The household arrangements of these posting establishments are often very primitive. The front door sometimes opens into the sleeping-room of the entire family; and if you arrive any time after nine P.M. you may see on entering the master and mistress of the mansion reposing on a broad high shelf at one end of the room near the stove, while the rest of the family and guests of lowly degree recline around on benches, or on the floor, where they can at least have what room they require. This is a luxury which no tall tourist need expect in a Norwegian guest-chamber; there the beds, although furnished with appliances for making them as wide, if need be, as the famous bed of Ware, are seldom longer than five feet eleven.
The roads, although necessarily steep at places, are fairly good; but most of the bridges are constructed in a very primitive style. The natives are a kind, hospitable, honest, but somewhat apathetic race. Watching their stolid expressionless faces, one cannot help wondering where the superabundant energy of the old vikings has betaken itself to. During the long winter evenings, the women knit and spin a great deal. They provide themselves plentifully with household linen and homespun clothes, which are often of a dark-brown colour, enlivened in the case of the men by a bright scarlet cap, and in that of the women by a white kerchief tied under the chin. In appearance, a small Norwegian farmer is very like an English labourer. His house, built of wood and thatched with sods, is devoid of ornament, but has no lack of solid comfort, and is sufficiently warmed by a huge quaint-looking iron stove.
The women on holiday occasions turn out in the old Norse costume, the chief feature of which is the bodice, which is often made of some bright-coloured velvet, turned down in front with white silk, and laced before and behind, according to our author, 'with several yards of fine silver chain, each chain ending in a silver bodkin, in order that they may be the better threaded through double rows of eyes (in themselves strikingly pretty articles of silver), that run in four lines up the back and front of this showy piece of Scandinavian haberdashery.' Both men and women are very fond of large bright buttons and of silver or plaited ornaments.
Bears abound in the dense forests of Norway and on the high barren uplands; and thrilling stories are told of hair-breadth escapes from these fierce but sagacious animals. A sportsman near Maristuen was one day wandering in a birch thicket, when he suddenly came upon a huge bear regaling itself with raspberries. Bruin was peaceably inclined, and fled; but he instantly gave chase. With a speed perfectly surprising in such a lumbering unwieldy animal, it ran down the hill-side, while he rushed after it in hot pursuit, till on a steep slope of the mountain it suddenly disappeared. There was a little patch of brushwood before him, over which he leaped, and hearing an ominous crashing of branches in his rear, turned round, when there was the bear, which with a murderous growl rushed right upon him. Instinctively he raised his rifle and drew the trigger just in time, for almost at the same moment the infuriated brute seized the muzzle of the piece, which exploding, blew its head to atoms.
A Norse wedding is always preceded by a series of presents from the bridegroom to the bride. First, there are about two dozen meal-tubs of various sizes, elaborately painted; and last and crowning glory of the trousseau, there is a wonderful clothes-press. Inside, as far as regards drawers large and small, and brass pegs and racks for crockery, it is a marvel of ingenuity; while outside it is a perfect triumph of art. The ground tint is a warm bright vermilion, painted all over with green and yellow scrolls, enlivened with wreaths of gorgeous flowers, and piles of brilliantly hued fruit, pleasingly interspersed with quaint lovers' knots and bleeding hearts transfixed upon Cupid's darts, in the midst of which are the names and birth-dates of the liberal donor and blissful recipient of this magnificent wedding-gift. A Norwegian maiden, who is generally as sober as a linnet in her ordinary attire, appears on her bridal day glittering in all the colours of the rainbow. On her long fair hair is set an antique crown of silver gilt; and her bodice, stiff as a cuirass, is thickly studded with beads, silver-gilt brooches, and small mirrors. This bridal adornment is too valuable to be the individual property of any Norse belle, but belongs to the district, and is hired out for the day.
The scenery in Norway is remarkably beautiful; the mountain roads often wind along the base of huge gray cliffs with steep dells beneath, where some bright salmon river may be seen sparkling along beneath the gloom of the overhanging pine-trees, or some soft blue lake may be discerned glimmering like a sheet of silver in the sunshine, or pillowing on the stillness of its waveless breast the mighty shadows of the everlasting hills.
At Strande Fjord, one of these lovely lakes, which was shut in by a dark background of pine-clad mountains, whose rugged sides were furrowed with deep torrents and white lines of waterfalls, our travellers found in the pleasant station-house a party of seven English ladies and gentlemen, tempted, like themselves, to make a halt of a few days at this charming spot. Here there was every variety of scenery—lofty mountains, precipitous waterfalls, dense pine forests, and wide undulating stretches of fresh green meadow-land; while in the midst slept the tranquil lake; now kissing with tiny wavelets the pebbles on its silvery shore, now bending away round the bold red cliffs, that guard like weird sentinels this lake Paradise of the North. The face of the huge crags is frayed and worn into deep shadowy caves, whose roofs are tapestried with a profusion of ferns; while by the precipitous margin of the lake, long verdant palm-like fronds wave in the breeze, or stoop to meet sub-aquatic forests of weeds and water-flags.
Lœrdalsoren, the highest point which they reached, was a quaint overgrown village, nestling between high green and purple hills. Insignificant as they accounted it, it was a town of no small repute in the surrounding wilderness, for it possessed a doctor, a church, two hotels, and a telegraphic office. Still, in spite of all these advantages, it was an undeniably dismal little place, intensely cold, and with nothing to offer by way of comfort for the inner man, except salmon, a viand of which, when confined to it exclusively, people tire sooner than of any other.
Wide ranges of mountains extend all around Lœrdalsoren, towering up one above the other in savage grandeur till their jagged snow-clad peaks seem to pierce the sky. Gray and yellow patches of reindeer's moss carpet the sheltered nooks and hollows among the hills, and the deer themselves are abundant: the skyds-carl pointed out a hill where a native sportsman had recently shot nine in one day.
So bitter was the cold, that before they reached Bjoberg, on the downward road, they were half frozen, and could scarcely hold the reins.