their confidence by distributing among them large rye cakes,
with which I had filled my pockets at Tromso, expressly with that view.
At first it was with difficulty they were induced to approach me to
receive my gifts, but they soon came readily enough, and, as fast as I
broke up the cakes and distributed the fragments, just so fast did the
said fragments disappear down their hungry little stomachs. They gave no
sign of acknowledgment of the treat--as it truly was to them--no more
than so many automata. The _tolk_, however, marking this, made one of
them say, in the Norwegian, "_Taks, mange taks_" (thanks, many thanks).

THE WORSHIP OF GOLD.

It is curious to look back on the fatal and universal prevalence of
Gold-worship recorded in the history of our race, from the period when
Midas became its victim, and the boy chased the rainbow to find the pot
of treasure at its foot, to the days when the alchemist offered his all
a burnt-sacrifice on the altar; until we reach the present time, when,
although the manner of its worship has changed, the old idolatry remains
in spirit the same. One or two anecdotes illustrative of the passion for
gold worship may not prove uninteresting.

The hero of our first story--a chamois hunter of the Swiss Alps--was for
many years of his existence an absolute stranger to the very sight of
gold. He dwelt in a mountain _chalet_, in the peaceful contentment and
ignorant simplicity of former ages--lord of his own freedom, with nature
for his domain, and the fleet Alpine creatures for his subjects. By some
unfortunate chance, however, he moved from this dwelling of his youth to
the lower station, and to the side of a pass frequented by travelers,
toward whom he was frequently called on to exercise hospitality. His
services, and the shelter he afforded, were occasionally rewarded with
gold, which, though of little actual use or value to him as a
circulating medium, gradually exercised a strange fascination over his
senses. He hoarded his guineas with the doting fondness of the miser; he
looked on them with more pleasure than on the faces of his children; and
listened to their chink with a satisfaction no tone of household love or
sweet Alpine melody could call forth. It chanced one day that our
hunter, in the pursuit of his ordinary avocation, perceived a tiny
cavern hitherto unknown to him. He determined to snatch his hasty
noon-tide meal beneath its shelter; and in order to enter it, roll