Three in Norway Part 12

Our old experience of Rus Vand taught us that one side was sporting-looking and interesting, while the other was bleak and ugly; but Esau, who took the ugly side, had much the best of it to-day, as the place seemed alive with fish, and he kept catching them all the time, so that his little ten-foot rod was continually to be seen in the form of a hoop, from which position it rea.s.sumed the perpendicular in a way that reflects no little credit on Mr. Farlow.

When we met again at the end of the lake on our way home, we found that we had twenty fish, weighing just 44 lbs., of which Esau had caught fifteen weighing 32 lbs., the Skipper four of 9 lbs. weight, and John, who was very unlucky, only a single two-and-a-half-pounder. The smallest of the bag was a little over a pound, the largest three pounds, which was reached by more than one; and nearly all were caught in water so shallow that the dorsal fin of the fish was often visible in his mad rushes. .h.i.ther and thither; this made it extremely difficult to prevent the tail-fly being hung up on a rock whenever the fish was hooked on the dropper, and not a few were lost in this manner. All were caught on two patterns of fly, namely----No, philanthropy has limits, and no man can expect to be told patterns of flies. Go to Norway, and the time and trouble spent in acquiring that knowledge will be amply repaid by the pleasure that no one could fail to derive from a visit.

No doubt, with the usual discontentedness of man we shall regret for ever that we did not all go to the ugly side of the lake, of which Esau was obliged to leave the best piece untouched as he came back, from sheer inability to carry any more fish over the rough ground. But the ways of fish are inscrutable; we hardly ever caught any number on that side before, and probably shall not do so again. It was just Esau's day.

Kismet.

After weighing our catch, we cleaned them and cut off their heads to lighten them for the journey over Glopit, and even without this extra weight we were a good deal troubled and felt overburdened on the uphill side, which is terribly steep and rough, only just practicable for a man on foot.

When we got back to camp we found that ola had not returned from Gjendesheim, which caused us some sorrow, as Esau wanted to go out stalking on the morrow, and could not go alone. At least, he would be extremely unlikely to see any deer, for the reindeer being exactly the same colour as the mountains among which they live, it is almost impossible to see them before they see the enemy and depart hastily.

These native hunters are wonderful at the profession, and seem to know by instinct when they are in the vicinity of deer, as if they could feel their presence in the air. No doubt they really see indications that we should never observe, for they always begin to go cautiously, crouching and peering over rocks when deer are about, long before we amateurs are aware from the ordinary signs of footprints, nibbled reindeer flowers, or newly moved stones, that there is likely to be any sport.

[Plate: ON THE TOP OF GLOPIT. RETURNING FROM RUS LAKE.]

_August 21._--It was cold and windy last night, so we turned into bed early and lay in luxurious comfort while John read out choice bits, all of which we know by heart, from the works of Mark Twain. We all think Mark Twain the best writer for camp life that has yet been discovered, and we have three or four of his books here. Besides these our library of light literature consists of Shakespeare, Longfellow, Dr. Johnson's Table-talk, and novels by Whyte Melville, Walford, and Thackeray. But Mark and William get more work than all the rest.

It is quite dark now during the night, and we have made a wooden chandelier out of a curiously bent piece of birch wood, which holds two candles and hangs down from the ridge pole by a string. In the daytime it is hoisted up to the roof, but at night we let it down till it swings about two feet above our heads as we lie in bed. This contrivance is capital for reading, and also affords considerable diversion to the last man into bed. The candles are just too high to be reached with a puff easily from a rec.u.mbent position, and yet we persistently try to blow them out without moving. Just as sleep is creeping over two of the wearied sportsmen, the last man begins blowing and cussing at these candles every night regularly. The scene is generally this. Skipper and John just dropping off to sleep. Esau lies down, makes himself extremely comfortable, and then--puff, whoo, whew, puff,--gasp for breath, rest a moment. Pouf. Chandelier swings round under the impulse of the strong wind thus created. Esau makes a brilliant flying shot at one candle, as it circles swiftly past. Skipper: 'Thank goodness.' Pause. Esau: Poof, whoo, whoof. John: 'Dash it all, get up and put it out.' Esau: 'Get up yourself.' Skipper: 'Let me blow it out.' Pouf, puff, whoosh. Chandelier swings madly round, drops grease on John's nose. John: 'Tare an 'ouns.'

