Under more agreeable circumstances next day, I became aware that Gottenburg is a regularly-built town of about 30,000 inhabitants, containing a remarkable proportion of good private houses – much permeated by canals, which are crossed by rather hard-favoured stone-bridges – exhibiting on the inland side some beautiful environs, throughout which are scattered many handsome mansions belonging to the most eminent merchants. Gottenburg contains several British mercantile houses, and is very much an English town, unless that my own countrymen may be said more particularly to take the lead in its society. Iron-founding and machine-making, cotton-spinning, sailcloth-making, and sugar-refining, are the chief branches of industry, all of them conducted under the protection of prohibitory duties, the Swedes being willing to buy these articles at high prices from Englishmen who will consent to make them in Sweden, rather than purchase them cheaply in England. Accordingly, several of the Gottenburg firms are understood to be realising incomes in striking disproportion to those common among the natives; one, for instance, having cleared so much as L.50,000 in a year; though here, it must be remarked, the result was helped by a patent. These settlers are probably compensating in some degree for their monopolies by the impulse which they give to the indigenous population, noted in all time for the slowness of their movements, and their dislike to adopt new fashions and methods. There is a good, moreover, to be gained from commixtures of the people of two countries, in as far as it tends, by making them acquainted with each other, to extinguish mutual prejudice. As might be expected, some of the manufactures thus forced into prominence in Sweden are conducted under considerable disadvantages as compared with those of England. For example, a cotton manufacturer in Sweden cannot get a supply of his materials equably over the year, all communications being shut up during the seven months of winter. The consequent necessity of laying up a stock to serve through the winter, entailing a greater outlay of capital, is so much against him. On the other hand, he may save in the wages of his labourers. These trades are in the meanwhile prosperous; but I have a strong sense of the precariousness of any prosperity depending on protection, and believe that it would be well for the protégés to consider that the self-sacrificing whim of their Swedish customers may some day give way to an admission of the rational principle – that the cheapest market is, in all circumstances, the best.
At the time of my visit to Gottenburg, one of the leading matters of local interest was the erection of an Exchange upon an unusually handsome scale. I had an opportunity of inspecting the building, when it was all but finished, on my return from the north, and I must say that I have rarely seen any edifice presenting a more elegant interior. There are, besides the Exchange-room on the street-floor, a ball-room and supper-room, also the apartments required for a restaurant and coffeehouse up stairs; and the whole are decorated in a style of taste far beyond any similar place in England that I am acquainted with. The outlay, I was told, would be L.60,000 sterling; a remarkable sum to be given for such a purpose in so small a town. Verily, I thought, if some of my friends, who speak of Sweden as little better than the Frozen Regions, were to be transported into the midst of the fairy palace here erected in one of its second-rate towns, their ideas about these northern countries could not fail to undergo a change. They might turn, it is true, to the hotel, and remark with some bitterness, derived from their own experiences, that Gottenburg, while going a century ahead in an Exchange, was lingering two centuries behind in its accommodations for strangers. I had afterwards some pleasure in looking over the Chalmers School, an institution founded by a Scotch gentleman of that name in order to give young men an education in the mechanical and physical sciences. It is a large establishment, conducted in a most efficient manner, and attended by abundance of pupils. Here, again, Gottenburg is ahead of many other places of greater pretensions. Mr Keiller's iron-foundry, where 170 people are employed, and where everything seemed in the best order, occupied an hour agreeably. Another was well devoted to Messrs Carnegie and Company's porter brewery at Klippen, a suburb of Gottenburg. The favourite beverage of London is here produced of excellent quality; and I was informed that it is extensively used in Sweden, though it might be more so but for a liquor more recently introduced – Bavarian beer – which is much better adapted to the means of the generality of the people. I likewise paid a visit to Messrs Gibson and Son's establishment at Jönsered, a few miles from town, where, in a charming rural situation, iron-founding and sailcloth-making are conducted on a large scale, the whole population concerned being about 700. The entire arrangements seemed admirable, but none more so than the general fact of the near and constant association of the people with beautiful natural scenes, in which they could, at their leisure hours, rove without restraint. When a factory can be conducted in such local circumstances, the noted drawbacks usually attending huge agglomerations of labour in a great measure vanish; and one can only wish that so were they all.
I had now to consider with some friends by what means I should prosecute my designed tour of Sweden and Norway, and much was the cogitation and discussion on this subject before a plan could be determined on. Driving one's self, with as little baggage as possible, in a light carriage called a carriole , peculiar to the country, was what my friends advised. Clever, pleasant Mr Enkstrom, the English consul, who entered into the arrangements as if they had been a duty of his post, could not imagine anything better. But I could not see how a middle-aged person, who had never driven a carriage in his life, was to get along with any comfort over the rough roads and through the vast spaces of this northern land, exposed to all weathers, and destitute of all knowledge of the language of the people by whose aid alone could he stir even a step. I therefore expressed my willingness to be somewhat obliging to myself in the way of expense; and it was finally settled that I should have a four-wheeled and hooded carriage for two horses, together with a servant to drive and act as my interpreter or tolkan . The former was speedily obtained at a sum equivalent to 1s. 8d. English a day – a plain, old, barkened, battered machine as ever met my eyes, yet warranted to be of great strength, as had been often shown in Norwegian tours heretofore. As to a tolkan, the case was more difficult. The man whom all regarded as the facile princeps of his class, by name Jacob Carlblom, was absent under an engagement. So were some others. At length a person named Quist was heard of, and brought under examination. He proved to be a fine-looking, robust man of about five-and-thirty, who had been a dragoon in the Swedish army, but was now usually employed about a wine-merchant's establishment. Little English did the honest fellow know, and he had never been far into Norway; yet, all things considered, he seemed far from ineligible. An amiable, simple character shone in his face, and he riveted the favourable opinion which this excited amongst us all by the interest he expressed about the welfare of his wife, and the stipulation he seemed resolved to make that a portion of his wages should be paid to her weekly during his absence. I therefore engaged Quist; nor was there ever occasion to regret doing so, for he justified every favourable anticipation. It was now, then, determined that I should set out on my travels at an early hour next morning, taking the road to Christiania, which is distant 215 English miles from Gottenburg. It was thought that I might reach that city in little more than three days, provided that forebud notices were sent on before to warn the station-house keepers to have horses in each instance ready for me. This is a custom peculiar to the north, where the rarity of travellers teaches that it is more economical to force horses from the farmers when they are wanted, than to have them kept by innkeepers for regular service. There is, therefore, a government regulation compelling the farmers to be ready, when called upon, to furnish horses at a certain rate of remuneration; and equally enforcing that the innkeepers shall, on receipt of warning, or when directly called on by travellers, have horses at their doors within two hours. It is a tyrannical system, to which I never could reconcile myself; but no one is heard complaining of it. On the present occasion, one of my friends procured for me a quantity of blank schedules, and, extending a few, sent them off by post along the road which I was to traverse next day, each being addressed to a special innkeeper. Thus we accomplished the purpose at a comparatively trifling expense. Had the post not been available, it would have been necessary to send a special messenger at a cost equal to half that incurred for the horses themselves.
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