LIBRARY THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA BARBARA PRESENTED BY Mr. H. H. Kiliani JiCSB LIBRARY Edition THE WORKS OF BAYARD TAYLOR NORTHERN TRAVEL TRAVELS IN GREECE AND RUSSIA tr G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS STREET 24 Knickerbocker NEW YORK LONDON 9J WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET 24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND NORTHERN TRAVEL SUMMER AND WINTER PICTURES SWEDEN, DENMARK AND LAPLAND BAYARD TAYLOR AUTHOR'S REVISED EDITION Entered, according to Act of Congress. In the year 1857, by in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Souther* District of New York. COPYRIGHT BY MARIE TAYLOR 1882 PREFACE. THIS book requires no farther words of introduction that those with which I have prefaced former volumes that my object in travel is neither scientific, statistical, nor politico economical ; but simply artistic, pictorial, if possible, panoramic. I hare attempted to draw, with a hand which, I hope, has acquired a little steadiness from long practice, the people and the scenery of Northern Europe, to colour my sketches with the tints of the originals, and to invest each one with its native and characteristic atmosphere. In order to do this, I have adopted, as in other countries, a simple rule : to live, as near as possible, the life of the peo- ple among whom I travel. The history of Sweden and Norway, their forms of Government, commerce, productive industry, political condition, geology, botany, and agricul- ture, can be found in other works, and I have only touched upon such subjects where it was necessary to give complete v PREFACE. ness to my pictures. I have endeavoured to give photo- graphs, instead of diagrams, or tables of figures; and desire only that the untravelled reader, who is interested in the countries I visit, may find that he is able to see them by the aid of my eyes. BAYARD TAYLOR. LONDON : November, 1857. CONTENTS CHAPTER L A WINTER VOYAGE ON THE BALTIC. Embarking at Lubeck Put into a Hut The Company on Board- Night on the Baltic Ystad A Life Lost Stopped by Ice A Gale The Swedish Coast Arrival at Dalaro Conscientious Custom-Houst Officer. ....... Page 13 CHAPTER IL STOCKHOLM PREPARATIONS FOR THE NORTH. Departure in Sleds A Meteor Winter Scenery Swedish Post-Station* View of Stockholm Arrival Stockholm Weather Swedish Ignor- ance of the North Funds Equipment. .... 81 CHAPTER HI FIRST EXPERIENCES OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. (L Swedish Diligence Aspect of the Country Upsala A Fellow-Pa* enger The Northern Gods Scenery Churches Peasant's Houses Arrival at Gefle FOrbwl Papers Speaking Swedish Daylight at Gefle A Cold Italian Experience of Skjuts and Fdrbud We reach Snow Night Travel An Arabic Landlord A Midnight Chase Quarters at Bro The Second Day We reach SundsvalL . 9) flfi CONTENTS CHAPTER IV. A SLEIGH RIDE THROUGH NORRLAND. SundsTsll and the Non-landers Purchase Sleighs Start again Driving on the Ice Breakfast at Fjal Twilight Hymn Angermannland A Bleak Day Scenery of Norrland Postillions Increase of Cold Dark Travel The Norrland People The Country and its Products North- era Thanks Umea The Inn at Innertafle. Page 38 CHAPTER V. PROGRESS NORTHWARD A STORM. Christmas Temperature First Experience of intense Cold Phenomena thereof Arctic Travel Splendour of the Scenery The Northern Nature Gross Appetites My Nose and the Mercury Frozen Dreary Travel Skelleftea and its Temple A Winter Storm The Landlady at Abyn Ploughing out Travelling in a Tempest Reach Pitea. 50 CHAPTER VI. JOURNEY FROM PITEA TO HAPARANDA. Torment Under the Aurora Borealis A Dismal Night Around tht Bothnian Gulf Forest Scenery Mansbyn The Suspicious Iron- Master Brother Horton and the Cold A Trial of Languages An- other Storm New Year's Day Entrance into Finland The Finns Haparanda. ....... 68 CHAPTER VH. CROSSING THE ARCTIC CIRCLE. Medical Treatment The Kind Fredrika Morals in the North Om Quarters at Haparanda Vain Questions Start for Lapland Arctic Daylight Campbell's TorneS A Finnish Inn Colours of the Arctic Sky Approach to Avasaxa Crossing the Arctic Circle An After noon Sunset Reception at Juoxcngi. . . .79 CONTENTS. |2 CHAPTER VHL ADVENTURES AMONG THE FINNS. 'oorney up the Tornea Wonders of the Winter Woods Lapps and Reindeer My Finnish Vocabulary A Night Journey Reception at Kengis Continue the Journey Finnish Sleds A Hard Day The Inn at Jokijalka Its Inmates Life in a Finnish Hut An Arctic Picture A Frozen Country Kihlangi A Polar Night Parkajoki We reach Muoniovara. . . . Page 82 CHAPTER IX. LIFE IN .LAPLAND. Reception at Muoniovara Mr. Wolley Our Lapland Home A Fin nish Bath Send for Reindeer A Finnish House Stables The Reindeer Pulk My first Attempt at driving Reindeer Failure and Success Muonioniska View from the Hill Fears of an old Finn The Discovery of America A Lapp Witch Reindeer Accident. 98 CHAPTER X. A REINDEER JOURNEY ACROSS LAPLAND Preparations for the Journey Departure A lazy Deer " Long Isaac" An Auroral Spectacle A Night at Palajoki The Table-Land of Lapland Sagacity of the Deer Driving a wild Reindeer Polar Poetry Lippajarvi Picture of a Lapp The Night A Phantom Journey The Track lost A Lapp Encampment Two Hours in a Lapp Tent We start again Descent into Norway Heavy Travel- Lapp Hut in Siepe A Fractious Reindeer Drive to Kautokeino. 101 CHAPTER XI KAUTOKEINO A DAY WITHOUT A SUN Lapland Etiquette The Inn Quarters at the Lansman s Situation 'A Kautokeino Climate Life Habits of the Population Approach ol Sunrise Church Service in Lapland Cold Religion Noonday with- vat Sunrise The North and the South A Vision Visits of the Lapps X CONTENTS. Lars Kaino A Field for Portrait-painting C haracter of the Lapp Race Their present Condition The religious Outbreak at Kauto keino Pastor Hroslef A Piano in Lapland The Schools Visit to ft Gamtne ... ... Page 136 CHAPTER Xn. THE RETURN TO MUONIOVARA. Advantages of Lapp Costume Turning Southward Departure from Kautokeino A Lapp Hut Religion The Reindeer Their Qualities Treatment by the Lapps Annoyances of Reindeer Travel Endur ance of Northern Girls The Table-Land The " Roof of the World" Journey to Lippajarvi Descent to the Muonio Female Curiosity The Return to Muoniovara P-rosaic Life of the Lapps Modern Prudery. ..... .141 CHAPTER XTIL ABOUT THE FINNS. Change of Plans Winter in Lapland The Finns Their Physical Ap pearance Character Drunkenness A Spiritual Epidemic Morality Contradictory Customs Family Names and Traditions Apathy of Northern Life The Polar Zone Good Qualities of the Race An English Naturalist. ...... 164 CHAPTER XIV. EXPERIENCES OF ARCTIC WEATHER. Departure from Muoniovara 50 below Zero A terrible Day An Arctic Night Jokijalka again Travelling down the Tomea A Night at Kardis Increase of Daylight Juoxengi A Struggle for Life Difficulty of keeping awake Frozen Noses The Norseman's Hell Freezing Travellers Full Daylight again Safe Arrival at Hapar anda Comfort The Doctor's Welcome Drive to Tornea Th Weather. .... 16 CHAPTER XV. WCTOENTS OF THE RKTIKX JOURNEY. Mild Weather' Miraculous Scenery Nasby Swedish Hu.esty Ad CONTENTS X3 ventures at Lulea Northern Sleds Pitea Accident at Skelleftea The Non-land Climate A damp Swede Travelling in a Tempest A Non-land Inn Character of the People Their Houses. Page ITt CHAPTER XVI. CONCLUSION OF THE ARCTIC TR'P iVarmth and Daylight Swedish Linen The Northern Women- Pro gress Southward Quarrel with a Postillion A Model Village Rough Roads Scarcity of Snow Arrival at Stockholm Remarks on Arcti Travel Scale of Temperature Record of Cold, . . IS 7 CHAPTER XVIL LIFE IN STOCKHOLM. Stockholm Its Position and Appearance The Streets and Houses Manner of Living Swedish Diet Stockholm in Spring Swedish Gymnastics A Grotesque Spectacle Results of Gymnastics Ling's System The Swedish Language Character of the Prose and Poetry -Songs Life in Stockholm. .... 197 CHAPTER MANNERS AND MORALS OP STOCKHOLM. Hospitality of the Swedes Northern Frenchmen Stockholm Manners Dress Conventionalism Taking off the Hat Courtesy of the Swedish An Anecdote King Oscar The Royal Family Tendency to Detraction The King's Illness Morals of Stockholm Illegitimate Births Sham Morality Causes of Immorab'ty Drunkenness An Incident ..... 2J CHAPTER XIX. JOURNEY T J GOTTKNTU'RG AND COPENHAGEN. Appearance of Spring Departure from Stockholm The Gotha Canai- Vreta Kloster Scenery of the Wener European Ideas concerning America A Democratic Nobleman The Gotha River Gottenb'irg- jfii CONTENTS. The Giant's Pots -The Cattegat Elsinore The Sound Dues Copen hajren and its Inhabitants Thorwaldsen Interview with Han; Christian Andersen Goldschniidt Prof. Rafn. . . Page 22S CHAPTER XX. RETURN TO THE NORTH. CHRISTIANIA. visit to Germany and England The Steamer at Hull The North Sea Fellow-Passengers Christiansand The Coast of Norway Arrival dt Christiania Preparations for Travelling The Carriole Progress of Christiania Beauty of its Environs. .... 23K CHAPTER XXI. INCIDENTS OF CARRIOLE TRAVEL. Disinterested Advice Departure Alarm Descending the Hills The Skyds System Krogldeven The King's View Country and Country People Summer Scenery The Randsfjord A Cow-Whale The Miosen Lake More than we bargained for Astonishing Kindness The Lake from a Steamer. . . . 242 CHAPTER XXn. GULDBRANDSDAL AND THE DOVRE FJELD. Lillehammer A Sabbath Morning A Picture of Dahi Guldbrandsdel Annoyances of Norwegian Travel The Louden River Cataracts The Station at Viik Sinclair's Defeat Pass of the Hasten The Upper Valley Scenery of the Dovre Fjeld Solitude of the Mountains Jerkin Summit of the Fjeld Nature in the North Defile of the Driv A Silent Country Valley of the Orkla Park Scenery A Cun- ning Hostess Solidity of Norwegian Women. . 