Throws tobacco pouch at it, more grease all over the place, tobacco pouch rebounds from tent into Esau's mouth. Recrimination for five minutes. Chandelier at last stationary. Everybody at once: 'Puff, boo, pouf, whew, ---- it, ---- it, pouf, ---- it, ---- the ---- thing -- -- -- pouf. Thank goodness;' and we all turn over with a sigh of relief, to repeat the performance the following night.

ola not having turned up, there could be no stalking, so the beautiful morning was wasted. The Skipper got so angry about it that he said he would go in his canoe to find the absentee, and take at the same time a lot of our surplus fish for the people at Gjendesheim.

Leaving the tent on its gra.s.sy sunlit lawn he walked down to the edge of the great lake, and turning over the smaller of the two canoes, which were lying bottom uppermost, launched her and got in with rod and fis.h.i.+ng bag, and pushed off into the deep. Opposite to the place where the canoes were drawn up, and apparently only a hundred yards distant though really more than a mile away, were the snow-capped mountain steeps that rise almost perpendicularly from two to three thousand feet out of the lake; and for these he made, gradually becoming a mere twinkling speck till he faded out of sight from the tent. The lake was as smooth as gla.s.s, only occasionally rippled as some monarch of the deep, excited for once in his life by some specially fascinating fly, condescended to make a rush for it instead of the gentle suck by which he usually took his food, and the Skipper paddled leisurely along within twenty yards of the rocks, with his rod bending over the stern, and trailing behind a couple of flies in the hope of catching a trout without the trouble of angling for him.

It is very pleasant to be alone once in a way in this overcrowded world.

Not alone as it is possible to be in England, but absolutely alone, with no living thing near except the trout, the insects, and one's image in the water. Oh, blessed Norway! when we get back to the turmoils, troubles, and pleasures of a London season how we shall long for you!

There is only one word to express this existence, and that is Freedom--freedom from care, freedom from resistance, and from the struggle for life. What a country! where civilised man can relapse as much as seems good to him into his natural state, and retrograde a hundred generations into his primeval condition.

But we forget that the Skipper is coasting up towards Gjendesheim in search of the miscreant ola.

He proceeded for a couple of hours, catching a few fish now and then, but presently as midday approached, the sun became too hot to be pleasant, the fish would not move, and the Skipper began to get impatient and annoyed at not meeting ola. After a while a black speck with two flas.h.i.+ng arms appeared rounding a promontory; this was ola in the boat. The Skipper was boiling with rage under the influence of various incentives as he approached. ola, like most Norwegians, was calm, placid, and utterly unconscious of the flight of time and the shortness of life. The Skipper had been primed to exploding point by his two friends before starting, and as he had now paddled five miles from home without meeting the adversary, he was, to put it mildly, 'indignant.' So, when he found ola smoking serenely, and sculling along as though his brief span were going to stretch through the unending cycles of eternity, he gave way to the most horrible outbreak of temper in English, which must have lasted four or five minutes, and then telling the caitiff in Norwegian to take the fish to Gjendesheim and return to camp by five o'clock whatever the weather might be, he turned and left that hardy Norseman open-mouthed and bewildered, looking as though he had seen the Stromkarl, or had had an interview with his mother-in-law.

Then a great wind arose, and blew against the Skipper all the way home, but he arrived in the most beatific frame of mind in spite of it; the relief of the storm of temper and bad language had been so great to him, that he was filled with a blessed joy. He said it was the most invigorating and refres.h.i.+ng pastime he ever indulged in, for ola could not understand a word of it, and therefore no remorse could follow the outburst, not a thoughtless expression or hasty word could go home to his heart and there rankle, to recoil on some future occasion, but the whole vial of pent-up wrath could be emptied on its object without fear of retribution.

The explosion must have been something very fine to enable the Skipper to make light of the head-wind, for a wind on Gjendin is not to be scoffed at in any boat, and least of all in a c.o.c.kle-sh.e.l.l of a canoe.

The mountains are so high and steep that the lake lies as it were in a trench, and any wind always draws straight up or down the length, and soon gets a big sea up. All the Norwegians we have seen say it is the height of madness to go on Gjendin at all in such boats, the sudden squalls are so dangerous; and neither of our men can be persuaded to go a yard in them.

Esau and John, for want of better employment, after fis.h.i.+ng a little, began to bake, and had laid out a goodly show of dainty confections, two dozen rolls, four wimberry tarts, a lot of biscuits, and a venison pie of the ordinary size (9 inches diameter). When the Skipper returned it was decided to make another, as we imagine the meat has a better chance of keeping when h.o.a.rded up in pies than when left in its raw state.

