[189] The charm of this name was illustrated in a curious way during the journey of the writer and another American through the mountains of central Norway in the summer of 1890. One early evening they came to the cabin of a _sæter_, or summer pasture, high up on the side of Gaustafjeld, and asked to be lodged for the night. It appeared that the only room available for strangers was already occupied by two young men from Christiania; but when the conversation developed the fact that both the late-comers were from America, and one from Minnesota, the woman of the house hastened off into the next room, ordered out the two Norwegians, and announced on returning that the room was at the service of the foreigners! Of the peculiar fitness of the Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes for this promotion of economic progress in a great section of the country, there is practically a unanimous opinion. A dispassionate, mature estimate is expressed officially by an agent of the British Government sent out to study the question of immigration in the United States. "It is generally admitted," he states, "that physically, morally, and socially, no better class of immigrants enter the United States. In some respects they are the most desirable of all."[190] A first-hand observer of their work as western farmers wrote in 1868 concerning the settlers in a Norwegian township in Minnesota, "They open their farms quicker, raise better stock than most any other class, and quickly become wealthy."[191] In a hearing before the Industrial Commission in 1899, Hermann Stump, a prominent German, testified that the Scandinavians "are really the best immigrants who come to the United States."[192] [190] _Report of the Board of Trade of Great Britain on Alien Immigration to The United States_, 211, 212. [191] Goddard, _Where to Emigrate and Why_, 247. [192] _Report of the Industrial Commission_, XV, 22. While the Scandinavians were admirably fitted to become substantial citizens and to develop their own properties, and while the prospect of possessing a farm was the most potent and pervading influence affecting their movements after about 1850, the very high rate of wages paid in the United States, as compared with the wages in Europe, was everywhere an important factor among the immediate attractions. All of the western States, in the first decade of their growth, were exceedingly anxious to secure settlers who should take up and improve the vacant square miles, thus adding to the population and to the taxable values of the commonwealth. At the same time there was a large and steady demand for wage-labor; the farmers needed helpers; the construction of internal improvements, begun and projected, like the rapidly expanding railroad systems, could be carried on only by the aid of an abundance of laborers.[193] [193] Mattson, _The Story of an Emigrant_, 29 ff.