Growth of the Soil - Knut Hamsun
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Inger thanked the Lensmand, and hoped he would put in a word for them
with the State.
"Yes, yes. But I've no say in the matter myself. All I have to do is
to say what I have seen, and what I think. How old is the youngest
there?"
"Six months as near as can be."
"Boy or girl?"
"Boy."
The Lensmand was no tyrant, but shallow, and not overconscientious. He
ignored his assistant, Brede Olsen, who by virtue of his office should
be an expert in such affairs; the matter was settled out of hand,
by guesswork. Yet for Isak and his wife it was a serious matter
enough--ay, and for who should come after them, maybe for generations.
But he set it all down, as it pleased him, making a document of it on
the spot. Withal a kindly man; he took a bright coin from his pocket
and gave it to little Sivert; then he nodded to the others and went
out to the sledge.
Suddenly he asked: "What do you call the place?"
"Call it?"
"Yes. What's its name? We must have a name for it"
No one had ever thought of that before. Inger and Isak looked at each
other.
"Sellanraa?" said the Lensmand. He must have invented it out of his
own head; maybe it was not a name at all. But he only nodded, and said
again, "Sellanraa!" and drove off.
Settled again, at a guess, anything would do. The name, the price, the
boundaries....
Some weeks later, when Isak was down in the village, he heard rumours
of some business about Lensmand Geissler; there had been an inquiry
about some moneys he could not account for, and the matter had been
reported to his superior. Well, such things did happen; some folk were
content to stumble through life anyhow, till they ran up against those
that walked.
Then one day Isak went down with a load of wood, and coming back, who
should drive with him on his sledge but Lensmand Geissler. He stepped
out from the trees, on to the road, waved his hand, and simply said:
"Take me along, will you?"
They drove for a while, neither speaking. Once the passenger took a
flask from his pocket and drank; offered it to Isak, who declined.
"I'm afraid this journey will upset my stomach," said the Lensmand.
He began at once to talk about Isak's deal in land. "I sent off the
report at once, with a strong recommendation on my own account.
Sellanraa's a nice name. As a matter of fact, they ought to let you
have the place for nothing, wouldn't do to say so, of course. If I
had, they'd only have taken offence and put their own price on it. I
suggested fifty _Daler_."
"Ho. Fifty, you said? Not a hundred?"
The Lensmand puckered his brow and thought a moment. "As far as I
recollect it was fifty. Yes...."
"And where will you be going, now?" asked Isak.
"Over to Vesterbotten, to my wife's people."
"'Tis none so easy that way at this time of year."
"I'll manage. Couldn't you go with me a bit?"
"Ay; you shan't go alone."
They came to the farm, and the Lensmand stayed the night, sleeping in
the little room. In the morning, he brought out his flask again, and
remarked: "I'm sure this journey's going to upset my stomach." For the
rest, he was much the same as last time, kindly, decisive, but fussy,
and little concerned about his own affairs. Possibly it might not be
so bad after all. Isak ventured to point out that the hillside was not
all under cultivation yet, but only some small squares here and there.
The Lensmand took the information in a curious fashion. "I knew that
well enough, of course, last time I was here, when I made out the
report. But Brede, the fellow who was with me, he didn't see it.
Brede, he's no earthly good. But they work it out by table. With all
the ground as I entered it, and only so few loads of hay, so few
bushels of potatoes, they'll say at once that it must be poor soil,
cheap soil, you understand. I did my best for you, and you take my
word for it, that'll do the trick. It's two and thirty thousand
fellows of your stamp the country wants."
The Lensmand nodded and turned to Inger. "How old's the youngest?"
"He's just three-quarters of a year."
"And a boy, is he?"
"Yes."
"But you must see and get that business settled as soon as ever you
can," said he to Isak again. "There's another man wants to purchase
now, midway between here and the village, and as soon as he does,
this'll be worth more. You buy now, get the place first, and let the
price go up after--that way, you'll be getting some return for all the
work you've put into it. It was you that started cultivating here at
all. 'Twas all wilderness before."
They were grateful for his advice, and asked if it was not he himself
that would arrange the matter. He answered that he had done all he
could; everything now depended on the State. "I'm going across
to Vesterbotten now, and I shan't be coming back," he told them
straightforwardly.
He gave Inger an _Ort_, and that was overmuch. "You can take a bit of
meat down to my people in the village next time you're killing," said
he. "My wife'll pay you. Take a cheese or so, too, any time you can.
