Collected Works of Johan Ludvig Runeberg
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If Dufva could be judged quite sane, and on the field be placed.
He let them chatter, stood serene, — then solved the matter so:
“If I may not with others march, then I alone will go!”
To carry gun and knapsack too, at last he gained the right, —
A servant in the times of rest, a soldier in the fight;
To fight, or on the table wait, were both to him as one;
And “coward” he was never called, though oft times “simpleton.”
But Sandels now was in retreat, the Russians pressed him sore,
And he receded step by step along a river’s shore.
Before them, in the army’s path, the stream a foot-bridge spanned,
Where scarce a score of men were placed, — an outpost on the strand.
And since these twenty had been sent but to repair the way,
And now ’twas done, secure from sword or shot at ease they lay;
And from a peasant’s farm they took whate’er they found of fare,
And let Sven Dufva serve it up, for he was also there.
But suddenly there came a change; for down the nearest steep
Came wildly Sandels’ adjutant on foaming steed a-leap:
“Quick, warriors, to the bridge! To arms! For God’s sake, haste!” he cried,
“For there, tis told, the enemy will cross the river’s tide!
“And sir,” he then addressed the man who led us, “Lay your plan,
“Destroy the bridge! But if you fail, then fight to the last man!
Our troops are lost, if once the foe a rear attack has made!
You will be reinforced, be sure, — the General comes to aid!”
He dashed away. But to the bridge our men had scarcely sped,
When high upon the other bank a squad of Russians spread.
They broadened out, then grew compact, took deadly aim, and shot!
And at the very first discharge, eight Finns to earth were brought!
It was not well to dally there; each one had wavering grown:
Another blast! And of our men remained but five alone.
When all obeyed the quick command, “Trail arms! Retreat! Retreat!”
Sven Dufva, dazed, his bayonet lowered, prepared the foe to meet!
But more, — in turning to obey, his course askew he bends,
And far from making a retreat, he on the bridge descends!
There stands he shoulder-broad and strong, and calm, in wonted mood,
Now keen to teach his cleverest drill to any man who would.
Not long was he compelled to wait before he found his chance,
For enemies had filled the bridge, he saw at sudden glance.
And man by man they on him pressed, but every one that came
He dropped successive right and left, with alternating aim!
To strike this mighty giant down, no power the host could wield,
And always was his nearest foe from others’ shot a shield.
The more the foeman’s hopes were tricked, the fiercer war he brought,
Till Sandels coming with his troops beheld how Dufva fought.
“Well done!” he cried, “Hold out, my boy, my hero hard beset!
Let not one devil cross the bridge, hold out one moment yet! —
Him you may call a soldier, boys! Let Finns all fight as brave!
Move swiftly, comrades, to his help! That man our cause doth save!”
Demolished now the enemy soon found their fierce attack;
The Russians quickly turned their course, withdrawing far aback!
When all was still, sprang Sandels down, and straight the river sought,
And asked where was the man who stood upon the bridge and fought.
They pointed to Sven Dufva then. His martial race was run,
And he had battled like a man; the struggle it was done.
He seemed like one who had lain down to rest him after play,
Though not more tranquil than before, yet paler since the fray.
And then did Sandels bend him down, to view the form now prone;
It was no stranger he beheld; it was a face well-known.
But underneath the silent heart the grass was stained with red;
His breast was by a bullet pierced, and he to death had bled.
“That bullet knew what course to take, it must acknowledged be.”
These words the general but spoke; “It knew far more than we.
It let his brow be spared in peace, the weaker, poorer part,
And chose the portion that was best, — his noble, valiant heart.”
What he had said, both near and far, soon all the army knew;
And everywhere was it believed that Sandels’ words were true;
“For surely,” they declared, “the mind of Dufva was but slight;
A scanty brain indeed he had, but then — his heart was right!”
CANTO EIGHTH. VON KONOW AND HIS CORPORAL.
The story of this Canto is regarded as, in all likelihood, an invention of the poet’s, but is believed by some to have been an actual occurrence in the battle of Kauhajoki, August 10, 1808.
Karl Johan von Konow (1773-1855), like many other commanders in this war, had also taken part in the Finnish war of 1788-1790, and in the Pomeranian campaign of 1807, and was captain of the Bjorneborg Regiment in 1808-9. He also distinguished himself at the battle of Lappo. As a warrior, he was valiant; as a man, harsh and rough in manner, but at heart honest and sincere; and was very celebrated for his profanity, with which he was accustomed to garnish his speeches liberally. But he could not tolerate tobacco.
Between Von Konow and Brask daily insults and complete pardons seem to have been far more feasible than in the case of the majority of mortals. Would that we all could relent so quickly, instead of prolonging our rancor to life-long enmity, and learning to hate our heart’s best brother.
