Through Finland in Carts Part 17

It is wonderful to note how democratic the people are in Finland. Each peasant is a gentleman at heart, brave, hasty, independent, and he expects every one to treat him as his equal.

Few persons are rich in Finland according to English lights, but many are comfortably off. It would be almost impossible there to live beyond one's income, or to pretend to have more than is really the case, for when the returns are sent in for the income tax, the income of each individual is published. In January every year, in the _Helsingfors_ newspapers, rows and rows of names appear, and opposite them the exact income of the owner. This does not apply if the returns are less than 200 a year; but, otherwise, every one knows and openly discusses what every one else has.

Very amusing to a stranger, but horrible for the persons concerned.

Fancy Jones saying to Brown, "Well, old chap, as you have 800 a year, I think you could afford a better house and occasionally a new suit of clothes;" and even if Jones didn't make such a remark, his friend feeling he thought it!

It is the fashion for each town to select a committee in December for the purpose of taxing the people. Every one is taxed. The tax is called a _skatt-ore_, the word originating from the small coin of that name, and each town decides whether the _ore_ shall be charged on two hundred or four hundred marks. Let us take as an example a 400-mark _ore_ (tax). The first four hundred marks are free; but payment is required on every further four hundred, and so on. For instance, if a man has 16,000 marks, he pays nothing on the first four hundred, and has therefore thirty-nine sets of four hundred to pay for, which is called thirty-nine _skatt-ore_. If overtaxed, the aggrieved person can complain to a second committee; and this sometimes happens. The tax varies very much; in some of the seaport towns, which receive heavy dues, the _ore_, which includes parochial rates, is very low. In _Wiborg_ they have had to pay as much as fifteen marks on every four hundred; but as a rule it is less.

The habit of publishing the returns of all the incomes began about 1890, and is now a subject of much annoyance--as much annoyance to a Finlander as the habit of never knocking at the door to a stranger. No one ever thinks of knocking at a door in Finland. People simply march in, and as few doors possess bolts, the consequences are sometimes appalling, especially to English people, who go through more daily ablutions than most nations, and prefer to do them in private. During our visit to _Sordavala_, for the Musical Festival, we had some curious experiences in connection with boltless doors. We were located at the brewer's. Now this was a great favour, as he was a private individual who cheerfully gave up his beautiful salon upholstered in red velvet "to the English ladies," but, unfortunately, this sumptuous apartment was reached by a smaller chamber where a man had to sleep. Not only that, but the sleeping apartment of the man was really a pa.s.sage which conducted directly into the _Konttoori_ or office of the brewery. As far as the man was concerned, this did not so much matter; eventually he became quite accustomed to hearing his door suddenly opened and seeing a stranger with an empty basket on his arm standing before him and demanding the way to the _Konttoori_ (which is p.r.o.nounced, by the bye, exactly in the same manner as an Irishman says _country_), when with a wave of the hand he indicated the office. But for us it was different.

One morning, when the gentleman occupant of the pa.s.sage was away and we were in the early stage of dressing, our door opened, and a fat burly man dashed into the middle of our room, where he stood transfixed, as well he might.

"Go away," we exclaimed. He heeded not. We waved and indicated, with the help of a brandished stocking, our desire that he should leave our apartment. But the stolidity of a Finn is always remarkable, and the appearance of strange Englishwomen in somewhat unusual attire appeared really to fascinate the gentleman, who neither moved nor spoke, only simply stared. "Go away," we repeated, gesticulating more violently than before. The situation was intensely awkward, and it seemed to us as though hours instead of moments had pa.s.sed since the entrance of our burly friend, and we were just wondering how on earth we were to get rid of him, when slowly, as though rolling the letters round his mouth, he p.r.o.nounced the word _Konttoori_.

"Yes, go into the country," we answered, pointing vehemently in the direction of that oft-inquired-for office. Very solemnly and quietly he turned round and marched out of the door--let us hope much impressed and less disconcerted by the interview than we had been. Once we were rid of him, we sat down and laughed so immoderately over the scene that the _bed_, one of those wooden collapsable affairs, peculiar to the country, on which my sister was sitting, completely gave way, and she was deposited upon the floor. The peals of merriment that followed this second misadventure apparently aroused the interest of some other visitor outside, for again the door opened and a youth of about seventeen stood before us. This was really getting too much of a good thing, for what may be considered a joke once becomes distressing if repeated a second time, and absolutely appalling on a third occasion.

However, as we could not understand him, and he could not understand us, we wished him good-morning, and gently waved him away. Eleven times in the course of five days did odd men and women thus rush like avalanches into our room, all having mistaken the way to the _Konttoori_.

