A Hardy Norseman

A Hardy Norseman is a novel by Edna Lyall. Lyall was an English novelist, who supported the women's suffrage movement. Excerpt: «Herr Falck lived in one of the pretty, unpretentious houses in Kalvedalen which are chiefly owned by the rich merchants of Bergen. The house stood on the right-hand side of the road, surrounded by a pretty little garden; it was painted a light-brown color, and, like most Bergen houses, it was built of wood. In the windows one could see flowers, and beyond them white muslin curtains, for æstheticism had not yet penetrated to Norway. The dark-tiled roof was outlined against a wooded hill rising immediately behind, with here and there gray rocks peeping through the summer green of the trees, while in front the chief windows looked on to a pretty terrace with carefully kept flower-beds, then down the wooded hill-side to the lake below—the Lungegaardsvand with purple and gray heights on the further shore, and on one side a break in the chain of mountains and a lovely stretch of open country. To the extreme left was the giant Ulriken, sometimes shining and glistening, sometimes frowning and dark, but always beautiful; while to the right you caught a glimpse of Bergen with its quaint cathedral tower, and away in the distance the fjord like a shining silver band in the sun.»