8M CHAPTER DRCNTHEIM VOYAGE UP THE COAST OF NORWAY. Panorama of Dr >ntheim Its Streets and Houses Quarters at the Hotel Protestant High Mass Norwegian Steamers Parting View oi CONTENTS. jjij Dr< nthe:m The Namsen Fjord Settlements on the Coast- The Rock of Torghatten The Seven Sisters Singular Coast Scenery Th Horseman Crossing the Arctic Circle Coasting Craft Bodo An Arctic Sunset ...... Page 268 CHAPTER XXIV. THE LOFODEN ISLES. Habits of the Arctic Summer The Lofoden Islands Moskoe The Myth of the Maelstrom The Lofoden Fishermen Improvement hi the People Lofoden Scenery The Rasksund Disappearance of Day- light Character of the Scenery Tromsoe at Midnight. Page 281 CHAPTER XXV. FINNARK AND HAMMERFEST. Visit to the Lapps Scenery of Tromsdal Phenomena of the Arctic Summer The Lapp Gammea A Herd of Reindeer The Midnighl Sun and its Effect Scenery of the Alten Fjord Pastor Hvoslef Mr. Thomas and his Home Altengaard A Polar Bishop An Excited Discussion Whales Appearance of Hammerfest Fishy Quarter?. 88U CHAPTER XXVI. THE MIDNIGHT SUN. Plans of Travellers Ship for the Varanger Fjord Scenery of Magerfle Miraculous Provision for human Life Fisheries on the Coast The Porsanger Fjord Coast Scenery Svserholtklub Rousing the Sea Gulls Picture of the Midnight Sun Loss of a Night The Church of the Lapps Wonderful Rock-painting Nordkyn. . . 300 CHAPTER XXVTL THE VARANGER FJORD ARCTIC LIFE. Hie Tana Fjord Another Midnight Desolation Arctic Life The Varanger Fjord The Fort of Vardohuus Arrival at Vadso Summei there More of the Lapps Climate and Delights of Living Ric* jay CONTENTS. Fishing Jolly young Englishmen Daylight Life- Its Effects, phy sical and Moral Trees of Hammerfest An astronomical Monument P&ge31( CHAPTER XXVIH. THE RETURN TO DARKNESS NORWEGIAN CHARACTER. Splendour of the Northern Coast Scenery Growth of Vegetation GOT ernment of the Lapps Pastor Lamers and his Secession Religion in the North An intelligent Clergyman Discussions on Board Star- light and Lamp-light Character of the Norwegians Their national Vanity Jealousy of Sweden. . ... 331 OHAPTER XXIX. nRONTHKIM AND RERGEW. rrouble at Drontheim Valley of the Nid The Lierfoss Picture ol Christiansnnd Molde and Romsdal The Vikings and thnir Descend- ants The, Rock of Hornelen Rainy Bergen A Group of Lepers Norwegian Filth Licentiousness Picture of Bergen Its Streets Drunkenness Days of Sunshine Home-sick for Hammerfest The Museum Delays and dear Charges. .... 330 CHAPTER XXX. A TRIP TO THE V6RING-FOS8. Flirting View of Bergen Lovely Scenery Interested Kindness The Roads of Norway Uncomfortable Quarters Voyage on the Oster fjord Bolstadoren Swindling Postillions Arrival at Vossevangen Morning Scenery Agriculture in Norway Destruction of the Forests Descent to Vasenden A Captain on Leave Crossing the Fjeld The Shores of Ulvik TTardanger Scenery Angling and Anglers PedarHalstensen National Song of Norway Sa-b6 A stupendous Defile Ascent of the Fjnld Plateau of the Hardanger The Vorinfl- fVwd Its Grandeur A Sseter Hut Wonderful Win. 34 COHTENTS. Jl CHAPTER XXXT SKETCHES FROM THE BERGENSTIFT. Peder's Embarrassment His Drowning The Landlady Morning at Ulvik A Norwegian Girl Female Ugliness Return to Vossevangei Indolence Detention at Stelheim Scenery of the Naerodal Pos tillions On the Gudvangen Fjord The Sogne Fjord Transparency of the Water The Boatmen ..... Page 359 CHAPTER HALLINGDAL THE COUNTRY-PEOPLE OF NORWAY. Roads to Christiania Southern Sunshine Saltenaoset The Church oi Borgund Top of the Fille Fjeld Natives on Sunday Peculiar Fe- male Costume Scarcity of Milk and Water The Peak of Saaten A Breakfast at Ekre Hallingdal Wages of Labourers Valley Scenery How FKrbuds are sent- Oeneral Swindling Character of the Nor- wegians for Honesty Illustrations Immorality A " Cutty Sark" Charms of Green. . . . 370 CHAPTER XXXIU. TELLEMARK AND THE RIUKAN-FOSS. Fhe Silver Mines of Kongsberg Roads in Tellemark Bargaining for Horses The Inn at Bolkesjo Sleeping Admonitions Smashing Travel Tinoset The Tind Lake A Norwegian Farm-House The Westfjord-dal and its Scenery Ole Torgensen's Daughter The Val ley A Leper Defile of the Maan Elv Picture of the Riukan-Foss Its Beauty A Twilight View Supper at Ole's The Comprehension of Man A singular Ravine Hitterdal How respectable People live The old Chnrch Return to Christiania. . . 388 CHAPTER XXXIV. NORWAY AND SWEDEN. Norwegian Honesty The Country People Illicit Connections Th Icelandic Language Professor Munck The Storthing The Norwe 1^1 CONTENTS. gi/m Constitution The Farmer-State Conversation between a Ger man Author and a Swedish Statesman Gottenburg A Fire Swedisk Honesty and Courtesy The Falls of Trollhatten. . Page 396 CHAPTER XXXV A TRAMP THROUGH WERMELAND AND DALECARLIA Our Route - Leaving Carlstad The Scenery Valley of the Klai Ehr - Ohlsater Wedding Arches Asplund A Night Journey Adven- tures in search of a Bed Entrance into Dalecarlia The Farmers at Tyngsjo Journey through the Woods The People at Westerdal The Landlord at Ragsveden The Landlady Dalecarlian Morality A Lasare The Postillion Poverty A Dalecarlian Boy Reception at Kettbo Nocturnal Conversation Little Pehr The female Postil- lion The Lflsare in Dalecarlia View of Mora Valley. . 40? CHAPTER XXXVI. LAST DAYS IN THE NORTH. lion Scenery "The Parsonage of Mora" The Magister Peasant* from Upper Elfdal Scenery of the Siljan Hymns on Board Opin- ions of the Lasare Their Increase Conversation with the Peasant* Leksand The Domprost Hvasser Walk in the Garden Dalecar lian Songs Rainy Travel Fahlun Journey to Upsala The Cholera The Mound of Odin Skal to the Gods The End of Summer hi Stockholm Farewell to the North, 43P NORTHERN TRAVEL, CHAPTER I. A WINTER VOYAGE ON THE BALTIC. went on board the little iron Swedish propeller, Carl Johau, at Lubeck, on the morning of December 1, A.D, 1856, having previously taken our passage for Stockholm What was our dismay, after climbing over hills of freight on deck, and creeping down a narrow companion-way, to find the cabin stowed full of bales of wool and barrels of butter. There was a little pantry adjoining it, with a friendly stewardess therein, who, in answer to my inquiries, assured us that we would probably be placed in a hut. After fur- ther search, I found the captain, who was superintending th: loading of more freight, and who also stated that he would put us into a hut. " Let me see the hut, then," I demandedj did we were a little relieved when we found it to be a state- room, containing two of the narrowest of bunks. There was another hut opposite, occupied by two more passengers 2 14 HOBTHERN TRAVEL all tliat the steamer could carry and all we had, except a short deck-passenger, who disappeared at the commencement of the voyage, and was not seen again until its close. The day was clear and cold, the low hills around Lubeck were covered with snow, and the Trave was already frozen over. We left at noon, slowly breaking our way down the narrow and winding river, which gradually widened and became clearer of ice as we approached the Baltic. W her we reached Travemunde it was snowing fast, and a murky chaos beyond the sandy bar concealed the Baltic. The town is a long row of houses fronting the water. There were few inhabitants to be seen, for the bathing guests had long since flown, and all watering places have a funereal air after the season is over. Our fellow-passenger, a jovial Pole, insisted on going ashore to drink a last glass of Bava- rian beer before leaving Germany ; but the beverage had oetn so rarely called for that it had grown sharp and sour, and we hurried back unsatisfied. A space about six feet square had been cleared out among the butter-kegs in the cabin, and we sat down to dinner by candle-light, at three o'clock. Swedish customs already appeared, in a preliminary decanter of lemon-colored brandy a thimbleful of which was taken with a piece of bread anc sausage, before the soup appeared. The taste of the liquor was sweet, unctuous and not agreeable. Our party consist- ed of the captain, the chief officer, whc was his brother-in- law, the Pole, who was a second cousin of Kosciusko, and had a name consisting of eight consonants and two vowels, a grave young Swede with a fresh Norse complexion, and our two selves. The steward, Hildebrand, and the silent A WINTER VOYAGE ON THE BALTIC 15 stewardess, Marie, were our attendants and purveyors The ship's officers were rather slow and opaque, and the Swede sublimely self-possessed and indifferent ; but the Pole, who had been condemned to death at Cracow, and afterward invented cheap gas, was one of the jolliest fellows alive. His German was full of funny mistakes, but he rattled away with as much assurance as if it had been his native tongue. Before dinner was over, we were all perfectly well acquainted with each other. Night had already set in on the Baltic ; nothing was to be seen but snow ; the deck was heaped with freight ; the storm blew in our teeth ; and the steamer, deeply laden, moved slowly and laboriously ; so we stretched ourselves on the narrow bunks in our hut, and preserved a delicate regard for our equilibrium, even in sleep. In the morning the steep cliffs of Moen, a Danish island, were visible on our left. We looked for Rugen, the last stronghold of the wor- ship of Odin in the Middle Ages, but a raw mist rolled down upon the sea, and left us advancing blindly as before. The wind was strong and cold, blowing the vapory water- smoke in long trails across the surface of the waves. It was not long, however, before some dim white gleams through the mist were pointed out as the shores of Sweden, and the Carl Johan slackened her speed to a snail's pace, snuffing it headland after headland, like a dog off the scent, in order to find her way into Ystad. A lift of the fog favored us at last, and we ran into the little harbor. I walked the contracted hurricane deck at three o'clock, with the sunset already flushing the west 'ooked on the town and land, and thought of my friend Dr NORTHERN TRAVEL. Kane. The mercury had fallen to 16, a foot of snow cov- ered the house-roofs, the low, undulating hills all were the same monotonous no-color, and the yellow haired people on the pier were buttoned up close, mittened and fur-capped The captain telegraphed to Calmar, our next port, and received an answer that the sound was full of ice and the harbor frozen up. A custom-house officer, who took supper with us on board, informed us of the loss of the steam-ship Umea, which was cut through by the ice near Sundsvall, and sunk, drowning fifteen persons a pleasant prospect for our further voyage and the Pole would have willingly landed at Ystad if he could have found a conveyance to get beyond it. We had twelve tons of coal to take on board, and the work proceeded so slowly that we caught another snow-storm so thick and blinding that we dared not venture out of the harbor. On the third morning, nevertheless, we were again at sea, having passed Bornholm, and were heading for the southern end of the Island of Oland. About noon, as we were sitting huddled around the cabin stove, the steamer suddenly stop- ped. There was a hurried movement of feet overhead a cry and we rushed on deck. One of the sailors was in the ict of throwing overboard a life buoy. "It is the Pole!" uas our first exclamation. " No. no," said Hildebrand, with 9 distressed face, " it is the cabin-boy" a sprightly, hand- some fellow of fourteen. There he was struggling in the icy water, looking toward the steamer, which was every moment more distant Two men were in the little boat, which had just been run down from the davits, but it seem- ed an eternity until their oars were shipped, and they pulled WINTER v; VAOE ON THE BALTIC. 