No. LXI. LARKOUL. On the east side of the Christiania Fiord, and a few miles below the town of Mos, is a small picturesque, and secure harbour, named Larkoul, having a ground of excellent clay, and admirably situated, with two entrances, one north, the other south, formed by the continent on the left side, and some small islands on the other. It is much frequented by large ships, which require secure anchorage, during the prevalence of those contrary winds, which so suddenly and so fatally occur to navigators in the Fiord. In the month of October, I remarked a singular phenomenon here, a regular change of wind every twelve hours, to the opposite point of the compass, blowing each way with equal violence, and frequently obliging the pilots to return, after an ineffectual effort to clear the great Fader Island. This harbour was deemed so important, that the Norwegians thought it expedient to fortify it strongly during a war with the Russians. The remains of the walls, or ramparts, are now to be seen, on the continental rocks, to the right of the view, which exhibits part of the west passage. On the margin below these nearly perpendicular masses, are innumerable fragments of the incumbent rocks. Along the sandy beach, are a few houses, inhabited by boat-builders and fishermen, as well as pilots, governed like their brethren in the harbours of Norway, by an alderman, whose large house is seen on the left of the view. In addition to his official occupations, he employs himself in procuring and cooking fresh meat, and sells bread, vegetables, liquors, tobacco, and small stores, for the use of the ships in his harbour; he has two or three spare beds for passengers. His house has likewise the advantage of a small garden, with a few fruit trees, currant and gooseberry bushes, cabbages, and other culinary vegetables ; the court-yard is stocked with ducks, hogs, and geese; there is also a small corn-field, seen under the trees between the rocks. On the gravel strand is a pleasant walk, and there are two commodious little piers, built of timber, immediately between which, is seen the road, leading around the rocks, and through a flat forest to Mos. At the distance of about two miles on the way is seen the hoved kirker, at Rigge: it is a good stone church, with a parsonage house, standing on a small eminence in a valley, and here the inhabitants of the district for miles around, assemble on Sundays for the purpose of devotion. Near it on the grounds of Mr. Collett, I observed growing from a hole in a rock, a tall luxuriant fir, whose small fibrous roots almost covered the stone like network, extending many yards to the ground, from whence it derived its sustenance. These trees frequently occur in well sheltered places, but their stability is so extremely slender, that they may easily be pushed down, with a walking stick applied to their tops, from the rocks above, and are frequently found after storms, lying across the roads below. It is a pleasant sail from hence to Tonsberg, Dram, Mos, or Frederickstad, from which the passage boats pass daily to or from Christiania. One of them, a sloop, is introduced into this View, as also a pilot boat, with its characteristic mark, a broad red stripe in the middle of the main sail, from the top to the bottom, and without a peak.