Pouring out a cup of coffee, R—— held up the Norwegian wine-bottle of milk by its long neck, and said to P——, "do you like a little, or a good deal, of milk?"
"Oh! middling;" and moving from the window, P—— walked towards the table.
"There," said R——, pushing the cup across to P——, "there's some real Mocha for you."
P—— raised the cup to his lips.
"Capital!" he exclaimed, taking breath after a long pull.
"So it is!" reiterated R——, expelling a tremendous and satisfactory cloud of smoke that took the shape of a balloon, and ascending towards the cottage beams, puzzled me, by its great dilatation, to think, how such a gigantic volume of sooty exhalation, as Dr. Johnson would say, could be compressed into a small compass, like R——'s mouth.
When pacification took place, and conciliatory explanations were made over and over again, R—— and P——, tumbling out their flies, commenced to repair those that had been damaged by the fish, and manufactured others, more suitable to the transparent water, and the timidity of the salmon. While they were thus engaged, I loitered about in the open air.
The day was hot to oppression; and it required no flight of the imagination to forget that the country was Norway, and fancy myself in the interior of Congo. Numerous insects, that flew with a droning noise about me, and a multitude of adders basking in the sun, or hurrying through the grass as I approached, gave new force to the illusion.
In the afternoon R—— and P—— caught thirty or forty salmon between them. Such success made them determine to remain for some days longer at Boom; but being desirous of a change of scene, as well as recreation, I returned to the yacht, and sleeping on board that night, went the next morning to Christiansand.
It was the 24th of June, known as St. John's Day; and on my arrival at Christiansand, I learned that the festival was commemorated with great ceremony by the Norwegians. Along the tops of the mountains, ever where the eye wandered, piles of faggots, and old boats were collected together, like funeral pyres. Men and women, children and dogs, congregated in multitudes around them, watching for the set of sun; and when the weary god sank down to rest, and with closing lids gave darkness to the earth, a hundred bonfires simultaneously blazing forth on the summits of the mountains, strove to reach his throne in the meridian, and imitate the day. The sight was certainly fine, but could not be compared with an ancient warlike and similar custom among the Scottish Highlanders.