Nordic Hero Tales From the Kalevala

by James Baldwin

  Suddenly, as he rounded a turn in the road, he came in full view of a grove of poplar trees in the middle of a field. He drove forward slowly, cautiously. He approached the field and paused quite near to the grove, listening, smiling as though he expected something. Then suddenly, from among the poplars, came well-remembered sounds—the sound of a hammer, cling-clanging upon an anvil, and the melodious tones of a manly voice singing in unison therewith. The Minstrel had heard that song a thousand times before; nevertheless, it seemed strangely new to him, and he leaned forward to listen to the words:

  “Cling, cling, clinkety cling!

  With Iron I labor, of Iron I sing;

  I heat it, I beat it, I make it ring, ring,

  I scold it, I mould it—my hammer I swing—

  Cling, cling, clinkety cling!

  “Ding, ding, dinkety ding!

  O honeybee, hasten, come hither and bring

  Your sweets from the wildwood, the flowers of spring,

  Help make of this Iron some beautiful thing—

  Ding, ding, dinkety ding!

  “Cling, cling, clinkety cling!

  Beware of the hornet, beware of his sting,

  Beware of the evils he surely will bring;

  In all things be gentle, O Iron, my king—

  Cling, cling, clinkety cling!”

  The Minstrel from his sledge could see the smithy from which the music came—a long, low building of logs in the very centre of the grove. It was dark and dingy and begrimed with smoke, but through the open door the fire of the forge glowed brightly, lighting up the whole interior and revealing even the smallest object; and there, before his anvil, stood the Smith, swinging his hammer and twirling his tongs and thinking only of his pleasant work.

  Wainamoinen leaped from his sledge and ran forward; he stood in the doorway and called loudly to his busy friend:

  “Hail, ho, Ilmarinen! Hail, dearest brother!”

  The astonished Smith dropped his tongs; he threw his hammer down; he ran to greet his unexpected visitor.

  “O Wainamoinen!” he cried. “Wainamoinen, prince of minstrels, wisest of men, best of friends—welcome, welcome! How glad I am to see you!”

  “And how sweet it is to grasp your hand again,” said the Minstrel warmly. “Oh, what joy to see home and comrades and country once again!”

  Ilmarinen led the Minstrel into the smithy; he made him sit down on the edge of his workbench; and all the time he kept his arm around his neck in loving, brotherly embrace. Each gazed into the other’s eyes, and for a time not another word was spoken—the hearts of both were so full of joy.

  At length the Smith made out to stammer, “Tell me, my brother, where have you been these many months?”

  “Far from home, Ilmarinen—yes, very far,” answered the Minstrel. “I have been tossed on the sea; I have been in many countries; I have seen the whole vast world.”

  “Tell me about it,” said the Smith. “You were gone so long that we gave you up as lost. Where have you been these many weeks, these long, long months? Tell me all about it.”

  Then, in a few words wisely spoken, the Minstrel told of his shipwreck, and how for eight days—yes, for nine long, wearisome days—he had been carried hither and thither on the crests of the waves.

  “I see! I understand!” said the impatient Smith. “Hard, indeed, was your lot, and fraught with danger. Tell me quickly, how did you escape from the seething waters? To what place did the mad waves carry you? On what savage shore were you cast?”

  “Have patience, brother, and I will tell you all,” answered the Minstrel. “Never did I think that Fate would carry me to the cold and misty shores of Pohyola, the Frozen Land; but it happened even so. There, for three months—yes, for four long and dismal months—I was forced to tarry. I learned wisdom from the Mistress of that land; and indeed it was she who snatched me from the jaws of the sea and nursed me to health and strength. Never saw I a wiser woman, although she is not strikingly fair. I sat by her fireside; I listened to her words; I ate at her table. On her snowshoes I skimmed hither and thither over her cheerless land. In her boat I went fishing in the quiet inlets of the shore. But no matter where I went, no matter what I did, my heart was always sick for my home land; I sighed for the dear friends I had left behind me.”

  “O great Wainamoinen!” cried the Smith, embracing him again. “O cunning magician, sweetest of singers! Tell me now about your escape from that dismal land. Tell me about your journey homeward. I am anxious to hear.”

