Mine host at Dal, a venerable-looking personage, with long grey hair floating on his shoulders, was a member of the Extraordinary Meeting of Deputies at Eidsvold in 1815, when the Norwegians accepted the Junction with Sweden. I and the old gentleman exchanged cards. The superscription on his was—Gaardbruger Norgaard, Deputeret fra Norges Storthing—i.e., Farmer Norgaard, A Deputy from Norway’s Storthing.

Another reminiscence of his early days is a framed and glazed copy of the Grundlov (Fundamental Law) of Norway, its palladium of national liberty, which a hundred and twelve Deputies drew up in six weeks, in 1814. Never was Constitution so hastily drawn up, and so generally practical and sensible as this.

The Crown Prince, the crafty Bernadotte, with his invading army of Swedes, had Norway quite at his mercy on that occasion; but the idea seems to have struck him suddenly that it was as well not to deal too hardly with her, as in case of his not being able to hold his own in Sweden, he might have a worse place of refuge than among the sturdy Norwegians. “I am resolved what to do, so that when I am put out of the stewardship they may receive me into their houses.” So he assented to Norway’s independence.

For my part, at this moment, I thought more about coffee than Norwegian liberty and politics; but as it was nine o’clock, P.M., the good people were quite put out by the request. Coffee in the forenoon, say they, tea in the evening. As it was, they made me pay pretty smartly for the accommodation next morning. “What’s to pay?” said I, striding into the room, where sat the old Deputy’s daughter, the mistress of the house, at the morning meal. She had not long ago become a widow, and had taken as her second husband, a few days before, a grisly-looking giant, who sat by in his shirt-sleeves.

“Ask him,” said the fair Quickly, thinking it necessary, perhaps, just so recently after taking the vow of obedience, by this little piece of deference to her new lord to express her sense of submission to his authority. For my part, as an old traveller, I should rather say she did it for another feeling. English pigeons did not fly that way every day, and so they must be plucked; and the person to do it, she thought, was the Berserker, her awful-looking spouse. The charge was exorbitant; and as the good folks were regaling themselves with fresh mutton-chops and strawberries and cream, while they had fobbed us off with eggs and black bread and cheese—the latter so sharp that it went like a dagger to my very vitals at the first taste—I resolutely taxed the bill of costs, and carried my point; whereupon we took leave of the Deputy and his descendants.

In one sense we had come to the world’s end; for there is no road for wheels beyond this. The footpath up the steep cliff that looks down upon the lake is only accessible to the nimble horses of the country. “Hurrah!” exclaimed I, as I looked down on the blue lake, lying hundreds of feet perpendicularly below us. “Hurrah for the mountains! Adieu to the ‘boppery bop’ of civilization, with all its forms and ceremonies, and turnpikes and twaddle. Here you can eat, and drink, and dress as and when you like, and that is just the fun of the thing, more than half the relaxation of the trip.” Why, this passion for mountain-travelling over the hills and far away is not peculiar to Englishmen. Don’t the ladies of Teheran, even, after their listless “vie À la pantoufle,” delight to hear of the approach of the plague, as they know they are sure to get off to the hills, and have a little tent-life in consequence? Didn’t that fat boy Buttons (not in Pickwick, but Horace), cloyed with the Priest’s luscious cheesecakes, long for a bit of coarse black bread, and run away from his master to get it?

The precipitous path is studded at intervals with heaps of hones, or whet-stones. I find that about here is the chief manufacture in all Norway for this article. One year, a third of a million were turned out. The next quarry in importance is at Kinservik, on the Hardanger Fjord. Surmounting the ascent, we traverse swampy ground dotted with birch-trees, and presently debouch upon one of those quaint edifices not to be found out of this country—stabskirke (stave church), as it is called—of which Borgund and Hitterdal Churches are well-known specimens. It is so called from the lozenge-shaped shingles (staves), overlapping each other like fish-scales, which case the roof and every part of the outside. Smaller and less pretending than those edifices, this secluded place of worship was of the same age—about nine hundred years. The resinous pine has done its work well, and the carving on the capitals of the wooden pillars at the doorway is in good preservation, though parts have lately been churchwardenized.

“That is Eidsborg church,” said a young student, who had volunteered to accompany me, as he was bound to a lone parsonage up the country, in this direction. “This is the church the young lady on board the steamer told you was so remarkable.”

