The Last Letter Home

by Vilhelm Moberg

  Now the evenings were bright in their house and they could stay up longer at their chores. Each night they stole a little time from the dark.

  But the new invention could cause a fire and must be used with utmost care. The fluid could catch fire, the oil chamber might explode. They had read in the papers how people had started house fires when lighting their lamps. Because of this, Karl Oskar at first would let no one but himself handle the lamp or carry it while it burned. But after a time he allowed his two oldest children to attend to it. Johan and Marta were almost of age now, and neither of them was careless. By and by Harald was given the same permission; he was as trustworthy as his older brother and sister. But Frank and Ulrika, the two youngest, were strongly forbidden to touch, move, or try to light the new lamp.

  Klas Albert came from time to time to check on the lamp and see that it was taken care of. But no accident happened, and the new invention started no fire in their house. The flame from the oil-soaked wick succeeded the daylight and shone cheerfully through the evenings.

  Lamp evenings were something new in the settler families.

  It was the great moment of the day when Father lit the lamp. Before, the hearth had been the heart and gathering point of the family, now the kerosene lamp became the family’s central point around which they gathered. It spread a warm, cozy light, at which the father read the paper, the children their lessons, the boys whittled with their knives, the girls knitted or sewed. In this light they could see to thread the smallest needle, and read the finest print. It saved their eyes and prolonged their evenings.

  With the new light—which came to their home in the fall of 1868—the settlers could spend more time at useful occupations.

  —2—

  Ditto Anno 1868 harvested 234 Bussels Corn, 196 Bussels Wheat and 162 Bussels Potatos, All Heaped Measure.

  These were the largest harvest figures Karl Oskar Nilsson had written down in his old almanac. But while he in America harvested his biggest crops, his old home parish in Sweden suffered the greatest crop failure in over a hundred years.

  In Hemlandet—whose printing office now had been moved to Chicago—he read about the ravaging famine in the old country: The summer had been the driest in memory throughout Småland. No rain had fallen from the moment the seeds were planted until the crops were cut, and there had been no comforting night dew. Barley grew to only five inches and could not be mowed with a scythe but had to be pulled up by the roots. Fields and meadows lay burned black, and brooks and springs had gone dry. People stole grain from each other by cutting the heads from the sheaves out in the fields. And after the summer’s severe crop failure, all things edible for man and beast were gathered against the winter: Hazel tops, heather seed, pine needles, white moss were ground together and mixed with the flour for baking. Porridge was cooked from barley chaff, lingon twigs, heather tops, salt, and water; also thistles, dandelion roots, and the leaves from beech and linden trees. Heather was cut for animal fodder and instead of oats, shavings and sawdust were mixed for the cows. The very poorest walked in the fields and picked up the bones that had been spread with the dung the year before; these they crushed and ground and mixed with the flour for bread.

  This winter, hunger would be a guest at practically every home in Småland. Each week the bells tolled for people who had starved to death or died from diseases contracted because of hunger.

  In issue after issue Hemlandet told of the suffering and misery in Småland. Karl Oskar understood how things were at home without difficulty. How many times hadn’t he himself left the table hungry! Now remembrance came to him of the great famine in the summer and winter of ’48—twenty years ago. Kristina had ground acorns and put them into the bread—his throat had been sore and swollen from the rough food and he had suffered with constipation the whole winter. Begging children had come in droves asking if they could pick up herring heads and other refuse from the scrap pile outside. That was the winter when little Anna had eaten herself to death on barley porridge. After that happened Kristina had changed her mind and promised to go with him to North America.

  But this time, it appeared, the homeland had been stricken by a still more severe famine. According to the paper, the suffering grew as the winter progressed. The farmers on the smaller homesteads became paupers. The sheriff in Linneryd had within two months foreclosed three hundred farms in his district. Many children died at birth because the famished mothers had no milk to give.

  The parishes were listed in famine groups, from one to four, according to their need. Karl Oskar read that Ljuder was listed in group two.

