With a crack of the whip that must have astonished the landlord, and caused him some misgivings for the fate of his horse and cariole, I took my departure from Lillehammer. About half a mile beyond the town we (the skydskaarl, myself, horse, and cariole) passed the falls—a roaring torrent of water tumbling down from the mountain side on the right. Several extensive saw-mills are located at this point. The piles of lumber outside, and the familiar sounds of the saws and wheels, reminded me of home. The scene was pretty and picturesque, but rather disfigured by the progress of Norwegian civilization. Passing numerous thriving farms in the full season of harvest, the road winding pleasantly along the hill-side to the right, the foaming waters of the Logen deep down in the valley to the left, we at length reached the entrance of the Gudbransdalen—that beautiful and fertile valley, which stretches all the way up the course of the Logen to the Dovre Fjeld, a distance of a hundred and sixty-eight miles from Lillehammer. It would be an endless task to undertake a description of the beauties of this valley. From station to station it is a continued panorama of dashing waterfalls, towering mountains, green slopes, pine forests overtopping the cliffs, rich and thriving farms, with innumerable log cottages perched up among the cliffs, and wild and rugged defiles through which the road passes, sometimes overhung by shrubbery for miles at a stretch. Flying along the smoothly-graded highway at a rapid rate; independent of all the world except your horse and boy; the bright sunshine glimmering through the trees; the music of the wild waters falling pleasantly on your ear; each turn of the road opening out something rich, new, and strange; the fresh mountain air invigorating every fibre of your frame; renewed youth and health beginning to glow upon your cheeks; digestion performing its functions without a pang or a hint of remonstrance; kind, genial, open-hearted people wherever you stop—is it not an episode in life worth enjoying? The valley of the Logen must surely be a paradise (in summer) for invalids.
At each station the traveler is furnished with a stunted little boy called the skydskaarl, usually clothed in the cast-off rags of his great-grandfather; his head ornamented by a flaming red night-cap, and his feet either bare or the next thing to it; his hair standing out in every direction like a mop dyed in whitewash and yellow ochre, and his face and hands freckled and sunburned, and not very clean, while his manners are any thing but cultivated. This remarkable boy sits on a board behind the cariole, and drives it back to the station from which it starts. He is regarded somewhat in the light of a high public functionary by his contemporary ragamuffins, having been promoted from the fields or the barn-yard to the honorable position of skydskaarl. His countenance is marked by the lines of premature care and responsibility, but varies in expression according to circumstances. The sum of four cents at the end of an hour’s journey gives it an extremely amiable and intelligent cast. Some boys are constitutionally knowing, and have a quick, sharp look; others again are dull and stolid, as naturally happens wherever there is a variety of boys born of different parents. For the most part, they are exceedingly bright and lively little fellows. Mounted on their seat of honor at the back of the cariole, they greatly enliven the way by whistling and singing, and asking questions in their native tongue, which it is sometimes very difficult to answer when one is not familiar with the language.
I had at Moshuus a communicative little boy, who talked to me incessantly all the way to Holmen without ever discovering, so far as I could perceive, that I did not understand a single word he said. Another, after repeated efforts to draw me out, fell into a fit of moody silence, and from that into a profound slumber, which was only broken off toward the end of our journey by an accident. The cariole struck against a stone and tilted him out on the road. He was a good deal surprised, but said nothing.
