A Yacht Voyage to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden / 2nd edition

by William A. Ross

Notwithstanding my many antipathies, I went to bed, and slept soundly till the next morning, having awaked but once during the night to throw off my eider coverlet. The Norwegians hold the eider in great estimation, and, invariably, whether it be in summer or winter, place it on the bed of a stranger; but I would recommend those who travel in that part of Europe, as we did, during the three summer months, to decline this domestic attention. The eider appears very much like a feather mattress, but is so light, that, when used as a coverlet, you can scarcely feel the difference between its weight and that of an ordinary linen sheet.

At six o'clock the following morning, we were up and on the banks of the river, which flowed within sight of the cottage windows. Our old Norwegian, punctual to his appointment, was walking by our sides in the joint capacity of spectator and mentor. Captain P—— threw the first fly, and continued throwing fly after fly, various as the tints of the rainbow, but with the same result as the Norwegian had anticipated. I soon became grieved at seeing the river well thrashed, and left P—— to persevere in his sport, and R——, like Charon, standing bolt upright in a punt, rod in hand, and tackle streaming in air, to be ferried about in search of some quiet nook for his particular diversion. Besides, it was now nine, and I felt interiorly that breakfast would be more pleasant than loitering on the banks of a river, pinched exteriorly by the eagerness of a N.E. wind; for the climate of Norway, in the early part of summer, is influenced by the same fickleness as the climate of England; and the wind, during the night, will visit the cardinal points of the compass, breathing as it did last night, from a warm quarter, and will blow as it does this morning, from the opposite extreme.

I had scarcely made myself a cup of coffee, and not yet added the cream, which encouraged the spoon to stand upright in its thickness, when R—— and P——, tired with their angling, came in. After demolishing nearly a dozen eggs amongst us, and two capital salmon-trout, which our fast friend, the Anglo-Norwegian, had filched from a large cistern, where they are placed during the winter, for the benefit of his master's table; and after imbibing cauldrons of coffee—so delicious was its flavour—we showed and expressed great anxiety to pay Bruin the compliments of the season, and as strangers and Englishmen to testify to him, as loudly as we could, the repute his fat had obtained in England.

Our cicerone raised no objection; and, turning to one of his countrymen who had entered the room to gape at us, for I could not then, and I cannot now conceive the nature of his business, addressed him in his native language. The man immediately disappeared, and in half an hour returned with two rifles over each shoulder, and one pistol in his breeches' pocket. The rifles were larger and heavier than the fowling-pieces formerly used by our regiments of the line, and the pistol was of the horse genus, and had a rusty muzzle and a flint lock. However, we were going to annihilate a ruthless foe; and the clumsiness of our accoutrements was of little moment. A few good-natured observations passed between us and the Norseman concerning the susceptibility and quality of the powder, for its grains were coarser than those black beads of which ladies in England make their purses. The said powder for security, was poured into an empty porter-bottle, and corked down.

We started; but we had barely proceeded three-quarters of a mile before our little Anglo-Norwegian, who had abided by our good or ill fortune constantly from the beginning, suddenly remembered that some important business required his presence in the low lands where dwelt industry and peace, and accordingly recommending us to the skill of two guides, shook hands cordially with us, and in a few minutes his ominous face and oval form were hidden from our sight by the shrubs and stunted firs which covered the mountain's side.

The waning of his courage did not darken ours; for, like all Englishmen, we instantly commenced a political discussion, which terminated, after an hour's duration, in the British fleet attacking, fatally, the Norwegian gun-boats at Christiansand, nemine contradicente, and the two boors grinning from ear to ear.

At length our guides, by signs, signified that silence was requisite. A quarter of an hour more elapsed when one of them motioned us to keep close, and going down on his hands and feet, intimated the proximity of our game.

We were now five and thirty yards from the brow of the mountain, and, crawling with the stealth and silence of a cat, the principal guide reached the summit, at the same moment levelling his gun, which made us imagine that Bruin was in full view; but gradually lowering his piece, till the butt reached the ground, and leaning on it with both hands, the man turned towards us, shook his head, and smiled. We were instantly by his side.

Round a hollow piece of table-land, tending to a swamp, we saw, standing at equal distances from each other, three sheds, constructed of long fir poles driven into the earth and tapering, like a cone, into the air, covered scantily with the branches of the pine or fir, and having an only inlet by which a man, crouching, might reach the interior. In the centre of this swamp the carcass of a horse lay, mangled and scattered in every direction. The trunks of trees, which had been felled for the purpose, were piled on the dead body; and this was done that the bear, finding it too troublesome, for he is economical of labour, to remove the body nearer to his den, would satisfy his hunger on the spot, and offer an opportunity to overtake him at his meals; besides, the bear, being quick of sight and shy, and so sensitive of scent that he can smell a man at the distance of a mile or more if he approaches with the wind, will frequently leave his food and as frequently return to it; and, therefore, the Norwegians conceal themselves in the kind of sheds I have described above, and remain for days and nights under such precarious roofs in order to circumvent and destroy the animal.

We felt rather disappointed at not having even seen old Bruin, but a good laugh in some degree compensated us for the fatigue we had undergone. For my own part, armed as I was with the rusty horse pistol, and intent on the manufacture of my own bear's grease, I had heard so many pleasing anecdotes of the bear's noble nature, that I did not regret his retreat had been commenced in time. These animals, unless severely pressed by hunger, will never attack any living creature, and will even avoid with much care those parts of the mountains where cattle are wont to feed; and it is beyond the recollection of the oldest inhabitant, or, indeed, the reach of tradition, when a child has been, in the slightest degree, hurt by the Norwegian bear. On the contrary, it is well known that these animals have met children in their track, and, though at the time much oppressed by thirst and famine, have passed them harmlessly by.