“Let my body then be hidden
In a humble, nameless tomb;
When at last I shall be bidden
To forsake that narrow room,
Jesus knows where they are sleeping
Who were given in His keeping. . ”
The sun shone down on a peaceful sea which had calmed this morning and now lay quiet before the song about a patient and resigned human soul who sought his sleep with God until the end of time. Still a little more earth trickled down the canvas toward the water.
Captain Lorentz was ready to give his crew men the sign: Lower away.
At that moment someone stirred behind him — the little brown-bearded man with the baby on his arm stepped up to the captain. He looked at the ship’s commander beseechingly, hesitatingly. Lorentz stepped aside, leaving his place at the head of the bier to the surviving husband.
Danjel Andreasson wanted to say something. His voice was not strong, he had never issued orders, he had no commander’s voice. And few were the words he had to say to his mate in the canvas: “The Lord said unto you as He said to Moses: ‘You shall not get into that land.’ You, my dear wife, were not allowed to see the new land — yet you reached the harbor before us.
“When I wanted to move over there, then you spoke to me and said: ‘say not to me that I should separate from you; where you go, there will I go, where you die there will I die and be buried.’”
Only those closest to Danjel Andreasson could hear his voice, his words were uttered in such low tones.
He took a step back from the bier, a long, hesitating step. Then the captain gave the sign — two seamen stepped forward and the oblong bundle glided into the sea. Almost as it disappeared over the rail a vague splash was heard from the side of the ship. It sounded as if some of the sea’s creatures had moved in play on the surface, or perhaps it was a little billow breaking.
The ship’s flag was raised and lowered — three times this was repeated.
Meanwhile the emigrants began to disperse. Soon the bare rough bier stood alone. But two crew men came and took it to pieces, carried away the planks and moved away the sawhorses, while the mainsail was spread to its full capacity, and the brig Charlotta sailed on — with one passenger less.
It was a radiant morning on the Atlantic Ocean. The sun had risen still higher and the beams glittered in the clear water where a moment before the ship had left part of her cargo from the hold. It was almost as if a fire glowed below the surface, a flame burned down there.
XXVI. SAILING TOWARD MIDSUMMER
— 1—
Robert and Elin stood leaning against the rail and watched the porpoises play alongside the ship. The fat round fishes looked like suckling pigs, and they tumbled about in the water as a mill wheel turns in its channel. These were the largest fishes the youth and girl had ever seen. But Robert had no fishing gear handy. His fishpoles, lines, and hooks were in the America chest, put away in the storeroom below the main hold at the embarkation in Karlshamm — Robert had not seen it since.
The eternal westerly wind was blowing; because they had contrary winds the porpoises moved faster than the ship. They swam and jumped and played around the bow as if mocking the tardy vesseclass="underline" Here we are! Where are you? How far have you come? What kind of old pork barrel are you, splashing about like that?
Elin pointed at the water where the porpoises played: right there the water was green, she had seen similar spots before on their voyage — how did it happen that the sea water was green in some places? Had some ship spilled green paint there? Robert thought a bit before he answered: perhaps God at the Creation had intended to make the sea water green, perhaps He had at first made a few sample lakes of that color and later changed His mind and created all waters blue. Then afterward He might have thrown the green lakes into the sea here and there, just so as to make some use of them.
There was always something to observe at sea. Robert did not agree with the other passengers, he did not think the sea was a desolate landscape, depressing to watch day after day. In storm the sea was a hilly landscape, each knoll mobile and rolling about. In sunshine and calm weather the sea lay there outstretched like a blue and golden cloth of silk or satin which he would have liked to stroke with his hand. The sea in moonlight at night was made up of broad, light paths, for the angels of heaven to walk on. A hill or a knoll on land always remained in the same spot, and looked exactly the same each time one passed by it. But the sea was never the same.
During a few nights early in the voyage Robert had thought he was going to die at sea. While the first storm raged he had lain in his bunk, his forehead moistened by the cold and sticky sweat of death-fear. This experience he had not liked. To be enjoyable, an adventure must not involve fear for life. But he had grown accustomed to the sea, and now he felt ashamed when he thought of his fear during that first storm. Now he could go to bed in the evenings without fear of drowning during the night.
And as they approached the end of the long-drawn-out voyage he had even begun to like the sea. Soon he must part from it. It was said they might expect to see land almost any day now. Every day passengers gathered in the prow and looked for America, as if thinking that that land was such a small speck they might pass it by if they didn’t keep a lookout for it. Those among them who possessed almanacs, and marked the passing days by crosses, said that it would be Midsummer in a few days. Perhaps they would reach the shores of America for the Midsummer holidays.
“Shall we read in the language book?” asked Elin.
“If you wish, let’s.”
She was now as eager as he to learn English words. He suspected she no longer relied on the Holy Ghost to give her power to use the new language immediately on landing. And he had several times reminded her that the descending of the Holy Ghost upon the apostles on the first Whitsuntide had taken place long before the discovery of America, long before the English language was invented. Therefore no one knew for sure if it could be taught in the same manner as the languages of the Greeks, the Elamites, the Syrians, and the Copts, which the apostles learned in one day — and this a holy day to boot.
In the textbook Robert and Elin had now reached the chapter about “Seeking Employment.” It was an important chapter; the very first day when they arrived in America they both must earn their own living, and anyone who must earn his living must also know how to find employment.
Robert had finally decided that they must pronounce the English words as they were spelled in the first sentences and disregard the spelling within the parentheses which only confused and complicated the language for them.
Could you tell me where to get work? — What can you do?
Here the work-seeker must answer that he was a carpenter, a tailor, a cobbler, a harness maker, a tanner, a spinner, a weaver, a mason, a waiter, or whatever occupation he pursued. But Robert had skipped all this, he was not concerned about what a harness maker was called in English as he couldn’t make harnesses anyway. He himself stuck to one single sentence: I am used to farm work.
He was a farmhand. The only work he had done was farm work, the only chores he had performed were those of the farmer. And he had long struggled with this sentence, but he knew it now — he repeated the words slowly and tried to pronounce them carefully as they were spelled.
I am used to farm work. He wished already the very first day to astonish the Americans by being able to tell them what he could do, and he wished to say it correctly in their own language. He wished to inspire respect from the very first day.