  “There is not much to say,” answered the Minstrel. “The journey homeward was easy—it was delightful. As for my escape—well, I escaped by promising to send you to the Frozen Land, my dear brother.”

  “What do you say?” cried the Smith in wonder. “Send me to the Frozen Land! Never will I go—no, not even to please my best friend.”

  “Indeed, you must go,” said the Minstrel curtly and decisively. “I have promised, and you know the penalty of a broken promise.”

  “Nay, nay, great Wainamoinen!” and dismay was pictured in the face of the Smith. “Is this your love for me, that you cause me to perish in order to save yourself?”

  “Calm yourself, young brother,” said the Minstrel soothingly. “You shall not perish. I have arranged it all. You are to do some skilful blacksmithing—use a little of your wondrous magic—and your reward shall be the loveliest wife in the world. The Mistress of Pohyola has promised.”

  The Smith spoke quickly, angrily: “You may make bargains for yourself, not for me. I want no wife. My own mother is queen of my house, and none other shall enter my door. Our dear village of Wainola is my home; it is the place of all places; I will never leave it.”

  “But if you could know how lovely she is—this Maid of Beauty—you would do as I desire, you would go to Pohyola,” said the Minstrel with increasing earnestness.

  “Never! never!” shouted the Smith, trembling with anger.

  “Yes, I am sure you would go,” said the cunning Minstrel. “There is no other maiden like unto this daughter of the Frozen Land. She is wise, industrious, brave. Her face is fairer than the moonlight on a midsummer eve; her eyes are like two suns; her lips are like twin berries, red and luscious; her voice is sweeter than the song of the meadow lark. All the young men in the countries of the North have sought to win her.”

  “And win her they may!” shouted the Smith. “Now say no more about her; change the subject; tell me a new story. I am sick of such twaddle.”

  “Come, come, dear brother!” said the Minstrel gently, as though conceding all. “Let us not quarrel. You are wise, your judgment is good, and I love you. Forgive me if I have offended you. Come and sit by me again, and we will talk of other things.”

  The Smith forgot his anger; he threw his arms about the Minstrel’s neck and burst into tears.

  “There! there!” said his old friend kindly, coaxingly. “Think no more of my words. I was hasty; I was rash. Come now and let us hasten home, for I long to see my own dear fireside—to hear the voices of my kinsmen.”

  “Yes, let us go,” said the Smith joyfully; and he hastened to cover the fire in his forge, to put his tools in their places, to remove his sooty apron.

  “We will ride together in my birchwood sledge,” said the Minstrel. “My reindeer steed will carry us briskly over the hill. But I wish first to drive back to the end of the causeway and show you a wonderful tree that I saw standing there.”

  “I will go with you willingly, gladly,” answered the Smith, “but I know every tree in the forest and the fen, and I call none of them wonderful. Indeed, I passed by the end of the causeway yesterday, and I saw only whispering pines and dwarf oaks and a few stunted poplars.”

  “Well, but the tree which I saw there is the most wonderful sight in the world,” said Wainamoinen. “Its topmost branches brush the sky. It is full of gorgeous flowers. The white moon sits on one of its branches; and the seven stars of the Great Bear play hide-and-seek among its leaves and blossoms. I sa
w it all with my own eyes not an hour ago.”

  The Smith laughed loudly, merrily. “Oh, my wise and truthful brother, tell me a story, two stories tell me! Travellers’ tales are wondrous, pleasing; but only fools believe them.”

  They climbed into the birchwood sledge; they sat down on the furs; they talked of this thing and of that as the reindeer drew them swiftly back towards the fen and the long causeway. The road seemed short to both, and both were surprised when they found themselves in the grove of pine trees beside the green and magic circle.

  “Wonderful! wonderful!” cried the astonished Smith as he gazed upward at the flower-crowned tree of magic. “Forgive me, my best of friends, sweetest of minstrels. You spoke the truth; you always speak the truth. I will believe whatever you say, I will do whatever you bid—only, I will never go to Pohyola.”

  “Well then,” said the cunning Minstrel, “let us make what we can of this wonderful tree; for it may disappear as suddenly as it came. I am old, my legs are stiff, my arms rheumatic. It is long since I climbed a tree. But you—you are young and nimble, strong and supple, and spry as a squirrel when the nuts are ripening. You can climb and never grow tired.”

