The poet scourges this incompetent king, who in his conceit believed himself to resemble Charles XII, and in all things endeavored to imitate the great warrior-king. He imagined himself to be “The Faithful and True” mentioned in the 19th Chapter of the Book of Revelation; that the world’s last days were at hand; and that Napoleon, his enemy, was the monstrous beast sprung up out of the ocean. So he waited revelations and archangels that should come from heaven to his aid. He also cherished the belief that in his own body Charles XII’s soul had taken up its terrestrial habitation; — which Pythagoras might have seriously questioned.
The sarcasm and ridicule of this canto is intensified by the solemn form in which it is written, and the use of the plural pronoun “we” for “I”, put into the mouth of the egotistical monarch.
Cf. Tegner’s poem, Karl XII:
“Kung Karl, den unge hjalte, Han stod i rok och dam,” etc., of which Runeberg has felicitously adopted the metric form.
The feeling among the officers against the king finds expression not only in this canto, but also in the following, The Field Marshal.
Johan Kristoffer Toll (1743-1817) was Governor-General of Skáne. He also took part in the Pomeranian War.
Karl Klas Piper (1770-1850) was Colonel at the time of the 1808-9 war, in which, however, he took no part.
Karl Lagerbring (1751-1822) was State Secretary of War; he later became Governor, Minister of State, etc.
XV. THE KING.
And now King Gustaf Adolf
Arose within his hall,
Broke his protracted silence,
And let his accents fall.
And for this time around him
These listeners had he:
Field-Marshal Toll, Count Piper,
Karl Lagerbring, — but three.
The king in utterance solemn
Thus forth his edict brought:
“Our Finnish troops, — God help us, —
Move back, but forward not!
The hopes we built on Klingspor
Unfolded nevermore;
Now Sveaborg is fallen,
And that support is o’er.
“We’ve trusted in a vision,
Till faith has weary grown;
But the archangel dallies,
Has not himself yet shown.
Meanwhile is sounding nearer
War’s frightful din and blare;
It is for us, as monarch,
A serious affair.
“And therefore we have moulded
Our regal mandate here;
Our grave and serious purpose
Decreed shall now appear:
Namely, we have commanded
To be brought here this day
The garb our Swedish Lion
First donned at Narva’s fray.
“The gloves of Charles Twelfth, monarch,
Now to draw on we plan; —
This with a meaning double, —
As monarch and as man.
We will around us buckle
That mighty hero’s blade,
And strike, like him, with wonder
A world by sleep o’erweighed.
“You, Piper, shall assist us
To draw his one glove on; —
You, Lagerbring, shall help us
The other then to don.
Field-Marshal Toll, your honor
And age such worth afford,
That you may round us circle
His triumph-laureled sword.”
And soon King Gustaf Adolf,
Grave as a God, and staid,
Stood there before their glances,
As Charles the Twelfth arrayed.
He was too proud for converse
Just now, so nothing said;
And round the hall he strutted,
With giant-measured tread.
When he this walk had finished,
An act was yet to see:
He readied the sword and guantlets
Again back to the three;
He looked on them with glances
Framed not at all in jest,
And deigned to break the silence
Once more with words expressed:
“Now Lagerbring, attention!
Quick to the army say
That we in grace have clothed us
In Charles the Twelfth’s array.
Field-Marshal Toll, Count Piper,
We call on you to weigh,
As witnesses, our action
On this illustrious day!”
How great a change of order
The war of Finland found
From this momentous exploit,
Doth history not expound.
But sure, ’twas struck with wonder, —
The world there round the king, —
The old man Toll, Count Piper,
And likewise Lagerbring!
CANTO SIXTEENTH. THE FIELD MARSHAL.
A satire on the inefficient leader sent by the King to defend Finland The title of the canto refers to Klingspor, who is made the subject of flaunting and ridicule by the drinking warriors here assembled, until the aged Lode in disgust withdraws from the jangling crowd that wastes time on so wretched a subject.
This canto is a companion satire to The King, Canto XV.
Baron (later Count) Vilhelm Mauritz Klingspor was born in 1744, and died in 1814. In the war of 1783-90 he had been chief commissary. He was weak and undecided in character, unable to win the confidence of his soldiers, was one-eyed, fat, good-humored, good-looking, and of a decidedly epicurean tendency, “with more stomach than brain,” and unable to endure privation. He was a courtier, not a warrior. Yet he had risen to Major-General in 1789, and later to chief of the troops in Finland; and, despite his vacillating incompetence, he held the commandership at the outbreak of the war in 1808. He took command personally in no battle, but wisely deputed it to his nearest man, Adjutant-General Adlercreutz. Klingspor was cowardly, made a business of retreating, and was accustomed to travel “well packed up in his covered sledge as guide-in-chief.” He was made Governor-General in 1809, but was dismissed from his post the following year.