The children like it."
Isak went with him up over the hills; it was firm, good going on the
higher ground, easier than below. Isak received a whole _Daler_.
In that manner was it Lensmand Geissler left the place, and he did not
come back. No great loss, folk said, he being looked on as a doubtful
personage, an adventurer. Not that he hadn't the knowledge; he was a
learned man, and had studied this and that, but he lived too freely,
and spent other people's money. It came out later that he had left the
place after a sharp reprimand from his superior, Amtmand Pleym; but
nothing was done about his family officially, and they went on living
there, a good while after--his wife and three children. And it was not
long before the money unaccounted for was sent from Sweden, so that
Geissler's wife and children could not be said to be held as hostages,
but stayed on simply because it pleased them.
Isak and Inger had no cause to complain of Geissler's dealings with
them, not by a long way. And there was no saying what sort of man
his successor would be--perhaps they would have to go over the whole
business again!
The Amtmand [Footnote: Governor of a country] sent one of his clerks
up to the village, to be the new Lensmand. He was a man about forty,
son of a local magistrate, by name Heyerdahl. He had lacked the means
to go to the university and enter the service that way; instead, he
had been constrained to sit in an office, writing at a desk, for
fifteen years. He was unmarried, having never been able to afford
a wife. His chief, Amtmand Pleym, had inherited him from his
predecessor, and paid him the same miserable wage that had been given
before; Heyerdahl took it, and went on writing at his desk as before.
Isak plucked up his courage, and went to see him.
"Documents in the Sellanraa case ...? Here they are, just returned
from the Department. They want to know all sorts of things--the whole
business is in a dreadful muddle, as Geissler left it," said the
official. "The Department wishes to be informed as to whether any
considerable crop of marketable berries is to be reckoned with on the
estate. Whether there is any heavy timber. Whether possibly there may
be ores or metals of value an the hills adjoining. Mention is made of
water, but nothing stated as to any fishery in the same. This Geissler
appears to have furnished certain information, but he's not to be
trusted, and here have I to go through the whole affair again after
him. I shall have to come up to Sellanraa and make a thorough
inspection and valuation. How many miles is it up there? The
Department, of course, requires that adequate boundaries be drawn:
yes, we shall have to beat the bounds in due order."
"'Tis no light business setting up boundaries this time of year," said
Isak. "Not till later on in the summer."
"Anyhow, it'll have to be done. The Department can't wait all through
the summer for an answer. I'll come up myself as soon as I can get
away. I shall have to be out that way in any case, there's another
plot of land a man's inquiring about."
"Will that be him that's going to buy up between me and the village?"
"Can't say, I'm sure. Very likely. As a matter of fact, it's a man
from the office here, my assistant in the office. He was here in
Geissler's time. Asked Geissler about it, I understand, but Geissler
put him off; said he couldn't cultivate a hundred yards of land. So he
sent in an application to the Amtmand, and I'm instructed to see the
matter through. More of Geissler's muddling!"
Lensmand Heyerdahl came up to the farm, and brought with him his
assistant, Brede. They had got thoroughly wet crossing the moors, and
wetter still they were before they'd finished tramping the boundary
lines through melting snow and slush up and down the hills. The
Lensmand set to work zealously the first day, but on the second he had
had enough, and contented himself with standing still for the most
part, pointing and shouting directions. There was no further talk
about prospecting for ore in the "adjoining hills," and as for
marketable berries--they would have a look at the moors on the way
back, he said.
The Department requested information on quite a number of
points--there were tables for all sorts of things, no doubt. The only
thing that seemed reasonable was the question of timber. Certainly,
there was some heavy timber, and that within the limits of Isak's
proposed holding, but not enough to reckon with for sale; no more than
would be required to keep up the place. Even if there had been timber
in plenty, who was to carry it all the many miles to where it could
be sold? Only Isak, trundling like a tub-wheel through the forest in
winter-time carting some few heavy sticks down to the village, to
bring back planks and boards for his building.
Geissler, the incomprehensible, had, it seemed, sent in a report which
was not easily upset. Here was his successor going through the whole
thing again, trying to find mistakes and blatant inaccuracies--but all
in vain. It was noticeable that he consulted his assistant at every
turn, and paid heed to what he said, which was not Geissler's way at
all. That same assistant, moreover, must presumably have altered his
own opinion, since he was now a would-be purchaser himself of lands
from the common ground held by the State.