These two comrades had probably not religiously cultivated the grace of pardon. On the other hand, they were perhaps not especially pachydermatous. But with them fighting was a business, and its flame must not be suffered to become entirely extinguished, even in hours of peace.
VIII. VON KONOW AND HIS CORPORAL.
“And did my hand not drag you from out the slough,
Because a wound had darkened about your brow?
And have I not both rank and reward conveyed,
And of a private soldier a corporal made?
“Have you in every fight not been satisfied
To stand as comrade, equal, and at my side?
Have I not praised your firmness and speed, I ask?”
Thus Konow, wrathful, greeted his corporal Brask.
“Complaints of you are uttered on every hand;
And every man declares you with pride expand;
You strike a soldier just as he aims his gun,
And chew tobacco quids two instead of one!”
The major’s speech Brask heard with a frowning brow:
“Tis true I nothing was, and am corporal now;
But what I am is product of faithful mood,
Nor was I dragged, Sir Major, from mire, but blood.
“And if I strike sometimes, wherefore such ado?
I do as many others, I do as you.
If you alone were striking, then let me tell,
I’d let the others coddle, and strike as well.
“Two quids I chew together, as all can see, —
I do it for the honor with you to be;
But if to you too weak seems the honor done,
Then will I drop the second, and march with one.”
And Konow drew his eye-brow, as he was wont:
“You are a jewel, boy, — as the devil blunt!
Remain my man and patron as e’er before;
Of use is such a one when the need is sore.”
Soon came the strife. Von Konow brought all his men
Within the woods, and Brask he was with them then.<
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The corporal darkly frowned, and his major sore
He hung his under-lip, while he shot and swore.
For four incessant hours did the major growl,
And still the whole engagement had gone afoul.
Too few of falling enemies did he see,
And all the host escaped him, from tree to tree.
“Damnation!” roared the major, “Ill goes it all!
I see the bark, like dust, from the pine-trees fall;
But midst them stands the Russian unhit, for shame!
Where is your eye, you fellows, and where your aim?”
Through his moustache the question had scarce gone forth,
When at a blow from Brask did he drop to earth!
’Twas almost more than answer to Konow’s talk,
And from his corporal came as a lightning-shock.
Up sprang he, drew his saber, with fury white, —
“What have you done, you scoundrel?” he shrieked outright;
“The devil take you now, hide and hair alike,
When in the worst of battles your chief you strike!”
But corporal Brask stood calm as in days before;
“Withhold your sword, O master, a moment more,
Until requital full I on him bestow,
Who aimed at you and fired, as I struck you low!”
By sudden musket-shot he revealed his plan,
And Konow saw, that instant, a shaggy man
Behind a bush strike earth in a sudden fall,
Scarce distant from his line twenty yards in all.
“And if ’twas he, whose bullet whizzed by in vain,
The instant when I fell, — may we friends remain!
A stroke like yours, I call it of manly art,
That ne’er, methinks, from memory will depart!”
Now Brask has lived with Konow these many years,
And where one goes, the other as well appears.
You see them off as friends who are all in all,
And just about as often you hear them brawl.
CANTO NINTH. THE DYING WARRIOR.
Here, as in Kulneff, Canto Fourteenth, is a kind word for the Russian soldier.
This beautiful number seems to be a fiction of the poet, as a tribute to the great bond of sympathy that unites all human hearts, and after the hour of strife is over, bridges even the chasm between our foes and ourselves. The Russian soldier becomes the Swedish soldier’s brother as the mists of mortality clear away and the pinions of his spirit become unfettered.
The battle of Lemo was fought near an inlet of the ocean June 19-20, 1808, shortly before midsummer. At this season the brief night was but a heavy twilight, whose sombre shadows rendered more ghostly the strange incident here portrayed.
On the evening of the 19th the Swedish land-troops, under the command of General Major v. Vegesack, arrived at the promontory of Lemo, situated south-east from Abo. Other soldiers and armed peasants joined them. Soon began the battle; it continued all the night, till morning dawned. The Russians won by superior force. At midday the pursued Swedes had re-entered their ships. Their plan to re-enforce the Finnish army had failed.
In this song lies skillful suggestion; — much is implied, nothing is spoken, How infinitely more powerful was the speech which the old Russian never made than any he ever could have made to his dead young enemy’s sweetheart, — since he himself had dealt the death-wound!
A tender and exquisite lyric gem. If was published in 1843, in “Dikter III.”
IX. THE DYING WARRIOR.
Departed was a gory day, —
It was on Lemo’s shore;
The sighs of them that dying lay
Grew silent, more and more.
’Twas darkening o’er land and wave,
The night was silent as a grave.
Upon the strand of murky sea
Where raged the day’s affray,
A warrior old sat silently,
A man of Hogland’s day;
His forehead on his hand found rest,
His cheek was pale, death-bled his breast.
