CHAPTER XVII.

THE DANGEROUS STRAITS--BRITISH SEAMANSHIP--THE GLACIERS OF FOLGEFONDE--BERGEN--HABITS OF THE FISHERMEN--THE SOGNE FIORD--LEERDAL--ARRIVAL AT AURON--A HOSPITABLE HOST--ASCENDING THE MOUNTAINS--THE TWO SHEPHERDESSES --HUNTING THE REIN-DEER--ADVENTURE ON THE MOUNTAINS --SLAUGHTERING DEER--THE FAWN.

The time was now drawing to a close that we had purposed to spend in Norway, because we desired to return to England and be present at the regattas which usually take place towards the latter part of July, or commencement of August along the southern coast of England; and therefore it became necessary that we should move with more expedition from place to place than we had hitherto done. A great many plans had suggested themselves to us, and it was a wish to carry them out that had enticed us in the first instance to Scandinavia; some we had already fulfilled, but there were others as important in the list of pleasure not yet realized. Moreover, our provisions, both for our personal use and for the use of the yacht's company, were dwindling to scarcity; and among these barren mountains no bread or meat could be bought. Bidding farewell, therefore, to the beautiful village of Sand, and to the kind hearts that increased its beauty, we made all sail the subsequent day for Bergen.

Siggen, the loftiest scion of Norwegian mountains, soon towered with conic form before and above us; and taking a shorter and different course than the one we had previously steered, we were spectators, as we proceeded, of the most magnificent scenery that the imagination could conceive. We were so fortunate as to keep a fine strong wind the whole way; and our pilot, who was an old and expert mariner, did not hesitate to contend with the rapid currents that flow between the thousand islands which obstruct the narrower and more unfrequented channels of the Bukke Fiord. The cutter, too, retained her celebrity for swiftness, and during her passage to Bergen showed her aptitude to overcome every emergency.

There are, half way between Sand and Bergen and within sight of mighty Siggen, two small islands of rock, disunited by a narrow channel not three hundred yards broad, and between which the stream rushes from a northern to a southern direction with much fleetness and force. It was necessary to pass through this channel; and if any difficulty could have arisen in our pilot's mind as to the efficiency of the yacht in making good her passage to Bergen, and unwarranting his boldness in selecting a path out of the ordinary track, it was the remembrance of this little strait.

On Friday morning, the 16th, two days after we had left Sand, the two islands, each with its solitary cottage belonging to some fishermen, hove in sight. The wind blew nearly due north, and was, as sailors say, "dead on end" for us. As the cutter came up to the islands, we saw a fleet of Norwegian vessels at anchor, waiting a change of wind to attempt the passage.

While the pilot and D---- held a short consultation regarding the capabilities of the yacht, she had already glided, with the noiseless speed of a spirit, into the midst of native brigs and Dutch barges, for they cannot be called, ships. The beauty of the cutter, and the English ensign streaming from the peak, combined with the strange place and novelty of a vessel like the yacht, were quite enough to cause conjecture and excitement among the crews of the different Norwegian and Dutch craft, and to crowd their decks with spectators. The proud, swan-like appearance with which the cutter sailed towards the channel, still more moved their astonishment; and when the first eddy caught the yacht on her weather bow and swung her to leeward, they were satisfied of the impudent attempt we were contemplating.

Every sail of the yacht flapped, and the skilful management of the helm alone prevented the boom from jibing. The pilot now saw that the task was not one which the Iris would, as he had hoped, surmount with ease, and going as far forward as he could, stood on the weather bow as if to re-consider what he was about to undertake. Fixing his eyes long and steadily on the swift flowing water, he appeared to think that, should the wind fail, or the strong current bear us back, the danger was manifest.

During the old pilot's meditation, D---- had mechanically taken his position aft, close to the helmsman on the weather quarter. More fairly, the cutter now started a second time, and, standing well up, promised to fetch the very centre of the passage. The gaff-topsail shook.

"Keep her well full," said D---- to the helmsman. The man kept her half a point more free. The current boiled, and eddied, and bubbled, as all swift running water will do; and when again it caught the cutter's bow, we could all feel the shock just as if she had touched a sand-bank.

