Nils Holgerssons Wonderful Journey Through Jämtland

Atop Östberget Tuesday October 4

Everyone who has travelled in the fjäll of Sweden knows how bad the fog can be, how it rolls over the landscape so that you simply can’t see a bit of the beautiful high fjäll that rises up all around you. You can even run into fog in the middle of summer, and in the fall it is hardly possible to avoid it. Concerning Nils Holgersson, the weather had been good enough so long he was still in Lappland, but before the geese had time to shout that they were in Jämtland, the fog had lain heavy about him, so thick he could see nothing of the countryside. He flew over it for a whole day not knowing if he had come to a country full of mountains, or covered in flat plains.

Towards evening the geese landed on a green spot that sloped down on all sides, so he knew that he found himself on the top of a hill, but he couldn’t tell if it was big or little. He believed that he had to be someplace where people lived, because he thought he could hear people’s voices, and the creaking of wagons rolling along on a road, but he wasn’t sure about that either.

He would sure have loved to have been able to find his way to a farm somewhere, but he was afraid of getting lost in the fog, and didn’t dare do anything but stay with the geese on the hilltop. Everything was dripping wet and damp. Small drops hung from every blade of grass and every little plant, so that if he moved at all he got a proper rain shower over himself. “This isn’t much better than the valley up in the fjäll,” he thought.

But he did dare to take a couple of steps, and when he did he saw a building right in front of him. It wasn’t particularly big, but it was many stories tall. He couldn’t see the top of it. The door was shut, and the whole building seemed to be empty. He saw that it couldn’t be anything other than an lookout tower, and that he could get neither food nor warmth inside. But he quickly hurried back to the wild geese. “Dear Mr. Mårten Goose!” he said, “let me onto your back, and carry my up to the top of the tower over there! Here it’s too wet to sleep, but up there I’m sure I can find a dry place to lie down.”

Mr. Mårten Goose was quite ready to help Nils. He left on the balcony of the tower, and there the boy lay and slept peacefully through the night, until the morning sun woke him.

But when he first opened his eyes and looked around, he couldn’t understand what he saw or where he was. Once at a market he had been in a big round tent and seen a great big painted panorama that ran along the inside wall all the way around - and he thought he was in such a tent now: a big round tent with a nice red ceiling, while on the walls and floor a beautiful and sweeping landscape was painted. There were big villages and churches, fields and roads, a railroad, and even a city. But he soon noticed that this was not the case. Rather, he stood on the top of lookout tower with the red morning sky above and with real country around him. But he was so used to seeing nothing but wilderness that it really isn’t all that strange that he mistook a busy countryside to be just a painting.

But there was something else, something more, that made the boy think that what he saw wasn’t real - it was that nothing seemed to have its proper color. The lookout tower where he stood rose up on top of a mountain, the mountain was on an island, and the island was near the eastern shore of a big lake. But this lake wasn’t gray the way lakes usually are, rather, most of the surface was pink as the sky at dawn, and in the deep bays it glittered nearly black. And the shores around the lake weren’t green, instead they were light yellow because they were covered with the stubble left on the grainfields and the yellowing autumn woods. Around all that yellow there was a wide band of black coniferous forest. Maybe it was because the leafy trees had yellowed, but the boy thought a spruce wood had never looked so dark as it did that morning. Beyond the dark spruce woods in the east he could see distant blue hills, but to the west, on the edge of sight, ran a long shimmering line of bare jagged mountains in many shapes. They wore such a mild and shining color that he couldn’t call it red nor white nor blue. There just wasn’t any name for it.

But the boy turned his eyes away from the mountains and the dark woods to get a better look at the land close by. In the yellow belt around the lake he could make out the one red village and white church after the other, and due east, on the far side of the narrow water that separated the island from the mainland, he saw a city. It spread out upon the lakeshore, a mountain stood behind and protected it, and all around it was surrounded there was a rich and populous tract. “This city had the good sense to find itself a nice location,” thought the boy, “I wonder what it’s called.”

He jumped and looked around; he had been so busy looking at the countryside that he didn’t notice that visitors had come to the tower.

They were running up the stairs fast, the boy barely had time enough to spot a hiding place and get himself there before the newcomers had climbed out onto the platform.

They were young people who were out on a hike, talking about how they had just wandered through all of Jämtland. They were happy that they had come to Östersund just the night before so that they could see the view from Östberget upon Frösön that clear autumn morning. Here they could see over sixty miles in every direction, so that they could enjoy one last look over their beloved Jämtland before they had to leave again. They pointed out the many churches around the lake to each other: “Down there we have Sunne,” they said, “and there’s Marby, and over there is Hallen. The one you see due north is Rödö’s church, and that one down there is Frösö’s church.”

Then they started talking about the mountains. The nearest was Oviksfjäll, they all agreed about that. But then they started to wonder which was Klövsjöfjäll, and which peak was Anarisfjäll, and where was Västerfjäll and Almosaberg and Åreskutan?

