The Argosy — page 303: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

286 About Norway. though we knew it not then. You think at once, dear reader, that we were robbed or murdered by these Dutchmen, but you are wrong. ‘They were only off before us the next morning, and during the remainder of that week were ahead of us on the road, taking up horses and carrioles, devouring everything before them like an army of locusts, and behaving to everyone they met with the greatest possible impoliteness. In the end they were voted a perfect nuisance by all, and a disgrace to their country. If anyone wishes to know what it is to have a night of sound, refreshing sleep, let him take as a prescription twelve hours’ carriole travelling in Norway. The remedy is unfailing. At the breakfast table the next morning, the host informed us that the three Dutchmen had been gone about an hour, and we did not realize the importance of this apparently commonplace announcement. A pretty and quite refined-looking young woman waited upon us. I have never seen anyone who did this with such extraordinary quietness. She moved about with no more noise than a cat; until A. declared she gave him an uncanny, creepy feeling that was positively un- pleasant. We were exercised in our minds as to whether she was the landlord’s wife or sister, and came at last to the conclusion that she must be the former. This house, once the station, is no longer so. The station, Fager- lund, 1s a hundred yards further up the road, and also receives travellers: our inn was Fagerzaes. It is a favourite place of resort in summer, and is often full of visitors. Beautifully situated on the borders of the lake, our host informed us that it furnishes excellent trout fishing, and some wild-duck shooting. ‘The surrounding views for many a long mile are charming, and for this alone a few days or a week might be pleasantly spent here. Small islands here, too, were dotted about the water, and willows hung gracefully and pen- sively over the banks. At Fagernaes, the rough and the wild in Norwegian scenery had given place to the sentimental and the refined. The whole of that day’s journey was a succession of beautiful scenes, varying in character, from the sublime and the severe to the quiet and unemotional. Now passing a wayside village or solitary cottage, out of which the dogs would spring barking with a furious noise that made us thankful that dogs are scarce in Norway: whilst the few villagers, the men with short jackets and gay waistcoats, and hats like sugar-cones, stopped their work to gaze after the way- farers, with less curlosity no doubt than in days gone by. Now we passed through long avenues of trees, that shut out the broad sun- light, which threw slanting shadows athwart our path. Still the road undulated, like the long rollers of an Atlantic sea, and one could almost imagine that here the ocean had once found its home. To our left were the calm waters of the Strandefjord; but here and there the calmness was turned to a rushing torrent which leaped down many feet in white, seething foam, breaking over huge boulders, and ECORNIELIOO KSEE) —— —-