the shores of their sea-girt homes.

Beyond this, nowhere are seen or heard the sights or sounds of man's
habitation, and, hushed in painful tranquillity and profound solitude,
the interior recesses of the fiord show no signs of life. With all their
storm-beaten antiquity, gaunt and inhospitable, the skeletons of land
rather than the land itself,--the grey and rugged crags--alone appear
between the coppice and the short scanty grass which, ever when the wind
came to breathe gently on our sails, sighed and moaned amid the general
repose.

About twenty miles from Christiania the fiord narrows to two miles, and
holds that breadth up to the city. The town of Christiania is hid by a
small island from the sight of the traveller approaching it by water;
but at a great distance we could, while winding up the fiord, catch a
glimpse of the white houses sleeping in a valley, surrounded by high
mountains. At eight o'clock in the afternoon--for there is not much
night--we dropped anchor off the town.

Christiania stands low; but the land slopes gradually from the shore of
the fiord till it loses itself on the hazy tops of the mountains. When
the sky is partially obscured by masses of clouds, the appearance of
Christiania, seen from the deck of a vessel in the harbour, is very
beautiful; that part of the town, near the water, shining brightly in
the sunlight, while the remoter suburbs, at the back, being canopied by
the heavy vapours that hang around the peaks of the mountains, look
black as night.

As soon as the anchor was let go, we went ashore, as usual, to make
inquiries about salmon; and received as much encouragement as at
Falkenborg and Kongsbacka. The time, however, had not yet quite arrived
when the salmon-fishery commenced; and a few days devoted to Christiania
would not debar us from any amusement attached to the long-desired
sport. We brought several letters of introduction; and, among them, one
to the Viceroy of Christiania; but we did not present our letter to the
old Count, all the information and hospitality we desired being amply
given to us by the British Consul-General.

There is nothing to see in Christiania, the most conspicuous object
being the palace, which stands, like a manufactory, on the top of a
rising piece of ground. It is an enormous pile of building, painted
uniformly white; and I do not believe the interior is more commodious
than the exterior is monotonous and void of architectural taste, since