[CHAPTER XXVII.]
A CHANGE.
September 3.—
‘Forty below Nero’ was the probable position of the thermometer during the night. Esau declares that his back is quite well, but it is suspected that he only does this in order to avoid the administration of further remedies by John.
However, we consider this such a successful cure that we here give our recipe for strained backs to an expectant world, not as a sordid advertisement, but from pure philanthropic motives.
‘Take the patient and place him on a grassy spot in the sun, and lubricate with oil; rub this in for three hours with the hand; seize his wrist and feel the pulse (if you can find it), displaying at the same time a large gold watch; look profound; mutter inwardly. Now shift him gently to a shaded position; and having lighted a fire to the windward, prepare and cook thereon fourteen or fifteen pancakes, and administer while hot (as a mixture, not a lotion). Take care that the aroma of each cooking pancake is wafted in the direction of the patient. Carry this principle throughout all his nourishment. Explain to him that deer abound in the neighbouring mountains; show him quantities of fresh-caught fish and newly killed ryper; ensure a week of fine weather, and if this do not cure him he must be a malade imaginaire.’
Notwithstanding the improvement, of course Esau was not fit to go stalking, and this and other reasons suddenly induced us to leave Memurudalen to-day for good, and go to Gjendesheim on our way to Rus Vand. So we made a last gigantic pie, packed up, lunched, and then pulled down the tent, which had been standing so long now on the same spot, and embarked everything on board our two canoes and the Gjendesheim boat, which had been lent to us. Then the whole fleet sailed from these hospitable shores ’neath a stormy sky, with cold wind and rain, and the towering heights of Memurutungen all wrapped in angry clouds, frowning blackly above us.
It was quite sad to leave the snug little corner where we have spent such a happy, careless time, with all the comforts which we have added gradually to our temporary home; and the valley looked very desolate without the tent, the cheerful fire, and ‘the meteor flag.’
Esau’s last act was to fill two brass cartridge cases with water and hammer them firmly into each other; the air-tight boiler so formed he put into the fire under the oven, and after waiting a short time for the explosion, forgot all about it and went away without telling any one. Just then John arrived at the spot to see if there were any loose belongings lying about, and was horrified to observe the oven suddenly elevate itself into the air and disappear among the clouds with a loud report. His mind at once reverted to the happy life of a landlord in co. Limerick, but he soon realised the true state of affairs, and came down to the lake muttering something about ‘tomdamfoolery,’ a Norwegian word which expresses censure of the silly custom of practical joking.
This morning we found a merlin sitting just outside the tent door; it had evidently been stuffing itself with scraps of offal from the camp until it was perfectly stupid and could scarcely fly. Esau wanted to knock it on the head at first, but more humane feelings came over him, so he fetched his rifle and shot it for an hour or so, till at length the bird, wearied by the constant noise, retired into the birch woods, and we saw it no more.
There are usually several ravens near the camp, which come down to ‘carry off carrion,’ but otherwise there are not many birds here: the most common are buzzards and kestrels, which abound; two eagles, which are generally soaring above Memurutungen; a pair of ospreys occasionally flying about the lake; a rough-legged buzzard seen once, a few merlins, and a small short-tailed red hawk, with whom we are not acquainted; sometimes black-throated divers and scaups on the lake, and a few fieldfares and redwings in the birch woods. We have found many nests of the latter in the trees, and one of a fieldfare in a bank.