Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Chapter VIII
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
THE THRENEN ISLANDS—YECHTS." 145
shelter or sleeping accommodation here as we had to
obtain food at Tromsö. I accompanied them for above
an hour in their search for lodging, and when obliged
to leave them to go on board they were still in some
difficulty about it.
The sky was remarkably clear during this part of the
return voyage, and the grand ranges of mountains far
inland on the Swedish frontier, with their glaciers and
snowy solitudes above, were seen still more finely than
when we passed them before. The active business-like
proceeding of the steam-packet, dropping and picking
up passengers and luggage at the various stations of
this busy coast thoroughfare in a country of classical
antiquity, renders it difficult to believe that within sight
are hundreds of square miles of ever-frozen solitudes
whose desolation has never been broken by human
footsteps.
The Threnen Islands which stand upon the Arctic
circle are a range of barren rocks seen just upon the
horizon, where they stand like the fragments of broken
teeth, single and double. In the neighbourhood of these
we passed a fleet of " yechts: " not yachts by any means,
but quite of different build. They are vessels which
carry the stock-fisli from the Loffodens and the coast to
Bergen, where they are shipped again for their southern
destinations. These vessels are the most quaint,
antique-looking craft I have ever seen, having immense breadth
of beam with abrupt flat sterns, and prows standing half
as high as the mast. The fish, besides being stowed
below, are piled upon the deck in a square mass almost
L
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
