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Swedish · The Wonderful Adventures of Nils

Vadmalsvåden

The Homespun Cloth

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  1. 1

    The boy flew along high up in the air.

    Pojkenboypojk · noun, nominative, common gender, singularhead of the phrase
    forflewfor · prepositionmodifies Pojken

    Past tense of fara (to travel/fly, here of tomte-Nils and geese in flight); mistagged as a preposition. Translation renders it "flew"/"passing over" far more often than "traveled".

    framforwardfram · adverbpart of the phrase for
    högthighhög · adjective, nominative, neuter, singularmodifies Pojken
    uppeup highuppe · adverbmodifies Pojken
    iini · prepositionpreposition marking luften
    luftenairluft · noun, nominative, common gender, singularoblique complement of uppe

  2. He had the great Östergötland plain beneath him, and sat counting the many white churches that rose up out of small stands of trees.

  3. It was not long before he had reached fifty.

  4. After that he grew confused and could not keep the count in order.

  5. 2

    The very great majority of the farms were built up with large, white-painted two-story houses, which looked so stately that the boy could not help marveling at them.

  6. "There can't be any farmers living in this country," he said to himself, "since I don't see any farmhouses."

  7. 3

    Then all the wild geese at once screeched: "Here the farmers live like gentry.

  8. Here the farmers live like gentry."

  9. 4

    On the plain the ice and snow had vanished, and the spring work had begun.

  10. "What are those long crayfish that go crawling over the fields?" the boy asked after a while.

  11. "—Plows and oxen.

  12. Plows and oxen," answered all the wild geese.

  13. 5

    The oxen moved so slowly across the fields that one could not tell they were moving at all, and the geese called out to them: "You won't get anywhere before next year.

  14. You won't get anywhere before next year."

  15. But the oxen were not at a loss for an answer.

  16. They lifted their muzzles into the air and bellowed: "We do more good in one hour than the likes of you do in your whole life."

  17. 6

    In some places the plows were drawn by horses.

  18. These went forward with much greater eagerness and haste than the oxen, but the geese could not help teasing them too.

  19. "Aren't you ashamed to be doing an ox's work?" they called to the horses.

  20. "Aren't you ashamed to be doing an ox's work?"

  21. "—Aren't you yourselves ashamed to be doing a lazybones' work?" the horses neighed back.

  22. 7

    While the horses and oxen were out at work, the barnyard ram went strutting about at home in the farmyard.

  23. He was newly shorn and nimble, knocked the little boys over, drove the chained dog into his kennel, and then went about strutting as though he were the sole master of the farm.

  24. "Ram, ram, what have you done with your wool?" asked the wild geese, who were flying past up in the air.

  25. "—I've sent it to Drag's mills in Norrköping," answered the ram with a long bleat.

  26. "—Ram, ram, what have you done with your horns?" asked the geese.

  27. But horns were something the ram, to his great sorrow, had never had, and one could not vex him worse than by asking after them.

  28. He ran around for a long while, butting at the air, he grew so angry.

  29. 8

    Along the highway came a man driving before him a flock of Skåne pigs that were no more than a few weeks old and were to be sold farther up the country.

  30. They trudged bravely on, small as they were, and kept close together as if to shelter one another.

  31. "Oink, oink, oink, we've come too soon from father and mother.

  32. Oink, oink, oink, what's to become of us poor children?" said the little pigs.

  33. Not even the wild geese had the heart to make sport of such little wretches.

  34. "It will turn out better for you than you can ever imagine," they called, as they flew past them.

  35. 9

    The wild geese were never in such good humor as when they got to travel over a plains country.

  36. Then they were in no hurry at all, but flew from farm to farm joking with the tame animals.

  37. 10

    As the boy rode along over the plain, he came to think of a tale he had once heard long ago.

  38. He did not remember it properly, but it was something about a tunic that was half sewn of gold-woven velvet and half of gray homespun wool.

  39. But the one who owned the tunic adorned the homespun cloth with so many pearls and precious stones that it shone finer and more costly than the cloth of gold.

