Halland, that knitting land, laden with worsted ware, putting us into a very fever; lastly, a boy with brushes.

Bands of youths, clothed in sailcloth, ran scampering about; orphans, educated as pastors, in a school founded, in the last century, by a merchant of Uddevalla. In the woods, under the pine-trees, blooms the linnæa in all its glory.

At Uddevalla we part company-womankind and belongings starting in karras across country for Trollhättan, there to have a ten days' rest: self, bound by sea for Göteborg, steam by Svanesund,-a pink painted bathing-house perched on a rock,-as well as several places of names unknown, and so reach Göteborg.

KONGELF AND BOHUS.

July 1st.-A small steam-gondola starts from the Göta stairs, bound for Kongelf and Bohus. This is the first day of duck-shooting; Swedish youths, tall and strapping of thew and sinew, and fresh faces, such as one loves to see, have donned their jack-boots, and slung their gun across their shoulder.

We ripple by the spot where old Göteborg once stood; pass Keiler's brick-works; at Sürte, on a small jetty, millstones lay set out to sell, waiting for customers. The splendid ruins of Bohus appear in sight. Leaving the Göta, we enter the Norder Elf, which, joyful to run free and unshackled, divides into two streamlets, cutting a figure of eight round the islands, on one of which stands the castle. This first exuberance over, it flows on quietly.

We land at Kongelf, a great place once, the meet

ing-place of kings,-in these degenerate days renowned for gingerbread. The old city stood lower down the river, which, save where the mud has collected, is navigable for large vessels to the sea.

The royal residence was at Castelgård, where the first "möte" on record was that of Sigridt with Olaf of Norway, who wished to marry her, but, as she declined becoming a Christian, the king, in his wrath, struck her on the face with his mailed glove, calling her "a heathen she-dog" and "old wrinkled-skin." She had her revenge later, marrying King Svend of Denmark, while Olaf lost Norway, crown, life, and everything. Queen Sigrid was a she-Tartar. A rich and blooming widow, many små konge sought her hand this bored her; so, inviting her wooers to a great feast, she made them drunk, and, while they slumbered beneath the tables, set fire to the banqueting-hall. All perished in the flames-" I will break these petty kings of wooing me," said she.

Here was the meeting between Olof Skötkonung and St. Olaf of Norway, at which the kings played at dice for the isle of Hissing. The King of Sweden cast sixes, the King of Norway did the same; when the Swedish king had again thrown sixes, the attendants thought Olaf the Holy must lose, but he cried, “God may still grant me success." He rattled the dice; one die sprang into two pieces, showing seven dots, and he obtained the prize.

Again, in 1078 Knud the Holy and Olaf of Norway planned together the conquest of revolted England,

Its earlier name was Konghalla—Kingshall—the residence of kings, like our own hall of Westminster.

↑ Sigrid Storrada, mother of Olof Skötkonung.

Olaf agreeing to furnish sixty ships to aid in the enterprise. In 1120 Sigurd Ring built a wooden fortress in Kongelf. Every child in Wik was compelled to furnish five stones and five pointed poles of oak, to serve as javelins for its defence. The wall was of stone and turf, surrounded by a moat; within was a splendid hall of wood, and a church built in form of the cross. To this church the king gave an altarpiece of copper and silver he had brought from Greece, and the farfamed missal, printed in gold (Liber Plenarius), a present from the patriarch of Jerusalem, which Sigurd in a passion tossed into the fire. More costly far to the country was a bit of the true cross, authenticated both by the patriarch and King Baldwin, only obtained by Sigurd on taking an oath that his subjects should pay tithes to the clergy-a debt not yet liquidated; but the king neglecting to send the holy splinter to repose, with the bones of St. Olaf, at Tronyem, as he had promised, he placed it in Kongelf, for which crime, six years after his death, the devoted city suffered.† There was, say the Sagas, a general feeling of approaching evil. Subterraneous noises, as of armed bands, were heard on Easter-eve;-all the dogs of the town went mad. On Ascension-day, thirteen vessels, laden with frightened citizens, set sail for Bergen; in vain Anders Brunsson from his pulpit implored the people "to trust in God, amend their ways, and not abandon their beautiful city." They started-but not one reached the coast of Norway. On Lammas-day the brother-in-law of Anders burst into the church,

Sigurd Ring-Jorsalafarare he was called, on account of his voyage to Jorsala, the ancient Scandinavian name for Jerusalem. † 1135.

crying, "A fleet of two hundred and fifty sail rows up the river, and a host of armed warriors ride towards the town." The terror-struck congregation, grasping their weapons, rushed to the bridge, where they beheld Kettibur, King of the Wends, with his army, already beneath the town-walls. The Saga tells how the wife of Anders fled to rouse the country. Coming on a marriage-festival, she implored the guests to rush and aid the town; but they refused, saying, "It is no good, we shall all be cut down ourselves." Then the bridegroom, Olfwer Stormund (of the wide mouth*), grasping his shield and battle-axe, cried, "To arms, my good men! let's be up and aid the burghers; 'twere a shame for us to fill ourselves with beer while brave men are fighting." And when none rose he set forth alone, "hoping he might knock some heathens on the head before he died." Scarcely arrived, he was attacked by eight Wends; two he brained with his battle-axe, two more he cut off with his sword; then hotly pursued the remaining four: two fell dead by a morass, in which the survivors, together with our hero, all got bogged together. There they stuck until the companions of Olfwer dragged him out, when he killed the last of them. Notwithstanding the heroic defence of the citi zens, Kongelf fell and every soul perished. "In these days," says the historian, "toothpicks' are set up to celebrate each skirmish under a princely leader. No stone, no monument, tells the tale of Kongelf's daring; but some few years since, when the bones of her defenders were disinterred by Castelgård, they were

*So called from his boasting tongue rather than from the size of his mouth.

gathered in heaps and shipped off, as manure, to England."

A brewery, with the guest-house and the church, forms the square of the modern town; under the rocky heights runs a long street of houses with hanging gardens. Such is Kongelf, a place decayed but beautiful, where strangers come to fish for perch, pike, trout, and salmon. A Lieutenant Thomson, now gathered to his fathers, was ten years since here taken in, well fed, and done for, in a private family, for the sum of 200 rix * per annum, grog alone extra.

We climbed to Bohus, a "fästning "t famed in northern story as the Tower of Wik. The site is glorious, on a rocky island, defending the narrow entry of the river. One tower alone, with extinguisher roof, remains intact; it is called "The Father's Hat:" the pendant, "Mother's Cap," of less durable materials, fell down some few years ago-rotted by too frequent washing of the storms and the clear-starching of the winter's frosts. In the large court is a wide well, of depth unknown, arched over, and walled round with long slabs of granite placed lengthways. As the river rises, so rises the water, which is now at three feet from the well's top. On the hill opposite, at Fontin (the old Gothic word for fountain), is a pure source, where the women of Kongelf mount the rock-side to fetch spring water.

Never were the rocks more beautiful than this season, -the mosses of brilliant green, the stonecrop glorious in its cloth of gold, the wild-brier redder than usual;

* About 117. sterling.

† Fortress.