y rising from lock to lock,
manage to reach an elevation of three hundred feet. Nor does he have
an opportunity to visit the falls of Trolletann, nor Drammen, nor
Kongsberg, nor any of the beauties of the Telemark.

In those days the railroad existed only upon paper. Twenty years were
to elapse before one could traverse the Scandinavian kingdom from
one shore to the other in forty hours, and visit the North Cape on
excursion tickets to Spitzberg.

In those days Dal was, and may it long remain, the central point
for foreign or native tourists, these last being for the most part
students from Christiania. From Dal they could wander over the entire
Telemark and Hardanger region, explore the valley of Vesfjorddal
between Lakes Mjos and Tinn, and visit the wonderful cataracts of the
Rjukan Tun. The hamlet boasts of but one inn, but that is certainly
the most attractive and comfortable imaginable, and one of the
most important also, for it can offer four bed-chambers for the
accommodation of its guests. In a word, it is Dame Hansen's inn.

A few benches surround the base of its pink walls, which are separated
from the ground by a substantial granite foundation. The spruce
rafters and weather-boarding have acquired such hardness and toughness
with age that the sharpest hatchet can make little or no impression
upon them. Between the roughly hewn rafters, which are placed
horizontally one above the other, a mixture of clay and turf forms
a stanch roof, through which the hardest winter rains can not force
their way.

Upstairs, in the bedrooms, the ceilings are painted in dark red or
black tints to contrast with the more cheerful and delicate hues of
the wood-work.

In one corner of the large hall stands a huge cylinder stove, the
pipe of which rises nearly to the ceiling, before it disappears in the
kitchen chimney. In another corner stands a tall clock which emits
a sonorous tick-tack, as its carved hands travel slowly around its
enameled face. Here is a secretary, black with age, side by side
with a massive iron tripod. Upon the mantel is an immense terra-cotta
candlestick which can be transformed into a three-branched candelabrum
by turning it upside down. The handsomest furniture in the house
adorns this spacious hall--the birch-root table, with its spreading
feet, the big chest with its richly wrought brass handles, in which
the Sunday and holiday clothing is kept, the tall arm-chair, hard
and uncomfortable as a churc