CHAPTER V.

THE FIRST CAMP.

_July 15._--We slept well, and at eight o'clock the Skipper, always first to wake, got up, and looking out of the window saw thence the four bad men who had taken the rooms before us and hung their socks out of the window, just starting on their journey, and looking as if they did so with an easy conscience.

Some men can carry with a light heart and gay demeanour a weight of crime that would wreck the happiness of less hardened ruffians.

Then he turned his gaze in the opposite direction, and oh, joy! our luggage and boats were in sight, and arrived directly afterwards. The man in charge said he had travelled all night with them without sleeping, and to judge from his appearance we imagined that his statement was correct. He had been sitting on the Skipper's bag for thirty-eight miles, and from the state of its interior we calculated his weight to be about twenty-two stone. He was very ill-tempered after his mere trifle of a journey and vigil, and asked for more money on hearing that he had three quarters of a mile further to go. This was very sad, and we thought showed an unchristian spirit; but we sternly urged him forward, and all ended happily on our arrival at Espedals, when we paid him his money and a shilling extra.

It only took us a quarter of an hour to get to the lake, and after unpacking there and dismissing the men we put the canoes into the water, and then put water into the canoes until they sank; while we sat on the shore watching the trout rising all over the rippled surface of the lake, occasionally eyeing our sunken canoes in an impatient, longing sort of way, but never attempting to start on our great voyage.

These tactics to an inexperienced 'voyageur' might look like the acts of an ordinary lunatic; but it should be explained that the long exposure to the sun which the canoes had undergone had caused them to leak badly, and they required soaking to swell up the joints, before they could be intrusted with our valuable property and persons. Besides this we were hungry, and thought it a good opportunity for lunch, and had to make some previously arranged alterations in the baggage with a view to lightening it. As long as the land journey lasted, strength was the chief object to aim at, but now lightness was of more importance. About one o'clock, when we had got all our things aboard and were just starting, a strong head-wind arose. This was always our luck. We decided to make only a short voyage. The waves were fairly big, but the canoes weathered them bravely, though they were very low in the water, and we had to keep the pumps going (_i.e._ mop them out with our sponges) during the whole voyage.

We landed not more than a mile and a half from the end of the lake, and found a very nice camping-ground about ten yards from the shore on the south bank, with what the poets call 'a babbling brook' close to it; pitched the tent, and had a simple dinner of bacon, eggs, and jam, the last dinner during our trip at which trout did not find a place. Then we sallied forth in the canoes to fish. Esau was the last to leave the shore, and as he paddled off he noticed the Skipper's rod in the familiar Norwegian shape of a bow, and found him struggling with two on at the same time, both of which he landed, and found to be over 1 lb. each. 'First blood claimed and allowed,' to quote the terse language of the prize ring. Not a bad beginning, but we only got a few more about the same weight. They came very short, but were remarkably game fish when hooked, and in first-rate condition. We turned in about eleven, when it began to rain a little, and slept with our heads under the blankets, the mosquitoes being in countless multitudes.

_July 16._--It was a lovely morning, and the lake looked its best, but it is not strikingly beautiful compared with many that we have seen. It has high rugged hills on both sides, and pine woods down to the water's edge, and some small islands dotted about the upper end of it; but the lake is rather shallow, the pine trees rather stunted, and there are a good many wooden huts and sæters on the hill-sides, which, although they appear to be mostly uninhabited, detract from the wildness of the scenery.

The natives have one or two boats on the lake, and do some fishing on their own account. To-day we saw a man engaged in the atrocious employment of fishing with an 'otter.'

Any natives who see our camp when rowing past come to shore to inspect us and our belongings. They all adopt the same course of procedure. They land, and stare, and say nothing; then they pull up their boat and make it safe, and advancing close to the tent stare, and say nothing either to each other or us. Then Esau says confidentially, as if it was a new and brilliant idea (he has done exactly the same thing some scores of times), 'We'd better be civil to these fellows; perhaps they could bring us some eggs, and they look pretty friendly.' The natives are all the time staring and saying nothing. Then Esau remarks in Norwegian, 'It is fine weather to-day; have you any eggs?' To this the chief native replies at great length in his own barbarous jargon, and Esau not having understood a single syllable answers, 'Ja! ja! (yes), but have you any eggs?' Then aside to the Skipper, 'Wonder what the deuce the fool was talking about?' Soon the natives perceive that their words are wasted, and relapse into the silent staring condition again, and after a time and a half, or two times, they depart as they came. Sometimes they return again with eggs in a basket, when we pay them well and give them some fish; at other times they look upon us as dangerous lunatics, and avoid us like the plague.

Esau learnt this habit of asking for eggs when we were on a fishing expedition near the south coast of Norway. On one occasion there we arrived at a small village, with an enormous quantity of trout that we had caught in the adjoining fjord; and found a small crowd of about fourteen or fifteen seafaring men, idly lounging round an open space between the cottages. He first went round and presented each of those men with two trout solemnly, without a word, as though it were a religious ceremony. Then he began at the first man again and said, 'Have you eggs?' and receiving a reply in the negative, he went on to the next, and to each one of the group asking the same weird question.

