Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - IX. Visit to Sweden in 1868–1869—The Object of my Journey—Experiences and Observations During the Same—Difference Between American and Swedish Customs—My Birth-place—Arrival and Visit There—Visit to Christianstad—Visit to Stockholm—The Swedish Parliament—My Return to America—Reflections on and Impressions of the Condition of the Bureaucracy of Sweden
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ss Story of an Emigrant.
102
one minute without a friend and protector. Men of all
classes,— from the millionaire to the day-laborer, or even
street loafer,—would have vied with each other in trying to
be the first to render her assistance.
I passed my old home at dnnestad station after dark, and
soon arrived in Christianstad, where four years of my youth
had been spent. It was my purpose this time only to pass
through the city without looking up any old acquaintances.
This was my thirty-sixth birthday, and, thinking of family
and friends in my western home, I felt lonely, and repaired
to my room at the hotel. I was not left alone very long,
however, for the news of my arrival had preceded me by a
telegram from Copenhagen, and soon an old schoolmate
called, and a few minutes later the editor of the
leading-newspaper, Karl Mollersvard, who was exactly of my own
age and had been on a short visit to America, and with
whom a warm and lasting friendship was soon formed.
The stroll through the little city the following morning
brought many tender recollections, and I should have enjoyed
it more had I not been such an object of attention and
curiosity to everybody there.
The advent of the railroad and the leveling of the old
fortifications had brought many improvements on the
outskirts, but the interior of the town with its little, narrow, but
rectangular squares, streets and alleys, and its little one and
two-story houses had undergone 110 change. And yet I could
hardly realize that it was the same, because those objects
which, to my boyish fancy, had seemed grand and imposing
now appeared so diminutive that it was more like a dream
than a living reality. This was particularly the case when,
at noon, I watched the guard-mount of the artillery at the
great square, and saw a large number of finely-uniformed
officers, many of them grey with age and service, their
breasts covered with decorations and crosses. With, their
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