After making a rough sketch of the exterior, we proceeded on our journey. The few huts around were tenantless, the inhabitants all gone up to the chÂlets. The blanching bear-skulls on the door of one of these showed the wildness of the country we are traversing; while a black-throated diver, which was busy ducking after the fish in the sedge-margined pool close by, almost tempted me to load, and have a long shot at him. As we proceed, I observe fieldfares, ring-ouzel, and chaff-finches, while many English wild flowers enliven the scene, and delicious strawberries assuage our thirst. Pursuing our path through the forest, we come to a post on which is written “Ravne jÜv,” AnglicÈ, Raven depth.

“Det maa De see,” (you must see that,) said my companion, turning off up a narrow path, and frightening a squirrel and a capercailzie, which were apparently having a confab about things in general. I followed him through the pine-wood, getting over the swampy ground by the aid of some fallen trunks, and, in two or three minutes, came to the “Ravne jÜv.” It is made by the Sandok Elv, which here pierces through the mountains, and may be seen fighting its way thousands of feet below us. Where I stood, the cliff was perpendicular, or rather sloped inwards; and, by a singular freak of nature, a regular embrasured battlement had been projected forward, so as to permit of our approaching the giddy verge with perfect impunity.

Lying flat, I put my head through an embrasure, and looked down into the Raven’s depth.

“Ah! it’s deeper than you think,” said my companion. “Watch this piece of wood.”

I counted forty before it reached a landing-place, and that was not above half the way.

Annoyed at our intrusion, two buff-coloured hawks and a large falcon kept flying backwards and forwards within shot, having evidently chosen this frightful precipice as the safest place they could find for their young. Luckily for them, the horse and guide had gone on with my fowling-piece, or they might have descended double-quick into the sable depths below, and become a repast for the ravens; who, as in duty bound, of course frequent the recesses of their namesake, although none were now visible.

What a pity a bit of scenery like this cannot be transported to England. The Norwegians look upon rocks as a perfect nuisance, while we sigh for them. Fancy the Ravne jÜv in Derbyshire. Why, we should have Marcus’ excursion-trains every week in the summer, and motley crowds of tourists thronging to have a peep into the dark profound, and some throwing themselves from the top of it, as they used to do from the Monument, and John Stubbs incising his name on the battlements, cutting boldly as the Roman king did at the behests of that humbugging augur; and another true Briton breaking off bits of the parapet, just like those immortal excursionists who rent the Blarney Stone in two. Then there would be a grand hotel close by, and greasy waiters with white chokers, and the nape of their neck shaven as smooth as a vulture’s head (faugh!) and their front and back hair parted in one continuous straight line, just like the wool of my lady’s poodle. How strongly they would recommend to your notice some most trustworthy guide, to show you what you can’t help seeing if you follow your nose, and are not blind—the said trustworthy guide paying him a percentage on all grist thus sent to his mill. Eventually, there would be a high wall erected, and a locked gate, as at the Turk Fall at Killarney, and a shilling to pay for seeing “private property,” &c. &c. No, no! let well alone. Give me the “Raven deep” when it is in the silent solitudes of a Norwegian forest, and let me muse wonderingly, and filled with awe, at the stupendous engineering of Nature, and derive such edification as I may from the sight.

At Sandok we get a fresh horse from the worthy Oiesteen, and some capital beer, which he brings in a wooden quaigh, containing about half a gallon.

On the face of the “loft,” loft or out-house, I see an excellent specimen of wood carving. “That,” said Oiesteen, “has often been pictured by the town people.” All the farm-houses in this part of the country used to be carved in this fashion. One has only to read the Sagas to know why all these old houses no longer exist. It is not that the wood has perished in the natural way; experience, in fact, seems to show that the Norwegian pine is almost as lasting, in ordinary circumstances, as stone, growing harder by age. The truth is, in those fighting days of the Vikings, when one party was at feud with another, he would often march all night when his enemy least expected him, and surrounding the house where he lay, so as to let none escape, set it on fire.

The lad who took charge of the horse next stage was called BjÖrn (Bear), a not uncommon name all over Norway. It was now evening, and chilly.

“Are you cold, BjÖrn?” said the student.

