did recognize the man who had just jumped up beside him. He had noticed him in the saloon, in the company of Larsson.

Larsson had said that he had not seen Max for a long time, and the two now acted like long-lost friends. Karl Oskar did not need to know English to understand that this play was put on for his benefit. After all, it was not more than minutes since he had seen them stand side by side in the saloon.

Apparently they considered him more simple than he was; now he knew for sure that two robbers were driving him into the forest. Larsson had followed him outside in order to get him into the gig, and meanwhile Max had sneaked away to meet them at the bridge. Now Karl Oskar had two men to handle, one beside him and one behind. The gig kept rolling closer to the edge of the forest; ahead of them the road swung in among the heavy close-standing trees; within two or three minutes he would be alone with two robbers in a thick forest.

He carried his money next to his body when asleep or awake; without it, he and his family would be destitute in this country. No one was going to take it away from him, without first killing him.

He had fallen into a trap. He had been led to believe there would be a store in the wilderness where he could buy milk and bread; he had ridden along like a meek beast to slaughter. But he was not going to ride another step with these robbers.

They had left habitations behind, and not a soul was in sight. He must use cunning, he must pretend he had to get off on an urgent matter, “to call on the sheriff,” as the authority-hating farmers at home used to say, when they had to go behind a bush.

But it wouldn’t be wise to mention the sheriff now, it might arouse suspicion. With forced calm, he turned to the man on the driver’s seat: “Would you mind stopping for a minute, Larsson? I’ve got to relieve myself.”

“All right. Whoa! Whoa!”

The Swede calling himself Larsson spit on the road and reined in his horse. The gig came to a stop. On the right were some bushes, on the left a tall pile of logs. Karl Oskar had been sitting on the left side of the gig, and he jumped off in that direction.

The driver had believed Karl Oskar’s excuse valid and had not objected when he wanted to get off; now he became suspicious. Karl Oskar had been in too much of a hurry to get off the gig, he had lost his feigned calmness; and he could see the two men exchange quick glances. They saw through his ruse.

Larsson rose from the driver’s seat, and his genial look disappeared; his pointed yellow-gray teeth showed in a sarcastic, malicious grin: “You almost dirtied your pants, I believe. Perhaps I’d better help you unbutton them.”

For a fraction of a second Karl Oskar stood paralyzed, his tin pitcher in his hand. Now he could not sneak away from behind the bushes as he had intended to do; now they would not let him go, and there would not be a single person to witness what they might do to him in the forest.

He glanced at the pile of logs beside the road; one log was sticking out toward the hindquarters of the horse. This gave him an inspiration: the logs and the horse must save him. The horse was young, barely broken in; the horse must run away with the robbers, since Karl Oskar couldn’t run away from them.

Larsson said something in English to his fellow bandit and handed him the reins. A sarcastic grin was still on his face as he said to Karl Oskar: “You can stay right there and use your pitcher! Don’t move, countryman, I’ll be right down to help you.”

But in the split second before the man jumped from the wagon, Karl Oskar gave the outjutting log a kick with his iron-shod heel; he kicked with all the strength in his body, and the added strength of a man fighting for his life.

The pile of logs started rolling onto the road. The young horse tossed his head, his whole body trembled, he snorted excitedly, jumped side-wise, and then bolted off in a wild gallop, pulling the light vehicle with the two men behind him, barely missing being crushed by the rolling logs.

Karl Oskar saw the gig disappearing with the two men clinging to the seats for their very lives; they were still hanging on as the vehicle disappeared among the trees. Karl Oskar felt pleased — the kick had been sufficiently hard, they made good boots in Småland.

But in his excitement he forgot all about the rolling logs behind him. Suddenly one of them hit his left leg with such force that he fell face forward over a small stump. He had the sensation of a sharp knife blade being stuck into his chest, and he heard himself cry out. He was in such intense pain that a wreath of red-hot sparks flashed before his eyes.

He ground his teeth together and managed to rise. He had fallen over the stump of a small tree which had been felled by an ax, leaving large sharp splinters sticking up, and these had cut him like knife points. He pulled out one splinter sticking through his shirt: blood oozed out. He was aware of pain in his left leg, it felt stiff and useless. A shudder of terror ran down his spine — suppose his leg were broken?

But he was able to stand on it. Slowly he moved the leg; he was able to walk. He noticed the milk pitcher which he had dropped in the fall, and he stooped to pick it up; then he limped along the rutty road, back toward the village; every step was painful.

He did not look back for the bolting horse, the gig, and the two strangers. He had no further interest in his countryman who had promised to show him the way to a store where he could buy as much milk and bread as his children could eat; he was in a hurry to get back, back to the houses and the steamer, and to his own family. Slowly he hobbled along; the return took him a long time. He could still see sparks before his eyes, but his head was clear, and his injured leg was good enough to help carry him back.

The steamer was still at the pier loading firewood. One passenger — gone ashore to buy milk and bread — returned, limping on his left leg.

— 5—

Karl Oskar made his way toward the steerage. He walked slowly to hide his limp. Lill-Märta came running toward him, crying out jubilantly: “Here comes Father with milk!” For he still carried the tin pitcher in his hand. Kristina and Johan also ran to him expectantly. “Father has brought us milk! Come!”