"What about the price?" asked the Lensmand.
"Fifty _Daler_ is the most they can fairly ask of any buyer," answered
the expert.
Lensmand Heyerdahl drew up his report in elegant phrasing. Geissler
had written: "The man will also have to pay land tax every year; he
cannot afford to pay more for the place than fifty _Daler_, in annual
instalments over ten years. The State can accept his offer, or take
away his land and the fruits of his work." Heyerdahl wrote: "He now
humbly begs to submit this application to the Department: that he
be allowed to retain this land, upon which, albeit without right
of possession, he has up to this present effected considerable
improvements, for a purchase price of 50--fifty--_Speciedaler_,
the amount to be paid in annual instalments as may seem fit to the
Department to apportion the same."
Lensmand Heyerdahl promised Isak to do his best. "I hope to succeed in
procuring you possession of the estate," he said.
Chapter VI
The big bull is to be sent away. It has grown to an enormous beast,
and costs too much to feed; Isak is taking it down to the village, to
bring up a suitable yearling in exchange.
It was Inger's idea. And Inger had no doubt her own reasons for
getting Isak out of the place on that particular day.
"If you are going at all, you'd better go today," she said. "The
bull's in fine condition; 'twill fetch a good price at this time of
year. You take him down to the village, and they'll send him to be
sold in town--townsfolk pay anything for their meat."
"Ay," says Isak.
"If only the beast doesn't make trouble on the way down."
Isak made no answer.
"But he's been out and about now this last week, and getting used to
things."
Isak was silent. He took a big knife, hung it in a sheath at his
waist, and led out the bull.
A mighty beast it was, glossy-coated and terrible to look at, swaying
at the buttocks as it walked. A trifle short in the leg; when it ran,
it crushed down the undergrowth with its chest; it was like a railway
engine. Its neck was huge almost to deformity; there was the strength
of an elephant in that neck.
"If only he doesn't get mad with you," said Inger.
Isak thought for a moment. "Why, if as he takes it that way, I'll just
have to slaughter him half-way and carry down the meat."
Inger sat down on the door-slab. She was in pain; her face was aflame.
She had kept her feet till Isak was gone; now he and the bull were
out of sight, and she could give way to a groan without fear. Little
Eleseus can talk a little already; he asks: "Mama hurt? "--"Yes,
hurt." He mimics her, pressing his hands to his sides and groaning.
Little Sivert is asleep.
Inger takes Eleseus inside the house, gives him some things to play
with on the floor, and gets into bed herself. Her time was come. She
is perfectly conscious all the while, keeps an eye on Eleseus, glances
at the clock on the wall to see the time. Never a cry, hardly a
movement; the struggle is in her vitals--a burden is loosened and
glides from her. Almost at the same moment she hears a strange cry in
the bed, a blessed little voice; poor thing, poor little thing ... and
now she cannot rest, but lifts herself up and looks down. What is
it? Her face is grey and blank in a moment, without expression or
intelligence; a groan is heard; unnatural, impossible--a choking gasp.
She slips back on the bed. A minute passes; she cannot rest, the
little cry down there in the bed grows louder, she raises herself once
more, and sees--O God, the direst of all! No mercy, no hope--and this
a girl!
Isak could not have gone more than a couple of miles or so. It was
hardly an hour since he had left. In less than ten minutes Inger had
borne her child and killed it....
Isak came back on the third day, leading a half-starved yearling bull.
The beast could hardly walk; it had been a long business getting up to
the place at all.
"How did you get on?" asked Inger. She herself was ill and miserable
enough.
Isak had managed very well. True, the big bull had been mad the last
two miles or so, and he had to tie it up and fetch help from the
village. Then, when he got back, it had broken loose and took a deal
of time to find. But he had managed somehow, and had sold for a good
price to a trader in the village, buying up for butchers in the town.
"And here's the new one," said Isak. "Let the children come and look."
Any addition to the live stock was a great event. Inger looked at
the bull and felt it over, asked what it had cost; little Sivert was
allowed to sit on its back. "I shall miss the big one, though," said
Inger. "So glossy and fine he was. I do hope they'll kill him nicely."
It was the busy season now, and there was work enough. The animals
were let loose; in the empty shed were cases and bins of potatoes left
to grow. Isak sowed more corn this year than last, and did all he
could to get it nicely down. He made beds for carrots and turnips, and
Inger sowed the seeds. All went on as before.
