160 On the Physical Geography of Norway. 



the inquiry, the reality of the paradox, makes the answer 

 often difficult. There are very many persons of opportuni- 

 ties far superior to these poor peasants who can form nearly 

 as little idea of the motives for such toilsome journeys. To 

 them, the country is the country everywhere, its stones are 

 stones merely, its glaciers and its lakes are accidents, which 

 suggest no particular conclusions except as they give a mo- 

 mentary variety to the landscape, or as they affect the value 

 of the soil. 



What comparative anatomy is to the study of living beings, 

 physical geography, or the comparison of different countries, 

 is to the study of the earth we live on. The interest of each 

 part is beyond measure increased by comparing it with other 

 parts ; and the more such comparisons we are enabled to 

 make, the more distinct meaning can we attach to even a few 

 slight and seemingly isolated observations in a country 

 wholly new to us, as when Owen reproduces the skeleton of 

 a long extinct bird from a few imperfect bones brought 

 from the antipodes. 



To construct the orographical map (map of mountainous 

 regions) or skeleton of a country, is a more difficult task than 

 it might at first appear to be. The materials for a complete 

 relief or model exist for but a few limited portions of 

 the globe. The materials for maps are gathered from com- 

 paratively limited observation. The tact necessary for per- 



the beaten tracks, in the theories which are formed as to his vocation. This is 

 nowhere the case more than in the more secluded parts of France. I once 

 amused myself by reckoning up the conjectures as to my business, and the 

 motives ascribed to me, during a journey of no very great extent, which in- 

 cluded, as well as I recollect, the following, besides guesses nearer the mark : — 

 An engineer of mines, a Government surveyor, a garde forestier, a tax-gatherer, 

 the descendant of a confiscated noble of the first revolution surveying his pater- 

 nal acres, a criminal escaping by bypaths from justice, an iron-merchant, a 

 stone-mason, and a gold-finder. Of these various aliases, the last is probably the 

 most inconvenient. I recollect travelling through the mountains of Cogne with 

 a half-witted fellow, a sort of cretin, for a guide, who, after hearing all the 

 explanations I had to give of my journey, constantly returned with a malicious 

 leer to the loss the country suffered by ignorance of the treasure which lay 

 about iu it, particularly under the glaciers, and which more knowing strangers, 

 assisted, he insinuated, by mystic arts, could turn to an excellent profit. 