1 7 away on their errand of life or death. We urged the matt to put the steamer about, but he passively refused. Tht boy still swam, but tho boat was not yet half-way, and headed too much to the left. There was no tiller, and the men could only guess at their course. We guided them bj signs, watching the boy's head, now a mere speck, seen at intervals under the lowering sky. He struggled gallantly : the boat drew nearer, and one of the men stood up and looked around. We watched with breathless suspense for the reappearance of the brave young swimmer, but we watched in vain. Poor boy ! who can know what was the agony of those ten minutes, while the icy waves gradually benumbed and dragged down the young life that struggled with such desperate energy to keep its place in the world ! The men sat down and rowed back, bringing only his cap, which they had found floating on the sea. "Ah!" said Hildebrand, with tears in his eyes, " I did not want to take him this voyage, but his mother begged me so hard that I could not refuse, and this is the end !" We had a melancholy party in the cabin that afternoon. The painful impression made by this catastrophe was heightened by the knowledge that it might have been pre- vented. The steamer amidships was filled up to her rail with coal, and the boy was thrown overboard by a sudden lurch while walking upon it. Immediately afterwards, lines were rove along the stanchions, to prevent the same thing happening again. The few feet of deck upon which we could walk were slippery with ice, \nd we kept below, smoking gloomily and saying little. Another violent snow-storm same on from the north, but in the afternoon we caughf 18 NORTHERN rRAVEI, sight of some rocks off Carlscrona, and made the light or. Oland in the evening. The wind had been blowing so freshly that our captain suspected Calraar Sound might be clear, and determined to try the passage. We felt our way lowly through the intricate sandbanks, in the inidst of fog *nd snow, until after midnight, when only six miles from Calmar, we were stopped by fields of drift ice, and had to put back again. The fourth morning dawned cold and splendidly clear. When I went on deck we were rounding the southern point of Oland, through long belts of floating ice. The low chalk cliffs were covered with snow, and looked bleak and desolate enough. The wind now came out of the west, enabling us to carry the foresail, so that we made eight or nine knots, in spite of onr overloaded condition. Braisted and 1 walked the deck all day, enjoying the keen wind and clear, faint sunshine of the North. In the afternoon, however, it blew half a gale, with flurries of mingled rain and snow. The sea rose, and the steamer, lumbered as she was, could not be steered on her course, but had to be " conned," to keep off the strain. The hatches were closed, and an occasional sea broke over the bows. We sat below in the dark huts ; the Pole, leaning against the bulkhead, silently awaiting his fate, as he afterwards confessed. 1 had faith enough in the timidity of our captain, not to feel the least alarm and true enough, two hours had not elapsed before we lay-to un dar the lee of the northern end of Oland. The Pole then gat down, bathed from head to foot in a cold sweat, and would have lauded immediately, had it been possible. The Swede was as inexpressive as ever, with the same ialf-smik on his fair, serious face A WINTER VOYAGE ON THE BALTIC. J I was glad to find that our captain did not intend to lost Hie wind, but would start again in an hour or two. VVe had a quieter night than could have been anticipated, fal- lowed by a brilliant morning. Such good progress had been made that at sunrise the lighthouse on the rocks of Landsort was visible, and the jagged masses of that archipelago of oloven isles which extends all the way to Tornea, began to stud the sea. The water became smoother as we ran into the sound between Landsort and the outer isles. A long line of bleak, black rocks, crusted with snow, stretched be- fore us. Beside the lighthouse, at their southern extremity, there were two red frame-houses, and a telegraph station. A boat, manned by eight hardy sailors, came off with a pilot, who informed us that Stockholm was closed with ice, and that the other steamers had been obliged to stop at the little port of Dalaro, thirty miles distant. So for Dalar6 we headed, threading the channels of the scattering islands, which gradually became higher and more picturesque, with clumps of dark fir crowning their snowy slopes. The mid- day sun hung low on the horizon, throwing a pale yellow light over the wild northern scenery ; but there was life in the cold air, and I did not ask for summer. We passed the deserted fortress of DalarS, a square stone structure, which has long since outlived its purpose, on the summit of a rock in the sound. Behind it, opened a quiet bay, held in a projecting arm of the mainland, near the ex- tremity of which appeared our port a village of about fifty houses, scattered along the abrupt shore. The dark-red buildings stood out distinctly against the white background ; two steamers and half a do*en sailing crafts were moored 3jQ NORTHERN TRAVEL. below them ; about as many individuals were moving quietly about and for all the life and animation we could see, w* might have been in Kamtchatka. As our voyage terminated here, our first business was U find means of getting to Stockholm Vy land. Our fellow- passengers proposed that we should join company, and engage five horses and three sleds for ourselves and luggage, The Swede willingly undertook to negotiate for us, and set about the work with his usual impassive semi-cheerfulness. The landlord of the only inn in the place promised to have ererything ready by six o'clock the next morning, and our captain, who was to go on the same evening, took notices of our wants, to be served at the two intervening post-stations on the road. We then visited the custom-house, a cabin about ten feet square, and asked to have our luggage ex- amined. " No," answered the official, " we have no authority to examine anything; you must wait until we send to Stockholm." This was at least a new experience. We were greatly vexed and annoyed, but at length, by dint of explanations and entreaties, prevailed upon the man to attempt an examination. Our trunks were brought ashore, and if ever a man did his duty conscientiously, it was this same Swedish official. Every article was taken out and separately inspected, with an honest patience which I could not but admire. Nothing was found contraband, however ; we had the pleasure of re-packing, and were then pulled Dack to the C*rl Johan in a profuse sweat, despite the in- tense cold STOCKHOLM. PREPARATIONS FOR THE NORTH. 21 CTI AFTER II. STOCKHOLM. PREPARATIONS FOR THE NORTH. ON the following morning we arose at fi?e, went ashore in tne darkness, and after waiting an hour, succeeded in getting our teams together. The horses were small, but spirited, the sleds rudely put together, but strong, and not uncomfortable, and the drivers, peasants of the neighborhood, patient, and good-humored. Climbing the steep bank, we were out of the village in two minutes, crossed an open com- mon, and entered the forests of fir and pine. The sleighing was superb, and our little nags carried us merrily along, at the usual travelling rate of one Swedish mile (nearly seven English) per hour. Enveloped from head to foot in our fur robes, we did not feel the sharp air, and in comparing our sensations, decided that the temperature was about 20. What was our surprise, on reaching the post-station, at learning that it was actually 2 below zero ! Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the darkness decreased, but the morning was cloudy, and there was little appearance of lay break before nine o'clock. In the early twilight we were startled by the appearance of a ball of meteoric fire, nearly 2* 22 HOBTHERN TRATBU as large as the moon, and of a soft white lustre, which moved in a horizontal line from east to west, and disap- peared without a sound. I was charmed by the forest scenery through which we passed. The pine, spruce, and fir trees, of the greatest variety of form, were completely coated with frozen snow, and stood as immovable as forests of bronze incrusted with silver. The delicate twigs of the weeping birch resembled sprays of crystal, of a thousand airy and exquisite patterns. There was no wind, except in the open glades between the woods, where the frozen lakes spread out like meadow intervals. As we approached the first sta- tion there were signs of cultivation fields inclosed witL "take fences, low red houses, low barns, and scanty patcheb of garden land. We occasionally met peasants with theii sleds hardy, red-faced fellows, and women solid enough to outweigh their bulk in pig-iron. The post-station was a cottage in the little hamlet ol Berga. We drove into the yard, and while sleds and horses were being changed, partook of some boiled milk and tough rye-bread, the only things to be had, but both good of their kind. The travellers' room was carpeted and comfortable, and the people seemed poor only because of their few wants. Our new sleds were worse than the former, and so were our horses, but we came to the second station in time, and found we must make still another arrangement. The luggage wag sent ahead on a large sled, while each pair of us, seated in a one horse cutter, followed after it, driving ourselves. Swedish horses are stopped by a whistle, and encouraged tojf' j a smacking of the lips, which I found impossible to learn at once, and they considerately gave us no whips. We had 8TOCKHOI.M. PREPARATIONS FOR THE NORTH. 