SUMMER JOURNEYS AND FERTILITY. 87 



thaii the ice, for example, on Sydkapfjord. But there was, as it 

 were, a still, slack belt of water stretching in a curve from South 

 Cape eastward almost to Frams Fjord. It could not justly be called 

 dead water, perhaps, but it was inside the full force of the tide, 

 and it is in such places that the pack-ice remains lying for the 

 greatest length of time. I also made the remarkable observation 



O o 



that in the tracts around Havnefjord it seldom blew from shore ; 

 we, at any rate, never experienced any strong land wind. 



This circumstance often brought to my recollection a spot on 

 the Norwegian coast called ' Stillefjerdingen.' It is the part 

 from Melo northward until some distance past the well-known 

 mountain of Eota, or Kunna, on the boundary-line between 

 North Helgoland and Salten. Although a land wind for two 

 or three reefs may be blowing not far off, a vessel sailing these 

 waters will hardly move; in fact, it is scarcely too much to 

 say that often when an off-shore gale is raging all the way up the 

 coast, there will probably be a dead calm here. I have myself 

 experienced the winter storms hissing out from every little bit of 

 fjord round about, while in ' Stillefjerdingen ' there was not more 

 than a hardly appreciable breeze. 



Before leaving Havnefjord we put up a cross to our dead friend, 

 Braskerud. It was made by Olsen, bore a short inscription, and 

 was erected on the point facing Skreia, immediately above the spot 

 where his body was committed to the sea. We supported it by 

 piling up stones ; and as it stands there, high on the point, it is 

 visible to all who may sail these waters, witnessing to a Norwegian 

 who died at his post, gentle and unassuming, as he had lived. 



