The Settlers (57 page)

But Karl Oskar grew neither poorer nor richer during 1857. What did it concern him that the banks tumbled? He didn’t have a penny in them. His claim was his possession, and the fields lay where they had always been. For months on end they didn’t have a coin in the house, but they had a roof over their heads, heat from the stove, bread, milk, butter, eggs, pork to eat. What did it concern them that money had disappeared? They had a home and food.

Karl Oskar had come as a squatter to his claim, one of the wooden-shoe people from Sweden. Other settlers in the Territory, with more elegant shoes, had often looked down on and pitied the poor squatter who must make his own shoes from the wood of the forest. But the man in the wooden shoes sat safe and comfortable on his claim after seven years, while thousands of other settlers became destitute in the great depression of 1857.

Each fall since Karl Oskar had got his own team, he had broken at least five new acres of the vast meadow below his house. By now he could look out on thirty acres. Next spring he would seed four times as much land as he had owned in Korpamoen, and this land was three times as fertile as his old farm. In favorable years he now harvested larger crops than any farmer in Ljuder parish.

He liked to sit at the window and look out at his fields; this was the land he had changed. When he came the whole meadow had been covered with weeds and wild grass. Now it produced rye, wheat, oats, corn, potatoes, turnips. The wild grass had fed elk, deer, and rabbits; now the field yielded so much there was enough for them as well as for other people. And it was
his
hands that had held the plow handles when this fertile earth was wrested from the wilderness. The cultivation was his work and no one else’s, it was the labor of his own hands.

If he should call his clearing his own created work, Kristina would undoubtedly say that he boasted and call him arrogant. A creator, to her, was only one who could make something out of nothing, and only one could do that, the Omnipotent himself: he had created the fertile field at Lake Ki-Chi-Saga on the third day of the creation, when he bade all water gather into one place under the heavens so that dry land appeared. Yet he, Karl Oskar Nilsson, sought his sustenance from the earth and had changed it so that it would give bread to people even after him. Couldn’t he at least consider himself a handyman to the creator?

Kristina was intimate with the Almighty and always trusted him. But Karl Oskar could not be like her in this trusting. Ever since the years of adversity at home in Korpamoen he had been suspicious of God’s help. Whatever a person did, he couldn’t be absolutely sure of God’s aid in his enterprise. He himself had been forced to trust himself and his own strength. Our Lord let the crops grow, but how many grains would he have harvested if he hadn’t cleared the land, plowed and sown? Who would have tilled the field for him if he hadn’t done it himself for himself? Could it be sinful arrogance in him to look out over his fields and feel: this is the creation of my own hands!

And he would continue his work; he would clear wider fields, raise more cattle, cut down more trees in the forest, and build bigger houses. He would from day to day improve his claim until he was no longer able to do so. Soon enough his arms would grow old and tired.

To struggle on, each day in turn, to feel and use the strength he had—that was a settler’s lot and purpose in life.

XXVIII

THE LETTER FROM SWEDEN

Åkerby at Ljuder parish, August 16

Anno 1857

Beloved Brother Karl Oskar Nilsson:

The Lord’s Peace and Blessing upon you.

I am about to write you a message of Sorrow. Tears of bereavement are falling as I pen these lines. Our Father, Nils Jakobsson, parted this life the 4th inst. and He was brought to the earth in the Parish Churchyard the 11th inst. His life’s span amounted to Sixty-two years and a few months. He suffered a long deathbed but did not Complain. Our new pastor gave him the Sacrament three days before he died, he managed to put himself in order for the pastor and combed his Hair himself.

It was Our Father’s wish to pass on and have Peace. He had some fever attacks and dizziness toward the last and his mind wandered. The last Night he mentioned you and Robert in North America, he heard your wagon drive out of the yard on your journey to America and he rose from his pillow and said Now they are leaving. He said few words in life after that.

We must all one day pale in Death. Our strength will not suffice against Him. But there is much to do when He is a guest in the house. We are settling the estate and I ask you to send me your power of Attorney, then we need not have an auction after our Father. Send also an attest that our Brother Robert is dead and then we won’t need a Power of Attorney from Him.

