I can breathe freely and enjoy life. The light breeze, which brings us the perfumes from the pine woods, is barely enough to stir the surface of the sea. In the wake of the ship is a long phosphorescent track. Every turn of the propeller brings me nearer to my country, the main object of my thoughts. The _Haakon Jarl_ stayed a few hours at Bodo, a small Scandinavian town, beginning to show traces of civilization. Doctor Ekelund and I landed. We were pleased to find some newspapers, in which a meeting of Andrée and Nansen at Tromsö was referred to, also the Polar voyage chart of the celebrated Norwegian explorer. We afterwards attended an open-air concert given by a family of German artists. During our passage to Torghatten, a small troupe of the Salvation Army came on board, and amused us a good deal with some of their musical performances, and their devout, though rather extravagant, practices. The captain, a respectable lady, with her head concealed at the farther end of a huge poke-bonnet, which would not be out of place at Madame Tussaud’s, was gravely seated in a rocking-chair, and presided over the spiritual concert given by the members of the congregation. The devout musicians, leaning against a heap of dried cod-fish, sang in more or less plaintive tunes the praises of the Lord, who doubtless understands all languages. For my part, I did not understand a single word of these hymns, but I could judge by the faces of the audience that the music, which _emollit mores_, did not convince them. It was a wonder we did not throw them some small change; we expected that one of the pleasant company would go round, hat in hand, to make a collection for the expenses of the institution, or for any other more prosaic purpose. A pretty young girl, of sixteen or seventeen years of age, with her hair arranged after the fashion of Miss Helyett (doubtless the captain’s niece), followed in a book, though with a distracted sort of devotion, the songs of the Salvation Army. However, the amusements on board were not very numerous, and this was the chief item, as far as I was concerned, in the passage from Tromsö to Trondhjem, where the main body of the army awaited their brethren, who were coming from the North to gain souls for Paradise. _Thursday, August 27th._—About four p.m. the town of Trondhjem appeared to be south-east. This is the haven so long wished for, although I have no right to complain of this latter portion of my voyage, during which no one suffered from the rolling of the vessel. The largest northern town in Norway, where the houses and buildings are made entirely of wood, has really an original appearance, and I sincerely regretted that I could not make a longer stay; but a few hours afterwards I left my amiable guide, Dr. Ekelund, and took a quick train on the single-line railway which was to carry me, within seventeen hours, over the 310 miles that divided me from Christiania.