Silent and embarrassed, Karl Oskar stood with the empty pitcher in his hand.

“You took your time,” said Kristina.

He dropped his hand with the pitcher so they could see for themselves; it was empty.

“We’ve been waiting for you,” Kristina was saying; then she broke off as she looked into the pitcher. “You haven’t any milk?”

“Not a drop.”

“Not a single drop?”

“No. No bread, either.”

Kristina’s lower lip quivered in disappointment. “No luck?”

“No, this time I had — no luck.”

Johan pointed to his father’s chest: “There’s blood on Father!”

“What are you saying, boy?” Kristina exclaimed.

Karl Oskar’s shirt was of a reddish color, and the blood didn’t show much. But she touched his chest, and her fingers became sticky with blood. “God in Heaven! You’re bleeding! What happened?”

“I fell over a tree stump, got a small splinter in my chest. Nothing to bother about.”

“Mother, I was right!” Johan cried triumphantly. “There’s blood on Father!”

“Only a very little blood,” corrected Karl Oskar. “Just a scratch from a splinter.”

“I must bandage it! Go to your bed and lie down,” Kristina ordered Karl Oskar.

Karl Oskar went over to their bunk and removed his shirt. Lill-Märta ran after him: “I want milk. Mother promised!”

“Be quiet, child,” admonished Kristina. “I must bandage Father.”

“But you promised us milk, Mother!” the child insisted.

“Father fell down. Go away, children.”

“Did you lose the milk when you fell?” Johan asked.

“Did you lose every drop?” Lill-Märta echoed.

Kristina took the children by the hand, led them to Robert, and asked him to look after them while she took care o£ Karl Oskar. She was relieved about Johan, who had improved during the day, having vomited up all the poison of the pestilence — if the sickness had been that. But now that her son was better her husband was hurt.

Karl Oskar had a deep wound just below his right nipple, blood had coagulated around the hole. The left side of his chest hurt when he breathed; he thought perhaps a rib was cracked.

“How did it happen?” Kristina asked.

“I told you, I fell on a stump. Accidents will happen.”

Karl Oskar had not told a lie; that was how he had hurt himself. But how much more he should tell her, he didn’t as yet know.

After her long sickness at sea Kristina had gradually regained her strength, but at the sight of coagulated blood like a wreath of fat leeches on her husband’s chest, she felt wobbly in the knees. Nevertheless, she had learned as a girl to look after wounds, when she had stayed with Berta, the Idemo woman, to have a gangrenous knee treated, and now she soaked a piece of linen cloth in camphor-brännvin and washed the wound clean. Then she applied a healing plaster which Jonas Petter had brought along. She tore up one of her old linen shifts into bandages which she tied around her husband’s chest. Berta had said that bandages must be tied as hard as though horses had helped pull them, in order to stanch the blood. Kristina tied the bandage as hard as her fingers were able to, but she thought regretfully she had not the strength of even half a horse.

“I’ll change the rags if it bleeds through,” she said.

Resting on his bunk, Karl Oskar reflected that he now had two bandages around his body, one of sheepskin and one of linen, one for his money and one for his wound. He had got the second because he must defend the first; the security belt for himself and his loved ones was still intact around his waist. But how near he had been to losing it — he had gone in a cart with a stranger, and this alone had been sufficient to endanger the lives of himself and his family. Yet who would have refused to go with the friendly Swede who offered to find as much healthy food as he and his family could eat?

Sitting close by him, Kristina was still wondering: “How could you fall so awfully hard, Karl Oskar? You’re usually steady on your legs.”

“When ill luck wills it, one might fall on an even floor.”

“You must look where you step in America. They have signs in dangerous places.”

“There was no sign in this place.”

Those danger signs they had seen so often should be painted not only on posts and walls in this country, they should be written in flaming letters across the sky of all North America; from above they would shine as a warning to immigrants in every part of the country.

“Your luck has left you,” mourned Kristina. “In spite of your big nose.”

For this “Nilsa-nose” which Karl Oskar had inherited was said to be lucky.

Yes, he, the father, was bleeding, and his children were without milk and bread. Another day and another night they must remain in this pest house with its unhealthy fare. But a little blood and a hurt leg could not be counted among the irreparable disasters of life. A whole family need not be destroyed by these misfortunes. He had merely fallen and hurt his leg, and a splinter had pierced his chest. Later, when all traveling dangers were behind them, he would tell the whole truth to Kristina. Then he would let her know how close she had come to continuing the journey without him, staking out and building the new home alone, a defenseless and penniless widow with three children.

It was not long before the bandages around his chest were saturated with blood.

“You won’t bleed to death?” Kristina’s voice quavered.

“Nonsense!” He smiled at her. “Only a little blood keeps dripping.”

“It goes right through the rags!”

“It drips a little from my nipple, like milk from a woman. It will soon stop.”

He reassured Kristina: His superficial scratch would soon heal, his flesh was of the healing kind; he was in good health and could well afford to lose a quart of blood; it was good against the cholera; he had thought of bleeding himself anyway, now he needn’t use the bleeding iron. It had been different when a woman called Kristina had bled streams from her nostrils one night at sea; she must have lost many quarts that night. Then, indeed, it was a question of her life. It had been the most horrible night he had ever lived through.