  “Yes, dear Minstrel, but why should I climb?” asked Ilmarinen.

  “To gather those gorgeous blossoms,” answered Wainamoinen; “to pick the rare fruit which you see; and, most of all, to bring down the white-faced moon and the seven golden stars that are playing among the branches. O Ilmarinen, skilfulest of men, if you are not afraid, climb quickly up and fetch down those matchless treasures.”

  “I am not afraid,” cried Ilmarinen; and he began at once to climb the tree of magic.

  VII. THE TEMPEST

  With painful labor, Ilmarinen climbed from branch to branch. He looked upward and saw the moon with silver face smiling from the topmost boughs. He saw the seven stars of the Bear glittering like gold amid the leaves and blossoms. They seemed almost within his grasp. They beckoned to him, called to him; and he, with right good-will, climbed up, up, towards the moonlight and the starlight.

  “Foolish fellow!” he heard a voice whispering. “Foolish fellow! foolish fellow! foolish fellow!”

  “Who is it that calls me names—me the prince of all smiths?” he said in anger.

  “It is I,” came the answer. “I am the tree which you are climbing—foolish fellow, foolish fellow! The moon which you are after is only a shadow, foolish fellow. The stars are false as jack-o’-lanterns, foolish fellow. Even I, the tree, am a delusion. Save yourself while you may, foolish fellow, foolish fellow!”

  The Smith heard, but he heeded not. The moon was just a little above him; the stars were right at his fingers’ ends; in another moment he would grasp them all. On the ground far below him, the Minstrel was working his spells of magic, Ilmarinen saw him dancing, heard him singing, but understood him not.

  “Come storm wind, come whirlwind,

  Come swiftly, I say now;

  Pick up the wise blacksmith

  And bear him away, now.

  “Seize on him, and into

  Your flying boat lay him;

  Then far to the Frozen North,

  Gently convey him.

  “Blow storm wind, blow whirlwind,

  Let nothing delay you.

  Blow swiftly, blow fiercely,

  Blow, blow, I pray you!”

  Suddenly there was a roaring in the air and in the tree tops, and the sky grew dark and very dark. Then a mighty tempest came hurtling over the land. In a moment the tree of magic melted into nothingness, and the fairy moon and the dancing stars vanished in the murk and gloom. The winds lifted the venturesome Smith in their arms; they laid him softly in their swiftly sailing cloud boat; they hurried him over forests and marsh lands, over mountains and sea, and at the hour of midnight dropped him gently on the frozen shores of Pohyola.

  Wise old Louhi, gray and grim and toothless, was standing in her doorway. She heard the roar of the tempest and the shrieks of the night wind. She saw the inky clouds swiftly sailing from the South Land and the gray wolves of the air racing madly over the sea. Then in the misty darkness she heard footsteps; but the watch dogs lay sleeping in the sledgeway, their ears were closed, they did not bark. She listened, and presently a voice—a strange and manly voice—was heard above the storm wind’s roar; but still the watch dogs slept and gave no alarm.

  The Mistress, grim and fearless, spoke up bravely in the darkness, heeding not the dreadful turmoil. “Who goes there?” she cried. “Who is it that comes on the storm wind’s back, and yet so quietly that he does not rouse nor waken my watch dogs?”

  Then the voice answered from out the turmoil and the gloom, and a young man tall and handsome stepped into view. “I am a wayfarer and a stranger,” he said, “and I am not here through my own choice. Nevertheless, I beg that I may find in this place some shelter till this fearful storm has passed.”

  “You have no need to ask shelter of me,” answered the woman; “for when did the Mistress of Pohyola turn a stranger from her door? When did she refuse to give a wayfarer the warmest place by her fireside?”

  Forthwith she led him into her long, low hall; she gave him a seat by the pleasant fire. She brought food in plenty and set it before him. She did everything that would take away his weariness, everything that would add to his comfort.

  At length, when he had warmed and rested himself and had satisfied his hunger, she ventured to ask him a question. “Have you ever in all your travels met a minstrel, old and steady, whom men call Wainamoinen?”