Frantsila is a parish 5 1/2 miles southeast from Siikajoki.
Adolph Ludvig Christjernin, Johan Henrik Furumark, Karl Reinhold Ladau, and Gustaf Aminoff, had all taken part in the former Finnish war of 1788-90.
Aminoff (1771-1836) had fought bravely at Revolaks, Lappo and Alavo, and in 1810 became Vibelius’ successor as Governor of the provinces of Savolaks and Karelen.
Johan Henrik Aflecht, Captain of the Savolaks Infantry Regiment, fell in the battle of Revolaks.
Gustaf Adolf Ehrnroth (1779-1848), Major with the Savolaks Infantry, seriously wounded at Oravais, after the war dwelt in Finland. Revolaks is a parish of Osterbotten, on the Siikajoki River.
Erik Alexander Tigerstedt, cousin to Gregori Tigerstedt (see Canto XXV), Lieutenant with Savolaks Infantry, also perished on the field of Revolaks. He was a hopeful and cultured officer.
XVI. THE FIELD MARSHAL.
Joy in Frantsila exultant
From the camps of Cronstedt sounded;
News of Siikajoki’s triumph
In the eve had thither bounded;
And they drank, in scattered circles,
To the fatherland they cherished,
To its earliest glimpse of fortune,
To its glory not yet perished.
Two intrepid veteran warriors,
First lieutenants of one feather,
Aged Christjernin and Lode,
One could there behold together;
Of their rank, and by them standing,
Aminoff his head uplifted,
And a band of younger warriors
To a circle round them shifted.
As they drank they all were chatting
Free, of all things whatsoever;
In such throng there was occasion
To restrain one’s chatter never;
Weak complaints
against commanders
No one ever sought to smother;
Now of all proud names, the Marshal’s
Sounded high o’er every other.
Aflecht, he who first in battle
Fell at Revolaks, nor faltered,
Merry spoke: “A skoal to Klingspor!
Brothers, he his plan has altered;
Jolly will it be to notice
How his brow is now uplifted;
Since through all the land he’s trotted,
To a bold stand he has shifted!”
One of Cronstedt’s aids, Lieutenant
Reiher, thus to speech did waken:
“Klingspor make a stand? Who says it
Is most damnably mistaken!
Adlercreutz it was, and Hertzen,
To our shame put termination;
And, as usual, fled the marshal
Like the devil from his station.”
Major Furumark made comment:
“Tis the king whom we should censure; —
For to put this trump so paltry
In the game, why did he venture?”
Ladau said: “You are not fitted
All the Marshal’s worth to measure;
You have heart, and he has stomach;
Death is yours, — food his sole pleasure!”
Ehrnroth said: “Let us remember
Where he sparkled in his glory;
It is not within store-houses
One grows ripe for martial story.
Klingspor’s hero-path has led him
Through the job of commissary;
Who would wonder he loves eating
More than matters military?”
Tigerstedt, the boy of Finland,
He who Aflecht’s fate was sharing,
Sudden bit his teeth together,
And broke out in wrath, declaring:
“It is true, he is an alien,
Has not grown within our valleys,
Does not understand our customs,
Nor in language with us tallies;
But he has beheld our country,
He has seen its rocks and islands,
Seen its thousand, thousand waters,
As we see them from our highlands;
Without God and without feeling
Must he be, the selfish mortal,
Who would not defend this country,
Joyous e’en to death’s own portal!”
Christjernin looked up toward Lode:
“Do you hear the youngsters, brother?
Klingspor of their tongues is victim
This day, as on many another.
We could call ourselves more happy
Death to meet on war-field gory,
Than to suffer the besmirching
Given our poor Field-Marshal’s glory!”
And the stern and aged Lode
Had sat silent through the prattle;
Now he rose, of all the tallest,
With his features flushed for battle; —
Drained his filled glass to the bottom,
Struck it hard upon the table; —
Neath his arm his hat then holding,
Spoke, to hold his scorn unable:
“I depart from this assembly;
Pleasure here may be for others;
One must hear the worthless Klingspor
Cursed where’er a circle gathers!
The Field-Marshal! The Field-Marshal!
Only theme of endless wrangling;
’Tis a shame that men so valiant
Should o’er such a wretch be jangling!”
CANTO SEVENTEENTH. SVEABORG.
A woe-cry over the betrayal of the Fatherland.
This poem was not placed by Runeberg himself among the Songs of Fanrik Stål; but in the later editions it has been here included, as its contents seem to conjoin it with The King and The Field Marshal.