A warmth came into Kristina’s eyes: “You were good to me that night, Karl Oskar. If you hadn’t gone for the captain, I would not be alive today.”

Then he had taken care of her, now she bandaged and cared for him. Then he had tried to stanch her blood, now she tried to stanch his. Blood was the very life inside one; when the blood ran away, life also ran away. Karl Oskar and Kristina were concerned for each other’s lives. It was between them as it ought to be between husband and wife: they were joined together to ease each other’s burdens, heal each other’s wounds. They were two people who in God’s presence had given the promise to love each other through shifting fortunes as long as they both should live.

X. THEIR LAST VESSEL

The boatman is a lucky man.

No one can do as the boatman can.

The boatmen dance and the boatmen sing,

The boatmen are up to everything. . (Old Mississippi River Boat Song)

The Boat

The Red Wing of St. Louis, B. Berger, Captain, Stuart Green, clerk, was an almost new side-wheeler, having started its runs on the Mississippi only two years earlier. It measured 147 feet in length, 24 in width, had one engine for each wheel, and a capacity of 190 tons. Toward the prow two tall funnels rose close together, like a pair of proud twin pillars. The Red Wing lay in the water like a floating house, long and narrow, well cared for and newly painted white. On either side of its prow a great wing had been painted, spreading its blood-red feathers. The steamer was named after a famous Indian chief, and its wheels plowed the same waters on which warriors of his tribe still paddled their primitive canoes.

New steamers, new sounds: on the Red Wing’s deck no bell rang, instead the booming of a steam whistle reverberated through the river valley, drowning the sounds of Indian powwows. The steam whistle was new and alien in this region where until lately only the sounds of the elements and of living creatures had been heard on land and water.

The rivers were the immigrants’ roads inland, and the Mississippi was the largest and most important of them all. No less than eight hundred steamers churned its waters, a fleet of eight hundred steamboats moved the hordes of travelers northward to a virgin wilderness. The Red Wing of St. Louis was one of the vessels in this river fleet, proudly displaying on its prow the Indian chief’s red feathers, as it plowed its way upstream, loaded with passengers.

The River

Broad and mighty, the Father of Waters filled his soft bed, like a mobile running lake with two shores, a lake now rising, now falling, yet never draining. From the lakelets of Minnesota in the north to the levees of Louisiana in the south the river flooded its shores and let them dry again; low, swampy shores, tall, rocky cliffs, grassy meadows, sand banks, and sandy bluffs, shores of tropical lianas, cotton fields, giant trees shadowing the water with their umbrageous crowns. Vast and varying was the river’s domain: now choppy as a sea whose mighty waves have been arrested after storm, now flowing smoothly, and overgrown with twisted brushwood, tangled masses of thorns, willows, sycamores, alders, vines, brambles, and cedars; here flowering blossoms stood high as altar candles in the swamplands, the nesting place of wading birds, here mountains and cliffs rose on either side, like tall, dark, triumphal arches through which the river roared like the procession of a proud ruler passing with much fanfare.

Trees and bushes grew not only along the shores but also in the water. The river bed itself was a mass of root wreaths; when the trees fell, they fell into the water, and there they lay, their branches stripped of bark, naked, like fingers feeling the stream, like drowning human hands grasping for something to hold. The waves from the steamers’ wake washed the wooden skeletons along the shores, hastening their disintegration. Trees lost their foothold on shore and floated into the current; whirling, spinning in circles, the trees floated about, twisted together, caught in each other’s branches, as though seeking protection on their uncertain, thousand-mile voyage to the sea. Veritable islets of trunks, roots, branches, bushes, brush, bark, and leaves swam about on the surface. And down deep, in the river bottom, was the grave of dead forests.

The Father of Waters embraced in his bosom other rivers, streams, brooks, becks, creeks; went on shore and stole plants, pulled trees out of the earth to make islands, seized all that was not anchored to the very rocks; the Mississippi, since the beginning of time the earth’s mightiest concourse of running waters — going onward for all eternity, onward to the sea.

The Captain of the Steamer

The travelers from Ljuder had seen many ships and boats since they left Sweden, but the steamer Red Wing of St. Louis was the most beautiful of them all.

When they stepped on board and showed their tickets, the captain himself came up to them and spoke in a mixture of Swedish and Norwegian which they could understand: “Ah, Svensker! Welcome aboard! I’m a Norseman — we have the same king.”

Captain Berger of the Red Wing was well past middle age, with gray hair, and a beard that grew thick, covering his face to the eye sockets, except for his red nose tip. The immigrants had observed many bearded men, both at home and during their journey, but Captain Berger was the most richly bearded man they had ever seen. He was also the first Norwegian they had met.

“We Norsker arrived before you,” continued the captain. “We were wondering how soon you Swedes would come along.”

They couldn’t understand all the Norwegian he spoke through his beard, but by and by he and his passengers were able to carry on a conversation. At last on this journey they seemed to have come upon good luck; after the cholera-infested steamer, they were now on a clean boat where the pestilence had not made its appearance, and where the captain himself welcomed them warmly as if he had long known them. The Red Wing was their sixth vessel, and here they felt more secure than on any of the other five, even though Captain Berger warned them that the river was so crooked a steamer sometimes met itself on the curves.

