tract I had hitherto passed over in Norway. It was often beautiful,
but seldom afforded those grand views which fill rather than soothe
the mind.

We glided along the meadows and through the woods, with sunbeams
playing around us; and, though no castles adorned the prospects, a
greater number of comfortable farms met my eyes during this ride
than I have ever seen, in the same space, even in the most
cultivated part of England; and the very appearance of the cottages
of the labourers sprinkled amidst them excluded all those gloomy
ideas inspired by the contemplation of poverty.

The hay was still bringing in, for one harvest in Norway treads on
the heels of the other. The woods were more variegated,
interspersed with shrubs. We no longer passed through forests of
vast pines stretching along with savage magnificence. Forests that
only exhibited the slow decay of time or the devastation produced by
warring elements. No; oaks, ashes, beech, and all the light and
graceful tenants of our woods here sported luxuriantly. I had not
observed many oaks before, for the greater part of the oak-planks, I
am informed, come from the westward.

In France the farmers generally live in villages, which is a great
disadvantage to the country; but the Norwegian farmers, always
owning their farms or being tenants for life, reside in the midst of
them, allowing some labourers a dwelling rent free, who have a
little land appertaining to the cottage, not only for a garden, but
for crops of different kinds, such as rye, oats, buck-wheat, hemp,
flax, beans, potatoes, and hay, which are sown in strips about it,
reminding a stranger of the first attempts at culture, when every