Inger went about for some time with a bag of hay under her dress, to
hide any change in her figure, taking out a little from time to time,
and finally discarding the bag altogether. At last, one day, Isak
noticed something, and asked in surprise:
"Why, how's this? Hasn't anything happened? I thought...."
"No. Not this time."
"Ho. Why, what was wrong?
"'Twas meant to be so, I suppose. Isak, how long d'you think it'll
take you to work over all this land of ours?"
"Yes, but ... you mean you had your trouble--didn't go as it should?"
"Ay, that was it--yes."
"But yourself--you're not hurt anyway after it?"
"No. Isak, I've been thinking, we ought to have a pig."
Isak was not quick to change the subject that way. He was silent a
little, then at last he said: "Ay, a pig. I've thought of that myself
each spring. But we'll need to have more potatoes first, and more of
the small, and a bit of corn beside; we've not enough to feed a pig.
We'll see how this year turns out."
"But it would be nice to have a pig."
"Ay."
Days pass, rain comes, fields and meadows are looking well--oh, the
year will turn out well, never fear! Little happenings and big, all in
their turn: food, sleep, and work; Sundays, with washing of faces and
combing of hair, and Isak sitting about in a new red shirt of Inger's
weaving and sewing. Then an event, a happening of note in the ordinary
round: a sheep, roaming with her lamb, gets caught in a cleft among
the rocks. The others come home in the evening. Inger at once sees
there are two missing, and out goes Isak in search. Isak's first
thought is to be thankful it is Sunday, so he is not called away from
his work and losing time. He tramps off--there is an endless range
of ground to be searched; and, meanwhile, the house is all anxiety.
Mother hushes the children with brief words; there are two sheep
missing, and they must be good. All share the feeling; what has
happened is a matter for the whole little community. Even the cows
know that something unusual is going on, and give tongue in their own
fashion, for Inger goes out every now and then, calling aloud towards
the woods, though it is near night. It is an event in the wilderness,
a general misfortune. Now and again she gives a long-drawn hail to
Isak, but there is no answer; he must be out of hearing.
Where are the sheep--what can have come to them? Is there a bear
abroad? Or have the wolves come down over the hills from Sweden and
Finland? Neither, as it turns out. Isak finds the ewe stuck fast in
a cleft of rock, with a broken leg and lacerated udder. It must have
been there some time, for, despite its wounds, the poor thing has
nibbled the grass down to the roots as far as it could reach. Isak
lifts the sheep and sets it free; it falls to grazing at once. The
lamb makes for its mother and sucks away--a blessed relief for the
wounded udder to be emptied now.
Isak gathers stones and fills up the dangerous cleft; a wicked place;
it shall break no more sheep's thighs! Isak wears leather braces; he
takes them off now and fastens them round the sheep's middle, as a
support for the udder. Then, lifting the animal on his shoulders, he
sets off home, the lamb at his heels.
After that--splints and tar bandages. In a few days' time the patient
begins twitching the foot of the wounded leg; it is the fracture
aching as it grows together. Ay, all things getting well again--until
next time something happens.
The daily round; little matters that are all important to the
settler-folk themselves. Oh, they are not trifles after all, but
things of fate, making for their happiness and comfort and well-being,
or against them.
In the slack time between the seasons, Isak smooths down some new
tree-trunks he has thrown; to be used for something or other, no
doubt. Also he digs out a number of useful stones and gets them down
to the house; as soon as there are stones enough, he builds a wall of
them. A year or so back, Inger would have been curious, wondering what
her man was after with all this--now, she seemed for the most part
busied with her own work, and asked no questions. Inger is busy as
ever, but she has taken to singing, which is something new, and she is
teaching Eleseus an evening prayer; this also is something new. Isak
misses her questioning; it was her curiosity and her praise of all he
did that made him the contented man, the incomparable man he was. But
now, she goes by, saying nothing, or at most with a word or so that he
is working himself to death. "She's troubled after that last time, for
all she says," thinks Isak to himself.
Oline comes over to visit them once more. If all had been as before
she would have been welcome, but now it is different. Inger greets
her from the first with some ill-will; be it what it may, there is
something that makes Inger look on her as an enemy.
"I'd half a thought I'd be coming just at the right time again," says
Oline, with delicate meaning.
"How d'you mean?"
"Why, for the third one to be christened. How is it with you now?"
