Perhaps This Observation Has Been
Made Before; But It Did Not Occur To Me Till I Saw The Waves
Continually Beating Against The Bare Rocks, Without Ever Receding To
Leave A Sediment To Harden.
The wind was fair, till we had to tack about in order to enter
Laurvig, where we arrived towards three o'clock in the afternoon.
It is a clean, pleasant town, with a considerable iron-work, which
gives life to it.
As the Norwegians do not frequently see travellers, they are very
curious to know their business, and who they are - so curious, that I
was half tempted to adopt Dr. Franklin's plan, when travelling in
America, where they are equally prying, which was to write on a
paper, for public inspection, my name, from whence I came, where I
was going, and what was my business. But if I were importuned by
their curiosity, their friendly gestures gratified me. A woman
coming alone interested them. And I know not whether my weariness
gave me a look of peculiar delicacy, but they approached to assist
me, and inquire after my wants, as if they were afraid to hurt, and
wished to protect me. The sympathy I inspired, thus dropping down
from the clouds in a strange land, affected me more than it would
have done had not my spirits been harassed by various causes - by
much thinking - musing almost to madness - and even by a sort of weak
melancholy that hung about my heart at parting with my daughter for
the first time.
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