"Blow, sweet breeze," said D----, half to himself, half aloud; and casting his eyes, alternately from the flying jib and foresail to the swelling gaff-topsail, stooped down and looked under the boom at the land.

"Steady,--the helm," exclaimed the pilot, as he still stood to windward, holding the bulwarks and bending slightly over the bow.

"Steady, sir," answered the helmsman.

Scarcely had the man made answer, than a puff filled every stitch of canvass, and the cutter yielding to its pressure, leaned over and shot, like a shaft, right into the middle of the channel.

"She'll do it now," said R---- to D----.

"She will, my Lord," replied D----, "if this puff holds ten minutes."

The wind did hold; and behaving well on this, her first tack, and edging up in the wind's eye whenever she could get the chance, the impatient cutter seemed willing to clear the channel on her second tack. The pilot made much of the narrow berth, and ran close to the shore.

"I suppose the water is pretty deep here, eh?" asked R----, addressing himself to D----.

"Oh! yes, my Lord; or the pilot would----"

"'Bout!" shouted the pilot, cutting D---- off in his reply.

"'Bout!" echoed the helmsman.

"Put the helm hard up," continued the pilot excitedly, in a louder voice; "she mustn't shoot."

"Ay, ay, sir," again replied the helmsman, and in obedience to the reply the cutter spun round, like a top. The noise of the sails and blocks, while the vessel was in stays, roused the fishermen, their wives, and children, who dwelt in the two cottages to which I have cursorily alluded, and they gathered about the doors to look on. I heard those hardy fishermen make some observation, for at intervals, we were not many yards from their houses, either in derision of the cutter being imagined competent to work through the channel, or in laudation of the seaman-like skill with which she was managed. They called aloud each to the other across the water, and spoke in praise or admiration; but being in a dialect of the Norwegian language I could not tell what they said, and how they thought. We had made a fair reach, and it was no longer audacity to hope, that, the cutter was a match for the current. To get a better view of the feat, some of the Dutchmen and Norwegians had mounted the shrouds of their vessels, and appeared to take as much interest in the trial as we did.

"'Bout!" a second time exclaimed the pilot, and turning towards the helmsman, made a rotary motion with his hand to bring the cutter right round at once.

"'Bout!" reiterated the helmsman, and lashed the tiller close up under the weather quarter bulwarks. With equal adroitness, as at first, the sails were let go and drawn aft, and our gallant vessel appeared not to feel the resistance of the rapid tide. The wind, although foul as any wind could be, blew steadily as any wind could blow, and the Iris, under its favour, reluctantly though it seemed given, was in another and third tack again in still water. The Dutch and Norwegian crews could not resist expressing their admiration; and flourishing their caps over their heads while standing in their rigging, they gave us three rounds of lusty cheers. The soaring, sombre mountains took up the echoes, and returned not cheer for cheer, but bellowed a ten-fold multiplication of huzzas.

Since we had taken leave, we had seen no vessel to remind us of England; and although, wherever we went, the natives would tell us some of our countrymen were in the immediate neighbourhood, we never had the good fortune to fall in with them. We had received no tidings, good or bad, from home; and Europe, as far as we knew, might be in revolutionary confusion: at Bergen, however, we hoped that letters were awaiting our arrival.

Saturday the 17th of July, at midnight, we brought up off Bergen. It was too late to pay much attention to any object; and after a careless view of the town from deck, I went to bed.

The position of Bergen is similar to that of most of the other Norwegian towns I had seen, girt on three sides with lofty, rocky mountains; and on the fourth side by the blue waters of the Fiord. I looked on Bergen with the liveliest interest, because its name was familiar to me when a child, and I used to lisp the word before I could walk steadily; for in those young days of waywardness my old schoolmistress, whose peaked nose and malicious heart are still a vivid truth, would threaten to give me to the fishermen at Bergen who, she said, would take and toss me into the Maelstrom. With an eagerness akin to that of a schoolboy at Christmas, gazing on the green curtain of a theatre, the moment it is rising to disclose its wondrous entertainments, did I, travelling headlong in memory from childhood to manhood and stumbling over a batch of ancient feelings, stand looking, with strained eyes, on the white-washed, quaint-fashioned Bergen, balancing the vicissitudes of life and conjecturing what the chances might be, I should not, by some agency as unaccountable as that which had brought me hither, be looking in three months' time on the Golden shore of the Bight of Biaffir.

