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THE BRITISH CONSUL AT TROMSO. 103
from the mainland; all being so cut up with fiords and
channels. There is an English consul here; and it
is a matter of etiquette to call upon the consul at
such places. This custom, as tourists become more
numerous, the consuls will doubtless regard as " more
honoured in the breach than in the observance:" it
must be already somewhat of a bore; though Mr. Hoist
was as polite and cordial as though we were the only
Englishmen of the season.
Some of my readers may possibly imagine that her
Majesty’s representative at Tromsö is a stately idler,
lounging in a magnificent mahogany office, duly
enveloped in brass rails and red tape, and perpetually
reading a very large newspaper. Not so, by any
means; the Norwegians are no such fools; nor are the
Englishmen who settle among them. Dignity and
usefulness go together here, as they should all the world
through. The royal standard of Great Britain waves
over the door of a homely wooden shop in the general
line, where the inhabitants buy halfpenny candles and
nips of brandy, and where you may be suited with a pair
of shoes,» a Dutch cheese, or a pocket-knife, and you
may buy a horse, a bottle of claret, a bearskin, or
anything in reason, from a full-rigged ship down to a box
of matches. The representative of Great Britain
represents the greatness of Great Britain fairly and
truthfully, by driving a flourishing trade, and thereby
benefiting himself and his fellow-creatures around
him.
Tromsö consists partly of the Noah’s-arks I spoke of
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