The Passengers

The travelers were now on the last stretch of their journey; the Mississippi was their last river, the Red Wing their last vessel.

The Father of Waters was emigrating to the sea, the steerage passengers on the side-wheeler were immigrating against the current to the northwest country. Yet both the river and the travelers were on the same errand — seeking new homes. Captain Berger said that all types of people were aboard his ship: settlers, traders, fur hunters, lazy rich men, restless farmers, high government officials, cardsharps, honest working people, happy-go-lucky adventurers. But the greatest number of his passengers were immigrants on the last lap of their journey.

There were German peasants who said Bayern at every second word — was it the name of their home parish? They were blond and wore blue linen shirts over their clothes, shirts with outside pockets like coats. Their women had thick legs covered with blue woolen hose; both men and women wore small, funny-looking caps. Among all the immigrants, the Germans alone still had something left in their food baskets. A sausage was always discovered in some bundle; the Germans were always eating sausage.

The Irish immigrants spoke loudly among themselves, seeming to be in a constant quarrel. About half of them were dark haired, the rest red haired. They drank whisky from large wooden stoups, as calves would gulp down sweet milk. Captain Berger said an Irishman would not work unless someone stood with a club over his head: he would no longer use them as crewmen, he preferred Negroes. But a German must be threatened with a club before he would quit work. The two races differed in another way: an Irishman could never get enough to drink, a German never enough to eat.

Then there was the large Jewish family which the bearded captain pointed out to the Swedes: a father bringing his ten sons, four daughters, five daughters-in-law, four sons-in-law, twenty-two grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren; all together forty-nine people. The old father, the head of the family, was a little man; he had a longish face with a black beard and a long crooked nose; he didn’t seem over fifty or fifty-five years of age. He always wore a small round cap without a visor, and when the family gathered together, he was always in the center. The little family father sat there, calm, silent, sure, smoking his long pipe, surrounded by his many descendants. Captain Berger guessed that this Jewish family was the largest one that had ever emigrated to North America, which to the children of Israel was the New Canaan; Jacob and all his sons were well represented here.

Karl Oskar asked himself how he could be so filled with concern for his own family of six, when he saw this little Jew with eight times as many.

The crewmen on the Red Wing were both colored and white; there were also men with yellow-brown skin, offspring of white fathers and black mothers. All seemed dirty, as if rolled in mud. All were half-naked. Deep down in the steamer’s bowels they stoked the engines; in the evenings they gathered on their own separate deck, sitting in clusters, singing their songs — or song, for it seemed they sang the same tune over and over again. In the evenings, when heavy darkness fell over the river, their song rang out over the black, wandering Mississippi:

We will be free, we will be free,

As the wind of the earth and the waves of the sea. .

— 1—

On a small deck near the prow, set aside for steerage passengers, the immigrants from Ljuder were gathered in a group. The deck was roofed but open at the sides, and in the melting heat the passengers sought their way up here to find coolness; some even slept here at night. They had lived so long on the water that a deck now felt like home to them.

A heavy thunderstorm had passed over the valley in the early morning, and fiery swords of lightning had crossed each other over the blue mountains; but the relief it brought had been of short duration. They could feel in the air that the thunderstorm was still near. The travelers from cooler regions sat listless and lazy in the stifling heat and gazed apathetically at the green countryside with its immense fertility, plants and herbs in great numbers spreading far on either side of the river. They pointed out to each other an occasional tree, a bush, or some clinging vine with unusual leaves; or their eyes might follow the flight of some unknown bird, whose name they would ask.

From time to time the river narrowed or broadened; at its greatest width they thought the distance must be about two American miles. At times the strong current slowed down their speed. But the steamer kept to the center of the stream and met the oncoming current with such force that water splashed over the forecastle. Behind them the smoke from the funnels hung in the air like serpentine tufts of hair behind a fast runner.

Time dragged for the immigrants; at sea the wind had delayed them, here on the river the stream hindered them. It was already the last week in July.

Fina-Kajsa lay outstretched full length on the dirty old blanket which she had shared with her mate before he was buried in the North Sea.

“Oh me, oh my! We’ll never get there, never! Oh me, oh my!”

From the lips of the old woman two questions constantly issued forth: Had anyone seen her iron pot? Would they never arrive?

With each day since landing in New York her health had improved, and by now she was as well as anyone in their company. She liked the heat; her old backache, a constant plague in the wet climate of Öland, had entirely disappeared. If they could put Fina-Kajsa into a well-fired oven and keep her there for a while, Jonas Petter had remarked, she might come out with new life and hop about like a young girl.

“Oh me, oh my! We’ll never get there! Oh me, oh my!”

