It was more for the amusement of the thing, and for the sake of ascertaining the resources of the country, that the party extended themselves into a line and beat their way onwards, for it was too early in the year for shooting anything but wild ducks. Game laws in Norway exist, certainly, but are utterly disregarded; still the broods of grouse were, as yet, too young to take care of themselves, and it would have been sheer murdering the innocents to injure the grey hens, which, into the bargain, are at this time not fit for eating. This proceeding seemed very absurd to Torkel and to Tom, for a Norwegian has no idea of preserving the game—in reality, he can eat and relish much that most civilized people cannot; but, besides that, he is a selfish animal, and the poor lean bird that he secures for himself in spring, is better than the fine, fat, plump, autumnal one that he has left for his neighbour.
Hen after hen got up and tumbled away before the dogs, who were too well broke to disturb her, had they even been deceived by her antics, but no shot was fired to convert her pretence into reality. Now and then, it must be confessed, when an old, selfish, solitary cock, as black as a hat, and as glossy as a whole morning’s dressing could make him, whirred off as if he cared for no one but himself and had not a wife or family in the world, he paid the penalty of his selfishness, and fell fluttering on the cranberries—deservedly, perhaps; at all events, he left no one behind him to lament his fate, for the black-cock is a roving bird, and never pairs: but no exclamations of Torkel’s could induce the English sportsmen to sever the loves of the smaller description of grouse, and Birger, though a Swede—for very shame—was obliged to imitate their forbearance. But, every now and then, a blue Alpine hare was knocked over without mercy; once an unlucky badger came to an untimely end, and, upon the whole, the bags were getting quite as heavy as the men approved of, when a light, graceful, elegant roe, for once in its life was caught napping, though there had been noise enough, not only from shots, but from talking also, along the whole line, to have awakened a far less watchful animal. It sprang from a thicker piece of covering than common, which probably had been the means of deluding it into staying, in the false hope that it could possibly escape the keen scent of old Grog, whose flourishing tail said as plainly as tail could speak (and dogs’ tails are very eloquent), “look out, boys; I have got something here for you, this time, that is worth having.”
Jacob was pretty well strung with hares, and remonstrated against the additional load, which was finally slung around Torkel’s body like a shoulder-belt, and he was dismissed at once with directions to follow the path to Soberud, a place where he was well known, and to prepare, as well as he could, for the reception of the party, and their provisioning.
Torkel undertook the mission readily enough, and went off gaily under a load of game that would have been quite enough for a pony, casting back a knowing look to Tom, who seemed perfectly to understand him, implying that he had some project in his head by which he intended to astonish the strangers.
The day wore on in this pleasant exercise—perhaps the halt for Middagsmad might have been a long one, and the pipe after luxurious; in fact, there is not so luxurious a couch in this sublunary world as a heap of heather, and no sensation so luxuriously happy as that of basking, half-tired, in the warm, pleasant sunshine, after a well-spent morning of honest exercise, with our gun beside us, and our dogs half sleeping, like ourselves, around us; but the sun was not a very great way from the horizon when the party gained the first view of the village which was to be their resting-place for the night.
The fjeld was not high, for it had been sloping away gradually to the eastward ever since they left the high mountains which surround the Lake of the Woods, but, as it almost always does, it terminated abruptly in a sort of cliff, portions of which were precipitous, and the rest extremely steep. The path which Torkel had taken, following the course of a largish brook, had found an easy access to the valley, practicable even for the carts of the country; but at the point at which they had struck the valley, there was nothing for it but a stiff scramble down the face of the hill, a proceeding which their loads rendered anything but pleasant and easy. It was a beautiful scene that lay before them, and perfectly different from anything they had seen before, though they had been passing through scenery of wood and lake ever since they left the Torjedahl.
In the present instance the broad, still lake, broad as it was, filled up but half the amphitheatre of the wooded mountains. There was an ample margin of cultivated land round it, fields rich with the promise of autumn, and green quiet meadows; here and there a wooded spur shot out from the frame of highlands, forming sometimes a cape or promontory in the water, while, in return, narrow secluded valleys would wind back into the recesses of the mountains, each with its own little brook and its own secluded pastures. Besides the village, there were several detached farmsteadings and scattered cottages, all looking trim and tidy and well to do in the world, and through the middle of them ran a well-kept but very winding road, with a broad margin of turf on each side. The fences might have been a dissight a little nearer, for they were the post and slab fence so common in the north, but, at the distance, they looked like park paling; and the swing poles for opening the gates across the road, formed a picturesque feature in the landscape.
Close by the lake-side was the church, a grey and weather-stained building, which looked like one solid mass of timber, supporting on its steeply-pitched and shingled roof, three round towers of different heights, each surmounted with its cross. Dominating over the whole sat a huge golden cock, which, newly gilded, glowed in the light of the setting sun as if it were a supplementary sun itself. The houses of the village were a good deal scattered, but, with the exception of the Præstgaard, or parsonage, did not hold out any very magnificent hopes of accommodation for the night.
This, however, was of little importance to men whose last night’s abode had been the shelter of the thickest tree; and they proceeded, with very contented minds, to descend the steep hill-side, in order to reach the path they ought to have taken, which they now discovered, far below them, winding along the edge of the cultivated ground.