So we each took our usual share in the construction of a PIE, before which all other pies should be as nought.

It was made in our largest baking tin, 12 inches across, and contained nearly a hind quarter of venison, our last six eggs, a heart, a liver, and about 1 lb. of bacon. The crust was put on about nine o'clock, and after we had all gazed at it and unanimously agreed that it was the 'boss pie,' we bore it proudly but gingerly to the oven, heated by John seven times hotter than before, and now gaping to receive it; a great full moon rose up from behind the mountains and seemed to smile on our good work; the bright fire shed a red glow over the three figures bending o'er the simmering treasure, and a more peaceful, domestic group it would be impossible to conceive.

About eleven John and the Skipper turned in, but outside could be seen for some time the solitary form of Esau still crouching over the expiring embers of the oven, and tending with a mother's care the tempting food that he already tasted in imagination.

[Plate: BAKING BY NIGHT IN MEMURUDALEN.]

Most of the berries of the country are now just at their best, and Memurudalen is a grand valley for all of them, except of course the strawberry and raspberry, which will not grow at this alt.i.tude. But we have 'klarkling' (the English crowberry) in great abundance; blau baer (wimberry), the finest and best ever seen, in quant.i.ties; also 'skin tukt,' another blue berry rather larger than a wimberry, and with a thicker skin and wonderful bloom on it; this we think does not grow in England. Then less numerous are a berry something between a raspberry and a red currant, but of better flavour than either of them; and the great and glorious 'molte baer' (cloudberry); to say nothing of 'heste baer,' and 'tutti baer,' and several others of unknown names. The last one grows in England, but we have forgotten its name; they make jelly from it here, and prize it highly for its acid taste.

CHAPTER XXII.

MEMURUDALEN.

_Sunday, August 22._--We woke up this morning with a bright sun s.h.i.+ning through the canvas of the tent, and making it intolerably hot inside; and as we threw open the door of the inner compartment, the fragrant aroma of the 'boss pie' was wafted to us on the morning air.

We spent the morning in quiet Sunday fas.h.i.+on, chiefly in lying under the shade of an awning made with rugs which we call the 'sycamine tree,' and eating wimberries and cream. Besides this we perpetrated a great deal of high art; every one was seized with the desire of sketching the camp, and so we sat around on pinnacles like so many pelicans, libelling the unfortunate place from every position whence it could be seen.

It is looking very comfortable just now. The tent itself is pitched in an angle of a steep little cliff which effectually protects it from cold winds at one side and the back, and at the other side we have put up a thick fence of birch branches to temper the storm to the sleeping-tent.

We find it very convenient to have the two compartments: the inner one is only used for sleeping in, and always immediately after reveille is plunged in an apparently hopeless confusion of rugs, sheepskins, mattresses, and boots, with here and there a book or a hat protruding (to use the Skipper's beautiful simile) like brickbats in a dust-heap.

After breakfast all the bedding is dragged out to be aired on the rocks, and the tent generally tidied.

But the outer tent is always a picture of order and neatness, for here we keep our stores, boxes of flour and biscuits, cartridges, cooking utensils, tools, whisky, and potatoes. One of the boxes was made specially under Esau's directions to be used as a table: the top and bottom are both hinged, and so when the box is put on its front and these two lids opened it makes a very good large table; the lids are held up by a batten screwed underneath them, and for greater security we have added two legs. But at present the weather is so pleasant that we always feed outside, a few yards from the tent and nearer to the oven.

On the extreme left, as the penny showman says, you will observe one of the meat safes, the other one 'thou canst not see, because it's not in sight,' being close to the back of the tent. Also behind the tent may be faintly seen the mustard and cress garden, always covered with a sheet by day to save it from the heat of the sun, and with the same sheet by night, to guard it from the cold, so that the poor thing never gets any light, and does not flourish very exceedingly. None of the mustard seeds have as yet grown up as big as the one in the parable, but when one does we mean to make a lot of salad out of it, enough for all the camp.

Above the middle of the outer tent are three things which look like lightning conductors, but are only our rods, which are always stuck in the ground there when not in use. At their foot under the rock is the egg larder, neatly constructed of stones and turf, with a wooden lid; and hanging from the cliff hard by is a very pretty and curious spider's nest made of paper, like a miniature wasp-nest, about two inches in diameter.