  40. 11

    He remembered that about the homespun cloth when he looked down on Östergötland, because it consisted of one great plain wedged between two hilly forest tracts, one to the north and one to the south.

  41. The two forest ridges lay beautifully blue and shimmered in the morning light, as though they were covered with veils of gold, while the plain, which only spread out one winter-bare field after another, was in itself no more beautiful to look at than gray homespun.

  42. 12

    But the people must have thrived well on the plain, because it was generous and good, and they had tried to adorn it in the best way.

  43. As the boy traveled along high above, it seemed to him that towns and farms, churches and factories, manor houses and railway stations were scattered over it like small and large jewels.

  44. The tiled roofs gleamed, and the windowpanes shone like jewels.

  45. Yellow highways, shining railway rails, and blue canals ran between the places like silk-embroidered ribbons.

  46. Linköping lay around its cathedral like a pearl setting around a precious stone, and the farms in the countryside were like little brooches and buttons.

  47. There was not much order in the pattern, but it was a splendor one could never tire of looking at.

  48. 13

    The geese had left the Omberg district and were flying eastward along the Göta Canal.

  49. It too was busy getting itself ready for summer.

  50. Workers went about repairing the canal banks and tarring the great lock gates.

  51. 14

    Yes, work was going on everywhere so as to give spring a proper welcome, in the towns too.

  52. There painters and masons stood on scaffolding outside the houses making them fine, and the maidservants had climbed up into the open windows and were washing the panes.

  53. Down at the harbor sailboats and steamships were being polished up.

  54. 15

    At Norrköping the wild geese left the plains country and flew up toward Kolmården.

  55. They had for a while been following an old hilly highway that wound along ravines and ran beneath wild rock walls, when the boy suddenly gave a cry.

  56. He had been sitting swinging his foot back and forth, and one of his wooden shoes had slipped off him.

  57. 16

    "Gander, gander, I've lost my shoe!" cried the boy.

  58. 17

    The gander turned and sank down toward the ground, but then the boy saw that two children, who had come walking along the road, had picked up his shoe.

  59. 18

    "Gander, gander," the boy cried quickly, "fly up again!

  60. It's too late.

  61. I can't get my shoe back."

  62. 19

    But down on the road stood Åsa the goose-girl and her brother, little Mats, looking at a little wooden shoe that had fallen down from the sky.

  63. 20

    "It was the wild geese who dropped it," said little Mats.

  64. 21

    Åsa the goose-girl stood silent for a long while, pondering over the find.

  65. At last she said slowly and thoughtfully: "Do you remember, little Mats, that when we passed by Övedskloster, we heard tell that on a farm they had seen a tomte dressed in leather breeches, with wooden shoes on his feet like any other workman?

  66. And do you remember that when we came to Vittskövle, a girl told us she had seen a Goa-Nisse with wooden shoes, who flew away on the back of a goose?

  67. And when we ourselves came home to our cottage, little Mats, we saw a pyssling dressed the same way, who also climbed up onto a goose and flew off.

  68. Maybe it was the very same one who rode along up here in the air on his goose and dropped the wooden shoe."

  69. 22

    "Yes, it surely must have been," said little Mats.

  70. 23

    They turned the wooden shoe over and studied it closely, for it is not every day that one finds a Goa-Nisse's wooden shoe on the highway.

  71. 24

    "Wait, wait, little Mats!" said Åsa the goose-girl.

  72. "There's something written on one side to read."

  73. 25

    "Yes, there is.

  74. But the letters are so small."

  75. 26

    "Let me see!

  76. Why, it says—it says: Nils Holgersson from V. Vemmenhög."

  77. 27

    "That's the most remarkable thing I've ever heard!" said little Mats.

The particulars

The text
Nils Holgerssons underbara resa genom Sverige, Selma Lagerlöf. The Wonderful Adventures of Nils.
Translation
Public-domain Swedish (Lagerlöf, d. 1940; published 1906–07). English translation © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC.
Words
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Data
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Two whoopie pies and a pine. An inside joke.