Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/239

Rh house which your grave-digger had built. But this is a gloomy picture! Nevertheless I beheld it with my own eyes in Millwankee. I would very willingly live for a time in Millwankee, upon its beautiful heights among its kind, lively people, but as to building a house there—No, I thank you!

On the morning of the 29th of September I arrived at this, the first Swedish Colony of the West. Herr Lange drove me there in a little carriage, along a road which was anything but good, through a solitary region, a distance of somewhat above twenty miles from Millwankee. It was on a Sunday morning, a beautiful sunshiny morning. There remain still of the little Swedish colony of Pine Lake, about half-a-dozen families who live as farmers in the neighbourhood. It is lake-scenery, and as lovely and romantic as any may be imagined—regular Swedish lake-scenery; and one can understand how those first Swedish emigrants were enchanted, so that without first examining the quality of the soil, they determined to found here a New Sweden, and to build a New Upsala! I spent the forenoon in visiting the various Swedish families. Nearly all live in log-houses, and seem to be in somewhat low circumstances. The most prosperous seemed to be that of the smith; he, I fancy, had been a smith in Sweden, and had built himself a pretty frame house in the forest; he was a really good fellow, and had a nice young Norwegian for his wife: also a Mr. Bergman who had been a gentleman in Sweden, but who was here a clever, hard-working peasant-farmer; had some acres of good land which he cultivated ably, and was getting on well. He was of a remarkably cheerful, good-tempered, and vigorous Swedish temperament; he had fine cattle, which he himself attended to, and a good harvest of maize which now stood cut in the field to dry in the sun. He had