23 QOW a broad, beaten road, and the many teams we met and passed gave evidence of our approach to Stockholm. The country, too, gently undulating all the way, was more thicklj settled, and appeared to be under tolerable cultivation. About one in the afternoon, we climbed a rising slope, and from its brow looked down upon Stockholm. The sky was dark-gray and lowering; the hills were covered with snow. and the roofs of the city resembled a multitude of tents, out of which rose half a dozen dark spires. On either side were arms of the Malar Lake white, frozen plains. Snow wag already in the air, and presently we looked through a screen of heavy flakes on the dark, weird, wintry picture. The impression was perfect of its kind, and I shall not soon for- get it. We had passed through the southern suburb, and were descending to the lake, when one of our shafts snapped off. Resigning the cutter to the charge of a stout maiden, who acted as postillion, Braisted and I climbed upon the luggage, and in this wise ; shaggy with snowy fur, passed through the city, before the House of Nobles and the King's Palace, and over the Northern Bridge, and around the northern suburb, and I know not where else, to the great astonishment oi everybody we met, until our stupid driver found out where he was to go. Then we took leave of the Pole, who had engaged horses to Norrkoping, and looked utterly disconso- late at parting ; but the grave Swede showed his kind heart at last for neglecting his home, from which he had been absent seven years he accompanied us to an hotel, engaged rooms, and saw us safely housed. We remained in Stockholm a week, engaged in making 24 NORTHERN TRAVEL. preparations for onr journey to the North. Dm ing thia time we were very comfortably quartered in Kahn's Hotel, the only one in the capital where one can get both rooms and meals. The weather changed so entirely, as completely to destroy onr first impressions, and make the North, which we were seeking, once more as distant as when we left Ger- many. The day after our arrival a thaw set in, which cleared away every particle of snow and ice, opened the harbor, freed the Malar Lake, and gave the white hills around the city their autumnal colors of brown and dark- green. A dense fog obscured the brief daylight, the air was close, damp, and oppressive, everybody coughed and snuffled, and the air-tight rooms, so comfortable in cold weather, became insufferable. My blood stagnated, my spirits de- cended as the mercury rose, and I grew all impatience to have zero and a beaten snow- track again. We had more difficulty in preparing for this journey than I anticipated not so much in the way of procuring the necessary articles, as the necessary information on the sub- ject. I was not able to find a man who had made the journey in winter, or who could tell me what to expect, and what to do. The mention of my plan excited very general surprise, but the people were too polished and courteous to say outright that I was a fool, though I don't doubt that many of them thought so. Even the maps are only minute enough for the traveller as far as Tornea, and the only special maps of Lapland I could get dated from I SOS. Thfl Government, it is true, has commenced the publication of a very admirable map of the kingdom, in provinces, but thegw do not as yet extend beyond Jemteland, about Lut. 63f STOCKHOLM. PREPARATIONS FOR THE NORTH 26 north. Neither is theie any work to be had, except some botanical and geological publications, which of course con- tain but little practical information. The English and German Handbooks for Sweden are next to useless, north .1 Stockholm. The principal assurances were, that we should suffer greatly from cold, that we should take along a supply of provisions, for nothing was to be had, and that we must expect to endure hardships and privations of all kinds. This prospect was not at all alarming, for I remembered that I had heard much worse accounts of Ethiopia while making similar preparations in Cairo, and have learned that all such bugbears cease to exist when they are boldly faced. Our outfit, therefore, was restricted to some coffee, sugar, salt, gunpowder, lucifer-matches, lead, shot and slugs, four bottles of cognac for cases of extremity, a sword, a butcher- knife, hammer, screw- driver, nails, rope and twine, all con- tained in a box about eighteen inches square. A single f alise held our stock of clothing, books, writing and drawing materials, and each of us carried, in addition, a double- barrelled musket. We made negotiations for the purchase of a handsome Norrland sleigh (numbers of which come to Stockholm, at this season, laden with wild-fowl), but the thaw prevented our making a bargain. The preparation oi the requisite funds, however, was a work of some time. It this T was assisted by Mr. MostrSm, an excellent valet-de- place, whom I hereby recommend to all travellers. When, after three or four days' labor and diplomacy, he brought me the money, I thought I had sudden^ come in possession :>f an immense fortune. Thert were hundreds of bank-notes and thousands of silver pieces of all sizes Swedish paper 26 NORTHERN TRAVEL. silver and copper, Norwegian notes and dollars, Danish marks, and Russian gold, roubles and copecks. The value belied the quantity, and the vast pile melted away BO fast that I was soon relieved of my pleasant delusion. Our equipment should have been made in Germany, for, singularly enough, Stockholm is not half so well provided with furs and articles of winter clothing as Hamburg or Leipsic. Besides, everything is about fifty per cent dearer here. We were already provided with ample fur robes, 1 with one of gray bear-skin, and Braisted with yellow fox. To these we added caps of sea-otter, mittens of dog-skin, lined with the fur of the Arctic hare, knitted devil's caps, woollen sashes of great length for winding around the body, and, after long search, leather Russian boots lined with sheepskin and reaching halfway up the thigh. When rig- ged out in this costume, my diameter was about equal to half my height, and I found locomotion rather cumbrous ; while Braisted, whose stature is some seven inches shorter, waddled along like an animated cotton-bale. Everything being at last arranged, so far as our limited information made it possible, for a two months' journey, we engaged places in a diligence which runs as far as Gefle, 120 miles north of Stockholm. There we hoped to find snow and a colder climate. One of my first steps had been to engage a Swedish teacher, and by dint of taking double lessons every day, I flattered myself that I had made suffi- cient progress in the language to travel without an inter- preter the most inconvenient and expensive of persons. To be sure, a week is very little for a new language, but tc me who speaks English and German, Swedish is already half acauired. ilKST KXPERIENCE8 OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. J>7 CHAPTER III. FIRST EXPERIENCES OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. THE diligence was a compact little vehicle, carrying foul persons, but we two were so burdened with our guns, sword, money-bag, field-glass, over-boots and two-fathom-long sashes, that we found the space allotted to us small enough. We started at eight o'clock, and had not gone a hundred yards before we discovered that the most important part of our outfit the maps had been left behind. It was toe late to return, and we were obliged to content ourselves with the hope of supplying them at Upsala or Gette. We rolled by twilight through the Northern suburb. The morning was sharp and cold, and the roads, which had been muddy and cut up the day before, were frozen terribly hard and rough. Our fellow-passengers were two Swedes, an unprepossessing young fellow who spoke a few words of English, and a silent old gentleman; we did not derive much advantage from their society, and I busied myself with observing the country through which we passed. A mile or two, past handsome country-seats and some cemeteries, Drought us into the region of forests. The pines were tall and picturesque in their forms, and the grassy meadowe 28 NORTHERN TRAVKL between them, entirely clear of snow, were wonderfully green for the season. During the first stage we passed some inlets of the Baltic, highly picturesque with their irregular woocltd shores. They had all been frozen over during the night. We were surprised to see, on a southern hill-side, four pea- sants at work ploughing. How they got their shares through the frozen sod, unless the soil was remarkably dry and sandy, was more than I could imagine. We noticed occasionally a large manor-house, with its dependent out- buildings, and its avenue of clipped beeches or lindens, look- ing grand and luxurious in.the midst of the cold dark fields. Here and there were patches of wheat, which the early snow had kept green, and the grass in the damp hollows was still bright, yet it was the 15th of December, and we were almost in lat. 60 N. The houses were mostly one-story wooden cottages, of a dull red color, with red roofs. In connection with the black-green of the pine and fir woods they gave the country a singularly sombre aspect. There was little variation in the scenery all the way to Upsala. In some places, the soil appeared to be rich and under good cultivation ; here the red villages were more frequent, and squat church-towers showed themselves in the distance. In other places, we had but the rough hills, or rather knobs of gray gneiss, whose masses were covered with yellow moss, and the straggling fir forests. We met but few country teams on the road ; nobody was to be seen about the houses, and the laud seemed to be asleep or desolated. Even at noon, when the sun ca uat out fairly, he was low on the horizon, and gave but at 2clipsed light, which was more cheerless than complete dnrk FIRST EXPERIENCES OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. 