  “Oh, yes, surely,” answered the Smith. “He is an ancient friend of mine, dear as a brother, precious as a father. He has just returned home from a long visit to this North Country. He tells wonderful stories of the good people of Pohyola—pleasant tales of a pleasant land.”

  “How glad I am,” said the Wise Woman. “Now tell me if in all your travels you have ever met a certain smith, young and wondrously skilful, whom men call Ilmarinen.”

  The stranger leaped to his feet and answered, “Surely, surely, I have often met that famous workman. Indeed, I myself am he; I am Ilmarinen, the Prince of Smiths, the maker of beautiful things, the skilfulest of men.”

  “Then welcome, welcome!” cried Louhi, grim and gray; and she grasped the stranger’s hand. “We have been waiting for you a long time. We expect you to forge the Sampo for us. I know you will do so, for Wainamoinen the Minstrel promised me.”

  “The Sampo! the Sampo! What is the Sampo?” stammered Ilmarinen. “The Minstrel spoke of skilful smithing, but he mentioned not the Sampo. Never have I heard that name, although I have travelled wide.”

  “Oh, you shall hear enough about it, and you will forge it for us, I know,” said the Mistress, grim but joyful. And then she turned and left him—left him standing by the hearth-side and gazing sadly, thoughtfully, into the flames.

  “Now I understand it all,” he softly muttered to himself. “Wainamoinen has betrayed me. He has sent me to this dreary Frozen Land to do a task too great for his skill, too wonderful for his magic. He is old, he is cunning, he has outwitted me; shall I do the thing which he sent me to perform?”

  Meanwhile the gray Mistress of the Frozen Land hurried from the long hall. She paused not till she reached her daughter’s chamber. Briskly she went in, and softly she closed the door behind her.

  “My child, my beautiful child,” she cried, “he has come at last. He is young and tall and handsome. He will forge the Sampo for us; he will put the wonderful mill together; henceforth we shall want for nothing.”

  “Yes, mother,” said the Maid of Beauty.

  “Dress yourself, now, fair daughter. Put on your finest raiment and deck your hair with jewels. Don’t forget the golden chain that goes around your neck; nor the belt with copper buckle; nor your earrings; nor the silken ribbons for your hair; nor the jewelled band that goes upon your forehead. And oh, my dear child, do look pleasant, pretty, comely, and let your face be bright and cheerful.”

  �
��Yes, mother,” said the dutiful daughter.

  VIII. THE RECIPE

  Smith Ilmarinen stood thoughtfully, silently, beside the fire. The low, dark hall was full of shadows; dim figures lurked in the corners and danced among the rafters; the air was grimy with smoke; the flames burned blue and fitfully on the ash-strewn hearth.

  Out-of-doors the storm was raging. The winds whooped and howled in savage combat. They reached their chilly fingers down through the chimney-hole as though they would snatch up the luckless Smith and bear him still farther away into regions untraversed and unknown.

  He stood and listened. He heard the shrieking of the tempest demons; he heard the hail pelting upon the roof and the rain dashing and splashing upon the half-frozen ground; he heard the sea roaring fearfully in the darkness and the mad waves pounding upon the dumb and patient shore.

  “In such a storm as this, any shelter is sweet,” he said; and he stirred the fire logs till the sparks shot upward and filled the hall with the sound of their merry snapping. Then the thought came to him of his own fireside at home—of his mother and sister and the friends whom he loved—and he groaned aloud in anguish.

  “O Wainamoinen, prince of minstrels!” he moaned. “Why have you treated me so unkindly? Why have you betrayed me—me your friend and brother? Never could I have believed that your magic power was so much greater than my own. Never——”

  He paused suddenly, for he heard a rustling which was not the rustling of leaves, a breathing which was not the breathing of the South Wind, a pitty-pat of soft footsteps upon the floor. He turned and looked, and lo! a radiant vision appeared before him in the firelight. It was the Maid of Beauty, the peerless daughter of the grim Mistress of Pohyola. Right winsomely she came forward to greet him, her cheeks blushing red, her eyes sparkling and joyous. The Smith’s heart was beating hard and fast like a sledge-hammer beneath his waistcoat. He trembled and grew pale. Never had he seen, never had he imagined, a maiden so wondrously fair.