The men, who had been chatting busily amongst themselves up to the moment of our arrival, became silent; they did not laugh, but only looked at one another; and one of them shyly felt in his pocket to see if there were any eggs there whose existence he might have chanced to forget.

Presently, as we could get no eggs, we moved off sorrowfully but not discouraged; and the men remained looking after us silent and uncertain. Thus the interview ended, and we regained our boat.

The beach here was capital for bathing, and we enjoyed a delightful tub this morning, the more pleasant indeed because at Dalbakken we slept in our clothes, and only had a soap-dish to wash in next morning. Immediately after bathing we lit a fire, and the cook commenced operations; the office of cook being held alternately by each of us for one day. The man from Dalbakken brought us some milk, so we indulged in coffee. When we have only 'tin milk' we drink tea; for though tin milk will do fairly with tea, we think it wretched with coffee. After breakfast we each took our canoe, and went fishing wherever the spirit moved us, taking lunch with us. On a day of this sort, if the fish are rising we have a great time, and if they won't rise, we lie on the bank in the sun and smoke, or sketch, or kill mosquitoes, and have a great time in that case also, so that the hours pass in a blissful round of enjoyment, and all is peace. Having each one his own ship we are quite independent, only taking care to return to camp about six o'clock to get dinner ready. After that there is nearly always a rise, and we fish till about eleven, when we generally turn in, though it is by no means dark by that time; and on a few occasions when the fish were rising very well, we have fished on all through the night and into the next day, losing count of the almanack, and conducting life on the principles of going to bed when tired, and eating when hungry, so that, like the Snark, we might be said to--

Frequently breakfast at five o'clock tea, And dine on the following day.

There was very little wind to-day, and these fish being very shy, and apt to come short, it was almost impossible to get them without a ripple until evening, when large white moths began to show on the water, and the trout became bolder; consequently we did not make great bags, though the fish caught were very good ones.

At night there was one of the most lovely sunsets ever seen. The sun went down right at the other end of the lake, so that we had an uninterrupted view, with all the glorious colours of the sky reflected in the water; and we agreed that the effects about half-past ten this evening formed as good a symphony in purple and orange as a man could expect to find out of the Grosvenor Gallery.

_July 17._--The morning began with a dead calm, but this soon gave place to such a wind down the lake that we were induced to strike the camp, pack the canoes, and proceed on our voyage into the unknown.

We started soon after eleven, lunched near Megrunden,[*] and saw there two black-throated divers on the lake, which Esau pursued for some time, but of course never got near them. Some of the dives they made to avoid his advancing canoe seemed to be about half a mile in length. Just below Böle we caught several fish, but kept paddling on with our favourable wind, casting every now and then in likely places, and soon came to a rapid with a rough bridge thrown across its upper end. The rapid was very shallow, so that we did not dare to attempt to run it with loaded boats, and had to make a portage. Even then we got a few bumps in running it, but arrived at the bottom all right. Now the scene changed; we were in a smaller and narrower part of the valley; buildings had entirely disappeared; there was nothing to be seen but gloomy pine forests and black-looking mountains: the weather also was quickly changing, and evidently intending to be wet and stormy; so we pushed on rapidly, one coasting on each side of the lake till we reached its further extremity, where Esau was nearly swamped crossing the waves, as the wind began to blow harder every minute. Soon the rain was upon us, while we looked for a camping-ground but found none, as the shores were everywhere very swampy for a quarter of a mile inland. At length we came to a second rapid, where the natives have thrown a clumsy weir across for some unknown purpose, and here we found a fairly dry spot, made our portage in heavy rain and wind, with a great deal of groaning, misery, and brandy and water; pitched the tent, and after struggling for about half an hour, got a dyspeptic fire to fizzle, and so cooked some fish and eggs, and then had tea in the tent. After this we were a little more comfortable, as it was very nice and dry inside; but it was midnight before we had finished all our portage, got the canoes down into the next lake, and made everything snug for the night, so that we were quite exhausted, as our day had commenced at seven A.M. The mosquitoes were more numerous here than at any place we have yet seen.

[Footnote: The various places mentioned on the voyage are not villages, as one might imagine from the dot that marks them on the Ordnance map, but generally only a single one-roomed log hut, and for the most part not inhabited or habitable.]

_Sunday, July 18._--It rained all night, but as Tweedledum said of his umbrella, 'not under here,' and a ditch we made last night kept our floor quite dry. Lighting a fire for breakfast was a toilsome business, but at last we found some wood dry enough to burn. It continued raining in a nice keep-at-it-all-day-if-you-like kind of manner, so we resided in the tent, and read, and indulged in whisky and water for lunch to counteract any ill effects of the reading--for some of it was poetry.

Our tent was about three-quarters of a mile from the end of Bred Sjö, and after lunch we both went in one canoe to reconnoitre the next rapid, which is a long one down to Olstappen Vand. We found that it is quite impracticable for canoes; the river simply running violently down a steep place till it perishes in the lake; about a mile of rapid with hardly enough decently behaved water in the whole of it to hold a dozen trout. But there _were_ a dozen, for we caught them, one wherever there was a little turnhole. How we were to get down that river was concealed in the unfathomable depths of the mysterious Future.