South-east of Bergen, twenty miles from the deck on which I stand, blazing with dazzling splendour in the mid-day sun, the glaciers of Folgefonde fall upon my sight; and raising its summit six thousand feet to heaven, the stupendous range of mountain with its field of ice, forty miles in length and twenty in breadth, braves with eternal snow the tropic fury of this northern noon.

Surrounded as Bergen is by mountains of solid rock which, at a little distance, appear completely black, some of the buildings painted green, and others white, with their uniform roofs of red tiles, have a very singular effect. The houses reared, with much order, on piles near the water, are also neatly constructed of wood; and their bright colours are not permitted to become tarnished by exposure to the weather, but may contend with Holland in cleanliness and the freshness of their paint. This first favourable glance from the deck of the yacht was not altered when I had found myself in the streets. The inhabitants seemed a lively, talkative set, and accustomed to mix with foreigners, for they paid less attention to us than their countrymen and women in the other towns we had visited.

The most important export trade of Bergen consists of timber and salt fish, which are sent to the Mediterranean and Holland. The stench arising from the fish, which is packed in great heaps on the eastern quay of the harbour, is insuperable; and I leave the reader's imagination to reach that height of misery when an unfortunate sight-seeker and traveller like myself, loses his way, at broiling noon, in the vicinity of this market, the thermometer being at 90 deg., and the ling fish at perfection. How the old fishwomen, the natural guardians of this northern frankincense, chatter and squabble! With their blue petticoats tucked up above their knees, how they pick off the stray pieces of raw haddock, or cod, and, with creaking jaws, chew them; and while they ruminate, bask their own flabby carcasses in the sun! With the dried tail of a herring sticking out of their saffron-coloured, shrivelled chops, Lord! how they gaped when I passed by, hurriedly, like a scared cat!

Being pressed for time, as I have hinted before, we did not waste much at Bergen for the present, promising ourselves a longer sojourn when we returned from the Sogne Fiord, for thither were we bound. The primary object that sent us up the Sogne Fiord was, certainly, a little more salmon-fishing; but rein-deer stalking had taken a tender hold of R----'s game side. At Leerdal, a town at the farthest extremity of the Sogne Fiord, and nearly one hundred miles to the north of Bergen, my two friends had heard flowed a wonderful salmon river; and they relied with confidence on the great chances of brilliant success since the stream was so far removed from the path of common travellers. To the northward, too, of Leerdal was Auron, a spot held in repute for the herds of rein-deer that frequent the mountains there; and failing in salmon, my companions might fall to venison. Replenishing, therefore, our exhausted provisions, we secured on Monday evening the services of two pilots; and on Tuesday morning, the 20th, we set sail for Leerdal. The whole of that day was calm; and being on a cruise of much novelty and anticipated sport, this lukewarmness of the wind touched our patience very severely. On any other occasion we should not have observed its indifference; but now we fretted, and expressed our annoyance in clamorous and bitter terms. Towards evening the cutter drifted among a fleet of fishing-boats; and it was no little entertainment to see the rapidity with which the fishermen drew net after net, and the shoals of fish they caught. Flocks of gulls hovered over the boats, and screamed; and sometimes darted down, and bore away the fish in their beaks. We purchased some very large fish, which were not cod, but very like them; and satisfied with their great likeness to that favourite fish, we ate them with greediness; but the heads being of an abominable bull-dog shape, the cook was ordered to decapitate, before committing them to the pot.

On Wednesday morning we entered the Sogne Fiord. It would be tedious to dwell on the magnificence, beauty, and silence of this Fiord; because it would only become a repetition of what I have already attempted to describe as native to the other Fiords. There can be no softer, and more soul-stirring scenery in the world than its small, rare, green valleys, and barren mountains.

