The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1928-06-15

Society. Washington. d. c.
r ONG ago, when the Goths laid
waste to western Europe, a
l. small band of half-wild fugitives
hid for safety in the great
swamps near the Oder-that low, fiat,
wooded region known now as the
Spreewald. The Wends, this odd frag
and to this day they are hiding there,
in this Spreewald swamp. Clannish,
isolated, and happiest when left alone,
they are concerned not at all with the
rise and fall of nations around them.
Though in Germany, the Wends are
not of it. Even the Germans them
selves look on this lost tribe more as
curious specimens of an ancient race
than as a part Of their citizen body.
They are Slavs.
Probably 1,5O0 years have passed
since the Wends first colonized in this
great swamp, and sailed forth, led by
their pagan kings, to kidnap children
and to plumber food in what is now
Poland and Germany. Today only a
few thousand of the tribe remain; but
through all these centuries they have
chung tenaciOusly to their own cdd
speech, their social forms and super
stitions; and, except for few of their
queerly clad girls, who sometimes go
to Berlin as nursemaids, the Wends
seldom quit their Spreewald haunts.
Yet, content as he is with his eel
| traps and cucumber patch, his hay
field and cherry trees, the wary Wend
will drive sharp bargain with out
siders who come trading for his
carved novelties, his wooden shoes
and dishes, his smoked cells, and the
cucumbers of his island gardens.
Stranger than his diet of cells and
cucumbers, however, and stranger
even than his hermitlike seclusion, is
the unique plan Of the Spreewalder's
village and his method of getting
about. The Spree river, rising down
near the old Bohemian frontier, flows
up through Saxony into Brandenburg
and splits here into hundreds of
brooks and canals whose watery net
work lies all over the Spreewald re-
gion and forms thousands of tiny
islands. The ancient village of Lehde,
built 1 400 years ago, literally covers
q whole group Of these islands, each
individual house standing on tiny
isle all it's own.
Their Streets Are Streams.
So, instead of having streets and
sidewalks like any normal town,
Spreewald village is served entirely
by these crooked water streets. Every
family has at least one boat, and in
summer the boat is the street car, so
to speak; and there are lines of public
boats, poled by stalwart "motormen,"
that run on schedule time over regu-
lar routes and loops called "Grobla."
All along these water streets there
are signboards that greet you and
point the way to various settlements.
But instead of saying two miles,"
for example, to such or such a place,
the sign says two hours" as all dis
lance is measured by the time it takes
to pole to place.
Some phases of this novel amphib-
Gus life seem almost absurd to visit
ing American. The American boy,
whether he is fourteen or forty, gets
a thrill from brass band and a street
parade-and so does the youth of the
Spreewald. But we have distinctly
American ideas about the correct uni
form brass band should wear, and
we insist that street parade shall
march in the street. But the Spree
valid form of celebration is wholly
different. Here the members of the
band dress in long black, funeral-look-
ing coats and two-quart bowler hats;
and, instead of marching, they squat
in fiat boat, the bass drummer in
the stern pounding away as the boat
is poled along the canal!
The country here is too low and wet
for grain, but wild hay is cut in abun-
dance. A platform of piles is raised
high above the swampy ground and
on this the haystack is built. Boat
loads of hay, moving through the
many canals, look from distance as
If they were sliding curiously about
the country driven by some unseen
force.
In winter the whole waterway net
of the Spreewald is frozen over and
becomes veritable spider web of icy
lanes and avenues. Then the Wend
wears special iceshoes, with his skates
built fast to them. Aided by light
ten-foot pole with a sharp spike in
one end, the Spreewalder glides
easily about his ice-bound colony, not
for pleasure, but for speed and con-
venience. Then, too, all burdens that