Tønsberg

Let us walk its shore a little longer.

There is a field in southern Norway, near the town of Tønsberg, where a ship once lay buried beneath the earth for more than a thousand years.

When it was finally uncovered, its oak timbers were still curved and graceful, its prow still carved with the swirling beasts of a vanished age.

It had carried someone to the grave, and the silence it kept for all those centuries was not the silence of emptiness, but of purpose.

a rude sort of cabriole was at last found and a driver half drunk who was not less eager to make a good bargain on that account i had a danish captain of a ship and his mate with me the former was to ride on horseback at which he was not very expert and the latter to partake of my seat the driver mounted behind to guide the horses and flourish the whip over our shoulders he would not suffer the reins out of his own hands there was something so grotesque in our appearance that i could not afford shrinking into myself when i saw a gentleman-like man in the group which crowded around the door to observe us i could have broken the driver's whip for cracking to call the women and children together but seeing a significant smile on the face i had before remarked i burst into a laugh to allow him to do so too and away we flew this is not a flourish of the pen for we actually went on full gallop a long time the horses being very good indeed i have never met with better if so good post-horses as in norway they are of a stouter make than the english horses appear to be well fed and are not easily tired i had to pass over i was informed the most fertile and best cultivated tract of country in norway the distance was three norwegian miles which are longer than the swedish the roads were very good the farmers are obliged to repair them and we scampered through a great extent of country in a more improved state than any i had viewed since i left england still there was sufficient of hills dales and rocks to prevent the idea of a plain from entering the head or even of such scenery as england and france afford the prospects were also embellished by water rivers and lakes before the sea proudly claimed my regard and the road running frequently through lofty groves rendered the landscapes beautiful though they were not so romantic as those I had lately seen with such delight.

It was late when I reached Tonsberg, and I was glad to go to bed at a decent inn.

The next morning, the 17th of July, conversing with the gentleman with whom I had business to transact, I found that I should be detained at Tonsberg three weeks, and I lamented that I had not brought my child with me.

The inn was quiet, and my room so pleasant, commanding a view of the sea, confined by an amphitheatre of hanging woods, that I wished to remain there, though no one in the house could speak English or French.

The mayor, my friend, however, sent a young woman to me who spoke a little English, and she agreed to call on me twice a day to receive my orders and translate them to my hostess.

Sheltered from the north and eastern winds, nothing can exceed the salubrity, the soft freshness of the western gales.

in the evening they also die away the aspen leaves tremble into stillness and reposing nature seems to be warmed by the moon which here assumes a genial aspect and if a light shower has chanced to fall with the sun the juniper the underwood of the forest exhales a wild perfume mixed with a thousand nameless sweets that soothing the heart leave images in the memory which the imagination will ever hold dear nature is the nurse of sentiment the true source of taste yet what misery as well as rapture is produced by a quick perception of the beautiful and sublime when it is exercised in observing animated nature when every beauteous feeling and emotion excites responsive sympathy and the harmonized soul sinks into melancholy or rises to ecstasy just as the chords are touched like the aeolian harp agitated by the changing wind but how dangerous is it to foster these sentiments in such an imperfect state of existence and how difficult to eradicate them when an affection for mankind a passion for an individual is but the unfolding of that love which embraces all that is great and beautiful when a warm heart has received strong impressions they are not to be effaced emotions become sentiments and the imagination renders even transient sensations permanent by fondly retracing them i cannot without a thrill of delight recollect views i have seen which are not to be forgotten nor looks i have felt in every nerve which i shall never more meet the grave has closed over a dear friend the friend of my youth still she is present with me and i hear her soft voice warbling as i stray over the heath fate has separated me from another the fire of whose eyes tempered by infantine tenderness still warms my breast even when gazing on these tremendous cliffs sublime emotions absorb my soul and smile not if i add that the rosy tint of morning reminds me of a suffusion which will never more charm my senses unless it reappears on the cheeks of my child her sweet blushes i may yet hide in my bosom and she is still too young to ask why starts the tear so near akin to pleasure and pain I cannot write any more at present.

Tomorrow we will talk of Tonsberg.

He ends up hiding that in Norway.

It comes to a church in Tønsberg.

And then at one point, thousands of years ago, there was the Time Stone which found its way to Earth.

