us occupations during all
hours, while the drowsy god appears to have departed on a vacation to
the southward. The apparent incongruity of starting upon a fresh
enterprise at midnight is only realized on consulting one's watch.

All along the coast the birds are nearly as numerous as the fishes, and
many islands are solely occupied by them as breeding-places. Their
numbers are beyond calculation, consisting of petrels, swans, geese,
pelicans, auks, gulls, and divers. These last are more particularly of
the duck family, of which there are over thirty distinct species in and
about this immediate region. Curlews, ptarmigans, cormorants, and
ospreys are also seen in greater or less numbers.

The steamer lands us for a few hours at Tromsoee, a small island in
latitude 69 deg. 38' north, a thriving place of six thousand inhabitants, a
goodly number for a town within the Arctic Circle. It is the capital of
Norwegian Lapland. Both to the north and south of the town snow-clad
mountains shut off distant views. During the winter months there are
only four hours of daylight here out of the twenty-four,--that is, from
about ten o'clock A.M. until two o'clock P.M.,--but the long nights are
made comparatively light by the glowing splendor of the Aurora Borealis.
The birch-trees in and about Tromsoee are of a remarkably developed
species, and form a marked feature of the place.

Just outside of the town a field is seen golden with buttercups, making
it difficult to realize that we are in the Arctic regions. A
pink-blooming heather also covers other fields, and we are surprised by
a tiny cloud of butterflies, so abundant in the warm sunshine, and
presenting such transparency of color as to suggest the idea that a
rainbow has been shattered, and is floating in myriad particles in the
air.

The short-lived summer perhaps makes flowers all the more carefully
tended. In the rudest domestic quarters a few pet plants are seen whose
arrangement and nurture show womanly care. Every window in the humble
dwellings has its living screen of drooping, many-colored fuchsias,
geraniums, forget-me-nots, and monthly roses. The ivy is especially
prized here, and is picturesquely trained to hang about the
window-frames. The fragrant sweet-pea, with its snow-white and
peach-blossom hues, is often mingled prettily with the dark green of the
ivy, the climbing propensities of each making them fitting mates. Surely
there must be an innate sense of refineme