n, close to the spot whence, in about twenty minutes,
he will rise, to repeat his prolonged course of nearly four-and-twenty
hours through the northern sky. But if the darkness of night is absent,
its deep quietude is there. The mighty cliffs that rise like giant
walls to heaven, casting broad, heavy shadows over the sea, send forth
no echoes, for the innumerable birds that dwell among them are silently
perched like snowflakes on every crag, or nestled in every crevice,
buried in repose. The sea resembles glass, and glides with but a faint
sigh upon the shore. All is impressively still on mountain and fiord.
Everything in nature is asleep, excepting the wakeful eye of day, the
hum of distant rills, the boom of inland cataracts, and the ripple on
the shore. These sounds, however, do but render the universal silence
more profound by suggesting the presence of those stupendous forces
which lie latent everywhere.

A white mist floats over the sea like a curtain of gauze, investing
insignificant objects with grandeur, and clothing caverns, cliffs, and
mountain gorges with unusual sublimity.

Only one object suggestive of man is visible through the haze. It is a
ship--of the old, old-fashioned build--with high stem and stern, and
monstrous figurehead. Its forefoot rests upon the strip of gravel in
yonder bay at the foot of the cliff, whose summit is lost in the clouds.
The hull reposes on its own reflected image, and the taper mast is
repeated in a wavy but distinct line below. It is the "longship"; the
"war vessel"; the "sea horse" of Solve Klofe, the son of King Hunthiof
of More, whom Harald Fairhair slew.

Solve had, as we have before said, spent the winter in taking his
revenge by herrying the coast in his longship, and doing all in his
power to damage the King's men, as well as those who were friendly to
his cause. Among other things he had, early in spring, persuaded Haldor
the Fierce to let him have the use of one of his warships, with a few of
his best men, to accompany him on a viking cruise. Erling had resisted
his pressing invitation to bear him company, because of important
business, the nature of which he did not think it necessary to disclose.
His friend Glumm the Gruff also declined from similar reasons. At all
events, he was similarly pre-engaged and taciturn. Thorer the Thick,
however, and Kettle Flatnose, and young Alric--the latter by special and
importunate request--were allowed to accompany