There came no friend that could have said
A last word of farewell;
Nor was the ground whereon he bled
His homeland loved so well;
His home the Volga’s billows lave,
This foreign shore but hatred gave.
Anon his lifted eyes expand,
Though failing fast, and dim;
Upon the self-same field and sand,
Not far removed from him,
There lies a youth benumbed and cold,
Whose form his opening eyes behold.
When bullets whined and battle raged,
And each one’s blood ran warm,
The two had mutual combat waged,
And proved both sword and arm;
Now slept the youth in strife’s release,
Now held the aged warrior peace.
But gradual stole on the night, —
One heard an oar-stroke’s sound;
The moon forsook a cloud, to light
The ghastly scene around;
A little boat then neared the strand; —
A maiden lone rowed to the land.
And like a restless ghost she trod
The tracks where Death had stepped;
From corpse to corpse she crossed the sod,
While silently she wept.
Amazed, as wakened from a trance,
On her the old man turned his glance.
But every moment grown more mild,
More thoughtful than anon,
His mournful eyes now faintly smiled,
While moved the maiden on;
His heart a deep foreboding crossed, —
He seemed to know what she had lost.
He seemed expectant. Then came she
As by some message caught, —
So still, so calm, so trustfully,
As by a spirit brought;
She came; and in the night’s pale ray,
The fallen Swede before her lay.
She gazed, she called his name aloud; —
But answering now was o’er!
Upon his open arms she bowed, —
They clasped her nevermore;
His transpierced breast was white and chill;
Withered was all, and all was still.
Then (sings the song-maid) on his face
The old man feels a tear;
Then speaks he words that without trace
In night-winds disappear;
Arising then, a step he tries,
But falls before her feet, — and dies!
What message had his glance of woe,
His words diffused away?
The tear that from his eye must flow, —
What meaning in it lay?
And when the maiden’s feet he gained,
To sink and die, what thought then reigned?
Would he have said, for peace of heart,
The words he ne’er expressed?
Was it a prayer he would impart
To a forgiving breast?
Bemoaned he only man’s hard lot,
To take, and give, the tortures wrought?
He came from an unfriendly land,
A foeman’s sword he bore;
Yet, brother, gently take his hand,
And what he was, ignore;
Ah, vengeance looks but on life’s shore. —
And in the grave dwells hate no more.
CANTO TENTH. OTTO VON FIEANDT.
This Canto is called “the first real Fanrik” Runeberg produced.
It is an accurate and graphic description of one of the most original of the officers of the Finnish War.
Otto Henrik von Fieandt was born in 1762 in the parish of Kristina, the oldest of four brothers, all of whom took part in the war of 1808 9; he was the son of Lieutenant Magnus Fred, von Fieandt, and grandson of a veteran who fell at the Battle of Villmanstrand. He w
as Major at the beginning of the war, but later became Lieutenant-Colonel, with the Tavastehus regiment. In the service, he was exacting and tyrannical, obstinate and defiant.
In the first eighteen stanzas, describing this angular First-Lieutenant, we form a sufficiently accurate conception of his personality. Then follows a portrayal of the battle of Karstula (between Lintulaks and Saarijarvi), in which von Fieandt with 1700 men, in a battle beginning at 4.30 A. M., and lasting 16 hours, was finally defeated by the Russian General Vlastoff with 3000 men, and retreated past Mottonen to Lintulaks, and past Perrho to the high north. After the war he lived again in Finland.
In 1810 he obtained a discharge from the Swedish service, and died at the parish of Viborg, Finland, in 1823.
To win a victory, a pipe of tobacco was absolutely necessary to him; to endure a defeat, the tobacco was equally indispensable.
X. OTTO VON FIEANDT.
From Kristina came one famed,
Otto Fieandt was he named;
Elder born than all his brothers,
Learned he thus to rule o’er others.
True, in battle did he grace
But Lieutenant-Colonel’s place;
With the full troop could not wander,
Since he would not heed commander.
But he went a course his own,
Bore his head for self alone;
Pliant not when man-directed,
He a troop his own collected.
Hear, while I his looks portray:
Marching wore he coat of gray
In his home loft fabricated
Of the wool his sheep donated.
On his crown right lofty sat,
Worn to sheen, his father’s hat
Saved on Villmanstrand, and cherished,
Where his father’s father perished.
Add thereto, in winter-tide,
Sheepskin pelt, quite short but wide,
Pitch-seamed boots at last providing; —
Thus he sat, as leader riding.
Not such hero, I avow,
One would wish to look on now;
Other times mean other manners; —
Fieandt bore too high his honors.
With his sword he never fought,
God knows if he fired a shot
During all the long contention;
If he did, there is no mention.