"Nay," says Inger. "For that matter you might have saved yourself the
trouble."
"Ho."
Oline falls to praising the children, so fine and big they've grown;
and Isak taking over more ground, and going to build again, by the
look of things--there's no end to things with them; a wonderful place,
and hard to find its like. "And what is he going to build this time?"
"Ask him yourself," says Inger. "I don't know."
"Nay," says Oline. "'Tis no business of mine. I just looked along to
see how things were with you here; it's a pleasure and delight for
me to see. As for Goldenhorns, I'll not ask nor speak of her--she's
fallen into proper ways, as any one can see."
They talk for a while companionably; Inger is no longer harsh. The
clock on the wall strikes with its sweet little note. Oline looks up
with tears in her eyes; never in all her humble life did she hear such
a thing--'tis like church and organ music, says Oline. Inger feels
herself rich and generous-minded towards her poor relation, and says:
"Come into the next room and see my loom."
Oline stays all day. She talks to Isak, and praises all his doings.
"And I hear you've bought up the land for miles on every side.
Couldn't you have got it for nothing, then? There's none as I can see
would take it from you."
Isak had been feeling the need of praise, and is the better for it
now. Feels a man again. "I'm buying from the Government," says Isak.
"Ay, Government. But they've no call to be grasping in a deal, surely?
What are you building now?"
"Why, I don't know. Nothing much, anyway."
"Ay, you're getting on; building and getting on you are. Painted doors
to the house, and a clock on the wall--'tis a new grand house you're
building, I suspect."
"You, with your foolish talk ..." says Isak. But he is pleased all the
same, and says to Inger: "Couldn't you make a bit of a dish of nice
cream custard for one that comes a-visiting?"
"That I can't," says Inger, "for I've churned all there was."
"'Tis no foolish talk," puts in Oline hurriedly; "I'm but a simple
woman asking to know. And if it's not a new grand house, why, 'twill
be a new big barn, I dare say; and why not? With all these fields and
meadow lands, fine and full of growth; ay, and full of milk and honey,
as the Bible says."
Isak asks: "How's things looking your way--crops and the like?"
"Why, 'tis there as it is till now. If only the Lord don't set fire
to it all again this year, and burn up the lot--Heaven forgive me I
should say the word. 'Tis all in His hand and almighty power. But
we've nothing our parts that's any way like this place of yours to
compare, and that's the solemn truth."
Inger asks after other relatives, her Uncle Sivert in particular. He
is the great man of the family, and owns rich fisheries; 'tis almost
a wonder how he can find a way to spend all he has. The women talk of
Uncle Sivert, and Isak and his doings somehow drop out of sight; no
one asks any more about his building now, so at last he says:
"Well, if you want to know, 'tis a bit of a barn with a
threshing-floor I'm trying to get set up."
"Just as I thought," says Oline. "Folk with real sound sense in their
heads, they do that way. Fore-thought and back-thought and all as it
should be. There's not a pot nor pitcher in the place you haven't
thought of. A threshing-floor, you said?"
Isak is a child. Oline's flattering words go to his head, and he
answers something foolishly with fine words: "As to that new house of
mine, there must be a threshing-floor in the same, necessarily. 'Tis
my intention so."
"A threshing-floor?" says Oline, wagging her head.
"And where's the sense of growing corn on the place if we've nowhere
to thresh it?"
"Ay, 'tis as I say, not a thing as could be but you have it all there
in your head."
Inger is suddenly out of humour again. The talk between the other two
somehow displeases her, and she breaks in:
"Cream custard indeed! And where's the cream to come from? Fish it up
in the river, maybe?"
Oline hastens to make peace. "Inger, Lord bless you, child, don't
speak of such a thing. Not a word of cream nor custard either--an old
creature like me that does but idle about from house to neighbour...!"
Isak sits for a while, then up, and saying suddenly: "Here am I doing
nothing middle of the day, and stones to fetch and carry for that wall
of mine!"
"Ay, a wall like that'll need a mighty lot of stone, to be sure."
"Stone?" says Isak. "Tis like as if there'd never be enough."
When Isak is gone, the two womenfolk get on nicely together for a
while; they sit for hours talking of this and that. In the evening,
Oline must go out and see how their live stock has grown: cows, a
bull, two calves, and a swarm of sheep and goats. "I don't know where
it'll ever end," says Oline, with her eyes turned heavenwards.