While they were discussing this, a girl took out a map, spread it over her knees and began to study. Suddenly she looked up. “When I see Jämtland on a map like this,” she said, “I think that it looks just like a mountain, tall and proud. I’m always expecting to hear a story about how once upon a time it stood up and pointed right at the sky.”

“Now that would be one heck of a mountain!” said one of the others and laughed.

“Yeah, and that’s probably why it got knocked down. But take a look yourself, don’t you think it looks like a mountain with a broad base and pointy top?”

“It’s fitting that such a mountainous place would itself have the shape of a mountain,” said one of the other tourists. “But while I’ve heard other stories about Jämtland, I’ve never…”

“-you’ve heard stories about Jämtland?” cried one of the girls, cutting him off, “then you must tell me them, you must! There could never be a better place for it than right here, where you can see all of Jämtland.”

All of the others voiced their agreement, and their young companion was not at all hard to persuade. He started talking right away.

The Saga of Jämtland

In the days when giants still lived in Jämtland, there once was a mountain-giant who stood in the yard in front of his home and groomed his horses. All of the sudden he noticed that the horses began to tremble with fear. “What is it with you, my horses?” he said and looked around to find out what it could be that had frightened the animals. He could see neither bears nor wolves around. The only thing he noticed was a wanderer who, though not nearly so big and tall as himself, seemed to nonetheless be fairly tall and strong, and he was hiking up the path that led to the mountain cabin where the giant lived.

As soon as he caught sight of the wander, the mountain-giant began to tremble from head to toe just like his horses. He dropped everything and ran into the stugan to his giant wife, who sat and spun oakum on a distaff.

“What is it?” she said. “You’re as pale as a snowy mountaintop!”

“And why shouldn’t I be? There’s a wanderer on the way, who’s as surely Thor as you are my wife.”

“Ah. Not exactly a welcome guest. Can’t you bewilder his sight so that he mistakes our whole farm for a mountain and goes on his way?”

“It’s too late for that kind of magic,” answered the giant, “I hear him opening the gate and walking into the courtyard.”

“Then I think you had better leave, and let me receive our guest,” said the giantess.

The giant thought that was a pretty darn good idea. He went and hid in the closet, while his wife sat on the bench in the main room, calmly spinning her thread, as if she wasn’t expecting any trouble at all.

Now you should know that back then Jämtland looked completely different than it does today. The entire countryside was one big flat rocky plateau, that lay naked and bare so that woods couldn’t grow anywhere upon it. There was no lake, no river, and no land with earth for a plough to till. Not even the mountains that now lay spread across the country were there then, instead they were all lined up, far to the west. Human beings couldn’t live anywhere in that whole wide tract, but the giants thrived there so much the better. It fact, it was because of the will and labor of the giants themselves that the land lay so desolate and inhospitable, and so it was with good reason that the mountain giant felt anxious when he saw Thor approach his home. He knew that the gods did not love those who spread cold, darkness, and desolation, and who prevented the earth from becoming rich, fruitful, and adorned with the dwellings of men.

The giant woman didn’t have to wait long before she heard determined footfalls in the courtyard, and the same wanderer that her husband had seen on the road flung open the door and walked into the home. The stranger didn’t stop by the door, like travellers are supposed to, but started walking straight toward the woman who sat at the further end of the room by the wall. But when he felt that he had been walking a good while, he noticed he was still quite near the door, and there was still a long way to go to reach the fireplace in the middle of the rum. He lengthened his stride, but after he had continued a while more it seemed to him that both the fireplace and the giantess were farther away than when he first entered the room. The home didn’t seem all that big at first glance. He didn’t really grasp just how big it was until he finally reached the fireplace, and by then he was so tired that he needed to lean against his staff and rest. When the giantess saw that he stopped, she put down her distaff, stood up from her bench, and with a few steps strode up to him.

“We giants appreciate big homes,” she said, “and my husband often complains that it’s too cramped in here. But I understand that it can be a lot of work to walk through a giant’s home for someone who can’t take longer steps than you. But tell me now, who are you, and what do you want with the giants?”

It looked like the wander had intended to give a heated reply, but surely he didn’t want to start a quarrel with a woman, so instead he answered calmly “My name is Handfast, and I am a warrior of many adventures. Now I have sat at home the whole year, and I began to think that maybe there was never going to be anything more for me to do when I heard people say that you giants tend the land up here so poorly that nobody can dwell here other than yourselves. So now I’ve come to discuss the matter with your husband and see if he can’t get this place in order.”

“My husband is out hunting,” said the giantess, “and he will have to answer you himself when he comes home. But I must say that someone who dares speak that way to a mountain giant should be a larger man than you. It would surely be best for your honor if you immediately went on your way without meeting the giant.”

“I think I shall wait for him, since I’ve already come all this way,” said he who called himself Handfast.

“I’ve given you the best advice I could,” said the giantess, “but then, you do as you please. Sit down on the bench, and I’ll go fetch you a welcome-drink!”