This evening, towards sunset, the cutter being becalmed, I went ashore in one of the boats with two men, in search of milk; and making the boat fast to a piece of rock, we walked to the top of a neighbouring hill to look for some signs of a human habitation; but only the waters of the Fiord could be seen at our feet, and the yacht, with a cloud of white canvass, floating on its still surface. No sound,--not a bird's note, nor the cry of animals, fell on the listening ear; save, occasionally, the loud roar and splash of the rocks as they were loosened from the mountains' sides, and rolled down into the water. Wandering about for some time, struck with the sublime, solemn aspect of the mountains and their level summits of endless snow, we found a goat tied with a string to a stake; and taking that as a token of the near abode of human beings, we strove to find some track through the long grass that might lead us to a cottage. One of the sailors climbed up a tree, and veering his body about in all quarters, like a bear on the top of a pole, came down again, and said, that he saw smoke curling upwards from the middle of a fir forest to the south-east. I had a small pocket-compass, and to the south-east, therefore, we went; and after stumbling over fallen rocks, and pulling each other up and down a variety of ravines, differing in depth and ruggedness, we succeeded in arriving at last before a very neat and comfortable cottage. An old woman, clean in dress and comely in her person, came to the door, having, on either side of her, two youths evidently her sons, for their features bore a strong resemblance to her own; and between the lad on her right hand, and the dame's black gown, a large dog, mongrel in his breed, thrust his inquisitive nose. Out of the four windows, which I attributed to the bed-rooms, the heads of four girls popped. Three half-naked savages, or the Graces, could not have caused more excitement in the streets of London, than we did to the amiable inmates of this lonely cottage; for I do not suppose there was another house, or hovel, within twenty miles. King, who had come with us, endeavoured to explain the object of our visit by a request, made in the Norwegian language, for milk, and by holding up the empty jug; but the old woman shook her head, and glancing at the two lads, they shook their heads, and the four girls above shook their heads too, but with the quick perception of drollery common to their sex,--they laughed. King made a step or two nearer to the cottage door to explain himself more distinctly; but the old lady retrograded in the same proportion as King advanced, her two sons following her example, and, likewise, the dog growling most gutturally.

"They don't understand you," I said to King.

"Oh! yes, Sir, they do," he replied; "but they can't make us out, and are afraid."

"The girls ain't afraid, your Honour," observed the good-humoured cockswain, who was the other sailor, beside King, with me, and had been coquetting already with the four lasses. We beckoned to them to come down, and one immediately withdrew her head, and the next moment peeped over the old woman's shoulder. She seemed inclined to speak with us, but the old hag would not permit such conduct: and the more earnestly King notified our pacific errand, the more belligerent the ancient mother thought it.

We were obliged to return without the milk; but I am sure, if the eldest girl had been allowed to use her own discretion, she would have supplied our wants; for when we had gone some distance from the cottage, I looked back and saw her standing at the door; and kissing my hand to her, she returned the salute readily.

I thought the old woman inhospitable, to say nothing of inhuman; for among these solitary mountains we might have lost our way, for aught she knew, and our wants exceeded a pint of milk. This is not, however, the general character of the Norwegians, for they are tender-hearted, kind, and generous to strangers; but fear had superseded the sympathy of the old lady's expansive heart; and had men of riper years than her sons been present, we should not have met with so much inattention to our necessities. Even the girl, young though she was, desired to administer to our need; but sweetness of manner, simplicity, tenderness, and noble generosity are unchanging types of the youthful female character in every quarter of the earth.

When I got on board again, R---- and P---- were amusing themselves by firing, one by one, at all the empty soda-water bottles that the steward could find. The bottles were slung to an oar which was stuck upright in the taffrail aft; and placing themselves close to the windlass, my two associates secured a range of some forty or fifty feet along the deck. Now and then a grampus would divert their attention; and every time the fish rose, a bullet was lodged, or attempted to be lodged, in his huge dorsal fin. In this way the greater portion of the time was passed, altered only by rowing about in the gig, and seeking for wild ducks among the crevices of the rocks. But the farther we sailed into the interior of the Fiord, the more bereft of animal and vegetable life the country appeared to become; the scream of the eagle, and the report of the rocks as they split asunder and bounded down the mountains, being the only sounds that varied the silent monotony. Sometimes the swivels were fired for the sake of listening to the echoes, which, by their prolonged reverberations, repaid us well for the lard we consumed in greasing the muzzles; a salute of nineteen or twenty guns, fired at intervals of fifteen or seventeen seconds, creating the most astonishing uproar; and what with the shrill screams of the eagles, the consternation of wild geese, and the falling of the rocks caused by the violent motion of the atmosphere, the powder and tow were profitably expended by the novel entertainment they produced. This amusement, I must intimate, was a favourite one with all on board, not omitting even Jacko; and whenever the yacht became land-locked, I could always hear the distinguishing order,

"Load the swivels!"