If they ever arrived, they would meet Anders, her only son, who had emigrated five years before. And now as they were nearing their destination her fellow travelers began questioning Fina-Kajsa about him. She told them: As long as he had stayed at home he had been an obstinate and unmanageable scoundrel; she and her husband had beaten him harder than an unbroken steer to make him tractable. He was lazy, evil-tempered, drunken, and ready to fight anyone; he had spent his time in the company of loose women, obeying neither father nor mother. When he was only ten years old, they had realized his nature: at one time they had refused to let him go with them to a Christmas party, they had locked him up. When they returned, the boy had broken out and given vent to his unchristen nature by smashing nearly all the furniture, from their fine chiffonier to the porcelain chamber pot. But after he had gone out into the world he had regretted his behavior; a few years ago he had written from America, asking his parents’ forgiveness. Out here he had become a different person, he worked hard, and he was capable. And he had written and told them about his fine home and the extensive fields he owned in Minnesota. She was sure she would find security and comfort with her son Anders as soon as they reached his beautiful farm. And he would help them all get settled, for whatever else she might have said of her son, he was capable, he knew what to do. According to his letters, there would be farms for all of them where he lived; as soon as they reached Anders all their worries would be over.

“But America has no end. We’ll never get there! Oh me, oh my!”

Karl Oskar still kept the piece of paper with Anders Månsson’s address. “Have patience a little longer, Mother Fina-Kajsa. We’ll get there,” he comforted the old woman.

Robert and Arvid were looking down into the water, trying to figure out how fast they were traveling. Robert had read in his book about the Mississippi that it drained a greater area than any other river in the world, and that it flowed with a speed of four miles an hour. And their bearded Norwegian captain had said that the boat could move with a speed of two miles an hour. This didn’t seem to make sense; if the river flowed faster than the steamer moved, they wouldn’t get forward at all, rather backward.

Robert deducted the speed of the steamer from the speed of the current — two minus four — then he said: “Now I’ve figured it out. We go two miles backward an hour! We’ll soon get back to the ocean again.”

“Christ in heaven!” Arvid exclaimed in terror. “Not back on the ocean again! I told you we should have walked once we were on dry land!”

But Robert’s figures did not give the truth of the matter. By watching the shores they could see for themselves that their boat was moving upstream. Luckily, Robert had been mistaken.

He asked his brother how the boat could move faster than the river even though the river moved faster than the boat? Karl Oskar said, perhaps Captain Berger had counted in Norwegian miles. But he did not wish to be drawn into arguments about miles and distances, he had already had enough trouble with the difference between Swedish and American miles.

Ever since Ulrika had found Lill-Märta in Detroit, harmony had reigned among the group; there was no longer talk of anyone’s leaving it. They realized that in their situation they could be of help to each other. After reaching these distant regions where their language separated them from other travelers, their group had become more unified than before: they owned one thing in common — their language. Since Landberg’s departure in Chicago, they had been left to rely on themselves, and a greater intimacy had sprung up among them. Kristina said if they all stuck together, they would get along; she told them the secret of success was that none must be proud. No one must feel above anyone else. They mustn’t act the way they used to at home in Sweden.

And they all agreed not to dig up old quarrels and scandals from their homeland; the past must be dead and buried forever. Ulrika had been the parish whore and spent time in prison; Danjel had many times been punished with heavy fines for breach of religious laws and had been threatened with exile by the authorities; both were now banned by the church in Sweden; but who cared about that out here? The deeds for which they had been punished in Sweden were not considered crimes in America. Moreover, no one here cared what they had done in Sweden. Why then bring it up among themselves? More and more they began to realize that Sweden was an antiquated country, behind the times, her unjust laws written by the masters that they might dominate the simple people. Here in America they could tell both the bishop and the sheriff to go to hell. As Jonas Petter put it, they could tell all of them — the bishop, the dean, the warden, and the sheriff — to kiss their bottoms.

The health of the travelers was improving. At little Eva’s death, on their previous boat, nearly all had felt pains and aches, but they had escaped the cholera. Ulrika had become perfectly well the moment she stepped aboard the Red Wing though at first sight of the steamer she had refused to go near it: one wheelhouse had an inscription in tall letters — PACKET. In Swedish packet meant rabble, mob, loose people. If they were to be lodged in the part of the ship called packet, she refused to go near it. Here in America all were supposed to be equal, and no one group ought to be called packet. She calmed down only after the Norwegian captain’s explanation that packet meant his steamer carried mail.

The captain had risen in unmarried Ulrika’s estimation since he addressed her as Min Fru. Apparently all men in America raised her to married status. Now, too, she was well again and without pain. She believed the mustard plaster had saved her from the cholera. In spite of Danjel’s friendly remonstrance, she had used it, but for a few days she had worried lest God punish this disobedience to His apostle. Never before had she disobeyed Danjel. However, the Lord God had not taken revenge because of her plaster, and now she wondered if she should always follow Danjel’s advice and warnings. She had noticed he was not as stern as before; it seemed as if he sometimes doubted that he had been chosen to guide their souls.

Kristina looked after Karl Oskar’s wound, which was healing well, but his chest was sore and blue all over and it hurt when he breathed. In his left leg some stiffness remained, and he still limped a little. His Swedish good luck had deserted him in America, Kristina insisted.

Since they had now been a whole month on their journey from New York, Karl Oskar was thinking of writing another letter to Sweden; but he decided to wait until they arrived at their place of settling. There was nothing new to tell his parents; nothing had happened that was worth mentioning in a letter.