High up in the centre is 'the meteor flag of England,' engaged in its customary occupation of 'yet terrific burning,' there being absolutely no Dutch Boers here. Underneath its shelter are many forked poles with cross-bars, all made from the birch with which the valley abounds just here, and on which clothing of some sort is always hanging out to dry; so that the place looks like a laundry-ground, and deceives even the ravens, which come down in swarms from the mountains in search of maids'

noses to devour. In the midst of these poles may be seen the oven, with its flue reaching halfway up the hill, and its two openings, the lower one for fuel, the upper for food.

[Plate: THE CAMP IN MEMURUDALEN.]

Right in front of the tent is the fireplace, a long trench in the ground, faced with stones of such a size and shape that they form apertures suitable for our numerous pans; and simmering by the fire is the perennial soup. Nearer to the front is the wood pile, and nearer still the board on which the cooking things are placed after was.h.i.+ng up.

In front again of this is the little stream which supplies us with water, now rapidly beginning to fail under the influence of the long drought: it may be noticed that the engineers have changed its course in several places for greater convenience in getting water, and to give more room on the camp side.

The foreground is a ma.s.s of juniper, wimberries, skintukt, crowberries, and rocks, and then comes about thirty yards from the tent the Memurua torrent, all thick and milky from the glacier, cold as Christmas, fishless, uninteresting, not drinkable, only useful as a refrigerator for milk, and only agreeable to look upon from a distance, but faithfully keeping up the unceasing roar that is customary among such torrents. This river makes the waters of the lake too cold to bathe in and too cheerless for fish to abide in near our camp, but it does not come into the picture, partly because it runs in a ravine, but more because it was right behind the artist.

The lake itself is to the extreme right, with unclimbable snow-capped rocky mountains forming the opposite coast.

To-day we dined at 4 P.M. in order to get an uninterrupted evening's fis.h.i.+ng, but the experiment was not a success and will not be repeated, for it spoilt the dinner and we caught no fish. On returning to camp at night rather cold, very cross, and exceedingly hungry, we agreed that the best antidote for these dangerous symptoms would be hot soup, so John put the pot on the fire while the Skipper and Esau were attending to the tent and domestic duties.

Soon the caldron was heated and brought into the tent, and the eager crowd drew near with cups and spoons, and one lifted the lid, while another plunged his cup into the steaming savoury mess. And then arose a great cry of horror and desolation, and the sleeping valley rang with the wail of men in despair, for John had put the wrong pot on the fire, and we had been presented with boiling dirty water in which the dinner-things had been washed up; while all the time the soup pot was quiet, untouched and cold in the corner of the tent where it is kept.

But three hungry men are not to be balked of a meal on which their hearts are set by any trifle like this, so we all commenced with a will to stoke that fire up and put that other pot on, and we got our soup and were snugly packed in bed long before the gentle August moon had sunk to rest behind the sheltering mountain tops.

The Skipper, by the way, is very much exasperated with this same moon just now. He says she is a fraud, for this morning when we got up, there she was high in the heavens.

'What right,' he wants to know, 'has this moon--any moon, in fact--to be up there blinking away in the middle of the day when we have plenty of sun to light us? forward, dissipated thing! and then probably after this week we shall have ever so many nights without any moon at all, and all the earth left in total darkness to take care of itself; while here we are to-day with an absurdly round moon at one end of this comparatively diminutive valley, and a most extravagantly blazing sun at the other.'

The whole thing is ridiculous, he says, and it must be confessed that there is some justice in his complaint; though no doubt there could be a good deal said on the other side.

_August 23._--While Esau went out after deer the other two crawled up the mountain and over to Rus Vand to fish, and had a good day. Two of the Skipper's fish were three pounds each, but, like most of the biggest fish, not in that beautiful condition which the smaller ones always show. The Skipper is sure that the old worn-out fish creep up to the stony shallows at the western end of the lake to die in a sunny spot, just as we men creep away in our old age to Bath, Cheltenham, Cannes, or Algiers, to breathe our last in a warm place, thereby taking one step in the direction of the proverbial future.

Esau arrived in camp about half-past seven, quite exhausted, and followed by ola, also dead beat, and again bearing the heads and skins of two deer, a buck and a doe. He was hailed with fervent joy and many congratulations: it is certainly great luck to fall in with deer on two stalking days in succession, for they are by no means numerous here this year. Dinner was served in a marvellously short time.