176 SHORT STALKS 



until she reached the edge of the valley, whence she 

 would see the farm below. When I reached home at 

 seven she had not returned. Calling a hasty council, for 

 there wanted but half an hour of sunset, we organised 

 search parties in three directions, who were to fire guns at 

 intervals, and to listen for the loud cow-horn, which was 

 to be the signal when she was found or returned. Happily 

 we had scarcely reached the trees when she appeared at 

 the upper end of the clearing. She had lost her direction 

 in a sharp snowstorm, and had finally struck the valley 

 some miles above Lovoen. Here it was narrow and 

 rugged, and there was no appearance of the green fields 

 which she expected to see. At first she thought she had 

 struck the wrong; vallev, and the farther she followed it 

 the more strange and inhospitable it seemed. She sat 

 down to consider, and at last came to the conclusion that 

 tlie waterfall she heard lielow could be none other than 

 one which she had seen some days before, four miles above 

 Lovoen. This determination she fortunately adhered to, 

 and though the intervening ground was very rough, she 

 ultimately came in sight of the homestead. It was a 

 small matter, l)ut the dismay of feeling lost is sometimes 

 no trifle even to a strong man. Fortunately the poor 

 child kept her composure as long as it was necessary. 



The topography of the upper plateaux of Norway and 

 Sweden is very puzzling, as every ridge and hollow re- 

 sembles the next, and the timber impedes a general view. 

 I have known even natives completely at fault, and on 

 one occasion in Jemtland even the Scovmand of the 

 beat, 1)y mistaking one lake for another, led a member of 

 my party ten miles wrony, an error which cost him four 