2P The sun set about three o'clock, but we had a long, splen- did twilight, a flush of orange, rose and amber-green, worthy of a Mediterranean heaven. Two hours afterwards, the lights of Upsala appeared, and we drove under the imposing front of the old palace, through clean streets, over the Upsala River, and finally stopped at the door of a court- yard. Here we were instantly hailed by some young fellows, who inquired if we did not want rooms. The place did not appear to be an inn, but as the silent old gentleman got out and went in, I judged it best to follow his example, and the diligence drove off with our baggage. We were right, after all: a rosy, handsome, good-humored landlady appeared, promised to furnish us with beds and a supper, to wake us betimes, and give us ceffee before leaving. The old gentleman kindly put on his coat and accom- panied us to a bookstore on the public square, where I found Akrell's map of Northern Sweden, and thus partially re- placed our loss. He sat awhile in our room trying to con- verse, but I made little headway. On learning that we were bound for Tornea, he asked : " Are you going to buy lumber?" " i\o," I answered; "we are merely going to see the country." He laughed long and heartily at such an absurd idea, got up in a hurry, and went to bed without saying another word. We h:\d a supper of various kinds of sausage, tough rye bread, and a bowl of milk, followed by excellent beds a thing which you are sure to find every- where in Sweden. We drove off again at half-past six in the morning moon light, with a temperature of zero. Two or three miles from the town \ve pa^se'l the mounds of old Upsala, the graves of 30 NOKTHKKX TRAVI'.L. Odin, Thor and Freya, rising boldly agaii 3t the first glim merings of daylight. The landscape was broad, lark and silent, the woods and fields confusedly blended together, and only the sepulchres of the ancient gods broke the level lin of the horizon. I could readily have believed in them a that hour. Passing over the broad rich plain of Upsala, we entered a gently undulating country, richer and better cultivated than the district we had traversed the previous day. It waa splendidly wooded with thick fir forests, floored with bright green moss. Some of the views toward the north and west were really fine from their extent, though seen in the faded light and long shadows of the low northern sun. In the afternoon, we passed a large white church, with four little towers at the corners, standing in the midst of a village of low red stables, in which the country people shelter their horses while attending service. There must have been fifty or sixty of these buildings, arranged in regular streets In most of the Swedish country churches, the belfry stands apart, a squat, square tower, painted red, with a black upper story, and is sometimes larger than the church itself. The houses of the peasants are veritable western shanties, except in color and compactness. No wind finds a cranny to enter, and the roofs of thick thatch, kept down by long, horizontal poles, have an air of warmth and comfort. The stables are banked with earth up to the hay-loft, and the cattle enter their subterranean stalls through sloping doorways like those of the Egyptian tombs. Notwithstanding we made good progreps through the day. it was dark long before we reached the bridge over the Dal FIRST i;xi'i:Kir.xci:s 01- XORTHKRN TRAVEL. 31 tulv, and of the famous cascades we saw only a sloping whit* ijlirnmer, between dark masses of forest, and heard the noisf of the broken waters. At Elfkarleby we were allowed twenty minutes for dinner boiled salmon and beefsteak both bad. I slept after this, until aroused by the old Swede as we entered Gefle. We drove across a broad bridge looked over vessels frozen into the inlet of the Gulf, passed a large public square, and entered the yard of the diligence office, A boy in waiting conducted us to a private house, where furnished rooms were to be had, and here we obtained tea, comfortable beds, and the attendance of a rosy servant- girl, who spoke intelligible Swedish. My first care the next morning, was to engage horses and send off my forbitd papers. We were now to travel by " skj fits'' (pronounced shoos], or post, taking new horses at each station on the road. The forbud tickets are simply orders for horses to be ready at an appointed time, and are sent in advance to all the stations on the road, either by mail or by a special messenger. Without this precaution, I was told, we might be subjected to considerable delay. This mode of travelling is peculiar to Sweden and Norway. It has been in existence for three or four centuries, and though gradually improved and systematized with the lapse of time, it is still sufficiently complex and inconvenient to a traveller coming from the railroad world. Professor Retzius had referred me to the botanist Hart man, in case of need, but 1 determined to commence by helping myself. I had a little difficulty at first: the peopl are unused to speaking with foreigners, and if you ask them to talk slowly, they invariably rattle away twice as fast af 32 NORTHERN TRAVEL. before. 1 went into a variety shop on the public square ana asked where 1 could engage horses for Sundsvall After making myself understood, as I supposed, the clerk {landed me some new bridles. By dint of blundering, 1 gradually circumscribed the range of my inquiries, and finally came to a focus at the right place. Having ordered horses at six the next morning, and despatched the f&rbud tickets by the afternoon's mail, 1 felt that 1 had made a good beginning, and we set out to make the tour of Gefle. This is a town of eight or ten thousand inhabitants, with a considerable shipping interest, and a naval school. It is a pretty place, well built, and with a neat, substantial air The houses are mostly two stories high, white, and with Bpacious courts in the rear. The country around is low but rolling, and finely clothed with dark forests of fir and pine. It was a superb day gloriously clear, with a south wind bracing, and not too cold, and a soft, pale lustre from the jloudless sun. But such a day! Sunrise melting into sunset without a noon a long morning twilight, a low, slant sun, shining on the housetops for an hour or so, and the evening twilight at three in the afternoon. Nothing seemed real in this strange, dying light nothing but m_y ignorance of Swedish, whenever I tried to talk. In the afternoon, we called on the Magister Hartman, whom we found poring over his plants. He spoke English olerably, and having made a journey through Lapland rom Tornea to the I .yngen Fiord, was able to give us some information about the country. He encouraged us in the belief that we should find the journey more rapid and easy in winter than in summer. He said the Swedes feared thr FIRST EXPERIENCES OF SORT HERN TRAVEL. 33 North and few of them ever made a winter journey thither, but nothing could stop the Americans and the English from going anywhere. He also comforted us with the assurance that we should find snow only six Swedish (forty English) miles further north. Lat. 60 35' N., the 17th of December and no snow yet ! In the streets, we met an organ-grinder playing the Marseillaise. There was no mistaking the jet- black hair, the golden complexion and the brilliant eyes o. the player, " Siete Italiano ?" 1 asked. " Siciiro /" he answered, joyously: "e lei anche?'' "Ah," he said, in answer to my questions, " io non amo questo paese ; 2 freddo ed oscuro ; noti si gagna mente ma in Italia si vive" My friend Ziegler had already assured me : " One should see the North, but not after the South." Well, we shall see; but I confess that twenty degrees below zero would have chilled me less than the sight of that Italian. We were at the inn punctually at six in the morning, but our horses were not ready. The hallkarl, or ostler, after hearing my remonstrances, went on splitting wood, and, aa I did not know enough of Swedish to scold with any profit, I was obliged to remain wrathful and silent. He insisted on my writing something (I could not understand what) in the post-book, so I copied the affidavit of a preceding travel- ler and signed my name to it, which seemed to answer the purpose. After more than half an hour, two rough two- wheeled carts were gotten ready, and the farmers to whom they belonged, packed themselves and our luggage into one, leaving: us to drive the other. We mounted, rolled ourselves in our furs, thrust our feet into the hay, and rattled out of Gene in the frosty moonlight, Such wag our first ex- perience of travelling by skjiits. 34 NORTHERN TRAVEL. The road went northward, into dark forests, over th same undulating, yet monotonous country as before. The ground was rough and hard, and our progress slow, so that we did not reach the end of the first station (10 miles) until nine o'clock. As we drove into the post-house, three other travellers, who had the start of us, and consequently the first right to horses, drove away. I was dismayed to find that my f Orbit d had not been received, but the ostler informed me that by paying twelve skillings extra I could have horses at once. While the new carts were getting ready, the post- man, wrapped in wolf-skin, and with a face reddened by the wind came up, and handed out my fdrbud ticket. Such was our first experience of fdrbud. On the next station, the peasant who was ahead with our luggage left the main road and took a rough track through the woods. Presently we came to a large inlet of the Bothnia n gulf, frozen solid from shore to shore, and upon this we boldly struck out. The ice was nearly a foot thick, and as solid as marble. So we drove for at least four miles, and finally came to land on the opposite side, near a saw- mill. At the next post-house we found our predecessors just setting off again in sleds ; the landlord informed us that he had only received my fdrbud an hour previous, and, according to law was allowed three hours to get ready his econd instalment of horses, the first being exhausted. There was no help for it : we therefore comforted ourselves with breakfast. At one o'clock we set out again in low Norrland sleds, but there was little snow at first, and we were obliged to walk the first few miles. The station was a long one (twenty English miles), and our horses not thf fIRST EXPERIENCES OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. 