a
terror of darkness in the mind, yet the north also possesses in the same
extreme the exactly opposite character, a warm, sunny, summer nature,
clear-aired, heavily scented, rich with the changing beauty of countless
colours; in which objects at ten or twelve miles' distance across the
sea-mirror, seem to approach within speaking-distance; in which the
mountains clothe themselves with brownish green grass to the very
top--in Lofoten to a height of 2000 feet--in which the small birch woods
wreathe themselves up on the slopes and ravines, like white,
sixteen-year-old maidens at play; in which too the air is laden, as in
no other place, with the scent of the growing strawberries and
raspberries there, and when the day is so hot, that you are compelled to
walk in shirt-sleeves, and you are longing to bathe in the rippling sea,
always saturated with sunshine, and perfectly clear to the very bottom.

The powerful aroma and bright colour of things growing there, have been
attributed by the learned to the strong light that fills the atmosphere,
when the sun is above the horizon uninterruptedly the whole twenty-four
hours. And in no other place can such deliciously flavoured strawberries
or raspberries, nor such fragrant birch-boughs, be gathered as in
Nordland.

If there is a home for a wonderfully beautiful idyl, it must be in the
fjord-valleys of Nordland in the summer-time. It is as though the sun
kisses Nature all the more lovingly, because he knows how short a time
they have to be together, and as if they both, for the time, try to
forget that they must part so soon. Then the hill grows green as if by a
sudden miracle, and the bluebell, the dandelion, the buttercup, the
dog-daisy, the wild rose, the raspberry and the strawberry spring up in
lavish abundance, by every brook, on every hillock, on every
mountain-slope; then hundreds of insects hum in the grass as in a
tropical land; then cows, horses, and sheep are driven up the hills and
the mountain-sides, while the Fin from the highlands comes down into the
valley with his reindeer and waters them in the river; then the
cloudberry moors lie reddening for many a mile inland; then there is
quiet, sunny peace in every cottage, where the fisherman is now sitting
at home with his family, putting his tackle in order for the winter
fishing; for in Nordland the summer is more beautiful than in any other
place, and there is an idyllic gladness and peace over Nature, which is
to