If it were not for the wild grandeur of the scenery, the sail among these Fiords would be most tedious, unchanging, as they are, by indications of human abode.

On Friday morning, at twelve, we arrived at Leerdal; and considered ourselves most fortunate in taking only four days to drift from Bergen; for beyond the eddying air that breathed down the valleys, no other agency had propelled the vessel nearly one hundred miles.

Here we met a young Englishman who had travelled, for pleasure, over land from Christiania; and although he could not speak two Norwegian words, had contrived, by some unaccountable method, to supply all his wants without difficulty. He was on his way to Bergen; and giving him all the information he begged of us, we parted company, exchanging mutual desires to meet again. Finding this place most desolate, we left it, and the cutter was got under weigh the next morning, Saturday, for Auron, a small town not many leagues farther up the Sogne Fiord, and receiving from both our pilots the reputation of greater liveliness and importance. Early the following morning we came within sight of Auron, and went ashore before the anchor was dropped.

Auron, like all the Norwegian villages that are found, at rare intervals, among the Fiords, is situated in a valley that rises gently from the shore of the Fiord, and hastens in a steep ascent till it aspires, south, east, and west, into high mountains, and inaccessible cliffs. This hamlet of Auron was the most pleasantly situated of any that we had seen; and the romantic beauty of the scenery was not more perfect than the unanimity that seemed to animate the whole village. The yellow ears of corn had invited men, women, children, and dogs to gather them for winter store; and dispersed over a large field that sloped along the valley to a considerable height up the mountains, this universal family, inclusive of the dogs, was at its work. The arrival, however, of three Englishmen with a retinue of some fifteen English tars, strange-looking fellows! at their backs, was a circumstance not likely to pass off in silence, or without due attention; and the intelligence sounded by the tongues of several ragged urchins, frolicking on the beach of the Fiord, was communicated to a lazy cur that set up a continuous howl, and his noisy throat spread the news to the diligent folk among the corn. In a short time we were naturally hemmed about by a throng of both sexes, human and canine, curious to learn the reason of our coming to Auron. The gestures of these people were so energetic, and their voices so low, that, had I not known both by history and my own observation, the Norwegians were not cannibals, I should assuredly have been led away by the idea they were devising some scheme to murder and eat us. Their behaviour, though respectful, appeared so suspicious, that I was not at first without fear; but being the slightest made and thinnest of the three, and my two friends being ruddy and plump, I consoled myself by knowing that their previous immolation would be timely warning enough for me to make good my escape. While these useful reflections were putting me on my guard, a little, spare, grey-eyed, high-cheekboned, long-headed man, forced his way through the crowd, and tottering into the central space occupied by ourselves, took off his felt hat, and making a profound obeisance remained, with extreme courtesy, uncovered; but said nothing.

King was ordered to ask the man what the nature of his visit was, and to tell him the object of ours. A few curt questions and answers made us understand, that he was the very person of all that lived in Auron whose acquaintance we most desired. The little man was lord of five hundred rein-deer, and sole proprietor of the salmon river of which we had come so far in search. The intelligent eyes of the Norwegian sparkled with satisfaction, when he replaced his hat on his head, and shook hands heartily with us all. The multitude who had given attentive ear to the dialogue between King and their countryman, appeared pleased with the immediate familiarity that sprung up between the Norwegian and ourselves, and showed their cordial acquiescence by shaking us also by the hand. Hurrying through the villagers our new friend led us with triumphant strides and a vivacious air towards his cottage, and calling forth his wife, bade her salute us, which she did with that modest and simple demeanour common to her countrywomen. Gratified that he had so far conduced, as he imagined, to our comfort, the Norwegian would insist on our entering his house; and conducting us, by a steep and narrow stair, to an upper room, the windows of which overlooked a small garden filled with currant bushes, brought us, in due lapse of time, every dainty that his larder or the thriftiness of his wife could give. Although we were not hungry, we were too sensible of a hospitable man's feelings to give offence by saying we had just breakfasted, but attacking the different mountain delicacies, such as dried venison, and broiled capercaillie, we actually devoured all that had been placed before us, and did not decline a succession of native cheeses. These latter dainties were, however, rather too much perfumed and animated for me, and I left their entire consumption to the more fashionable taste of my companions. After this slight repast, we then told our host, definitively, the plans we wished to carry out by wending our way to Auron; and that he would confer the greatest favour on us if he could secure us a day's sport on the mountains. Our host replied, that he was himself a proprietor of several hundred rein-deer; but his consent that we should disturb the peacefulness of the whole herd, by firing at a deer belonging to him, was not alone to be obtained. He informed us, that the rein-deer were the original cattle of the country; and the primitive usages adopted with regard to these animals by the old inhabitants of Norway were still persisted in by their descendants.

