stor bock_," shouted Ulus, and
whipped out his knife, and proceeded to do the offices, being filled
with strong glee, which he imparted to the driving rain, the swishing
trees, and my dripping self.

And, by Jove, his highness was a beauty too! Antlers in velvet, of
course, as is the fashion with all Norwegian deer at this time of year;
but there were eight points on each, and they've got the most approved
"impudent" downward curve. What with no _rype_ and few trout, I'd
been feeling rather down on my luck all these long weeks till now; but
this big elk turned the scale. Glad I came.

September nights drop down early here, and day was getting on, so we
hurried up with the work, and loitered not for tempting admiration. Off
came the coarse-haired pelt, pull by pull; and away dropped head and
neck, after a haggle through sinew and vertebrae; and then we got heavy
stones and built in the meat securely, lest the lynxes should thieve
the lot. It all took time, and meanwhile the weather worsened steadily.
The rain was snorting down in heavy squalls, and often there were
crashes from amongst the pines. But the _stor bock's_ trophies
repaid one for these things.

At last we got through the obsequies, shouldered the spoils between us,
and started.

It was slow passage. On this primaeval ground one is so constantly being
baulked. There are so many knotted jungles of splintered rock, such
frequent swamps, so much fallen timber. And, moreover, the watercourses
and torrents were all new-bloated with the rain, so that we had to cast
about for fords, and then to grip one another at stiff arm's length, so
as not to get swept adrift whilst wading amongst the eddying boulders.
And when at last we did come to the lake, we saw there in the gray dusk
a thing which caused Ulus to offer up hot words in Norsk, which were
not words of prayer.

To remind you again of where we were:--

Some eight miles distant in crow-flight was the salt-water fjord. From
it two mountain walls sprout out towards the north. At first the valley
between these is filled with land which is mostly forest. Then comes a
lake, hemmed by two precipices. Then another two-mile-wide strip of
forest. Then another lake, with shiny granite walls running up sheer
two thousand feet, so that of the fosses which jump in cream over the
brinks above, only the stouter ones reach more than half-way down.

We were on the farther side of this last sheet of water, and across it
la