University of Virginia Library

3. III.

Why should I speak of the ceaseless care, the suffering, and the hard toil, which made the first few months of Brita's life on this continent a mere continued struggle for existence? They are familiar to every emigrant who has come here with a brave heart and an empty purse. Suffice it to say that at the end of the second month, she succeeded in obtaining service as milkmaid with a family in the neighborhood of New York. With the linguistic talent peculiar to her people, she soon learned the English language and even spoke it well. From her countrymen, she kept as far away as possible, not for her own sake, but for that of her boy; for he was to grow great and strong, and the knowledge of his birth might shatter his strength and break his courage. For the same reason she also exchanged her picturesque Norse costume for that of the people among whom she was living. She went commonly by the name of Mrs. Brita, which pronounced in the English way, sounded very much like Mrs. Bright, and

this at last became the name by which she was known in the neighborhood.

Thus five years passed; then there was a great rage for emigrating to the far West, and Brita, with many others, started for Chicago. There she arrived in the year 1852, and took up her lodgings with an Irish widow, who was living in a little cottage in what was then termed the outskirts of the city. Those who saw her in those days, going about the lumber-yards and doing a man's work, would hardly have recognized in her the merry Glitter-Brita, who in times of old trod the spring-dance so gayly in the well-lighted halls of the Blakstad mansion. And, indeed, she was sadly changed! Her features had become sharper, and the firm lines about her mouth expressed severity, almost sternness. Her clear blue eyes seemed to have grown larger, and their glance betrayed secret, ever-watchful care. Only her yellow hair had resisted the force of time and sorrow; for it still fell in rich and wavy folds over a smooth white forehead. She was, indeed, half ashamed of it, and often took pains to force it into a sober, matronly hood. Only at nights, when she sat alone talking with her boy, she would allow it to escape from its prison; and he would

laugh and play with it, and in his child's way even wonder at the contrast between her stern face and her youthful maidenly tresses.

This Thomas, her son, was a strange child. He had a Norseman's taste for the fabulous and fantastic, and although he never heard a tale of Necken or the Hulder, he would often startle his mother by the most fanciful combinations of imagined events, and by bolder personifications than ever sprung from the legendary soil of the Norseland. She always took care to check him whenever he indulged in these imaginary flights, and he at last came to look upon them as something wrong and sinful. The boy, as he grew up, often strikingly reminded her of her father, as, indeed, he seemed to have inherited more from her own than from Halvard's race. Only the bright flaxen hair and his square, somewhat clumsy stature might have told him to be the latter's child. He had a hot temper, and often distressed his mother by his stubbornness; and then there would come a great burst of repentance afterwards, which distressed her still more. For she was afraid it might be a sign of weakness. “And strong he must be,” said she to herself, “strong enough to overcome all resistance, and to conquer a great name for

himself, strong enough to bless a mother who brought him into the world nameless.”

Strange to say, much as she loved this child, she seldom caressed him. It was a penance she had imposed upon herself to atone for her guilt. Only at times, when she had been sitting up late, and her eyes would fall, as it were, by accident upon the little face on the pillow, with the sweet unconsciousness of sleep resting upon it like a soft, invisible veil, would she suddenly throw herself down over him, kiss him, and whisper tender names in his ear, while her tears fell hot and fast on his yellow hair and his rosy countenance. Then the child would dream that he was sailing aloft over shining forests, and that his mother, beaming with all the beauty of her lost youth, flew before him, showering golden flowers on his path. These were the happiest moments of Brita's joyless life, and even these were not unmixed with bitterness; for into the midst of her joy would steal a shy anxious thought which was the more terrible because it came so stealthily, so soft-footed and unbidden. Had not this child been given her as a punishment for her guilt? Had she then a right to turn God's scourge into a blessing? Did she give to God “that which belongeth unto

God,” as long as all her hopes, her thoughts, and her whole being revolved about this one earthly thing, her son, the child of her sorrow? She was not a nature to shrink from grave questions; no, she met them boldly, when once they were there, wrestled fiercely with them, was defeated, and again with a martyr's zeal rose to renew the combat. God had Himself sent her this perplexing doubt and it was her duty to bear His burden. Thus ran Brita's reasoning. In the mean while the years slipped by, and great changes were wrought in the world about her.