Sveaborg, “the Gibraltar of the North,” was built late in the 18th century by Augustin Ehrensvárd, who died 1772 and lies buried therein. This granite fortress stands upon the seven islets just outside of Helsingfors. On the most southern of these is the fort called Gustafssvard (Gustaf’s Sword). Its commandant had been, since 1801, Vice-Admiral Karl Olof Cronstedt (1756-1820), the same who, commanding the Swedish fleet, achieved such a glorious victory over the Russians at Svensksund July 9-19, 1790. On May 3, 1808, Sveaborg, of which he was commandant, was, by the shameful capitulation of Cronstedt, surrendered to the Russian General V. Suchtelen.
“A conscious traitor Cronstedt certainly was not, nor false; but he lacked altogether the qualities required in the commandant of a fortress,” it was declared. Yet it was by some believed his surrender was purchased by a bribe of the enemy.
The poet has given expression to a feeling that existed among the veterans from the war of 1808; but from a historical standpoint, according to the dictum of others, “his strong words are unwarranted.”
Old Ensign Stál’s condemnation of Cronstedt is so extreme and overwhelming that he will not even mention the name of the nation’s betrayer as he recites the mournful tale to the youthful poet. And to catch the spirit of the song, we must assume the denunciatory attitude of the narrator.
XVII. SVEABORG.
We sat, when day had glided by,
Beside the fire-light’s glow,
The aged Ensign Stål and I, —
We made our custom so.
Our chat and jest the day had claimed,
When Sveaborg by chance was named.
I scarcely did the name suggest,
When sudden, all was grave.
“Hast seen where Ehrnsvard’s fort doth rest, —
An isle in ocean’s wave, —
Gibraltar’s image in the North?”
With gloom the old man’s words came forth.
“She looks across the sea and fjord
With eyes of granite clear,
And lifts on high her Gustaf’s Sword,
With challenge proud: ‘Come here!
This sword does not descend for blows;
It flashes but to shatter foes!’
“Approach thou not in scorn the isle
When war carves out his path;
Disturb the sea-queen not the while
She reeketh in her wrath!
To thee death’s message doth she fling,
Which thousand cannon-voices bring.
“Now backward forced were Finland’s troops,
Near polar bounds they stood;
Yet brightly flaming were our hopes,
Yet glowed our dauntless mood.
We could repair our wasted powers,
As long as Sveaborg was ours.
“Each clouded brow grew quickly clear
When rang that name alone;
Laments were o’er, nor care or fear,
Nor cold or want was known.
New life the Finnish bear now took,
And shook his mighty paw, and struck.
“On snow-drifts’ bed how many a night
That name inspired mine ear
From some gray champion of the fight,
Far from his homeland dear!
This was his fire in winter’s thrall,
In distant land his home, his all.
“Then from the south a whisper broke, —
A story of alarms;
Of treason foul the rumor spoke,
Of scoffing at our arms.
From man to man, from plain to plain,
The rumor met but proud disdain.
“That day of days is ne’er forgot
Which proved this story true; —
When, like a dismal thunder-shot,
The tidings to us flew
That all our country’s hope was o’er,
And Sveaborg was ours no more!
“Had ocean’s vast abysmal bowl
Engulfed the fortress all?
Had lightning’s flash or thunder’s roll
O’erthrown its ma
ssive wall?
Did on its ramparts none remain? —
We asked, but could no answer gain.
“From many a stricken heart a sigh
Long pent was then bestowed;
Once poor in tears, now many an eye
With copious streams o’erflowed.
And it was dead, our fatherland!
We by its grave must weeping stand!
“O life! The man whose heinous sin
Caused all these tears to run,
Did once the fairest laurels win
That ever hero won: —
For victor at Svensksund was he,
The Swedish fleet’s great victory.
“Yet though a world its radiance
Had found but through his sword,
Though suns had paled before his lance,
He still must be abhorred.
Scorn is the wage for deed of knave
Upon the rock by Ehrnsvard’s grave.
“You love, O youth, both verse and song,
You love our story old,
And you perchance may sing erelong
The tales I now unfold;
Then give his dark misdeed the light,
But veil, as I, his name in night.
“Sing not his rank, his kin ne’er name,
His crime must be his own;
May no one redden for the shame
That falls on him alone.
He who his native land betrays,
No father has, nor son, nor race.
“The name “False Arm” shall him adorn,
For Finland’s stay once placed;
Call him Dishonor, Shame, and Scorn,
And Death, by crime disgraced!
Thus only should his name appear,
To spare the ears of them that hear.
“Take all the darkness of the grave,
And all the woes that live,
And build thereof a name for knave,
And him the title give; —
’Twould wake less sorrow evermore
Than name at Sveaborg he bore!”
CANTO EIGHTEENTH. DOBELN AT JUUTAS.
A poetic narrative, which is highly epic and dramatic.
George Karl von Dobeln was the most popular and best loved of all the heroes of the Finnish war, despite his hot blood and inequable disposition. His keen eye, his bravery, his burning love for the homeland, and his lofty-minded chivalry, combined to place him among the foremost personages of the army.
Collected Works of Johan Ludvig Runeberg Page 10