CHAPTER XX. 



NORDLAND. 



^RUISING about at the close of July 

 I found myself in Bergen, for the 

 purpose of taking the boat for 

 Trondhjem on the morrow, en 

 route for Bod^, to fish the Salten 

 river, by arrangement with a 

 friend who had not yet visited Saltdalen. 



I was glad to find that a new restaurant had been 

 opened in Bergen, for I am sure that any competition 

 which may tend to improve the food and living in Bergen, 

 and throughout western Norway, should be encouraged, as 

 in the towns the hotels are mostly bad as regards sanitary 

 arrangements, while as to provisions, the meat is of most 

 inferior quality, and beyond a distance of a few miles from 

 the coast, the only fish one gets is the everlasting "lax," 

 and vegetables they scarcely take the trouble to grow. 

 The country-folk are ignorant to a degree as to the 



