[2] Compare Björnson's account of the temperature at Kvikne in his autobiographical sketch, _Blakken_. [3] The statistical and much of the other matter in this chapter has been taken from _Norway, Official Publication for the Paris Exhibition_, 1900, published at Christiania. But I am also indebted to the stately publication by Norwegian authors and artists entitled _Norge i det nittende Aarhundrede_, 2 volumes, large folio, 436 and 468 pages. Christiania, 1900. The scholars who published this are W. C. Brögger, B. Getz, A. N. Kjær, Moltke Moe, Bredo Morgenstjerne, Gerhard Munthe, Frithjof Nansen, Eilif Peterssen, Nordahl Rolfsen, J. E. Sars, Gustav Storm and E. Werenskjold. The editor in chief for the texts is Nordahl Rolfsen, for the illustrations E. Werenskjold. There is a large staff of collaborators, each article is prepared by a specialist; the whole is a rare piece of book-making. The printers are Alb. Cammermeyers Forlag, Christiania. I wish to mention also especially here Christensen's _Det nittende Aarhundredes Kulturkamp i Norge_, Christiania, 1905. The population of Norway[4] is very unevenly distributed, the north being rather thinly settled. The area of Norway is 124,495 square miles, or somewhat more than that of Wisconsin and Illinois together. About four per cent of this, however, is covered by lakes, and the average number of inhabitants to the square mile is only seventeen. The corresponding figures of inhabitants to the square mile for Sweden is twenty-eight; for Denmark, however, it is one hundred and forty-eight, and for all Europe, it is ninety-eight. The density of population is greatest in Larvik and Jarlsberg on the south (barring the cities of Christiania and Bergen). In these provinces there are one hundred and sixteen inhabitants to the square mile. In Hedemarken the number falls to twelve. The western fjord districts, those of Trondhjem Fjord, the Sogne Fjord and the Hardanger Fjord are thickly populated. [4] It was 1,490,950 in 1855, 2,350,000 in 1908. Norway is a land of fjords and lakes, of mountains and glacier expanses. Less than one-fourth of the country is capable of cultivation, and eighty per cent of this is forest land. This leaves less than five per cent under actual cultivation. We may compare again with Denmark, where seventy-six per cent of the land is cultivated, while in all Europe the ratio is forty per cent. Norway's climate is noted for its healthfulness,[5] and its inhabitants attain a higher degree of longevity than those of most other European countries. Nearly seven per cent of its people reach the age of sixty to seventy, while one per cent attain to the age of from ninety to one hundred years. That is, reckoned as a whole, about twelve per cent attain to the age of sixty years or more. This is considerable in excess of that of nearly all other European countries.