Cape, contrive by every possible means to make themselves as agreeable as possible. If, therefore, a man has anything in him, it is sure to come out of him. I had been talking about mineralogy, botany, and geology, to Professor B, who quickly communicated this to some of the gentlemen of the mining department, before whom I had to pass an examination, which I got through as well as I could.

After this a concert was commenced by the party, which was well performed by many excellent amateur musicians. I then informed them that I was a flute player, upon which an immediate demand was made upon me for a solo, which I performed as well as I was able.

At last a lady approached me, and addressed me in the following manner. "I think," she said, you are an Englishman."

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I replied in the affirmative; and I added, "Out of the forty counties in England I have visited thirty-nine, and I am acquainted with a good number of people."

She continued, "Do you know Petworth?" I said, "Yes, and every leading person in it." "I am from Petworth," she said.

After this the reader may imagine that this English lady and myself carried on a long conversation; and it may be further imagined that if we did not converse very profoundly or learnedly, that we were both perfectly delighted with what we said, which is more than can be said for ordinary conversation. Some years afterwards I was accosted by a lady in the Strand, in whom I recognised the features of her who had entertained me with song and conversation in the fair and romantic regions of the North Cape.

After this a very agreeable and gentlemanlike person accosted me in good English, and who

stated himself to be the clergyman of the North Cape. This reminded me of one of my journeyings in Scotland through the Valley of Guich, a very lonely and thinly populated part, where I fell in with a peasant, who informed me when he went to church he had to go a distance of twenty-eight miles. That I communicated to my friend the clergyman of the North Cape, who made the following statement:

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My parish extends over an area of three hundred miles; some of my parishioners are two and even three days occupied in performing their journey or voyage to church." He added, "Sometime since we had a gentleman here who published a book on Norway, in which he made honourable mention of me. Do you know him ?"

I replied, "I did not."

He further continued, "I read his book, in which I found a passage, wherein was stated his great surprise in finding that we spoke English, and, moreover, that we read Lytton Bulwer. In the passage in which he made honourable mention of myself, he stated as a proof of our wonderful intelligence, that I put the question to him whether it was true that Madame Vestris had such fine legs. I mix a great deal with your countrymen in my capacity here, and from visiting the Consul very frequently come in contact with many Englishmen." He added, "There is a peculiarity in all your untravelled countrymen which if once seen is never to be forgotten."

CHAPTER VI.

Norwegian Sun at Midnight-Varied Effects of Sunset on Different Landscapes-The Falls of Niagara-Journey to the Arctic Circle for the Purpose of Sun Seeing.

IN my last chapter I had got to my twentieth page, when all of a sudden it came into my head that I ought to refer to the first page, and finding that I had arrived at my twentieth page without bringing my reader to the concluding scene of the party at Kaffiord, I shall therefore continue the same subject in the present chapter.

I was informed by one of this numerous and delightful assembly, that they had had a visitor amongst them who had excited their curiosity more than usual. A French gentleman, accustomed to all the gaieties of Parisian life, a thorough drawing-room man, and one of that class whom you might have supposed would have been alarmed at the sight of a heavy pair of highlows for an envelope for his beautifully formed and well shaped foot, and one who at any time would consider it' next in bravery to leading a forlorn hope to dash away the early dew of the morning with his active walking and dancing pedestals, so well calculated for the performance of all the various and graceful evolutions of the ball-room; in short, a Parisian exquisite, a thing somewhat less lovely than a flower, had had the hardihood sufficient to run the risk of his tender toes being frostbitten, or wetted with the dews of a Lapland climate.

In this curious group of people congregated at Kaffiord, many of the languages of Europe were

to be heard, and many of the most civilized nations had their representatives present. This variety of the numerous group tended not a little to render it a most charming occasion, particularly when the reader reflects on the scattered and thinly populated parts of Norway, where you have to roam many a distant mile without seeing the smile of a human being, and where every traveller has more solitude than is agreeable even to one accustomed to the life of a solitudinarian.

I was informed by some of the party that they frequently got up amateur theatrical performances, which tended not a little to amuse them, as well as to render the monotonous gloom of the long winter nights more tolerable.

After we had sung, ate, drank, and enjoyed ourselves in a manner that is seldom seen at a party either in London, or in any other part of Great Britain, by the same class of people who took part in the joyous and truly heartfelt pleasures of that distant and hospitable land-after the best of these ever memorable enjoyments were somewhat on the decline, and evidently approaching to a close, the consul walked up to me and addressed me in the following manner :

"Knowing that you are not accustomed to our climate, I must now tell you that it is bed-time." I looked at my watch, and I found the time to be either a little after or before midnight.

When speaking of a party one usually associates with it fire, lamps, gas, &c., or something in the shape of artificial light, which contribute certainly not a little to give an air of comfort to the party thus assembled. Here, however, was a complete absence of every kind of luminary. I must inform my reader that it was the month of June, and, therefore, afforded the visitor an excellent opportunity of seeing all the many peculiarities of the Norwegian summer.

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When I retired to my room there was the nificent sun shining at a considerable height above the horizon at midnight. The sight of the sun at midnight in Lapland in actual appearance presents nothing different to the setting or rising of the sun at such a height above the horizon as may be equivalent to an hour, or an hour and a half of time, as the case may be in his own climate. When, however, the visitor remembers that it is midnight instead of daytime, he then begins to contemplate the absence of such a thing in his own climate, and then is at once struck with the phenomenon, and begins to regard it as one of the wonders of this beautiful and diversified world.

A man born in the great American prairie, is very apt to view the beautiful region so variously painted with all the gay flowers it contains, in no other light than that of things that he has been accustomed to regard ever since he first possessed the power of vision. The man who has passed the greater part, or the whole of his life in the neighbourhood of those sublime Falls of Niagara, has got pretty well accustomed to them, and ceases to be struck with those phenomena, which in a stranger create all those various emotions which the place is calculated to produce. The man who has passed a considerable portion of his time in the neighbourhood of an American forest, and witnessed that most wonderful of all earthly sights, the fall of the leaf, sees none of those charms in it which enraptures the visitor.

This, however, is but the effect upon ordinary minds. The poet, the painter, and the musician may be confined to one locality of nature, and that not one of the most lovely kind, where beauty ever changing and fresh will be present, to instruct, to amuse, and to interest, which would not be appreciated except by those gifted with higher powers