302 Rev. U. F. Borgesen’s Description of Vettle's Giel , 
from a very high pasture-glen belonging to the farm, gushes 
down in a fall of about 200 fathoms. Every thing is gigantic 
and threatening. It is Nature’s grand style. Small objects dis- 
appear, and the heart beats with the anticipation of approach- 
ing danger. At Jelde, you do well to dismiss your horse, and 
trust to your own legs. It will now, too, be of importance to 
provide yourself with an additional guide. Farmer Civind of- 
fered to accompany me ; but, as he could not himself go with 
me the whole way, he made his servant likewise be of the par- 
ty. I had thus three companions well accustomed to this 
road, and, therefore, on their own part, altogether unconcerned 
about dangers which were familiar to them, but who could very 
well enter into the feelings of a person in a different mode of 
life, who, for the first time, trod a path the like to which he 
had never seen, nor could conceive. When Civind had found his 
axe, which he had long to look about for, and the use and ne- 
cessity of which I had afterwards to learn, to my terror, we all 
set out. 
At a short distance from the dwelling-house of Jelde farm 
this frightful way begins. The entrance to the Giel is altoge- 
ther worthy of it. You climb up over the hill of Jelde. This 
is a projecting out-corner of the mountain, consisting of granite, 
which, with an inward bend, hangs over the river which washes 
its foot. It is thus impossible to find a lower road, as this pre- 
cipice forms the bank of the river. It is a severe exertion to 
climb this steep and difficult path at such a height, and con- 
stantly on the brink of precipices. 
It is probably this hill which has fixed the height of the path 
in the Giel itself ; for otherwise, you see no reason why it should 
have been cut out, at such a height, on the side of this fright- 
ful wall of rock, that the person who falls over it, must be dashed 
to pieces, before he reaches the surface of the water. When you 
have reached the top of this hill, you turn round to the right 
hand, and enter into the Giel itself, by a bridge of pliant trunks 
of trees, laid over with birch-bark, and turf and gravel, that all 
swing under your feet. The mountain here hangs a little over 
the passenger’s head, and you willingly incline to it as to a friend- 
ly support, to avoid seeing, and, if possible, to avoid thinking of 
the abyss you are swinging over, but of which, the gravel thrown 