We are in good health in our family except that I have a boil on a finger of my right hand. I have a kind husband, we have now 2 sons and 1 daughter. I have forgotten how many children you have, Write and tell us. I guess you’ve forgotten the people hereabouts—Dean Brusander is dead, he had a stroke in the Sacristy Whitsuntide morning, he asked about you a few years ago when he Baptized our oldest boy.

Mother greets you as she can’t write to you herself. Our Mother is getting old and worn-out—when our strength is gone all joy is over.

It is not easy to write down my thoughts on paper, I am poor in composition, excuse my poor spelling. Don’t forget us in your new Homeland. God Bless you, Brother, and hope your success continues.

Written down by your devoted Sister

Lydia Karlsson

XXIX

THE LETTER TO SWEDEN

New Duvemåla at Taylors Falls Post ofis

North America, October 3 Anno 1857

Beloved Sister Lydia Karlsson,

Your letter received, I could not help but shed a few tears as I held it in my hand and read that our Father had passed through the Valley of Death. I mourn him here, far from His bier.

I had hoped to see Him once More, I had a good Father but was not always an obedient Son at Home. I feel though that Father forgave me my emigration, I did the best for my Own, our Father couldn’t think anything else.

Now my Father is in that Land where I no longer can reach Him. Peace over his Grave and Remains. Yes, Death mowes his sharp scythe and makes no exception among us. When He comes we must go with him, whether we want to or not. I am however, glad that Father had one of his children with him as a comfort on his Deathbed.

My kind parents looked well after me when I grew up but out here in my new land I have been of little Help or comfort to them.

I enclose a paper which assures you that you my beloved Sister Lydia Karlsson shall have my inheritance after my demised Father Nils Jakobsson. You shall have my share for looking after Our Mother as long as She is in Time. I believe it cannot be a large sum of money.

We have lately had some trouble with money matters in America but it is getting better. Many people have moved in from Sweden this last Summer and they are still coming daily. Even from Ljuder Parish people have come to this Valley. I see that the Dean is Gone, how did he like it that his parishioners followed me to North America? But he couldn’t blame me, I like the land here but have never boasted in order to lure people here from Sweden. I urge no man to emigrate; each one must do so at his own risk.

The number of our children is 6 up to date, if I haven’t written this before. Our youngest is a strapping son, we call him Frank, it is an American name. He runs and plays on the floor, He was one year last February, the little American let go his hold and walked by himself 14 Days before he was a full year. Our Children have grown fast in their new Homeland it’s a Joy for us to see.

I enclose my dear Greeting to our Mother. I know you take good care of her. You are my beloved Sister and we must write each other more often. Before each Day reaches its end I have some thought here in America for my old Home,

Your Devoted Brother

Karl Oskar Nilsson

XXX

KARL OSKAR’S FOLLOWERS

—1—

They had seeded and planted and harvested and threshed this year as all other years, but the weather had been unfavorable and contrary at all seasons. In the fall came a flood; it began as a sudden shower, but the shower lasted a week, two weeks. The rain did not fall in drops, it streamed down in sheets. Days on end it hung outside the window like a striped curtain. No settler had ever seen such a persistent rain in Minnesota. The autumn sowing was delayed because of the wet weather, and the rye did not begin to sprout until the winter frost had gone into the ground.

On one of these long days, when the rain prevented all outside work, the Lutheran pastor came to call. A memorable rainy night four years earlier Pastor Erland Törner had come to the settlement at Duvemåla for the first time. This rainy day he came on a last visit—he had come to say goodbye.

There had long been rumors that he wanted to leave the Swedish congregation in the St. Croix Valley, and now they were confirmed by his own words: he had accepted the call as pastor to the new church in Rockford, a new town down in Illinois, where there was a sizable Swedish colony. He was going to get married and this had influenced his decision to leave. He was engaged to a Swedish girl in Rockford and she wanted to remain in her hometown after her marriage.

