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224 THROUGH NORWAY WITII A KNAPSACK.
hanging snows I was subject to these tropical
annoyances, and a burning sun to match them. The peasants
and the horse were proof against these annoyances, by
virtue of tougher skins, with an outer stratum of hair
on the one, and of dirt 011 the other.
I found that they started from the saeters about two
hours earlier than I did, and that it was their footsteps
I saw in the snow. I walked on with them for about
an hour; they complained sorely of fatigue, and at last
gave up on reaching an empty saeter hut. They were
surprised at my freshness, especially when I told them
how far I wandered from the track by ascending to the
wrong ridge, which added some two hours of hard
climbing over and above their day’s work. I was rather
surprised at it myself; for I had done some very heavy
work during the last few days, without any feeling of
fatigue worth notice. This, I suspect, is attributable to
two causes: first, to having prudently commenced with
easy stages; and, secondly, to the total absence of hotels
and anything approaching to a dinner.
I have continually found that in countries where there
are hotels and good dinners, it is very difficult to do a
fair day’s walk. If any attempt at dinner is made early
in the afternoon, the case is quite hopeless; and even
when dinner is taken late in the evening, at the end of
the day’s walk, the fierce appetite thus engendered, if at
all pandered to by tempting dishes, is almost certain to
give the stomach so much to digest, that a large amount
of vital energy is consumed in the process, and much
unnecessary weight added to the body. This, of course,
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