  Hunger was ravishing his home parish while he sat here with his bins filled to the ceiling. He read about the barley on the Småland fields, too short to be cut, while his crops had grown taller than ever. In the old country they ate bread from white moss, while in his house they ate rich wheat bread with plenty of butter, as much as they wanted. In their old country was famine, in their new overabundance.

  Karl Oskar thought again and again of this great difference, and an idea ripened in him.

  One winter evening as he was reading Hemlandet by the light of the kerosene lamp, a knock was heard on the door. A visitor had come; Klas Albert greeted them heartily, in high spirits. The Center City shopkeeper had been a frequent guest in this house of late although there was no need for him to look after the lamp any more.

  Karl Oskar, looking up from the paper, said, “It’s bad at home, Klas Albert. They’re starving to death this winter.”

  “I’ve read it too,” said Klas Albert. “Ljuder is now in the second famine group.”

  “I can’t help thinking about it . . .”

  “I didn’t think you cared for the old country?”

  “Not a shit for the useless dogs at the top. But I feel sorry for the poor, good people.”

  Klas Albert thought they probably had enough food for everyone in the old country, but the Swedes had not yet learned that food supplies could be transported from one end of the country to the other if need be.

  “The government won’t be bothered to do anything, of course,” said Karl Oskar.

  What were they doing in Sweden to alleviate hunger? He had seen a piece in Hemlandet and he read it to Klas Albert:

  “The King, the Queen, and the Princess Lovisa have given the sufferers in Småland 1,000 riksdaler: on King Carl’s name day a ball was given at Växjö to help the suffering in the Province, where masked persons representing diverse characters collected money. This brought in 586 riksdaler. Another 140 daler was collected at the Opera Cafe . . .”

  Karl Oskar counted in his head: altogether 1,726 riksdaler, almost 500 dollars, really not bad.

  Klas Albert laughed. Wasn’t it lucky for the hungry people in Småland that the King’s name day happened to fall in the middle of the winter, when the famine was at its worst? A royal house was indeed of great help to the people in years of hunger; the bigger the royal family, the more royal name days, the more bread for the starving subjects.

  This king was rumored to have sense enough to admit that he was human; no Swedish king before had admitted as much. About King Carl XV it had been written that no false pride prevented him from bending his head and entering the humblest cottage.

  “I’ve thought about something,” said Karl Oskar. “I would like to send a load of my wheat to the hungry in Ljuder.”

  “What a Christian deed!” exclaimed Klas Albert. “Good, white American bread for the hungry!”

  “But how can I do it?”

  “I’ll take care of everything! And I’ll pay the freight!”

  The businessman from Center City thought and planned quickly. He had connections with a freight office in Stillwater and he was certain they would send the wheat to Sweden. It was sure to get there, especially if they addressed it to the officials in Växjö, with instructions that it was for the sufferers in Ljuder parish.

  But Karl Oskar was suspicious about officials in Sweden.

  “Suppose t
hey eat the wheat themselves?”

  “Oh no! They wouldn’t dare! Don’t worry, Karl Oskar! You deliver the wheat to me and I’ll handle the rest!”

  Said and done.

  Karl Oskar had thought Klas Albert just happened to drop in this evening, without any special errand. Now it came out that he did indeed have a reason. Tonight all of them were told why the storekeeper of Center City had spent so much time on the road to their house this winter. One of the children in the house knew in advance: This evening Mr. C. A. Persson told Karl Oskar that his oldest daughter, Marta, had promised to become Mrs. Persson. They would be married a week from Saturday.

  Klas Albert and Marta had got to know each other when he came to look after the lamp, and he had found many excuses to service that lamp. His real errand had been another all the time: It was for Marta’s sake he had come evening after evening.

  Klas Albert had come to their house to take away one of the children. The years had fled and Karl Oskar had not realized he had a marriageable daughter in the house.

