54 NATURAL H I S T O R Y of NORWAY. 



See plate ,v. (fcfofa ^ foy^ j fl the ^^ of Evindv - ig? fo j eagues ^fc 



of Bergen, is a place called Stenefund, where the mountain, for 

 half a quarter of a league, abounds with fuch petrified bodies, as 

 are fought for in the cabinets of vertuofos ; many kinds of Cornua 

 Hammonis, large and fmall fnakes, mufcles, worms, infecTs, and 

 many others. This cannot be called a Lufus nature, which ex- 

 preflion, in this fenfe, is rather a Lufus poeticus, and amounts 

 only to a paltry evaflon, invented by perfons who are difpofed to 

 deny what is undeniable. All thefe figures appear there as if they 

 had been impreffed into a parte, or dough, and no rational in- 

 quirer can entertain any doubt, that the rock was as foft as dough, 

 or pafle, when flrfl thefe bodies were intermixed with it. I fhall 

 pafs over many leffer examples of this kind, fuch as St. Olave's 

 ferpent in Nordal creek, which, as far as it concerns the faint, is 

 fabulous, the monks having made ufe of it to attribute to St. Olave 

 the miracle of encountering this huge ferpent, and throwing it up 

 againfl the place where it is now feen ; but that it has hung there 

 ever fince the deluge, is not incredible, unlefs its dimenfions 

 of many fathoms render it fo. But this doubt will likewife vanifh, 

 when I come in order, to fpeak of the northern fea-reptiles, and 

 other extraordinary lea-animals. In the quarry of marble near 

 Muflerhaun, feyen Norway miles fouth of Bergen, in the furface of 

 the rock, which is as it were the outward crufl of the marble, or a 

 porous flime, called Degflein, we fee feveral fmall round holes, 

 like thofe obfervable in tallow, or in wax, when congealing after 

 fufion ; and that the whole mafs of this quarry, together with its 

 veins, were formerly in that flate, appears to me unqueflionable 

 from the anfwer of one of the workmen, when I afked him, if 

 he had never met in the marble with fomething dk, or fome 

 fubflance which had the appearance of a different fubflance ? his 

 anfwer was, u This happens very feldom, yet both myfelf, and 

 others of my .trade, have fometimes met with it, and we have 

 found in the middle of blocks of marble, fnakes, mufcles, fand, 

 flone, and other fuch things, fo inclofed in on all fides by the 

 marble, as if they belonged to it, although they immediately 

 loofen and drop out as a foreign fubflance. When this happens, 

 it is ufually followed by fuch a violent flench, as over-powers us, 

 unlefs we turn immediately afide from it." This lafl circumflance 



I im- 