“No; the BjÖrn is never chilly,” was the facetious reply. The nearest approach to a witticism I had ever heard escape the mouth of a Norwegian peasant.

Two or three miles to the right we descry the river descending by a huge cataract from its birthplace among the rocky mountains of Upper Thelemarken. Presently we join what professes to be the high road from Christiania, which is carried some twenty miles further westward, and then suddenly ceases.

Long after midnight, we arrived at the Rectory House at ——, where I was to sleep. Mr. —— was an intelligent sort of person, very quiet and affable, and dressed in homespun from head to foot. After breakfast, the staple of which was trout from the large lake close by, I offered him a weed, which he declined, with the remark, “Ieg tygge,” I chew. The ladies, as usual, are kind and unassuming, with none of the female arts to be found in cities. A friend of mine, proud of his fancied skill in talking Norsk, was once stopping at a clergyman’s in Norway, when he apologised to the ladies for his deficiencies in their language. He was evidently fishing for compliments, and was considerably taken aback when one of them, in the most unsophisticated manner, observed, taking him quite at his word, “Oh yes, strangers, you know, often confound the words, and say one for another, which makes it very difficult to comprehend them.”

Ludicrous mistakes are sometimes made by the Norwegians also. An English gentleman arrived at a change-house in Österdal late one evening, and was lucky in obtaining the only spare bed. Presently, when he was on the point of retiring to rest, a Norwegian lady also arrived, intending to spend the night there. What was to be done? Like a gallant Englishman as he was, with that true, unselfish courtesy which is not, as in France, confined to mere speeches, he immediately offered to give up his bed to the “unprotected female,” who was mistress of a little English. “Many thanks; but what will you do, sir?” “Oh! I will take a chair for the night.” At this answer the lady blushed, and darted out of the room, and in a few minutes her carriole was driving off in the darkness. What could be the meaning of it? The peasant’s wife soon after looked into the room, with a knowing sort of look at the Englishman. He subsequently discovered the key to the enigma. The lady thought he said “he would take a share,” and was, of course, mightily offended. So much for a smattering of a foreign language. Doubtless, from that day forward, she would quote this incident to her female friends as an instance of the natural depravity of Englishmen; and this scapegrace would be looked upon as a type of his nation.

The priest has some knives, the handles of which are of ivory, and exquisitely carved in a flowing pattern. They cost as much as three dollars apiece, a great sum. But the artificer, who lives near, is the best in Thelemarken, the part of Norway most celebrated for this art. The patterns used are, I hear, of very ancient date; being, in some instances, identical with those on various metal articles discovered from time to time in the barrows and cromlechs.

The walls of the sitting-room are hung with some engravings on national subjects, e.g., “Anna KolbjÖrnsdatter og de Svenske,” “Olaf, killed at Sticklestad,” and “Konrad Adeler, at Tenedos.” Kort Adeler, whose name lives in a popular song by Ingemann, was born at Brevik, in 1622, but took service under the Venetians, and on one occasion fought and slew Ibrahim, the Turkish admiral. Ibrahim’s sword and banner are still to be seen at Copenhagen. Adeler’s successor, as Norwegian Admiral, was the renowned Niels Juel, the Nelson of the North.

I saw tossing about the Manse an old Runic Calendar, which nobody seemed to care anything about. It was found in the house when the parson came there, and appeared occasionally to have been used for stirring the fire, as one end was quite charred. Without much difficulty I succeeded in rescuing it from impending destruction, and possess it at this moment. Some of these calendars are shaped like a circle, others like an ellipse. They were of two kinds. Messedag’s stav (mass-day stave) and Primstav. But the latter term properly applies to a much more complex sort of calendar than the other. It contained not only runes for festivals and other days, but also the Sunday letter or quarters of the moon for every golden number. Its name is derived from prima luna, i.e., the first full moon after the vernal equinox. The primstav proper was generally four feet long. The almanack I here obtained is flat, and figured on two sides, not as some of the old Anglo-Saxon calendars were, square, and figured on four sides. It is shaped like a flat sword, an inch and a half broad and half an inch thick, and is provided with a handle. The owner of it appears to have been born on the 6th June, as his monogram which is on the handle occurs again on that day. On the broad sides the days of the week are notched, and on the narrow sides there is a notch for every seventh day; i.e., the narrow sides mark the weeks, the broad sides the days.

