short trip into the interior, I had sufficient
opportunities for experiencing the extortions and inconveniences to which
a traveller is liable in Norway.  No country in Europe is so much in its
infancy as regards all conveniences for locomotion.  It is true that
horses, carriages, boats, &c. can be had at every station, and the law
has fixed the price of these commodities; but every thing is in the hands
of the peasants and the publicans, and they are so skilled in tormenting
the traveller by their intentional slowness, that he is compelled to pay
the two-fold tax, in order to proceed a little more quickly.  The
stations are short, being rarely above five or six miles, and one is
therefore constantly changing horses.  Arrived at a station, it either
happens that there is reallyin a space of 3500 feet.  They are
broad, deep, blasted out of the rock, and walled round with fine
freestone.  They resemble the single steps of a giant's staircase; and by
this name they might fitly rank as one of the wonders of the world.  Lock
succeeds lock, mighty gates close them, and the large vessel rises
miraculously to the giddy heights in a wildly romantic country.

                      [Picture: Falls of Trollhatta]

Scarcely arrived at the locks, the traveller is surrounded by a crowd of
boys, who offer their services as guides to the waterfalls near
Trollhatta.  There is abundance of time for this excursion; for the
passage of the ship through