“Within a few hours of our arrival in Christiania the hotel servant came to tell us someone wanted to speak to us through the telephone… ‘Have you arrived?’ called a cheery voice in English, which we at once recognised as Dr. Fridtjof Nansen’s.
‘Yes, and very tired from the over-land and over-ice journey of 1300 miles.’
‘Please don’t be tired–rest a bit, and come to a party at my mother-in-law’s at eight o’clock.’
After a good deal of talking, tired as we were, we arranged that we would go, as it was a special party got up for a son-in-law’s birthday, and we would meet many old friends and some new ones. So at eight o’clock we went.
In a moment Dr. Nansen came forward and bore us off to the second drawing-room, to introduce us to his mother-in-law, who, unfortunately, being a very old lady, could not speak anything but Norsk.
As soon as we had time to look around, we noticed that one end of the room was draped with a large Norwegian flag, in front of which there were three busts – not of the King, but the busts of the great Radical leaders, all of whom were in the room in the flesh. Björnson was in the middle; Grieg, the composer, was on the right, while on the left was Professor Ernest Sars, the son of the hostess, and one of the prime leaders of the Radical Party.”
Mrs. Alec Tweedie: ‘Henrik Ibsen and Björnstjerne Björnson’ in Temple Bar, London: 1893