The day-marks or signs do not go from January to July, and from July to December. On the one side, which was called the Vetr-leid, winter side, they begin with the 14th of October, or “winter night,” and reach to the 13th of April. On the other side, which was called the summer side, they begin with the 14th of April “summer night,” and go to the 13th of October. The runes, or marks distinguishing the days, are derived from a variety of circumstances: sometimes from the weather, or farming operations, or from legends of saints. But it must be observed that hardly two calendars can be found corresponding to each other. Some are simpler, others more complex. In some, one saint’s day is distinguished, in others another. Winter then began with the old Norwegians on the 14th of October; Midwinter was ninety days after—i.e., on the 11th January, and Midsummer ninety-four days from the 14th of April.

The great winter festival in honour of Thor, on 20th January, was called HÖggenÄt, i.e.—slaughter-night.[4] This word is derived from hÖgge (to cut or hew), on account of the number of animals slaughtered in honour of Thor. The word still survives in Scotland, in HogmanÁy (the last night of the old year).

Snorro Sturlesen informs us that it was Hacon the Good, foster-son of our King Athelstan, who made a law that the great Asa, or heathen festival, which used to be held for three successive days in January, should be transferred to the end of December, and kept so many days as it was usual to keep Christmas in the English Church. His missionaries being Northmen who had resided in England, like St. Augustine, the Apostle of England, accommodated themselves to the superstitions and habits in vogue among the people they came to convert. The great banquets, where people feasted on the flesh of horses and other victims, were turned into eating and drinking bouts of a more godly sort; and the Skaal to Odin assumed the shape of a brimming bowl to the honour of the Redeemer, the Virgin, and the saints. In their cups, no doubt, their ideas would become at times confused, and many a baptized heathen would hiccup a health to Odin and Thor. Even now, as we have seen, after the lapse of so many centuries, much of the old heathen leaven infects their Christianity.

We may here observe that the Norwegian word for Saturday is LÖverdag, i.e., washing-day, as a preparation for the Sunday festival, so that the division of time into weeks of seven days must have originated in Norway within the period of its conversion to Christianity. Herein, then, they differed from the Anglo-Saxons, who called it SÆterndÆg (Saturns-day); while the South Germans called it after the Jewish Sabbath, Sambaztag, now Samstag. The Scandinavians had exhausted their great gods upon the other days. Sun and Moon, Tyr, Odin, Thor, and Freya, had been used up, so they took the appropriate name LÖverdag, above-mentioned.

The following are the old names of the Norsk months:

Some of these names are very appropriate, e.g., GormÁnaÐr is gore-month, when so many victims were slaughtered. Ýlir, or JÝlir, is the month that prepares for Yule. MÖrsÚgr refers to the good cheer which people sucked up at that period. Þorri is said to come from Þverra, to get short, because the good things are then nearly run out. GaukmÁnaÐr is Gauk’s (cuckoo’s) month. SÓlmÁnaÐr is the sun’s month. Heyannir is hay-time. TvimÁnaÐr (from tvi, two) is the second month after midsummer, while HaustmÁnaÐr is harvest (scotticÈ) “har’st” month.

But our readers will think us becoming prosy, so we will mount the cart, and discarding the society of the fat peasant woman who proposes inflicting herself upon us, accept the kind offer of our intelligent student to accompany us on our journey to Kos-thveit (Kos-thwaite, as we should say in East Anglia), on the Lake of Totak.

“Are there any songs current in the mouths of the peasants here?” I inquired, as we drove very slowly along a narrow road, through morasses, studded with birch. “This is pre-eminently the old fashioned part of Norway, so I suppose if they are anywhere they are here.”

“Oh, yes. There has been a student from Christiania wandering about these parts lately, collecting songs for the purpose of publication. Many of them are dying out fast. Some years ago, the girls used to improvise over the loom. At weddings, lad and lass used to stevne (sing staves) in amoebean fashion, on the spur of the moment.”

Some of these pieces are highly witty and satirical. But the bonders are very averse to repeating them. One of them, on being asked by the student to repeat a stave, replied, “Ieg vil ikke vÆre en Narr for Byen-folk:” (I won’t play the fool to amuse the city folks.)

Here is a specimen of one native to this part done into English.

The whole winds up with a description of the married life of the pair.