him down;" and opening a clasp-knife, he ran the blade
into the crown of the salmon's head. The creaking sound of the bone as
it yielded to the passage of the sharp knife, like the cutting of a
cork, made my teeth ache. The fish stirred not; but the blood trickled
from his mouth in small bubbles, and stretching out all his fins, as a
bird would stretch its wings to fly, a spasmodic shudder succeeded, and
then the fins gradually relaxed and adhered close to his sides, while
the blood still oozed from the mouth and gills, and striking his tail
once or twice on the ground, the salmon seemed to fix his round,
staring, glassy eye on me, as if in accusation of the torture I had
caused, and gaping, died.

"If I ever gaff another fish, may I be gaffed myself," I said.

"Fish do not feel so acutely as you imagine," replied R----, wiping the
penknife on his handkerchief with the coolness of an anatomical
operator; "all the quivering you observe is not from actual pain, but
merely from muscular action."

"Well, I am not surgeon enough to know that," I answered; "but if you
talk for three years, you will never persuade me that a fish does not
feel, as well as every other creature, in proportion to its size, the
anguish of bodily torture as sensibly as you, or I."

"Never mind arguments," cried R----, "here, let's see what he weighs."

And R---- drew from his coat-pocket, a small balance that he always
carried about with him, and hooking the defunct salmon on it, held it
up.

"Twenty-two pounds to a fraction," he said; and took a little book from
his other pocket, and noted down the weight. Casting up the figures to
himself in a sort of whisper common to all calculators, R---- observed
aloud, when he had concluded his addition,

"I have killed forty-five pounds myself. That's not so bad, eh? Come
on;" and hurrying into his pram, was rowed away.

I did not remain much longer on the bank of the river, and desiring a
change, I walked towards the road that ran parallel with the stream. A
Norwegian peasant, driving a carriole soon overtook me, and asking him
in the most grammatical and simple manner I could, if he were returning
to Larvig, he made me a long speech in reply; but beseeching him in my
second address to give me a monosyllabic answer, either affirmatively or
negatively, as I was a foreigner, the man bowed his head till his chin
came in contact with the bone of his chest, and said,

"Ja!"

I then asked him if he w