As they sat together on deck they spoke for the first time in a long while about their old homeland, and now it appeared Karl Oskar was the only one who had written home to Sweden. Danjel had no one to write to there; after the church had pronounced its bann, none of his relatives would have anything to do with him, no one expected a letter from one who was exiled, no one cared what happened to him after his departure. His servant Arvid could not write. Jonas Petter could write, and he had his wife Brita-Stafva to write to, but after twenty years of daily quarrels they had at last reached complete disagreement, so he had left her; he was in no hurry to write to the cause of his emigration; nor would he have anything to say to his wife, except that he was glad to be rid of her, and that she already knew.

When she heard them speak of letters home, Ulrika of Västergöhl exclaimed: “Write to Sweden? But that country doesn’t exist any more! That hellhole is obliterated from the face of the earth!”

Jonas Petter asked what she meant by this, and Ulrika explained: When leaving Karlshamn, Danjel had said that their old homeland would immediately perish. The Lord’s vengeance would smite the land which had put His faithful in prison on bread and water. The Lord God had long intended to destroy Sweden, but He had to wait until Danjel and his followers had left. Soon four months would have passed since their ship had sailed away, and undoubtedly divine judgment had by now been meted out; the Almighty had surely stricken Sweden and erased her from the earth. If they wanted to send letters home, Ulrika suggested they address them to Hell Below, if mail were delivered there.

Danjel admitted in a low voice that at the departure he had made a prophecy concerning the homeland’s imminent destruction. But he did not know whether the Lord had as yet carried it out. Perhaps the Lord in patience held back His avenging hand.

Kristina looked at her uncle and shook her head: Surely the Last Judgment could not have taken place in Sweden without having been noticed here in America? Or what did he think?

Danjel turned his kind eyes toward his sister’s daughter: He would never again prophesy the Day of Doom; he had now learned that this happening was not postponed until the end of the world but that every day, for every mortal, old or young, was a day of doom. For the Last Judgment was the judgment of conscience within one’s soul, it was meted out in the heart of every pious Christian each time he committed a sin.

Robert had this to add: They must all realize that when the world was destroyed, then the whole globe would be destroyed in one moment. That little part of the earth’s surface called Sweden could not fall out by itself and disintegrate.

Ulrika said: “I wouldn’t send a letter to that hellhole, whether it has sunk below or not!”

She continued in bitterness as her memories rose within her: To whom would she write? To the dean in Ljuder who had chased her away from the Lord’s altar and forbidden her the Sacrament, and who many times had called her a child of Satan? She had always answered him: “Yes, dear Father, I hear you calling me!”—Or should she write the sheriff and thank him for putting her in prison? Or the judge of the county court who sentenced her to bread and water? Or should she send a letter to the prison guard who gave her this fine fare, who brought her the dirty water and the mildewed bread? Should he receive an epistle of love from her, was he worth it? And all those in the home parish who had spit at her and thrown filth after her — should she remember them with a letter? Was any single creature among that damned packet worth a letter? All they did was to serve the devil every moment of their lives.

Only one person in Sweden would Ulrika like to honor with a letter — the King himself. She would like to thank His Majesty for the feast she had enjoyed in the royal prison, and she would like to tell him that she daily thanked her Creator for having liberated her from being a subject of His Majesty. She would also like to ask the royal person on his high throne how his conscience could let him rule a kingdom where little children were sold at auction, their whole childhood through to be mistreated by greedy, cruel peasants. She would like to tell the King how happy she now was to have escaped from his kingdom, to have arrived in a country where neither he nor any of the lordships at home had any power, a country where she was considered one of God’s own creatures.

Yes, indeed, next time she got hold of paper and writing tools she would send the King of Sweden a farewell letter from one of his former subjects. And before she put this letter into an envelope addressed to the “King by God’s Grace” at Stockholm Castle, they could guess what she would do with it!

They all laughed at the Glad One’s letter to the King — they all knew she couldn’t write.

Karl Oskar said: “Forget the old! It’s over.”

What purpose could be served by harboring grudges against Sweden? Now that they had arrived in a new, young country, it was better to forget all that old stuff, throw it away as they threw away old rags. They must not keep their homeland so much in their minds that it depressed and irritated them; this would only hinder their success in America.

Ulrika agreed on this point, as did Danjel and Jonas Petter, But Kristina sat silent the whole time and let no one know how she felt about the danger of thinking too much of her homeland.

— 2—

Every day Robert read in his language book, every day he practiced the new forms and positions indicated for his lips and tongue. The most useful sentences he learned by heart: how to ask one’s way to inns and lodging places, to food stores and eating places; how to ask the price of food and quarters; how to find work, and above all — the salary paid for work: How much wages do you pay? He must be sure to ask the right question in each instance. He also learned the numbers in English, as he considered these of the greatest importance to avoid being cheated when receiving change or pay.

Not only was it important to ask rightly; it was equally important to answer correctly when the Americans asked questions. He studied the exercises on getting a job: What can you do? In Sweden he had been a farm hand. But he didn’t like the English word farm hand. Farm hand! It sounded too lowly an occupation, as if he were one hand of the farmer, a piece of his master’s body, another farm tool used by the master. In Sweden he had actually felt that he was nothing more than a tool, a most insignificant and helpless tool, used by the masters as they saw fit. But here the servant was as good as the master, and he had emigrated to America because he didn’t wish to be a tool used by masters; he didn’t want to have any masters, he wanted to be free.

