Tartars. 



240 NATURAL HISTORY of NORWAY. 



hundred merchants families, above half of which are Germans or 

 Dutch; but have been naturalized long fince. There is another 

 German colony in one of our towns up. in the mountains, called 

 Kongfberg, where they have divine fervice performed in their 

 own language, as it is at the company's houfe at Bergen. There is 

 ftill a more ancient colony of this nation, which came here in the 

 reign of Chriftian III. the fate of which I have related above in 

 my defcription of the filver-mines in Norway, fee Part I. p. 181. 

 J. Ramus gives us a fhort account of a Tartarian colony that 

 fled from their own country and fettled here, in the reign of king 

 Hagen Hagenfen, which he relates in the following words, in 

 page 231: "In Senniens Lehn, there is a place called Malanger- 

 fiord, which in the reign of king Hagen Hagenfen, was given to 

 a certain people to fettle in, who had fled from Tartary to Bi- 

 armeland, and from thence came to Norway. King Hagen caufed 

 them all to be baptized, and gave them leave to fettle in Ma- 

 langerfiord," 6cc. 



SECT. IV. 

 I mail now proceed to the chief point I had in view in this 

 chapter, namely, to give an exact defcription of the Norwegians, 

 their genius, manner and qualities, both of body and mind. Tho' 

 the outward afpecli is feldom regarded as the principal endow- 

 ment in any civilized nation, yet as it firfl: ftrikes the eye, I mail 

 begin with obferving, that the Norvegians are in general of a good 

 appearance, tall, well made, and lively. There are fome who 

 pretend that there is a difference in the inhabitants of Norway 

 according to their fituation; and obferve that the peafants who 

 live among the mountains, are generally taller than the reft, and 

 have a certain feverity in their countenance which commands re- 

 is declining, and grows every day lefs and lefs. In fact, they have but a finall por- 

 tion left, fince the warehoufe- trade, &c. has been by degrees bought up by the na- 

 tives, to whom it belongs by natural right. This company poiTeiTes the belt part of 

 the city of Bergen. Their ground extends all along the weft-fide of the haven, and 

 is in length 340 paces, and 120 in breadth, containing thirty large houfes, the 

 fronts of which look towards Garpe-Bridge, or the German-Bridge, and form a 

 ftreet. In the fame row are the compting-houfes, oppofite to thefe is the place where 

 the fifh-dealers are always at work. They are continually bulled in packing, load- 

 ing, unloading, &c. efpecially in May and Auguft, when the Nordland veffels 

 come in by hundreds at a time, befides a great many foreign Ships. Each compt- 

 ing-houfe has feparate apartments, and are properly factories, having their feparate 

 ceconomy conducted by a mailer who has his clerks and fervants, that are moftly 

 Germans, but in the fervice of the Norwegians. No women are furTered to be in 

 the compting-houfes, according to ancient cuft'om, by which they are all regulated 

 to this day. 



3 f P e6l > 



