VEGETABLE PRODUCTIONS OF NORWAY. 249 
The amount of suffering, nay, positive starvation, that 
accordingly ensued is perfectly inconceivable. I can 
only compare it to the Irish famine of 1848. 
The high floods of 1860 caused an immense amount 
of damage, for they literally washed off the top soil 
from the fields, leaving nothing but a deposit of slime 
and grit behind. Many of the peasants thus became 
completely ruined, and had to sell their farms for a 
mere nothing, and emigrated to America in numbers 
truly surprising for so small a country.* 
As above stated, Norway extends through 15° of 
latitude, consequently one may expect to meet with 
striking climatic changes. Other modifymg circum- 
stances must, however, be taken into consideration. A 
glance at the map will show what an extensive sea- 
board Norway possesses, and, as is well known, this 
fact alone preventst extremes of heat and cold in 
in succession, was in the following autumn sacrificed by his subjects. 
The same fate also happened to the ancestor of the Norwegian auto- 
erat, Olaf Treeteleja, who lived at the end of the seventh century. 
On the other hand, there was a general belief that the corpse of a - 
king under whose reign there had been prosperous harvests, pos- 
sessed a charm, so as to insure a succession of good years. Thus 
in 860, when Halfdan Svarte died, his body was divided into four 
parts, one of which was sent to each of the four quarters of the 
country for interment. Vide Schiibeler’s ‘Culturpflanzen Nor- 
wegens 
* From 1851 to 1855 the numbers of emigrants amounted to 
21,921. In 1861 I believe them to have amounted to 6,800! 
+ Thus, at ‘Bergen, lat. 60° 23' 37", the mean temperature for the 
whole year is + 8°21 Centigrade; the mean temperature for the 
winter ++ 2°21, and for the summer + 14°75. At the North Cape 
for the whole year it is +0; for the winter, — 5; for the summer, 
— 6°25. At Christiania, lat, 54° 54' 43”, it is + 5°37; —5°0; 