It was discovered by this guy named Agamotto, who became the fourth, first Sorcerer Supreme.

a rude sort of cabriole was at last found and a driver half drunk who was not less eager to make a good bargain on that account i had a danish captain of a ship and his mate with me the former was to ride on horseback at which he was not very expert and the latter to partake of my seat the driver mounted behind to guide the horses and flourish the whip over our shoulders he would not suffer the reins out of his own hands there was something so grotesque in our appearance that i could not afford shrinking into myself when i saw a gentleman-like man in the group which crowded around the door to observe us i could have broken the driver's whip for cracking to call the women and children together but seeing a significant smile on the face i had before remarked i burst into a laugh to allow him to do so too and away we flew this is not a flourish of the pen for we actually went on full gallop a long time the horses being very good indeed i have never met with better if so good post-horses as in norway they are of a stouter make than the english horses appear to be well fed and are not easily tired i had to pass over i was informed the most fertile and best cultivated tract of country in norway the distance was three norwegian miles which are longer than the swedish the roads were very good the farmers are obliged to repair them and we scampered through a great extent of country in a more improved state than any i had viewed since i left england still there was sufficient of hills dales and rocks to prevent the idea of a plain from entering the head or even of such scenery as england and france afford the prospects were also embellished by water rivers and lakes before the sea proudly claimed my regard and the road running frequently through lofty groves rendered the landscapes beautiful though they were not so romantic as those I had lately seen with such delight.

It was late when I reached Tonsberg, and I was glad to go to bed at a decent inn.

The next morning, the 17th of July, conversing with the gentleman with whom I had business to transact, I found that I should be detained at Tonsberg three weeks, and I lamented that I had not brought my child with me.

The inn was quiet, and my room so pleasant, commanding a view of the sea, confined by an amphitheatre of hanging woods, that I wished to remain there, though no one in the house could speak English or French.

The mayor, my friend, however, sent a young woman to me who spoke a little English, and she agreed to call on me twice a day to receive my orders and translate them to my hostess.

Sheltered from the north and eastern winds, nothing can exceed the salubrity, the soft freshness of the western gales.

in the evening they also die away the aspen leaves tremble into stillness and reposing nature seems to be warmed by the moon which here assumes a genial aspect and if a light shower has chanced to fall with the sun the juniper the underwood of the forest exhales a wild perfume mixed with a thousand nameless sweets that soothing the heart leave images in the memory which the imagination will ever hold dear nature is the nurse of sentiment the true source of taste yet what misery as well as rapture is produced by a quick perception of the beautiful and sublime when it is exercised in observing animated nature when every beauteous feeling and emotion excites responsive sympathy and the harmonized soul sinks into melancholy or rises to ecstasy just as the chords are touched like the aeolian harp agitated by the changing wind but how dangerous is it to foster these sentiments in such an imperfect state of existence and how difficult to eradicate them when an affection for mankind a passion for an individual is but the unfolding of that love which embraces all that is great and beautiful when a warm heart has received strong impressions they are not to be effaced emotions become sentiments and the imagination renders even transient sensations permanent by fondly retracing them i cannot without a thrill of delight recollect views i have seen which are not to be forgotten nor looks i have felt in every nerve which i shall never more meet the grave has closed over a dear friend the friend of my youth still she is present with me and i hear her soft voice warbling as i stray over the heath fate has separated me from another the fire of whose eyes tempered by infantine tenderness still warms my breast even when gazing on these tremendous cliffs sublime emotions absorb my soul and smile not if i add that the rosy tint of morning reminds me of a suffusion which will never more charm my senses unless it reappears on the cheeks of my child her sweet blushes i may yet hide in my bosom and she is still too young to ask why starts the tear so near akin to pleasure and pain I cannot write any more at present.

Tomorrow we will talk of Tonsberg.

And yeah, we're here in Norway.

So we're in Tonsberg in Norway.

Amazing.

And you love it over there? As they say here, we're thriving.

Degrees to enable anyone to practice any profession must be taken at Copenhagen, and the people of this country, having the good sense to perceive that men who are to live in a community should at least acquire the elements of their knowledge and form their youthful attachments there, are seriously endeavoring to establish a university in Norway.

And Tønsberg, as a central place in the best part of the country, had the most suffrages for experiencing the bad effects of a metropolis.

They have determined not to have it in or near Christiania.

Should such an establishment take place, it will promote inquiry throughout the country and give a new face to society.

Premiums have been offered and prize questions written, which I am told have merit.

The building, college halls, and other appendages of the seat of science might enable Tønsberg to recover its pristine consequence, for it is one of the most ancient towns of Norway and once contained nine churches.

At present, there are only two.

One is a very old structure and has a Gothic respectability about it, which scarcely amounts to grandeur, because to render a Gothic pile grand, it must have a huge unwieldiness of appearance.