"On the tops of these mountains," he said in Norwegian, and, I am afraid, I translate his beautiful language but indifferently, "many hundred rein-deer are wandering; and though a great many belong to me, I cannot give you leave to shoot one of them, without the consent of those by whom the remaining deer are owned; for all the deer herd together, and they are only known to belong to different persons by the marks made, at birth, on their skin. Mine have two slits on the right ear. These distinguishing marks, which separate my deer from those claimed by the neighbouring farmers, are so slight, that, they could not be ascertained at a distance; and in taking aim with your rifles, you might miss my deer and destroy the property of another man. You must be so placed, that, you may kill, indifferently, any deer that comes within shot; and for that purpose I must seek the assent of my friends. If, however, you will go to the mountains with me to-day, you shall see the herds, and to-morrow I will send round to my friends; to-day it is hopeless to think of communicating with my neighbours, for they live so far;--the night would come before my task was finished."

We hesitated for some time whether we should undergo the fatigue of travelling over such declivitous mountains without any palpable reward.

"You hesitate," the Norwegian observed, smiling; "but you will not be sorry when you stand up there."

And he pointed to the high peaks of the mountains that soared half-way up to the clear, blue firmament.

"Let us not go unarmed," he continued, "for there are wolves and bears; and the nightly destruction of our flocks gives us need of men who love the chase like you. I, myself, will bear you company. Come, let us go."

The intimation that bears and wolves congregated on the level lands above was quite sufficient to decide our wavering mood; and ordering the crew to return with the gig to the yacht, and bring our rifles, we wiled away the intermediate time by sitting at a window that opened upon the waters of the Fiord, and afforded us a splendid view of the limitless range of mountains on the opposite shore, called the Reenfjeld.

The morning was sometimes bright and clear, and sometimes the sky was dimmed by large, dark, solid masses of clouds. It was very beautiful to see the mountains glittering with their white summits in the strong sunlight, while their bases were blackened with a shower of rain. These showers were partial, and all things around so still, that we could hear the rain drops pattering among the leaves of the trees that grew on the sides of the mountains two miles from the spot where we sat rejoicing in the warmth and cheerfulness of a summer's sun.

At eleven o'clock the boat returned with rifles, and powder enough to blow up the village of Auron. Our host, who had disappeared for some little time, now came back decked out like a chamois-hunter. His hat had been exchanged for a red cap that fitted exactly to his skull, and a velvet jacket buttoned up to his throat, defined a tolerable expanse of chest. Across his back, from the right shoulder towards the left heel, his trusty gun was slung, muzzle downwards. A leathern belt went entirely round his waist, and pressing a brace of horse-pistols and a wonderfully large knife to his left hip-bone, was clasped in front with an embossed silver buckle. A red handkerchief, spotted white, hung by a knowing loop from the right arm, contained provender and a flask of liquor for the inward man. This last piece of accoutrement had the evident impress of a woman's clear-sightedness; for while our friend fortified the outward walls of his person with guns, pistols, and knives, his wife, knowing how useless all these preparations were without suitable attention to the repletion of the cisterns and stores of the citadel, had suggested, with affectionate devotion no doubt, this trifling bundle as being necessary to the conquest of present labour and future danger. The very knot bore the combined neatness and strength of female ingenuity, and its complication looked endless as conjugal love.

