128 FORESTRY OP NORWAY. 



the most bare, the most snowy, the most wintery, the most 

 desert, the most gloomy of this plateau, stretches along 

 the western declivities of the precipice. 



From these mountain chains and elevated plateaux in 

 Southern Norway come down systems of mountains of 

 lesser attitude, dominated in certain places by elevated 

 summits, but which, as a general rule, form wooded ridges 

 of little elevation. And last of all come the low lying 

 lands, but which only in certain places stretch themselves 

 out in great plains. 



In all the Vesteiaolen, Lofoden, and Sonjen groups of 

 islands, lying considerably to the north of Drontheim, the 

 mountains lofty, sharp-edged, and tooth-shaped, or ser- 

 rated, often conical or pyramidal have a precipitous 

 descent towards the sea, leaving but rarely a narrow littoral 

 strip of turfy soil. On some points only do the mountains 

 recede far enough to give rise to small valleys, generally 

 filled with marshes. The interior of the large islands is 

 in like manner filled with bogs, which are often, as is the 

 Dvergbergmyr, in the An doe, of considerable extent, and 

 covered with cloudberry (ttubus chamaemorus). The sum- 

 mits of the mountains rise often to from 800 to 1,300 

 metres, or 3,700 to 4,350 feet. On the island of Andoe, 

 the most northern of the Vesteraolen, the mountains are 

 lower and the summits more rounded. 



On many parts of the Lofoden Islands and Vesteraolen 

 Islands on the coast looking towards the Arctic Ocean are 

 found remarkable bird mountains called Nyker, inhabited 

 by marcareax (Mormon articus) common penguins (Alca 

 Torda). Large guillemots (Una troile), and three-toed 

 mews (Larus tridactyllus). The Nyker are composed of 

 steep pyramidal mountains, which shoot up directly from 

 the sea, without any cincture of rocks, so it is only after a 

 long calm, and when the wind blows off the land, that it 

 is possible to land upon them. They are often covered 

 with a layer of sandy vegetable earth of the thickness of 

 from 50 to 60 centimetres, 20 to 24 inches, the surface of 



