Another idea is that it might get a sale by appearing surreptitiously among the Christmas books for the young, and for that purpose we should use the names of our two henchmen Anglicised. ‘Oola and Eva: a Tale for Girls,’ could not fail to attract the favourable attention of parents and guardians.
Possibly it might create a greater sensation if it were introduced to the world as ‘Julia and Pausanias: an Idyll.’ It is very difficult to decide on a good name, but we are all agreed that the name once found, it will be perfectly easy to write the book afterwards.
September 4.—
How soothing and pleasant it is, when we hear the storm and rain shrieking and beating outside, to reflect that there is a good solid roof over our heads, and that we shall not be roused in the night by the cry of ‘All hands turn out to slack off guy-ropes!’
This morning the lake was so rough that we perceived that we had been very lucky to make our voyage yesterday; we certainly could not have attempted it to-day. The man from Gjendebod was here, and started for the other end of the lake with Andreas in the big boat about nine o’clock, but at two they came back dead beat and wet through, having been obliged to desist from their attempt before they had gone two miles, and they considered themselves lucky to have got back.
The appearance of the lake is wonderfully fine as the white-capped breakers come rolling in, flinging the spray high up the face of the opposing cliffs, and dashing with an angry roar against the black rocks where they jut out into the deep part of the lake. The Skipper, affirming that he could smell the salt in the air, began to look out pollack-flies, while John put on a beautiful brand-new shooting coat, and went down to the shore to pick up seaweed and dig on the sands: he came back saying that the tide was coming in, and he thought he had seen the smoke of a steamer in the offing.
Close to this end of the lake a little promontory runs out, which forms a breakwater, so that the sea just opposite the house is comparatively calm. In this bay, directly after breakfast, we saw two scaups, and the Skipper and Esau manned a canoe to try for them, the former to paddle, the latter to shoot. Only one was shot at, and it managed to fly beyond the headland before falling dead, and we dare not go after it in our frail craft.