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Smoking the Cows: Thelemarken.

Jamsgaard Laave.

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Going to Berge from Sillejord, we had torrents of rain—a deluge: we now approached higher ground and a blacker country. Snow ploughs on the side of the road told tales of wintry difficulty of transit, while sledges were round most of the houses. Arrived at the station, we found one small bedroom with strong store-closet atmosphere, game lost, &c. In the vand are perch; in the river, greyling. The hunter and bonde here was building a large room, which, though still unfinished, we decided to sleep in. We soon had a roaring fire; the beds were made, the Patriarch slinging his hammock under a huge carpenter’s bench; then came the cooking, followed by a few songs; and finally stories of bears, wolves, wild cats, and lynxes from the bonde. There was a very fine old mangletræ here, two feet long. So peculiar an instrument of Norwegian household necessity is deserving of explanation: it is two feet long and four inches wide: b represents the things to be mangled; c the roller; the right hand of the mangler takes hold of the lion at d, and the left hand on a balances the mangletræ, which is worked backwards and forwards until the things are done. Mem.—Last night reindeer were seen above here; and at the vand, high over this place, the bonde had seen a glutton after a wounded or sick reindeer. The chief brought in three trout for breakfast. Now the real life was bursting on us. How we drank in the stories of the hunter, rising in the morning to delight in the health and beauties about us!