the line, were thrown over the
quarter, and leaving a perpendicular track of froth, descended, hissing
through the water. The whole hundred and eighty fathoms ran out; and we
seemed as far from the bottom of the Fiord as we were before we
commenced. Some idea may be conceived of the amazing depth of these
Fiords, when I say, that the yacht was not one hundred and twenty yards
from the shore, and the entire breadth of the Fiord about two miles.
The pilot again came aft, and through his interpreter, King, informed us
that the Fiord had never been plumbed, although the endeavour had been
made very frequently by scientific men, and Danish naval officers.

Not many miles from the village of Sand, the place to which we were
bound, on one of the sloping woodland swards that cheer by their vivid
verdure the loneliness of the Bukke Fiord, a small cottage, thatched
with the branches of the fir, may attract the traveller's observation,
and if he does not look around attentively he will not see it, for it is
low, and sheltered by the spreading arms of an old pine. The waters of
the Fiord flow not many feet from its humble threshold; and perhaps,
fastened to a stake, a fisherman's pram swings to the changing currents
of air. Now, however, as the cutter drifted, rather than sailed, nearer
to this green point of land, we saw that the pram had been untied from
the stake, and was rowed by an old woman round and round, in an unending
circuit, in midway of the Fiord. Often she ceased to row, and unfolding
a white handkerchief from her head bared her whiter hair to the burning
sky, and waved the signal in the air. Shouting with the shrill voice of
her sex and age, she beckoned us to hasten to her aid. Then, hobbling
from one end of her pram to the other, and moving quickly from side to
side she leaned over and looked steadfastly down in the water, as if
something valuable had been lost. When she saw we made no haste, she
resumed her seat, and singing a native song that had more of liveliness
than melancholy in its burden, again she rowed her pram round the same
circle, never deserting the spot, but whistling and chanting by turns,
she kept her face turned in one direction, that she might always watch
the central surface of the water.

"What means that old woman?" asked R---- of several men who were
observing her, and, clustering round the pilot, seemed to be gathering
all the information he could give.

"She is mad, my Lord," the sailor