35 most promising. Coming upon solid suow at last, we travelled rather more swiftly, but with more risk. The sleds, although so low, rest upon narrow runners, and the shafts are attached by a hook, upon which they turn in all directions, so that the sled sways from side to side, entirely independent of them. In going off the main road to get a little more snow on a side track, I discovered this fact by overturning the sled, and pitching Braisted and myself out on our heads. There were lakes on either side, and we made many miles on the hard ice, which split with a dull sound under us. Long after dark, we reached the next station, Stratjara, and found our horses in readiness. We started again, by the gleam of a flashing aurora, going through forests and fields in the uncertain light, blindly following our leader, Braisted and I driving by turns, and already much fatigued. After a long time, we descended a steep- hill, to the Ljusne River. The water foamed and thundered under the bridge, and I could barely see that it fell in a series of rapids over the rocks. At Mo Myskie, which we reached at eight o'clock, our horses had been ready four hours, which gave us a dollai banco v intapenningar (waiting money) to pay. The land- lord, a sturdy, jolly fellow, with grizzly hair and a prosper- ous abdomen, asked if we were French, and I addressed him in that language. He answered in English on finding that we were Americans. On his saying that he had learned English in Tripoli, I addressed him in Arabic. His eyea flashed, he burst into a roaring laugh of the profoundest delight, and at once answered in the majestic gutturals of the Orient. "Allah akhbar !" he cried; "I have beei 36 NORTHERN TRAVEL. waiting twenty years for some one to speak to me in Arabic and you are the first !" He afterwards changed to Italian which he spoke perfectly well, and preferred to any foreigi language. We were detained half an hour by his delight, and went off forgetting to pay for a bottle of beer, the price of which T sent back by the skjiitsbonde, or postillion. This skjutsbonde was a stupid fellow, who took us a long, circuitous road, in order to save time. We hurried along in the darkness, constantly crying out "Kir pa/* (Drive on !) and narrowly missing a hundred overturns. It was eleven at night before we reached the inn at Kungsgarden, where, fortunately, the people were awake, and the pleasant old landlady soon had our horses ready. We had yet six- teen English miles to Bro, our lodging-place, where we should have arrived by eight o'clock. I hardly know how to describe the journey. We were half asleep, tired out nearly frozen, (mercury below zero) and dashed along at haphazard, through vast dark forests, up hill and down, following the sleepy boy who drove ahead with our baggage. A dozen times the sled, swaying from side to side like a pendulum, tilted, hung in suspense a second, and then righted itself again. The boy fell back on the hay and slept, until Braisted, creeping up behind, startled him with terrific yells in his ears. Away then dashed the horse, down Bteep declivities, across open, cultivated valleys, and into the woods again. After midnight the moon rose, and the cold was intenser than ever. The boy having fallen asleep again, the horse took advantage of it to run off at full speed, we following at the same rate, sometimes losintr sight of him ind uncertain of our way, until, after a chase of a few miles FIRST EXPERIENCES OF NORTHERN TRAVEL. 3? lire found the boy getting his reins out from under the runners. Finally, after two in the morning, we reached Bro. Here we had ordered a warm room, beds and supper, by fftrbud. but found neither. A sleepy, stupid girl, who had just got up to wait on a captain who had arrived before us and was going on, told us there was nothing to be had " We must eat, if we have to eat you" I said, savagely, for we were chilled through and fierce with hunger ; but I might as well have tried to hurry the Venus de Medici. At last we got some cold sausage, a fire, and two couches, on which we lay down without undressing, and slept. I had scarcely closed my eyes, it seemed, when the girl, who was to call ug at half-past five o'clock, came into the room. " Is it half- past five ?" I asked. " Oh, yes," she coolly answered, " it ; s much more." We were obliged to hurry off at once to avoid paying so much waiting money. At sunrise we passed Hudiksvall, a pretty town at the head of a deep bay, in which several vessels were frozen up for the winter. There were some handsome country houses in the vicinity, better cultivation, more taste in building, and a few apple and cherry orchards. The mercury was atill at zero, but we suffered less from the cold than the day previous, and began to enjoy our mode of travel. The horses were ready at all the stations on our arrival, and w were not delayed in changing. There was now plenty of snow, and the roads were splendid the country undulating, w3th beautiful, deep valleys, separated by high, wooded hills, and rising to bold ridges in the interior. The houses were larger and better than we had yet seen so were the peopl* NORTHERN TRAVEL. and there was a general air of progress and well-doing In fact, both country and population improved in appearance as we went northward. The night set in very dark and cold, threatening snow We had an elephant of a horse, which kicked up his heel and frisked like an awkward bull-pup, dashed down the hilla like an avalanche, and carried us forward at a rapid rate. We coiled ourselves up in the hay, kept warm, and trusted our safety to Providence, for it was impossible to see the road, and we could barely distinguish the other sled, a dark speck before us. The old horse soon exhausted his en- thusiasm. Braisted lost the whip, and the zealous boy ahead stopped every now and then to hurry us on. The aurora gleamed but faintly through the clouds ; we were nearly overcome with sleep and fatigue, but took turns in arousing and amusing each other. The sled vibrated con- tinually from side to side, and finally went over, spilling ourselves and our guns into a snow-bank The horse stop- ped and waited for us, and then went on until the shafts came off. Toward ten o'clock, the lights of Sundsvall appeared, and we soon afterwards drove into the yard of the inn, having made one hundred and fifty-five miles in two days. We were wretchedly tired, and hungry as bears, but found room in an adjoining house, and succeeded in getting a sup- per of reindeer steak. I fell asleep in my chair, before my pipe was half -finished, and awoke the next morning to a sens* of real fatig ie. I had had enough of travelling by fOrbtid A SLEIGH HIDE THROUGH XOKRLAND. 39 CHAPTER IV. A SLEIGH RIDE THROUGH NORRLAND. SDNDSVALL is a pretty little town of two or three thousand inhabitants, situated at the head of a broad and magnificent bay. It is the eastern terminus of the only post-road across the mountains to Trondjem (Drontheim) in Norway which passes through the extensive province oi Jemtelaud. It is, consequently, a lively and bustling place, and has a considerable coasting trade The day after our arrival was market-day, and hundreds of the Norrlanders thronged the streets and public square. They were all fresh, strong, coarse, honest, healthy people the men with long yellow hair, large noses and blue eyes, the women with the rosiest of checks and the fullest development of body and limb. Many of the latter wore basques or jackets ol sheepskin with the wool inside, striped petticoats and bright red stockings. The men were dressed in shaggy sheepskin coats, or garments of reindeer skin, with the hair outward. There was a vast collection of low Norrland sleds, laden *ith butter, cheese, hay, and wild game, and drawn by th( rough and tough little horses of the country. Here wa plenty of life and animation, although we were already XORTHERN TRAVEL so far rorth that the sun did not shine upon Sundsvall the whole day, being hidden by a low hill to the south. The snowy ridges on the north, however, wore a bright roseate blush from his rays, from ten until two. We called upon a merchant of the place, to whom I had a letter of introduction. He was almost the only man I met before undertaking the journey, who encouraged me to push on. "The people in Stockholm," said he, "know nothing about Northern Sweden." He advised me to give up travelling by f&rbud, to purchase a couple of sleds, and take our chance of finding horses : we would have no trouble in making from forty to fifty English miles per day. On returning to the inn, I made the landlord understand v;hat we wanted, but could not understand him in return. At this juncture came in a handsome fellow / with a cosmopolitan air, whom Braisted recognised, by certain invisible signs, a* the mate of a ship, and who explained the matter in very good English. I purchaed two plain but light and strongly made sleds for 50 rigs (about $14 ), which seemed very cheap, but, I afterwards learned that I paid much more than the current price. On repacking our effects, we found that everything liquid iras frozen even a camphorated mixture, which had been carefully wrapped in flannel. The cold, therefore, must have been much more severe than we supposed. Our sup- plies, also, were considerably damaged the lantern broken, a powder-flask cracked, and the salt, shot, nails, wad- ding, e;i]ies. The inlets of the