Chasing The Sun

Our Hero, Fred Temple, has risen to be a senior manager in the great
Liverpool business founded by his father. But he was getting overworked
and deeply tired, so one day he announced that he was taking leave for a
while and was going to visit Norway in a small yacht.

Ballantyne had several holidays in Norway, so to write about it and
describe it was a pleasure to him. This book is therefore an account of
Norway seen through the eyes of an enthusiast for that country.

Fred takes some friends with him. Together, they have great adventures
and great fun. They even venture so far north as Lapland, and the Land
of the Midnight Sun.

A wonderful piece of vintage Victoriana at its best.


CHAPTER ONE.

PREPARATIONS FOR THE CHASE.

Fred Temple was a tall, handsome young fellow of about five-and-twenty.

He had a romantic spirit, a quiet gentlemanly manner, a pleasant smile,
and a passionate desire for violent exercise. To look at him you would
have supposed that he was rather a lazy man, for all his motions were
slow and deliberate. He was never in a hurry, and looked as if it would
take a great deal to excite him. But those who knew Fred Temple well
used to say that there was a great deal more in him than appeared at
first sight. Sometimes a sudden flush of the brow, or a gleam of his
eyes, told of hidden fires within.

Fred, when a small boy, was extremely fond of daring and dangerous
expeditions. He had risked his life hundreds of times on tree-tops and
precipices for birds' nests, and had fought more hand-to-hand battles
than any of the old Greek or Roman heroes. After he became a man, he
risked his life more than once in saving the lives of others, and it was
a notable fact that many of the antagonists of his boyhood became, at
last, his most intimate friends.

Fred Temple was fair and ruddy. At about the age of nineteen certain
parts of his good-looking face became covered with a substance
resembling floss-silk. At twenty-five this substance had changed into a
pair of light whiskers and a lighter moustache. By means of that
barbarous custom called shaving he kept his chin smooth.

Fred's father was a wealthy Liverpool merchant. At the period when our
tale opens Fred himself had become chief manager of the business.
People began, about this time, to say that the business could not get on
without him. There were a great number of hands, both men and women,
employed by Temple and Son, and there was not one on the establishment,
male or female, who did not say and believe that Mr Frederick was the
best master, not only in Liverpool, but in the whole world. He did not
by any means overdose the people with attentions; but he had a hearty
offhand way of addressing them that was very attractive. He was a firm
ruler. No skulker had a chance of escape from his sharp eye, but, on
the other hand, no hard-working servant was overlooked.

One day it was rumoured in the works that Mr Frederick was going to
take a long holiday. Since his appointment to the chief charge, Fred
had taken few holidays, and had worked so hard that he began to have a
careworn aspect, so the people said they were "glad to hear it; no one
in the works deserved a long holiday better than he." But the people
were not a little puzzled when Bob Bowie, the office porter, told them
that their young master was going away for three months to chase the
sun!

"Chase the sun, Bob! what d'ye mean?" said one. "I don't know wot I
mean; I can only tell ye wot I say," answered Bowie bluntly.