MY SPORTING HOLIDAYS 



CHAPTER I 



MY FIRST STAG AND SOME OTHERS 



IT was in 1872 that it occurred to my friend Alex 

 MacGregor and myself, then undergraduates at 

 Oxford, that it might be necessary for our health 

 to cross the North Sea for the Long Vacation. 

 Throndhjem was the most distant Norwegian port 

 that could be reached by the Wilson line from Hull, 

 and to Throndhjem therefore we sailed in July of 

 that year. On arrival at the ancient Scandinavian 

 capital, in whose fjord a British squadron then lay at 

 anchor, being there to assist in celebrating the coming 

 coronation of a Scandinavian King, we made inquiries 

 at Consul K. Kjeldsberg's well-known emporium as 

 to routes and sport. It was there and then that I 

 first heard of the island of Hitteren, where I have 

 since spent many happy seasons in wild woodland 

 sport, and with which I have now a thirty years' 

 intimate acquaintance. 



The island of Hitteren lies slantwise across the 

 mouth of the Throndhjem Fjord, and some three 

 miles away from the rocky coast-line of the mainland, 



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