well-matched and smoothly finished,
laid horizontally one upon another, like our frontier cabins in the
far West. Each farm, besides the home acres, has also connected with
it what is termed a "saeter," being a tract of mountain pasture, where
a portion of the young members of the family (usually the girls only)
pass the nine or ten weeks of summer engaged in cheese-making, the
cattle being kept on the hills for that period. Here a very rude hut
with but two apartments serves for the girls, and a rough shed for
the cattle at night. The outer apartment of the hut contains a stove,
a table, and a coarse bed, forming the living-room, while the inner
one is improved for the dairy. The available soil about the home farm
in the valley must raise hay and grain for the long winter's use.
After being milked in the morning, at the saeter, the cows, goats, and
sheep go directly to their allotted feeding ground, perhaps more than
a mile away, and at the evening hour they by themselves as surely
return to be milked. The only inducement for such regularity on the
part of the intelligent creatures, so far as we could understand, was
a few handfuls of salt which was given them nightly, and of which
they seemed to be very fond. Great exertion is made by the girls in
the mountains to excel one another as to the aggregate production of
cheese for the season, much pride being felt also in the quality of
the article. The sturdy figures and healthy blooming faces of these
girls, "with cheeks like apples which the sun has ruddied," showed
what physical charms the bracing mountain air and a simple manner of
life in these regions is capable of producing.

Norway has been appropriately called the country of mountains and
fjords, of cascades and lakes. Among the largest of the latter is
Lake Mjoesen, which is about sixty miles long and has an average width
of twelve. It is certainly a very remarkable body of water. It
receives into its bosom one important river, the Lougen, after it has
run a course of nearly a hundred and fifty miles. At its southern
extremity is the port of Eidsvold, and at the northern is
Lillehammer. These are situated in the direct route between
Christiania and Troendhjem. But the most singular fact attached to the
lake is that it measures over fifteen hundred feet in depth, while
its surface is four hundred feet above the level of the ocean. Its
bottom is known to be nearly a thousand feet below that of the North
Sea, whic