The Norwegian, our three selves, and King, formed the whole party. Our ascent of the mountain, I need scarcely say, put the sinews of our thighs to a severe test; and the higher we mounted, the more frequent were the expressions of fatigue. When we had clambered a quarter of the way, we came suddenly upon two sheds built of wood, and appropriated to the use of a little girl and half a hundred pigs. I do not know whether the swine squeaked their surprise more at seeing us, than the cheerless child looked it. King, who had been ailing occasionally for some days, now fell to the rear, and said, that, he was incompetent to proceed any farther, and the permission to descend, which he solicited, was granted.

All larger vegetation now began gradually to disappear, and though I had hardly marked the trees dwindling from the cherry to the filbert, and then to long tufts of grass, the bare rocks strewed over an endless tract of gravel made me stop and look about. When I cast my eyes above, the mountains still towered half a mile higher, and gazing downwards I could see the different kinds of trees and shrubs changing in size and colour of their foliage, as the space between me and the low lands increased. I do not remember that I had ever exceeded in elevation the point to which I had now risen; and perhaps the appearance of the valleys, the water, and habitations of men might have been more novel than to persons who are accustomed to crawl to the tops of mountains. I must confess I remained perfectly lost in thought for some minutes; nor did I ever feel, or could imagine so distinctly, how the stupendous and neglected works of creation are blended with the truest beauty; for, seen from the very mountains on which I stood, so rough, so barren, so bleak, the same rugged, straggling rocks, scattered over the opposite mountain, seemed soft as velvet and more delicate than the finished lines of a miniature.

Beneath the dark, blue surface of the Fiord I could discover shoals and rocks for which the mariner had sought in vain, and for many miles along the shore the shelving land showed, with a faint yellow tinge, the distance it stretched under the water that was otherwise of a deep azure shade. When from the deeply-dyed cerulean water, the valley with its different green colours of tree and grass, and the red tints of the atmosphere that rested round the sides of the remoter mountains, I lifted my eyes to the fields of snow that extended, to an incalculable extent, over the flat summit of the Reenfjeld, the contrast was so forcible, that while I gazed my very soul seemed to bound with delight it had discovered Sublimity was something material, and not an ideal torture.

"Hollo! Bill, keep moving," was shouted in a loud voice from some rocks above my head, and seriously interfered with any further contemplation.

"Here's a fox," continued the same voice, sustaining its sharp, resonant tone; "come, and smell him!"

Though fond of giving reins to the imagination, I am as matter of fact as most people when necessity requires it; nor do I yield to any man the estimation at which I hold the odorous Reynard. Tucking my feet well into the shingly mountain side, and bringing the point of equilibrium, as nearly as possible, to an angle of twenty-five degrees, I scrambled towards R----, and P----, and the Norwegian. They were all three on their knees peering into a hole that Reynard had intended should be round; but having forgotten, or never heard of Euclid, had dug it frightfully oblong. It must have hurt his back to go in and out. We shouted, and rummaged the premises very disgracefully, and if Reynard were at home, I need not state the opinion I entertain of his courage; for apathetic as I am, no one, not Goliath himself, should have ransacked my house with the impunity we poked long sticks, and threw acute-sided stones into the recesses of the Fox's residence. I ventured to assure my companions that Reynard was abroad, and accepting my hint, they partially jammed up the mouth of the cave with the fragments of an old hat, and rising from their knees, left Reynard to find out who had meddled with his lodging.

I have heard say, that mariners, returning home from India, may smell, for many leagues off the Island of Madagascar, the sweet odour of countless spices; but I must do this fox the fairness to state, that if he were exiled to the Island of Madagascar, those latitudes would soon excite in the minds of all keen-scented sailors the idea of an interesting expedition to discover the variation of smell.

Passing that portion of the mountain where the hardiest plants had ceased to grow, we arrived at those high regions abounding with the rein-deer moss, and struggling with the severity of the cold temperature the wild strawberry put forth its small, red fruit. The rein-deer moss being purely white, like hoar frost, the scarlet colour of the strawberry mingling thickly with it, conveyed pleasure to the eye, and a feeling of delicacy to the mind. Our path did not become less irksome now we had left the gravel behind, for the moss yielded with its softness so much to the feet, that it sometimes covered our ankles; but panting with desire to ascend the supreme brow of the mountain, fatigue succumbed to the resuscitation of spiritual vigour.

