It took them only about two hours and a half to reach Moel, which is situated at the end of Lake Tinn. Here they were obliged to leave the kariol and take a small boat, for at this point a chain of small lakes begins. The kariol paused near the little church, at the foot of a water-fall at least five hundred feet in height. This water-fall, which is visible for only about one fifth of its descent, loses itself in a deep crevasse before being swallowed up by the lake.
Two boatmen were standing on the shore beside a birch-bark canoe, so fragile and unstable that the slightest imprudence on the part of its occupants would inevitably overturn it.
The lake was at its very best this beautiful morning. The sun had absorbed all the mist of the previous night, and no one could not have asked for a more superb summer's day.
"You are not tired, my good Joel?" inquired the professor, as he alighted from the kariol.
"No, Monsieur Sylvius. You forget that I am accustomed to long tramps through the Telemark."
"That is true. Tell me, do you know the most direct route from Moel to Christiania?"
"Perfectly, sir. But I fear when we reach Tinoset, at the further end of the lake, we shall have some difficulty in procuring a kariol, as we have not warned them of our intended arrival, as is customary in this country."
"Have no fears, my boy," replied the professor: "I attended to that. You needn't be afraid that I have any intention of making you foot it from Dal to Christiania."
"I could easily do it if necessary," remarked Joel.
"But it will not be necessary, fortunately. Now suppose we go over our route again."