1 4 Norway and the Norzvegians 



river-mouth. But neither the lesser branches nor the 

 greater fjords do so in reality, for reasons which I will 

 now point out. 



One way in which the fjords are distinguished from 

 ordinary estuaries and river-mouths we have already 

 spoken of — and this is the first peculiarity which the 

 traveller to the Hardanger or the Sogne will notice — 

 namely, by the island-belt which separates the fjord 

 mouth from the open sea. In most countries the river 

 mouths form the only harbours of the country. Where 

 the firths afford safe anchorage, this is due, as a rule, 

 to the formation of the estuary itself; and the advantage 

 which is derived from protection from winds and waves 

 is to a certain extent neutralised by the complications 

 of tides and river-currents. But with Norway tlie 

 whole sea-coast may be spoken of as one vast harbour ; 

 for all the force of the sea is kept out by the island 

 rampart. 



And let me pause at this point a moment to point 

 out how this protected character of the Norwegian fjord 

 should make us modify some of the views with which 

 we probably have become imbued before ever we came 

 to Norway. We are always thinking of the hardy 

 Norsemen venturing forth to battle with the wild 

 Northern seas, to wring his livelihood from their 

 death-dealing waters, and in this struggle with Nature 

 learning those arts of navigation which created the in- 

 domitable race of Vikings or Sea-rovers, and made the 

 Scandinavian people the greatest seafarers and the 

 greatest pirates of the early middle ages. This picture 

 is partly true and partly false. I shall speak here- 

 after of the Vikings and their origin, and tell 