Bothnian Gulf were hard, snow-covered plains inclosed b} bold, rugged headlands, covered with ink-black forests. The more distant ridges faded into a dull indigc hue. flecked with patches of ghastly white, under the lower- ing, sullen, shwt-lived daylight. Our road was much rougher than hitherto. We climbed long ridges, only to descend by as steep declivities on the northern side, to cross the bed of an inland stream, and then ascend again. The valleys, however, were inhabited and apparently well cultivated, for the houses were large and comfortable, and the people had a thrifty, prosperous and satisfied air. Beside the farmhouses were immense racks, twenty feet high, for the purpose of drying flax and grain, and at the stations the people offered for sale very fino and beautiful linen of their own manufacture. This is the staple production of Norrland, where the short summers are frequently insufficient to mature the grain crops. The inna were all comfortable buildings, with very fair accommodations for travellers. We had bad luck with horses this day, however, two or three travellers having been in advance and had the pick. On one stage our bagga see-sled was driven by a poike of not more than ten years old a darling fellow, with a face as round, fresh and sweet as a damask rose, the oluest of eyes, and a cloud of silky golden hair. His sue- ressor was a tall, lazy lout, who stopped so frequently to Ulk with the drivers of sleds behind us. that we lost all patience, drove past and pushed ahead in the darkness, trusting our horse to find the way. His horse followed, leaving him in the lurch, and we gave him a long-winded A Sl.KICH KIUF. TIlKonill XOIM'.I.ANH. 45 chase astern before we allowed liim to overtake us. This so exasperated him that we had no trouble the rest of the way. Mem. If you wish to travel with speed, make your postilion aiiiiTY. At Hijriia's they ifave us a supper of ale and cold pig's feet, admirable beds, and were oidy deficient in the matter of water for washing. We awoke with headaches, on account of gas from the tight Russian stove. The temperature, at starting, was 22 below zero colder than either of us had ever before known. We were a little curious, at first, to know how we should endure it, but, to our delight, found ourselves quite warm and comfortable. The air was still, dry, and delicious to inhale. My nose occasionally required friction, and my beard and moustache became a solid mass of ice, frozen together so that I could scarcely open my mouth, and firmly fastened to my fur collar. We travelled forty-nine miles, and were twelve hours on the way, yet felt no inconvenience from the temperature. By this time it was almost wholly a journey by night, dawn and twilight, for full day there was none. The sun rose at ten and set at two. We skimmed along, over the black, fir-clothed hills, and across the pleasant little valleys, in the long, gray, slowly-gathering daybreak : then, heavy snow-clouds hid half the brief day, and the long, long, dusky evening glow settled into night. The sleighing was superb, the snow pure as ivory, hard as marble, and beautifully crisp and smooth. Our sleds glided over it without effort, the runners making music as they flew. With every day the country grew wilder, blacker and more rugged, with no change in the general character of the scenery, [n the 3* 46 NOK1I1KHX afternoon we passed the frontier of Norrland, ana entered the province of West Bothnia. There are fewer horses a1 the stations, as we go north, but also fewer travellers, and wa were not often detained. Thus far, we had no difficulty : my scanty stock of Swedish went a great way, and I began to understand with more facility, even the broad Norrland dialect. The people of this region are noble specimens of tti physical man tall, broad-shouldered, large-liinbed, ruddy and powerful ; and they are mated with women who, I ven- ture to say, do not even suspect the existence of a nervous system. The natural consequences of such health are: morality and honesty to say nothing of the quantities of rosy and robust children which bless every household. If health and virtue cannot secure happiness, nothing can, and these Norrlanders appear to be a thoroughly happy and contented race. We had occasional reason to complain of their slowness ; but, then, why should they be fast ? It is rather we who should moderate our speed. Braisted, how- ever, did not accept such a philosophy. '* Charles XII. was the boy to manage the Swedes," said he to me one day ; " he always kept them in a hurry.'' We reached Lefwar, our resting-place for the night, in good condition, notwithstanding the 22 below, and felt much colder in the house, after stripping off our furs, than out of doors with them on. They gave us a supper consist- ing of srndrgas (" buttergoose" the Swedish prelude to a meal, consisting usually of bread, butter, pickled anchovies and caviar flavored with garlic), sausages, potatoes, and milk and made for us sumptuous beds of the snowiest and sweetesf A SLEIGH RIDE THROUGH XUHRI.AXl 4J linen. When we rose next morning it was snowing About an inch had fallen during the night, and the mercury had riser, to 6 below zero. We drove along in the dusky half-twilight toward Angesjo. over low, broad hills, covered with forests of stunted birch and fir. The scenery con- tinued the same, and there is no use in repeating the description, except to say that the land became more cold and barren, and there seemed to be few things cultivated except flax, barley and potatoes. Still the same ridges sweeping down to the Gulf, on one hand, the same frozen bays and inlets on the other, and villages at intervals of eight or ten miles, each with its great solid church, low red belfry and deserted encampment of red frame stab'lea Before reaching the second station, we looked from a wooded height over the open expanse of the Gulf, a plain of snow- covered ice, stretching eastward as far as the eye could reach. The day gradually became still and cold, until the tem- perature reached 22 again, and we became comfortable in the same proportion. The afternoon twilight, splendid with its hues of amber, rose and saffron, died away so gradually, that it seemed scarcely to fade at all, lighting our path for at least three hours after sunset. Our postilions were all boys ruddy, hardy young fellows of fourteen or fifteen, who drove well and sang incessantly, in spite of the cold. They talked much with us, but to little purpose, as I found it very difficult to understand the humming dialect they spoke 3ach, as he received his driclcpenninffar (drink-money, 01 gratuity), at the end of the station, expressed his thanks b\ shaking hands with us. This is a universal custom 48 NORTHERN TRAVEL. throughout the north of Sweden : it is a part of the simplt natural habits of the people ; and though it seemed rathei odd at first to be shaking hands with everybody, from tht landlord down to the cook and the ostler, we soon came tc take it as a matter of course. The frank, unaffected way in which the hand was offered, oftener made the custom a pleasant one. At Stocksjo we decided to push on to a station beyond Umea, called Innertafle, and took our horses accordingly. The direct road, however, was unused on account of the drifts, so we went around through Umea, after all. We had nearly a Swedish mile, and it was just dark when we descended to the Umea River, across whose solid surface we drove, and up a steep bank into the town. We stopped a few moments in the little public square, which was crowded with people, many of whom had already commenced their Christmas sprees The shops were lighted, and the little town looked very gay and lively. Passing through, we kept down the left bank of the river for a little distance, and then struck into the woods. It was night by this time ; all at once the boy stopped, mounted a snow- bank, whirled around three or four times, and said something to me which I could not understand. "What's the matter?" I asked ; " is not this the road to Innertafle?" " I don't know I think not," he said. " Don't you know the way. then ?" I asked again " No !" he yelled in reply, whirled around several times more, and then drove on. Presently we overtook a pedes trian. to whom he turned for advice, and who willingly acted %s guide for the sake of a ride. Away we went again, but the snow was so spotless that it was impossible to see the A SLEIGH HIDE THROUGH NORRLAND 49 track. Braisted and 1 ran upon a snow-bank, were over turned and dragged some little distance, but we righted ourselves again, and soon afterwards reached our destina- tion. In the little inn the guests' room lay behind the large family kitchen, through which we were obliged to pass. We wepe seized with a shivering fit on stripping off our furs, and it seemed scarcely possible to get warm again. This was followed by such intense drowsiness that we were obliged to lie down and sleep an hour before supper. After the cold weather set in, we were attacked with this drowsy fit every day, toward evening, and were obliged to take turns in arousing and stimulating each other. This we generally accomplished by singing " From Greenland's icy mountains," and othei appropriate melodies. At Innertafle we were attended by a tall landlady, a staid, quiet, almost grim person, who paid most deliberate heed to our wants After a delay of mure than two hours, she furnished us with a supper consisting of some kind of fresh fish, with a sauce composed of milk, sugar and onions, followed by gryn^r&t, a warm mush of mixed rice and barley, eaten with milk Such was our fare on Christmas eve ; but hunger is th< best sauce and our dishes were plent : fully seasoned with it 50 NORTHKKX TKAVKI,. CHAPTER V. PROGRESS NORTHWARDS. A STORM. WE arose betimes on Christmas morn, but the grim and deliberate landlady detained us an hour in preparing oui coffee. I was in the yard about five minutes, wearing only my cloth overcoat and no glc/es, and found the air truly sharp and nipping, but not painfully severe. Presently, Braisted came running in with the thermometer, exclaiming, with a yell of triumph, " Thirty, by