Another peculiarity of the Finlander is that he never shakes hands. He seizes one's digits as though they were a pump handle, and warmly holds them, wrestles with them, waggles them, until the unsuspecting Britisher wonders if he will ever again be able to claim his hand as his own. In this way the gentleman from the Grand Duchy is demonstrative with his acquaintances; he is very publicly devoted also to his wife, fondling her before his friends. On the other hand, he seldom kisses his mother, and never his sisters. Indeed, all the outward affection seems reserved for husbands and wives; daughters seldom kiss their parents, and brothers and sisters rarely even shake hands. This struck us as particularly strange, because the members of an English family generally greet one another warmly when meeting for breakfast, especially parents and children; yet in Finland, as a rule, they hardly take any notice of one another. A certain son we knew kissed his mother's hand on the occasion of leaving her for some weeks, while he merely nodded to his brothers and sisters standing around.

Another strange freak, in a land where there is no night for two or three months, is that the better houses never have shutters, and seldom blinds, at the windows; therefore the sun streams in undisturbed; and when a room has four windows, as happened to us at _Sordavala_, the light of day becomes a positive nuisance, and a few green calico blinds an absolute G.o.dsend; indeed, almost as essential as the oil of cloves or lavender or the ammonia bottle for gnat bites, or the mosquito head-nets, if one sleeps with open windows. Mosquitoes have fed upon me in tropical lands, but they are gentlemen in comparison with the rough brutality of the mosquitoes of the far North; there their innings is short and violent.

It is indeed a strange experience to sleep with one's head in a sort of meat safe, for that is what these unsightly green muslin bags called mosquito nets resemble. They are flat on the top, with a sort of curtain hanging down all round, which one ties neatly under one's chin before retiring to rest. Behold a beautiful lady--for all ladies are as certain to be beautiful when they write about themselves, as that auth.o.r.esses are all old and ugly, which seems to be a universal idea in the eyes of the public generally--behold then a beautiful lady enveloped in a large unwieldy and very wobbly net head-covering, of such a vivid green hue that the unfortunate wearer looks jaundiced beneath! Well, they had one advantage, they saved some bites, and they afforded us much amus.e.m.e.nt; but becoming they were not.

In our strange chamber, with its four windows only protected by white muslin blinds from the fierce glare of that inquisitive sun, that seemed to peer in upon our movements all day and all night, we endured a small martyrdom, till we begged the maid to make our beds the reverse way; that is, to put the pillows where one's feet are usually to be found, as by this means the wooden bedstead kept a little of the light out of our weary eyes. No one can realise the weariness of eternal light until he has experienced it, any more than he can appreciate the glaring effects of everlasting day. We stayed with our kind friends at _Sordavala_ for some days, and were a great source of interest to the servant, who, one day s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up her courage, curiosity having got the better of her shyness, thus addressed a person she thought could furnish the required information--

"Is it part of the English ladies' religion to sleep the wrong way round?"

"No," was the reply; "what do you mean?"

"Is it in their worship that they should sleep with their heads towards the sun?"

"Certainly not; how did such an idea get into your head?"

"Every night the English ladies have made me make their beds the wrong way round, and I thought perhaps it was one of their religious customs."

We were much amused when this conversation was repeated to us. Such a notion as keeping the sun out of one's eyes had never entered the girl's head. Apparently Finlanders cannot have too much sunlight; probably by way of contrast to the darkness they live in during the long winter, for be it remembered that in the far North, where we travelled later, the sun disappears altogether in December and January, and winter every year lasts for eight or nine months.

We were surprised to find that every basin is left by the housemaid with cold water in it, and there it stands waiting at all seasons; but such a thing as warm water is considered positively indecent, and the servant generally looks as if she would fall down with amazement at the mention of such a strange thing being wanted.

In quite a large hotel at which we were once staying, the landlord being the only person who could speak anything except Finnish, we asked him at night if he would be so kind as to explain to the housemaid that we wished to be called at half-past seven the following morning, when we should like her to bring us hot water.

"Certainement, Madame," he replied, and bowing low took his leave.

After a few minutes we heard a knock at the door (the door actually possessed a bolt or he would not have knocked), and on opening it we found the landlord.

"Pardon, Madame, but how much hot water do you want for grog?"

"No, no," we answered; "to wash with."

He looked amazed; evidently he was more accustomed to people drinking tumblers of hot water--for grog--than he was to our requiring it for washing purposes.

Finland has much to learn in the way of sanitation, and yet more as to the advisability of a daily bath, for while even in hotels they give one an enormous carafe, which might be called a giraffe, its neck is so long, filled with drinking water surrounded by endless tumblers, the basin is scarcely bigger than a sugar bowl, while the jug is about the size of a cream ewer.

