The record-union., 1893-11-25

or Clae Oleson. who was and still is a
bOnder or landed proprietor alongside
the national highway:
'Y on shall entertain travellers and not
impose upon them. Your gard or farm
shall hencelorth be legally a station.
You shall become its keeper or master.
IN consideration of this If the conditions
forbid profit such a per cent. of your
taxes will be remitted; or (if it is place
which of necessity will secure reVenue)
you are to pay so much annually to the
Government. You shall provide such a
number of carrioles, or stollcarts, or both,
and so many horses, and the legal charge
to travellers for the same to the stations
each way, shall be so much. You must
be responsible for any harm coming to
charge while posting from your station to
the next. Ii you break the law you shall
be fined and i'm prisonedv'
SO the roadside farm, with it's anti
quated outbuildings, has gradually de-
yeloped into the station. The bonder or
farmer. or his eldest son, has gone
through the evolution from the simplest
and most primitive condition of little
more than lowly peasant life in Norwe-
gian solitude to the yeXatIous life of still
conducting his mountain and valley
farm and maturing and housing his
crops IN the brief northern summer, and
al the same time caring for the hosts who
fit by him at great speed in their efforts
10 see all Norway in the selfsame all too
brief period. Not too much should be
expected from such characters and con-
ditions. You are fairly sure of some
things, and absolutely certain Of others
Whatever these stations may have been
in the days OF foot and knapsack travel,
when the traveller sat at meals with the
bOnder kand his servants in the huge
smOke-cOlOred living-room, and slept
in common bed with the entire house,
hold upon the same floor, cleanliness is
now nearly uniVersal; hearty and ample
food are not lacking; civility yields rude
yet sufficient and kindly service. and by
a little tact and Difference the soddenness
and gravity Of these sturdy folk are
transformed into the very sunshine of
genial hospitality. You may be sure of
the righting OF every error, and certain of
an integrity in all dealings so exact,
punctillious and unyarying as to leave
no doubt that universal honesty is as
deeply rooted a national characteristic of
NOrwegians, in Norway, as it is lacking
in all other travelled lands.
One may travel six, eight, ten or even
twelve miles through most majestic
scenes of nature without sight of a single
living thing. Perhaps the only sugges-
ton Of life in the entire distance
will be the tinllle of the cowbells from
the hidden wales among the mountain
nights where the living HuldreS in utter
loneliness care for their summer herds.
Even this hint OF life amid deSolate
grandeur reaches one burdened with an
unutterable sense of dreary remoteness.
Suddenly emerging from a shadowy
gorge, or rounding the base of some
preciplce towering thousands of feet
above your head, or again when Begin
ming the descent from some frozen field,
your always CHEEKY sllydsgut or postbOy
Will triump phantIy-in tone OF rejoicing
at good things to come-shout the name
OF near station. 1t will stand huddled
upon some dreary mass Of rocks, jumbled
against patch of lichened birch, strewn
along a bit of level, winding way, or,
perching upon the edge of some mighty
rock cleft where a torrent thunderS be-
low, seem like a mass of gray rock
broken from the nights above, pOising
before final plunge into the roaring
abyss beneath.
As you approach the place three or four
or, perhaps, half a dozen substantial,
low built structures will be gradually
disclosed. The larger one Will, perhaps,
be a comparatively large structure set at
odd angle against the highway. 1t has
been built by the bonder station master
himself, and while of pine, has huge
hewn timbers, a low solid roof, square
windows often protruding so as to give
wide window seat as provision for pot
ted flowers, and almost invariably boasts
a door porch remarkable in appearance
to the famous old south porches of the
more ancient parish churches of England.
But if this structure is of recent origin.
it is still as gray and antique in appear
ance as all the rest. Behind this. or ex
tending from its rear wall is the original
farmhouse, often 200 Or 800 years old,
though built of wood, altogether a mass
OF patch work in pine and thatching,
with cavernous chimney top towering
at one corner, the whole reminding you
OF the stone built StructureS>Of the Eng
lish lake district, evincing generations of
on building and patching of additional
house room of all sizes and shapes, and at
every conceivable angle.
Extending from this farther along the
highway with, perhaps, a return" at the
end which abuts -the road, the whole
forming a sort Of open and still somewhat
protected statiOny yard, is series of sub
stantial sheds, low, deep and capacious,
III which may stand travellers carrioles
and ponies, and where all sorts of odds
and ends may be temporarily stored.
Usually across the way are three or four
lesser buildings, often arranged so as to
10TH Vie I6DldIulLR sue Ol In6 q QldUFan-
gle-like station. In one may live fam
lily or two who serve the bonder in the
fields upon the nights with the herds. or
still assist in the manifold duties imposed
by summer travel.
Another structure may have simply
one huge. long room. where Iowly peas
ant or other travellers are lodged in hunks
against the wall, or upon straw and fir
branches upon the earthern floor. This
will also be provided with a long deal
table, some rude pottery and cooking
utensils, and fireplace where such as
are the sheltered here may prepare their
own food. Besides these there is always
the storhaus or storehouse. 1t is an odd
structure. strongly built, setting upon
uncemented squares OF hewn stone, sew
eral feet above the ground, to escape
earth-damp, frequent treshets and accu-
mutation of snow. It's stories project
each beyond the other to the roof which
is still an unaccountable projection, the
whole having ut a distance the appear
ance OF an unwieldly pagoda. In this
huge-tilnbered stronghold is stored the
grain and ali the many supplies for man
and beast against the severe needs OF the
dark and almost unending northland
winter.