The few hundred dollars which Brita had been able to save, during the first three years of her stay in Chicago, she had invested in a piece of land. In the mean while the city had grown, and in the year 1859 she was offered five thousand dollars for her lot; this offer she accepted and again bought a small piece of property at a short distance from the city. The boy had since his eighth year attended the public school, and had made astonishing progress. Every day when school was out, she would meet him at the gate, take him by the hand and lead him home. If any of the other boys dared to make sport of her, or to tease him for his dependence upon her, it was sure to cost that boy a black eye{.}

He soon succeeded in establishing himself in the respect of his school-mates, for he was the strongest boy of his own age, and ever ready to protect and defend the weak and defenseless. When Thomas Bright for that was the name by which he was known was fifteen years old he was offered a position as clerk in the office of a lumber-merchant, and with his mother's consent he accepted it. He was a fine young lad now, large and well-knit, and with a clear earnest countenance. In the evening he would bring home books to read, and as it had always been Brita's habit to interest herself in whatever interested him, she soon found herself studying and discussing with him things which had in former years been far beyond the horizon of her mind. She had at his request reluctantly given up her work in the lumber-yards, and now spent her days at home, busying herself with sewing and reading and such other things as women find to fill up a vacant hour.

One evening, when Thomas was in his nineteenth year, he returned from his office with a graver face than usual. His mother's quick eye immediately saw that something had agitated him, but she forbore to ask.

“Mother,” said he at last, “who is my father? Is he dead or alive?”

“God is your father, my son,” answered she, tremblingly. “If you love me, ask me no more.”

“I do love you, mother,” he said, and gave her a grave look, in which she thought she detected a mingling of tenderness and reproach. “And it shall be as you have said.”

It was the first time she had had reason to blush before him, and her emotion came near overwhelming her; but with a violent effort she stifled it, and remained outwardly calm. He began pacing up and down the floor with his head bent and his hands on his back. It suddenly occurred to her that he was a grown man, and that she could no longer hold the same relation to him as his supporter and protector. “Alas,” thought she, “if God will but let me remain his mother, I shall bless and thank Him.”

It was the first time this subject had been broached, and it gave rise to many a doubt and many a question in the anxious mother's mind. Had she been right in concealing from him that which he might justly claim to know? What had been her motive in keeping him ignorant of his origin and of the land of his birth? She had wished him to grow to the strength of manhood,

unconscious of guilt, so that he might bear his head upright, and look the world fearlessly in the face. And still, had there not in all this been a lurking thought of herself, a fear of losing his love, a desire to stand pure and perfect in his eye? She hardly dared to answer these questions, for, alas, she knew not that even our purest motives are but poorly able to bear a searching scrutiny. She began to suspect that her whole course with her son had been wrong from the very beginning. Why had she not told him the stern truth, even if he should despise her for it, even if she should have to stand a blushing culprit in his presence? Often, when she heard his footsteps in the hall, as he returned from the work of the day, she would man herself up and the words hovered upon her lips: “Son, thou art a bastard born, a child of guilt, and thy mother is an outcast upon the earth.” But when she met those calm blue eyes of his, saw the unsuspecting frankness of his manner and the hopefulness with which he looked to the future, her womanly heart shrank from its duty, and she hastened out of the room, threw herself on her bed, and wept. Fiercely she wrestled with God in prayer, until she thought that even God had deserted her. Thus months passed and years, and the constant care and anxiety began to affect her health. She grew pale and nervous, and the slightest noise would annoy her. In the mean while, her manner toward the young man had become strangely altered, and he soon noticed it, although he forbore to speak. She was scrupulously mindful of his comfort, anxiously anticipated his wants, and observed toward him an ever vigilant consideration, as if he had been her master instead of her son.

When Thomas was twenty-two years of age, he was offered a partnership in his employer's business, and with every year his prospects brightened. The sale of his mother's property brought him a very handsome little fortune, which enabled him to build a fine and comfortable house in one of the best portions of the city. Thus their outward circumstances were greatly improved, and of comfort and luxury Brita had all and more than she had ever desired; but her health was broken down, and the physicians declared that a year of foreign travel and a continued residence in Italy might possibly restore her. At last, Thomas, too, began to urge her, until she finally yielded. It was on a bright morning in May that they both

started for New York, and three days later they took the boat for Europe. What countries they were to visit they had hardly decided, but after a brief stay in England we find them again on a steamer bound for Norway.