Very, very tired one night we arrived at a little inn. The beds were not made, and, knowing how long it took a Finn to accomplish anything of the kind, we begged her to be as quick as possible, as we were dead beat.

She pulled out the wooden bed, she thumped the mattress, and at last she went away, we hoped and believed to fetch the sheets. She remained absent for some time, but when she returned it was not with the sheets; it was with what to her mind was far more important, viz., a tin tray on which were arranged _four gla.s.s tumblers and a huge gla.s.s bottle full of fresh water_, which she had been to the bottom of the garden to pump from a deep well!

We often pondered over that water subject, and wondered whether Finns had nightly carousals with the innocent bottle, or whether drinking _aqua pura_ is a part of their religion, as the housemaid had thought sleeping with our heads the wrong way was a part of ours!

Our minds were greatly exercised also as to why the pillows were so hard and often gave forth such a strange smell, but that mystery was one day solved. When driving along a pretty road, we saw ma.s.ses of soft white cotton flower waving in the wind, the silvery sheen catching the sunlight and making it look like fluffy snow. This we were told was _luikku_, the Latin name of which is _Eriophorum angustifolium_. Women were gathering it and packing it into a sack.

"That," explained our Finnish friend, "is used for stuffing the pillows and sometimes even beds."

"Really?" we returned; "then that is why they are so hard and lumpy."

"Oh, but there is another plant even less soft than the _luikku_, which is employed for the same purpose. It grows at the water's edge and is a kind of rush."

This plant turned out to be _ruoko_ (_Phragmites communis_), a common species of water shrub in Finland; after its dark red flowers have turned silvery gray, they look beautiful swaying with the wind, the long reed-like leaves making a pretty swish at the water's edge as they bend.

Going up the ca.n.a.ls it is quite strange to notice how, when the steamer sucks the water from the sides to her screw, the _ruoko_ sways and bows its head down to her, and, as she pa.s.ses on, it lifts its majestic head again, and gently sways down the other side as though to bid the ship farewell.

In the summer months, when things often have to be done in a hurry, getting in the hay or reaping the harvest, for instance, since the moment the weather is propitious and the crop ripe no time must be lost, or a night's frost may prove destructive to all the crops, it is very common to have a _talkko_.

A _talkko_ is a sort of popular amus.e.m.e.nt at which a great deal of work is done. The farmer invites all his friends to help him clear a rye field, for example. They all come in eager haste, and generally have a sort of picnic. Work proceeds much quicker in company than alone, and while they reap with old-fashioned sickles, they chat and laugh and sing their national songs, eat and make merry on small beer, that terrible concoction which we explained before is called _Kalja_, which they drink out of the same spoon, regardless of disease germs.

The corn and rye when cut are put on pine-tree trunks to dry. They saw down the small pines, chop off the branch a foot from the trunk, plant them in a line along the field, and loosely throw their crop over these stumps exposed to the sun and wind; then, after binding by hand, carry them on sledges--summer sledges--to the farmstead, where thrashing, also by hand, completes the business of harvesting.

Farm work is very primitive still in parts of Finland; the small plough, behind which the native plods, guiding it in and out of the stones, which his small st.u.r.dy pony drags, is a long and tedious business.

A _talkko_ relieves labour much; and thus it comes to pa.s.s that, after Jones and party have helped Smith on Monday, Smith and party help Jones on Tuesday; a very socialistic arrangement, like many others in _Suomi_.

From the poor the rich have taken a hint, and where, in England, we have work parties for bazaars, or to make garments for the village clubs, in Finland they have a _talkko_. Especially is this the custom just before Christmas time, when many presents have to be got ready, and all the girl friends a.s.semble and prepare their little gifts for distribution on Christmas Eve. On this night there is much festivity. A tree is lighted even in the poorest homes, and presents are exchanged amid much feasting and merriment.

Christmas comes in the winter, when snow and ice are everywhere; therefore the richer folk drive to their b.a.l.l.s and parties in sledges, rolled up in furs, and big skating-parties are the order of the day.

It is amusing at these gatherings to hear the young people all calling one another by their Christian names, and as some of the real Finnish names are musical and pretty, we give a few of the most usual--

MEN.

Onni Ilmari Yrjo (George) Vaino Armas Aarne Arvo Reijo Esko Heikki (Henry) Urpo Eero (Eric) Mauno (Magnus) Lauri (Laurence) Vilho (William) Toivo Pekka (Peter) Ahti (Kalevala) Sampsa "

Antero "

Youko "

Kullervo "

Kalervo "

Untamo "

Kammo "

Nyyrikki "

Osmo "

Valio Ensi

WOMEN.