bruises, troubles, and tumbles, and would not have changed places with the most rational of God's creatures that walked on the level earth, breathing an atmosphere some thousand feet lower than mine. Before me was a wilderness of snowy mountains, with the superior Gousta in the midst;-not a house, nor a living creature was to be seen for leagues and leagues; but all was bleak, solitary barrenness. Turning round, however, and looking over the mountains that lay betwixt me and Kongsberg, the scenery, though not so awfully, gloomily grand, was more pleasing, and more variedly picturesque. Dark mountains of every variety of shape extended themselves in all directions, and several rivers were to be seen winding among them; and there were green plots of land and white farm houses, which the sun seemed to strike with his most dazzling beams.

And there I stood, high up as it were above the earth, and not a fellow-mortal was within. the range of many leagues. My glowing bosom

confessed a thousand ravishing sensations; my soul dilated within me, and I gloried in the magnificence of my temporary resting-place, and thanked my Creator with a gush of devotional gratitude for having bestowed on me those feelings which ever awoke at the magic call of nature, and, in the midst of sorrows, could occasionally vibrate with transporting joy. Nor less did I thank thee, Almighty God! for having suffered me, though now in the sear and yellow leaf, to retain and still experience those emotions which too commonly pass away with the ingenuousness of youth, but which assure the heart of its alliance with something superior to ordinary clay, and recompense it for a thousand privations, and render insignificant a thousand misfortunes, and lift it still higher in communion with the Eternal, and suffuse it with a thousand graceful and beautiful hues that do not perish or fade until increasing worldliness and selfishness have rusted its finer springs, covering it with a damp and noxious shade, and concealing

whatever it possessed that was estimable and lovely.

What boundless satisfaction occupied my whole fabric as I dwelt on the surrounding prospect! I was filled with a torrent of crowding thoughts, that hurried too swiftly through the chambers of the mind to be defined or arrested; and it was with great reluctance that I quitted my lofty station, whither I never again should repair.

I found the descent, however, to be not so easy a proceeding as I had hoped to find it. Frequently I came on a sudden to the brink of a precipice, and was obliged to wander far out of the direction I wished to pursue, or lowered myself down by the branches and roots of trees at the risk of my neck. Sometimes I slipped for many yards down banks of frozen snow, and was frequently in such imminent danger of being dashed to pieces, that I thanked Heaven very gratefully, when, after several hours' exertion, I found myself safe at the bottom. I

passed on to the neighbourhood of Goustaa sketch of which forms the frontispiece to one of these volumes-where I wandered for several days amid scenery of a very noble character, and then returned by Bolkesoe to Kongsberg.

CHAPTER XIII.

WATERFALLS-LAURVIG.

WHOEVER Visits Kongsberg ought to go in search of Laŭgerud Foss, called by the common people Labro Foss, one of the noblest and most beautiful falls in Norway; though not on so great a scale as several.* It is on that river, the Laŭgen, which runs through Kongsberg, and is four or five miles distant from the town; and not very easily discovered, being at some distance from any road.

The two most celebrated falls are Vöringfoss, in the Hardanger mountains, near Bergen, and Rukanfoss, near the Gousta mountain.