"I asked him what hour it might be, for it appeared to me the night was long, and the day slow in coming. He told me, that the year in these countries was divided into four parts; three months of total night, when the sun never shone upon the earth at all; and three months of twilight, neither night nor day; there were also three months of perpetual day, when the sun was never hid, and three more of a night twilight; that the present season was the day twilight, and it was a vain hope to look for the light of the sun; and that it would be equally hopeless to look for a return to my own country, except during the season when it was always day, at which time ships sailed from these parts to England, France, and Spain, with various sorts of merchandise. He asked me if I knew of any way of gaining my bread, till the time should arrive when I could hope to return home to my own land. I told him I was a dancer, and a wonderful man for cutting capers, and that I knew a good many sleight of hand tricks. The man laughed aloud, and told me that these exercises, or employments, or whatever I was pleased to call them, would not avail me much, in Norway, or in any of these parts. He asked me if I knew what a goldsmith's business was. I told him I had skill to learn anything he could teach me. "'Then come along brother,' said he, 'but first, let us go and bury this miserable creature.' "We did so, and then he took me to a city where all the inhabitants walked about the streets, carrying lighted pine-branches in their hands, and so transacting the business of daily life. As we went along I enquired how and when he had come to this country, and if he really was Italian. He replied that one of his ancestors had married and settled here, having come to transact some important business, and that he had taught all his children his native language, and so it had descended to all his posterity until it had reached him, who was one of his cousins four times removed.... I could tell you much of the house where I was received, of the wife and children I found there, and servants of whom he had many, of his immense possessions, of the kind and hospitable reception I met with, but it would be to go on for ever; enough to tell you briefly that I learned his business, and in the space of a few months, could gain my own livelihood.