The life of a fisherman is everywhere full of privations and dangers, but nowhere more so than at the Lofoten Islands. Here, after toiling on the stormy sea for many hours, he has nothing but the miserable shelter of a damp, filthy, over-crowded hut, which affords him neither the rest nor the warmth needed after his fatiguing day’s work. Even the iron-framed sons of the North are frequently unable to resist such continuous hardships, and bring home with them the seeds of contagion and death. Malignant fevers have frequently decimated the population of Norway, and their origin may generally be traced to the fishing-grounds. “The Arab and the Persian,” says Leopold von Buch, “build caravanseras for the wayfarers through the desert; the inhabitants of the Alps have founded ‘hospices’ on the summits of the mountain passes; and the Norwegian has erected houses of refuge on Dovrefjeld, but none for the fishermen of Lofoten. Near Rodoë there is a large hospital for the sick of Nordland; would it not be as well to build houses in Lofoten, so as not to crowd the hospitals and churchyards?” This was written at the beginning of the present century, but the poor fishermen are still as neglected as ever, for a more recent traveller, Marmier, beheld with pity the wretched huts in which they spend three winter months far from their families. In the channel between Hvalö and the mainland lies, in 69° 45´ N. lat., the small island of Tromsö, where about fifty years since only a few fishermen resided, whose huts have gradually expanded into a thriving little town of about 3000 inhabitants, along the shore opposite the mainland. Its staple exports are dried and salted cod, and train-oil. The livers of the cod are put in open barrels and placed in the sun, and the melted portion which rises to the surface is skimmed off, being the purest oil. The coarse refuse is boiled in great iron pots by the side of the sea, and yields the common “train-oil.” The muscular matter which remains is collected into barrels and exported as a powerful manure; some of it is sent to England. The town consists mainly of one long straggling street, following the windings of the shore, and has a picturesque appearance from the harbor. The houses are all of wood painted with lively colors, and the roofs, mostly covered with grass, diversified with bright clusters of yellow and white flowers, look pretty in summer. Tromsö has a Latin school, and even boasts of a newspaper, the _Tromsö Tidende et Blan for Nordland og Finmarken_ (“The Tromsö Gazette, a paper for Nordland and Finmark”). This paper is published twice a week; and as only one mail arrives at Tromsö every three weeks, the foreign news is given by instalments, spreading over six successive numbers, until a fresh dispatch arrives.