ere
was much good as well as evil in them. They had good and wise laws when
nearly all the rest of the world was lawless; and many of the laws and
customs which prevailed among them a thousand years ago exist at the
present day. The bold Vikings were great colonisers; among other parts
of the world they overran and settled in a large portion of Great
Britain, and much of their blood--more than many people are aware of--
flows in our own veins.

But I am wandering from my subject. Let me return to it by repeating
that Bergen, this ancient stronghold of the Vikings, is a famous and a
strange old place.

It is built at the foot of a steep mountain-range which is so close to
the margin of the sea that the city has barely room to stand. One might
fancy that the houses were crowding and jostling each other and
squeezing themselves together, in order to avoid on the one hand being
pushed up the mountain-side, and, on the other hand, being thrust into
the sea. Some of the smaller cottages and a few villas seem to have
been beaten in this struggle for standing-room, for they appear to have
been obliged to clamber up the mountain-side, and perch themselves on
spots where there does not seem to be standing-room for a goat. From
such elevated positions they look down complacently on their crowded
brethren.

The houses near the sea have not fared so well. They are built _in_ the
water on piles, and are all of them warehouses with projections in
front, from which hang blocks and hoisting tackle. These projections
resemble heads; the piles look like legs; and it does not require a very
strong effort of imagination to believe that the warehouses are great
living creatures which have waded into the sea, and are looking
earnestly down into the water to observe how the fish are getting on.

The houses are all built of wood; all are painted white, and all have
red-tiled roofs. They are peaked and gable-ended to an extraordinary
degree, so that the general aspect of the city is confused and
irregular--all the more interesting and picturesque on this account.

A thought strikes me here, and when a thought strikes one, I think we
ought always to pay that thought the compliment of jotting it down. It
is this--regularity in small details is pleasing; regularity on a grand
scale is disagreeable. For instance, a chair with one leg turned,
another square, and a third ornamentally carved, would be a disagreeable
object. The two fr