  —3—

  Karl Oskar Nilsson sorted twenty bushels of wheat, of the best he had, to be sent to Sweden. He packed it in strong jute sacks that ought to hold during the long journey to Småland. It made a good load and he drove it with his team to Mr. Persson’s store in Center City. This Minnesota wheat would make fine white bread for the hungry people at home.

  Why did he give this grain to Sweden? He was not paying a debt with it, he was under no obligation to his native land. There he had wasted the best years of his youth in labor that had only increased his poverty. In Sweden those who governed had so arranged things that it did not pay to work. And he had no close relatives in need. His parents were dead, and hungry no more. And his sister Lydia had written at Christmas that she and hers had all they needed. Nor did he send the grain because he wanted to feel he was a good and helpful person. He did it because he knew what hunger meant. He had seen one of his children die because of hunger. It was in memory of little Anna that he sent this load of wheat.

  Klas Albert had surprised him by offering to pay the freight. Why was the storekeeper suddenly so generous, he had wondered. Five minutes later he had been given the answer: Mr. Persson was going to marry Marta; the son-in-law-to-be wanted to be in with his father-in-law.

  Karl Oskar Nilsson of Korpamoen would have been greatly honored if the church warden’s son, one of the best catches in Ljuder, should have proposed to his daughter. But among the Chisago people men were valued with other measures than in Sweden. The settlers did not ask who the parents of the intended were, they asked only what he himself was good for. Here it was Klas Albert who ought to feel honored in obtaining the daughter of the first settler at Chisago Lake.

  Marriages took place quickly in America; a man and a woman might decide one day and go to the pastor the next. People got married on the run, as it were, like making a purchase in a shop while the team waited on the road. Only a week before the wedding Karl Oskar learned that Klas Albert and Marta would be married. They had not asked him if he had anything against it. The girl was of age this spring, the father had no say over her any longer. But the father-in-law wasn’t quite satisfied with his son-in-law-to-be. The light-hued storekeeper was capable and industrious, and Marta would be well taken care of as Mrs. Persson. But in her father’s eyes Klas Albert followed an occupation he did not think much of. And during the war he had made clever deals when his duty should have called him to war. To Karl Oskar, such a man was not to be trusted fully.

  Moreover, he still needed his oldest daughter at home. Ulrika was not yet fifteen; it would not be easy without Marta. Yet Karl Oskar could say nothing: He himself had left his father at fourteen, although he had been much needed in Korpamoen. Now it was his turn to be deserted by his children. No one could change this: The young ones, in order to live, deserted the old ones, to let them die. Thus one generation succeeds another.

  But there was something he wanted from Klas Albert in exchange for his daughter.

  In the store in Center City he had several times seen a map of Ljuder parish. The year before Klas Albert emigrated he had been a surveyor’s helper at home, and when he left he was given a map as a parting gift from his boss, as a reminder of his homeland. Every time Karl Oskar had been in the store he had studied the map of Ljuder; it was on good, thick paper that he beheld his home parish in miniature.

  And now that his neighbor in Sweden was to be his son-in-law he said to him, “Klas Albert, if you take my girl from me you ought at least to give me your map of Ljuder!”

  Klas Albert thought at first it was a joke, but Karl Oskar insisted he meant it. He wanted the old map in payment for Marta. If this was not worth an even deal he was willing to pay for the map, whatever was asked.

  This was a peculiar exchange. But as his future father-in-law was so anxious, Klas Albert did not wish to refuse; he gave him the Ljuder map. But he could not understand why Karl Oskar was so anxious to have the old map. What could he use it for? Why did he value the old parish chart so highly?

  But Karl Oskar said nothing more on the subject. He folded the map carefully and put it under his arm.

  The boy could not understand why he wanted it, and Karl Oskar did not wish to enlighten him: He would never again see the place where he had been born, but it was some small consolation to have it on a paper, where he could look at it. A paper was better than nothing to the farmer from Korpamoen who must die on another continent.

  —4—

  And one Saturday in March Karl Oskar’s Marta became Mrs. C. A. Persson. The first child had flown from the nest.