Before the pastor arrived, Kristina had felt her nose itch and she had sneezed three times in succession, a sure sign that important callers would arrive. But the minister’s visit today was of little joy to her, as he had come to say farewell to them.

He was no longer the pale, spindly young man who had warmed himself before the fire in their old log house, dressed like a scarecrow in Karl Oskar’s roomy clothes. Since then he had put on weight and his body was firmer; his face was weatherbeaten and his looks rugged. The hard life of traveling about in the wilderness had left its mark on him so that now the young pastor could be taken for a settler. And his life was not unlike that of his fellow countrymen.

During the first two years they had gathered for services in the schoolhouse; only last year had the new church been ready for use. Since then Kristina had failed to attend services only four or five times: if a child lay sick or if she herself lay in childbed. Karl Oskar and she had also attended the Sacrament each time the Holy Supper was given. Pastor Törner’s sermons had been a comfort to her soul; they had quieted her anxiety and helped her overcome her worries about eternal damnation. This minister did not enter the pulpit like a stern judge—he was a mild gospel preacher, on equal footing with the sinners. He did not wish to judge anyone, he only wanted to comfort all. He was the only minister she could think of in their pulpit; he was
The Minister.

And now he was to move away from them. She couldn’t pray God to leave him for her sake. She mustn’t be ungrateful, but rather, grateful. She only wished she could give him something in return for all the comfort he had brought her.

Yesterday Karl Oskar had shot a wild goose with black neck and brown wings; she had plucked the white-breasted bird, drawn it, and prepared it for the pot. The goose was as fat as a grouse and had so much flesh there would be sufficient for all of them. She had planned to save the delicate bird for their Sunday dinner but it was as if God had designed that she must roast the goose today and invite Pastor Törner, since it would be her last opportunity.

She set the table in the large room, and invited her guest to sit down on the new sofa they had recently bought. Karl Oskar and she sat on either side of him. The children were not allowed to sit at table today, they would eat afterward in the kitchen.

“My first night in the St. Croix Valley I slept in this home,” said Pastor Törner. “In this home I preached my first sermon in this valley, and here I gave the Lord’s Holy Supper for the first time. Memories make your home dear to me, my friends!”

He spoke his native tongue better than any other Swede she had met in America, thought Kristina. It was balm just to listen to his voice. Most of the immigrants had begun to mix up the two languages dreadfully so that she could hardly understand them. Even Karl Oskar’s language had changed; she noticed the mixture sooner than others because she herself never used English.

The children peeked in through the kitchen door while Karl Oskar and Kristina sat eating with the minister. To the three oldest he had been their teacher and they had great respect for him; they were unusually silent and well behaved as long as this caller was in the house.

In the beginning Pastor Törner had acted as teacher for the Swedish children as well as minister for the congregation, but after great effort the parish had last year managed to get a teacher from Sweden, a Mr. Johnson—he was quite particular that they call him Mister. He had brought good recommendations from previous positions in the new country, but childless parents had not been anxious to share the burden of the salary for the new teacher—which would indeed have been unjust—and thus the parents of the schoolchildren alone paid him. The teacher was remunerated according to the number of children he taught, receiving one dollar a month for each child. A room had been prepared for him in the school building and he was also given free firewood. The parish contributed ten bushels of rye flour a year, and thus he had his bread free.

Besides instruction in the Christian Lutheran religion, Swedish, and English, the settlers’ children were taught writing, arithmetic, history, and geography, and Mr. Johnson had proved to be a competent teacher; he had graduated from high institutions in Sweden. But after he had been here for some time it was discovered that he drank. According to the children he sometimes told funny stories to them during school hours instead of going on with the lesson. Once he had danced in the school, jumped about, and sung for the children, and it had definitely not been psalms he had sung, either. He had apparently been drunk. Some parents had become greatly disturbed and insisted the parish must get rid of Mr. Johnson. Other parents would rather have a drunkard than no teacher at all. At Karl Oskar’s suggestion the parish council had deferred the question. Now he wished to ask Pastor Törner’s opinion.