No, he wanted to tell the Americans what he could do: I can plow and tend cattle! It sounded more like a man talking, inspiring more confidence than to say, I am a farm hand; it sounded more capable and grown-up, as if he worked with his own hands and not with the master’s.

The Americans were polite and considerate and always asked a stranger how he was. Robert wanted to be equally polite and he had learned by heart the reply: Thank you! I am feeling very well! True enough, he wasn’t quite well, his ear still bothered him, but he wasn’t going to admit that, not even if he were worse than he was. He didn’t want to cause the friendly Americans anxiety in any way. He didn’t want them to go about worrying over his health; they had so many other things to worry about, and so much to do.

If he were offered some food that was spoiled or tasted bad (for in America, too, he had discovered such dishes), then he would be courteous, like a man of the world; he would say that he didn’t have time to eat and drink just now, he had a few things to attend to. The Americans, themselves so industrious and thrifty, would hardly blame him for attending to his business.

The language book gave advice about conversations with people of different trades and positions: Conversation with an Innkeeper, Conversation with a Watchmaker, Conversation with a Hatmaker, Conversation with a Shoemaker, Conversation with a Laundress, Conversation When Purchasing a Country Place, Conversation When Building a Log House. Each conversation listed a dozen questions and answers, and as soon as one knew the person concerned, it was merely a matter of opening the book and starting off. Under different headings were lists of words most frequently used: Time, Nature and the World, Man, Mental Qualities, Bodily Attributes, Plants and Flowers, Metals and Stones, Animals — Wild and Tame. If Robert wanted to report to the police that he had found a corpse in the street, he would only have to look under Man. And if he wanted to compliment someone on his great intelligence, he would look under Mental Qualities; if he wished to tell a girl how beautiful she was, he must turn to the heading Bodily Attributes. And when he had become rich and wanted to buy a riding horse, a thoroughbred stallion, he must choose the words for this transaction under Animals — Wild and Tame. Having bought the stallion, he might also wish to buy a golden watch, and instruction for this purchase might be obtained under Stones and Metals, or perhaps under Conversation with a Watchmaker.

Robert had written down on a list the names of all the dishes he liked: veal, mutton, pork sausage, rice porridge, pancakes. He had learned to name forty-three different dishes and twelve kinds of drinks. He wanted to have everything in order for the day when his riches were accumulated so that he could order anything he liked and finish up the order with this sentence from his book: Put all the dishes on the table!

He had heard stories of immigrants who in a short time had accumulated immense fortunes but had been unable to handle their riches. Greed had eaten them up or dried them up, or gluttony had made their stomachs swell to abnormal proportions. Some rotted away in unmentionable vices. Money was their destruction. Robert felt a warning in this for himself. Ever since entering the portals of the New World in New York, he had pondered his ambition in America and how best to effectuate it. He would neither become puffed-up and haughty in prosperity, nor would he worry in adversity, like a weakling. He would not wish for everything he saw, he would be satisfied with sufficient possessions, a small fortune, easy to handle; moderate riches would not be dangerous, would not tempt him to destroy himself.

But all the steerage passengers on the Red Wing, whatever their language, were as poor as he, and all wanted to get rich.

Robert’s purpose in coming to America was perhaps best expressed in a song which he had heard from the crew’s quarters many evenings. Their voices could be heard from their place of gathering on their own deck, where he could see their half-naked bodies in the semidarkness. At first he had only been able to understand one word of their song—free. But after listening for a few days he could interpret the whole meaning:

We will be free, we will be free,

As the wind of the earth and the waves of the sea. .

This was the crew’s song in the evening, it was the song of the wandering river, it was the song of Robert’s aim in America.

— 3—

From the deck of the Red Wing Robert and Arvid saw a constant change of scenery: the shores, the river itself, the many passing steamers with strange names, logs floating along on the current, pieces of lumber, bushes, trees, boxes, barrels, dead birds. Once they saw a corpse sail by, only part of the head sticking out of the water, a gray-white face and black hair entangled in a mass of green grass and branches; they thought it was the corpse of a woman, floating along with this unusual bridal wreath on her head.

They watched for new trees and plants along the shores, for Arvid had heard that shirts and pants grew on trees in America, and he wanted to see these trees. Robert said he must have in mind the cotton bush which grew only in the Southern states; they would not see it here.

Robert was looking for crocodiles; he had read in his book that these monsters inhabited the Mississippi. And one day Arvid pointed out an animal, swimming near the shore, so ugly that the like of it he had never seen before; it must be a crocodile. But the captain assured them that crocodiles didn’t swim this far north, and the ones in the swamplands near the river mouth weren’t really crocodiles, they were alligators.

One night an immigrant from Scotland, sleeping on the deck, fell into the river. No one missed him until morning. He left a wife and six small children on the boat. A collection was taken up among the passengers for the destitute family, and each one contributed something. In all, more than thirty dollars was collected as comfort and aid to the fatherless family; but the widow and her six children continued to weep just the same.