Standing on a solitary patch of snow that spread over the highest point of the mountain we found ourselves on a level plain with the lofty chain of the Reenfjeld, separated from us by a gulf of fifteen miles, at the bottom of which flowed the Sogne Fiord diminished in its wide expanse to a river, and darkened to the sable dye of ebony by the intersecting shadows of numerous mountains. The general character of the Norwegian mountains being perfectly flat on the top, the distance seen where we stood was very great; and the table-land assumed more solemn grandeur, free as it almost was from glaciers, since, with livelier relief, the peaks that cleaved the air shone brilliantly with their snowy hoods; and over an infinite extent of country, diversifying no other verdure with that of the tawny moss, these peaks, rising numberlessly, one over the other, seemed like conical loaves of white sugar placed on an enormous sheet of brown paper.

Taking up a handful of snow, we jestingly alluded to the occupation of our cockney friends at the same moment, and saw them, in fancy, tricked out with the Gallic finery of kid gloves and nankeen trowsers, strutting through the crowded thoroughfares of Regent Street, or ambling in Rotten Row.

"Yes, by George!" observed R----, who had been silently scraping the snow together, and levelling it with his foot again, "I remember the time when, about this hour of the day, and season of the year, then somewhat younger than I am now, I used to look at men who talked of anything else but balls, operas, and Hyde Park, as so many marvels of imbecility; but now their good sense and just estimation of life oppress me with the recollection of that lost portion of my own youth passed in all the puppyism of fashion."

"Ay," I replied, "there is one consolation in growing old, we grow wiser in our wickedness."

"Well, and if men are, de natura, depraved," continued R----, "and possess virtue and vice only in proportional masses to the size of the brain and body, they can surely exhibit a pound or two of wisdom to eighteen stone of folly; and if they must be asinine, may cover their actions with a little good sense."

"They may, truly," I said; "but remember your head has not grown a particle larger since the Spring of 1844, nor your body less; but had the same idea of Ethics been then presented to you, you would certainly not have seen its lucidity."

R---- was about to retort, and I do not know how much longer we should have endangered the moral existence of the young dandies at home, had not P----, already at a distance from us, called out with the impatience of a huntsman,

"Are you fellows coming on to-day?"

In a few seconds we overtook P---- and the Norwegian, and they proposed that we should descend till we came to a valley, which the Norwegian pointed out at a considerable way beneath us, and there it was thought we should find a herd of deer. Remaining stationary while we spoke, a space of fifty miles, partly mountain, and partly valley, lay above and below us, and glancing the eye from end to end of this immense tract, not a hut of any kind could be seen; but, faintly, the tinkling of bells attached to the necks of sheep, or cattle, could be heard, and that only when the feeble puffs of wind blew from a certain direction. We wandered for many miles over the desolate mountains, and found no signs by which we might be guided to the animals that we sought. Hour after hour elapsed, and the day began to wane; but no tracks, not even the print of their hooves on the muddy banks of the small lakes that abounded everywhere, pointed the path the deer had taken. We reached, at last, towards sunset, a valley that, virent by the multitude and variety of its trees, changed the dreary similarity pervading all things; and a few sheep, that bleated loudly when they saw us, led us to hope we had come again within the line of animal existence. The Norwegian, our guide, however, said that no one lived in this valley, but in an adjoining vale, he thought, some cowherds dwelt.

"What are all these sheep here for?" I asked.

"They are driven here," the man replied, "for food; since in the lower lands the grass is parched by heat."

"Who takes care of them, then?" again I asked.

"No one," answered the guide. "They will remain among these mountains all the summer; and when the winter returns, they will be taken home, and folded at Auron."

While the Norwegian was still addressing these sentences to me, we had crossed the rivulet that gurgled through the valley, and commenced our ascending zigzag way. The skins and bones of sheep destroyed by the wolves that infest these mountains were scattered on every hand, and the foot-marks of these furious brutes and bears were plainly distinguishable on those parts of the soil moistened by the snow-water, and not covered with moss. Our flagging spirits were roused when we remembered that it might so chance we fell in with one of these animals; but our guide did not