8 Norzvay and the Norimgians 



one of the special features of the country which the 

 traveller should note when he first sees it. The island 

 rampart protects the whole coast with the quite in- 

 significant exception of a small district at the extreme 

 south, between Lister and the moutli of the Stavanger 

 Fjord, and another opposite tlie Lofoten Islands. 

 Skjccrgaarcl, or rock-rampart, is the collective name 

 which this protecting belt receives in Norway. 



The general appearance of these islands — of the 

 larger as well as the lesser, the mere rocks — is, as I 

 have said, as if they had been sea-worn. What seems 

 at first siglit stranger still, you will find, as soon as you 

 have threaded the last of them and arrived at the main 

 coast, that that too carries on the same effect. The 

 hills are now much higher than the most lofty of the 

 islands which you have passed through, certainly high 

 enough (if there could be any doubt about the latter) 

 to be, and to have always been, far out of reach of the 

 sea ; and yet these hills have, like the Skjmrgaard, a 

 rounded, billowy look, as if they too had been worn 

 smooth by the action of water. Eound Stavanger, the 

 point on the Norwegian coast which the traveller from 

 Hull first touches, this characteristic of Norwegian 

 coast scenery is very marked. So much is this the 

 case, that I have before now been doubtful when 

 arriving at that port in the twilight whether the 

 eminences which I saw between me and the eastern 

 sky were really hills or clouds ; the hills have so 

 very much the look of dark clouds hanging on the 

 horizon. At Bergen you see the same effect, not quite 

 so marked. In the more northern fjords it is frequently 

 absent, so far at least as regards the appearance of the 