  Karl Oskar felt rather disappointed that his oldest daughter married in such a hurry: Klas Albert and Marta ought to have been engaged for some time, as they would have been in Sweden. If they had delayed the marriage till summer he could have given them a real wedding. He could afford a big party for once. Now he confined himself to inviting a few old neighbors and friends—Jonas Petter and Swedish Anna, Algot and Manda Svensson, Mr. Thorn, the Scottish sheriff, and a few friends he had made while serving on the jury in Center City. One uninvited guest came, Samuel Nöjd. He brought a collar and muff of silver fox for the bride: with these he wanted to indemnify the brides father for the sheep his dogs had killed many years ago. The old trapper had broken a leg last fall and had been in bed all winter, and during this time he had grown kinder and more mellow. Karl Oskar accepted the gift as payment for the sheep.

  Already early in the evening the newly married couple had left for their home in Center City, and Karl Oskar was left behind in the bridal house with his guests. He had brought home a couple of gallons of whiskey and a keg of beer, and the preparation of the food was in the charge of Swedish Anna, assisted by another Swedish woman from Taylors Falls. The dishes were many and well prepared and there was room for all the guests around the table in the big room.

  Karl Oskar Nilsson himself sat at the upper end of the table with Jonas Petter, his oldest friend, to the right of him. Soon the men were perspiring and red-faced from whiskey. The clear, friendly light of the kerosene lamp spread its glow over full glasses and abundant dishes and over the faces of sated and happy guests.

  Samuel Nöjd sat blinking against the lamp, fingering its oil chamber in curiosity. Jonas Petter warned him that the lamp might explode, he mustn’t set the house and the wedding guests on fire.

  “That whiskey you’re drinking is more liable to catch fire than the oil in the lamp,” said the old trapper.

  Everyone laughed at this but Nöjd went on: He knew what he was talking about, for he had once had a horrible experience with a German hunter friend, Andreas Notte. The German had drunk about a gallon of Kentucky straight a day for many years. One evening Notte, with many other hunters, was sitting around the campfire eating elk meat and beans and after supper he wanted to smoke a cigar. He put it in his mouth and struck a match. Then it happened: The German caught fire.

  The burning match started a fire inside his mo
uth and flames shot over his face and ignited his hair. He tried to choke the flames with his hands, but they burned too. Notte let out some horrible roars and his fellow-hunters rushed to a nearby brook for water and poured it over him, bucket after bucket. But his innards were burning by then and they couldn’t put out the fire inside his body. When at last they quenched the flames, Andreas Notte was dead. Of their good friend there remained only a smoking cadaver which spread an obnoxious stink, like burning dung. Nothing was left of his face. His lips were burnt away and his mouth was only a gaping hole with the tongue left like a well-baked piece of rusk.

  The German’s body had been saturated with whiskey, his breath was flammable and when he lit the match it caught fire. There had been a long piece about him in the paper under the heading: Drunkard burned to death through internal combustion.

  Accidents of this kind often happened in his homeland, said the Scot, Mr. Thorn. And this reminded him of something he himself had been involved in many years ago and which had scared many whiskey drinkers. A friend of his, Charlie Burns, also a Scot, had been bitten by a rattler which struck at him and bit him in the right arm. They were hunting beaver in the fall along the Minnesota River and Charlie was climbing over a log and didn’t see the critter. The arm swelled up until it was as big as his thigh. Now a person bitten by a rattler was supposed to drink as much cognac or whiskey as he could, at least half a gallon at once. But they had no whiskey or cognac, and Charlie swore and hollered in pain. Then Mr. Thorn made a salve of tobacco, gunpowder, and beaver fat which he rubbed into the swollen limb. But nothing sucks out the rattler poison better than the earth itself, and he dug a hole in the ground for his friend and rolled him into it. For three days Charlie lay with his swollen arm in the ditch. The first day he was delirious, the second day he prayed, the third day the swelling went down and he was able to swear again.