Arvid was horrified at the thought of the Scotsman; not only did the poor man lose his life, if his body floated toward the sea, he might be eaten by the gruesome crocodiles. How could he, on the Day of Doom, rise up from the stomach of a crocodile?

One morning Arvid called to Robert in consternation: “Look over there! The wild critters have come!”

On a cliff overlooking the river stood a group of strangely immobile figures, all facing the steamer, which passed them at a distance not above a gunshot. Feathers on their heads indicated they were Indians; some had bows in their hands. All watched the steamer intently, its funnels spewing smoke, its wheels rolling along through the water, splashing like large fins. The Indians stood like trees grown out of the rock, petrified by the sight of the steamer.

Undoubtedly these were wild Indians, Robert said.

Several times during their journey inland they had seen Indians, but they had been civilized. Now, for the first time, they saw wild Indians, Indians in the bush. And Robert understood that the immigrants were now approaching the vast, unknown, dangerous wilderness, a much larger and much more dangerous wilderness than they had traveled through before.

“They might shoot arrows at us!” Arvid said, looking for a place to hide.

But the Indians remained like statues, straight and silent, intently watching the puffing, pushing steamer on the river.

Suddenly the stillness was broken by the Red Wing’s steam whisde; a piercing sound reverberated across the water, echoing back from the cliffs on shore. The sound cut like a lance in Robert’s ear.

The Indians answered the whistle with a shriek of terror and disappeared from their cliff as quickly as if swept away by the wind; quicker almost than the eye could see, they had run and hidden behind bushes at the foot of the cliff. The two boys had never seen human beings so swift of foot. The highly entertained passengers on the upper deck laughed heartily.

Arvid was much surprised: he had heard that the Indians were cruel and horrible as wolves. How could they be dangerous when that litde boat whistle could scare them away? And now he knew what he would do if encountering wild Indians in the forest: he would whistle; then they would scatter like chickens from a hawk.

Robert thought that perhaps these Indians had never before seen a steamer. At home people said steamers were Satan himself traveling about on water in these latter days, spurting fire and smoke. The heathens out here could hardly be expected to have more sense than Christians in Sweden. Perhaps they thought the steamer was an evil monster risen from the depths of the river. They might be familiar with crocodiles, sea serpents, and other river creatures, but had they ever seen an animal spewing smoke, sparks, and fire? Were they accustomed to roaring river creatures, paddling along with wheel-feet, shrieking like a thousand pigs simultaneously stuck with sharp knives? Robert’s own ears could not stand the sound of the whistle, and Arvid had said that his heart had stopped inside his breast for many minutes when he heard the whisde for the first time. Robert was sure that a sound like the steam whistle had never before been heard on God’s earth.

And he thought it was an evil deed to let loose the whistle in order to frighten the Indians and entertain the passengers. It was true that the Indians were heathen and unchristian, but there was no need to plague them unnecessarily.

Robert had read about the Indians shooting with poisoned arrows and killing people with dull wooden spears. He had even heard that they scalped people without sharpening their knives, a thought which made him shudder so that his hair stood on end. Such were the deeds of unchristian people who were neither baptized nor confirmed; heathens knew no better. This would change as soon as they became civilized and Christian. When the missionaries arrived among the Indians and baptized them and gave them the Lord’s Supper, the one-time wild Indians would learn to use their enemies’ breech-loading guns and scalp their victims with sharp knives.

The captain said: “The Indians are horrible people; they tie their captives to poles and burn them to death; they fry them the way Christian people fry pork.”

And Robert appreciated this warning. He had now actually glimpsed the natives of this unknown wilderness where he and his group were about to build their homes. They would soon reach their destination; a new, strange life would soon begin. And the life awaiting them began to take shape in his imagination.

Each day Robert carefully observed the new country, its natives, plants, animals, general appearance. Sometime in the future, when he had leisure and writing implements, he intended to write a description of his surroundings according to his own observations. He possessed a small writing book, once given to him by Schoolmaster Rinaldo, in which he had put down the most unusual happenings so far.

With the arrival of evening, both river and shores flowed together in that impenetrable darkness of North America, the densest and thickest darkness of all the darknesses God had created. Then Robert could observe neither land nor water. But sometimes in the evenings or during the nights, flames could be seen from the invisible shores of the Mississippi. They looked like moving torches or tongues of fire; they were fires from Indian camps, glowing, flaming somewhere on land. The Indians were there — they weren’t visible, but they were there, they lurked somewhere in the forest, somewhere in the bottomless darkness — the most horrible people the old Mississippi captain had ever seen.

And Robert watched these fires with deep apprehension; they indicated to him the presence of the cruel redskins; they were all around him here, they were close. And this very country was to be his home, in the midst of these heathens he would have to live, among Indians he would pass the rest of his life.

He felt a great fear, and a still greater foreboding.

— 4—

On the last day of July, 1850, the immigrants from Ljuder stepped ashore in the town of Stillwater, on the St. Croix River, a tributary of the Mississippi, in Washington County, Territory of Minnesota.

They arrived at a time of year most inconvenient for farmers: the summer was by now so far advanced that it was too late to sow or plant anything. They were peasants who had lost a year’s crops, and they knew what this meant.