Jupiter !" (30 ol ReaumW, equal to 35 i below zero of Fahrenheit.) We were delighted with this sign of our approach to the Arctic circle. The horses were at last ready ; we muffled up carefully, and set out. The dawn was just streaking the East, the sky was crystal-clear, and not a breath of air stirring. My oeara was soon a solid mass of ice, from the moisture of my breath, and my nose required constant friction. The day previous, the ice which had gathered on my fur collar lay against my face so long that the flesh began to freeze over my cheek bones, and thereafter I was obliged to be par- ticularly cautious. As it grew lighter, we were surprised to find that our postilion was a gill. She had a heavy I'liOi.Kv.ss N:HCTII\VAKI>S. A STORM 5) sheepskin over her knees, u muff for her hands, and a shawi around her head, leaving only the eyes visible. Thus accoutred, she drove on merrily, and, except that the red oi her cheeks became scarlet and purple, showed no signs of the weather. As we approached Sormjole, the first station, w again had a broad view of the frozen Bothnian Gulf, ovei which hovered a low cloud of white ice-smoke Looking di>wu into the snowy valley of Sormjole, we saw the straight pillars of smoke rising from the houses high into the air, not spreading, but gradually breaking off into solid masses which sank again and tilled the hollow, almost concealing the houses. (July the white, handsome church, with its tall Bpire, seated on a mound, rose above this pale blue film and shone softly in the growing Hush of day. We ordered horses at once, after drinking a bowl of hoi milk, flavored with cinnamon. This is the favourite win- ter drink of the people, some-times with the addition :>f brandy. But thajSn&el, or common brandy of Sweden, is a detestable beverage, resembling a mixture of turpentine, train oil, and bad molasses, and we took the milk unmixed, which admirably assisted in keeping up the animal heat. The mercury by this time had fallen to 38 below zero. We were surprised and delighted to find that we stood the cold so easily, and prided ourselves not a little on our pow- ers of endurance. Our feet gradually became benumbed, but, by walking up the hills, we prevented the circulation from coming to a stand-still. The cold, however, played some grotesque pranks with us My beard, moustache, cap, and fur collar were soon one un- divided lump of ice, Our eye-laahes became snow-whiU 52 NORTHERN TRAVEL. and heavy with frost, and it required constant motion to keep them from freezing together. We saw everything through visors barred with ivory. Our eyebrows and hail were as hoary as those of an octogenarian, and our cheeka a mixture of crimson and orange, so that we were scarcely recognizable by each other. Every one we met had snow- white locks, no matter how youthful the face, and, whatever was the colour of our horses at starting, we always drove milk-white steeds at the close of the post. The irritation of our nostrils occasioned the greatest inconvenience, and as the handkerchiefs froze instantly, it soon became a matter of pain and difficulty to use them. You might as well at- tempt to blow your nose with a poplar chip. We could not bare our hands a minute, without feeling an iron grasp of cold which seemed to squeeze the flesh like a vice, and turn the very blood to ice. In other respects we were warm and jolly, and I have rarely been in higher spirits. The air was exquisitely sweet and pure, and 1 could open my mouth (as far as its icy grating permitted) and inhale full draughts into the lungs with a delicious sensation of refreshment and exhilaration. I had not expected to find such freedom of respiration in so low a temperature. Some descriptions of severe cold in Canada and Siberia, which I have read, state that at such times the air occasions a tingling, smarting sensation in the throat and lungs, but I experienced nothing of the kind. This was arctic travel at last By Odin, it was glorious ' The smooth, firm road, crisp and pure as alabaster, ovei which our sleigh-runners talked with the rippling, musical murmur of summer brooks ; the sparkling, breathless firma- PROGRESS NORTHWARDS. A STORM. 53 aient; the gorgeous rosy flush of morning, slowly deepen- ing until the orange disc of the sun cut the horizon ; the golden blaze of the tops of the bronze firs ; the glittering oi the glassy birches ; the long, dreary sweep of the landscape; the icy nectar of the perfect air ; the tingling of the roused blood in every vein, all alert to guard the outposts of life against the besieging cold it was superb ! The natives themselves spoke of the cold as being unusually severe, and we congratulated ourselves all the more on our easy endur- ance of it. Had we judged only by our own sensations we should not have believed the temperature to be nearly so low. The sun rose a little after ten, and I have never seen anything finer than the spectacle which we then saw for the ^rst time, but which was afterwards almost daily re- peated the illumination of the forests and snow-fields in his level orange beams, for even at midday he was not more than eight degrees above the horizon. The tops of the trees, only, were touched : still and solid as iron, and cov- ered with sparkling frost-crystals, their trunks were changed to blazing gold, and their foliage to a fiery orange-brown The delicate purple sprays of the birch, coated with ice, glittered like wands of topaz and amethyst, and the slopes of virgin snow, stretching towards the sun, shone with the fairest saffron gleams. There is nothing equal to this in the South nothing so transcendcntly rich, dazzling, and lorious. Italian dawns and twilights cannot surpass those we saw every day, not, like the former, fading rapidly into the ashen hues of dusk, but lingering for hour after hour with scarce a decrease of splendour. Strange that Nature 54 NORTHERN TRAVEL. should repeat these lovely aerial effects in such widel) dif- ferent zones and seasons. I thought to find in the winte! landscapes of the far North a sublimity of death and desola- tion a wild, dark, dreary, monotony of expression but J had, in reality, the constant enjoyment of the rarest, the ten Merest, the most enchanting beauty. The people one meets along the road harmonise with these unexpected impressions. They are clear eyed and rosy as the morning, straight and strong as the fir saplings in their forests, and simple, honest, and unsophisticated beyond any class of men I have ever seen. They are no milksops either. Under the serenity of those blue eyes and smooth, fair faces, burns the old Berserker rage, not easily kindled, but terri- ble as the lightning when once loosed. " I would like to take all the young men north of Sundsvall," says Braisted, ' ; put them into Kansas, tell them her history, and then let them act for themselves." " The cold in clime are cold in blood," sings Byron, but they are only cold through superior self-control and freedom from perverted passions. Better is the assertion of Tennyson: " That bright, and fierce, and fickle is the South, And dark, and true, and tender is the North." There are tender hearts in the breasts of these northern men and women, albeit they are as undemonstrative as the En glish or we Americans, for that matter. It is exhilarating to see such people whose digestion is sound, whose nervea are tough as whipcord, whose blood runs in a strong full stream, whose impulses are perfectly natural, who are good PROGRESS NORTHWARDS. A STORM. 5 without knowing it, and who are happy without trying tc be so. Where shall we find such among our restless com* munities at home ? We made two Swedish miles by noon, and tnen took a breakfast of fried reindeer meat and pancakes, of which we ate enormously, t j keep up a good supply of fuel. Braisted and 1 consumed about a pound of butter between us. Shriek not, young ladies, at our vulgar appetites you who sip a spoonful of ice-cream, or trifle with a diminutive meringue, in company, but make amends on cold ham and pickles in the pantry, after you go home I shall tell the truth, though it disgust you. This intense cold begets a necessity for fat, and with the necessity comes the taste a wise provision of Nature! The consciousness now dawned upon me that I might be able to relish train-oil and tallow-candles before we had done with Lapland. I had tough work at each station to get my head out of iny wrappings, which were united with my beard and hair in one solid lump. The cold increased instead of diminish- ing, and by the time we reached Gumboda, at dusk, it waa 40 below zero. Here we found a company of Finns travel- ling southward, who had engaged five horses, obliging us to wait a couple of hours. We had already made forty miles, and were satisfied with our performance, so we stopped for the night. When the thermometer was brought in, the mercury was frozen, and on unmuifling I found the end of any nose seared as if with a hot iron. The inn was capital; we had a warm carpeted room, beds of clean, lavendered .inen, and all civilised appliances. In the evening we sal down to a Christmas dinner of sausages, potatoes, rancakes 56 NORTHERN' TRAVEL. raspberry jam, and a bottle of Barclay and Perkin's beat porter, in which we drank the health of all dear relatives and friends in the two hemispheres. And this was in West Bothnia, where we had been told in Stockholm that we should starve ! At bedtime, Braisted took out the ther mometer again, and soon brought it in with the mercury frozen below all the numbers on the scale. In the morning, the landlord came in and questioned us, in order to satisfy his curiosity. He took us for Norwe- gians, and was quite surprised to find out our real character. We had also been taken for Finns, Russians and Danes, since leaving Stockholm. "I suppose you intend to buy lumber ?" said the landlord. " No," said I, " we travel merely for the pleasure of it." " Ja so-o-o /" he exclaimed, in a tone of the greatest surprise and incredulity. He asked if it was necessary that we should travel in such cold weather, and seemed reluctant to let us go. The mercury showed 25 below zero when we started, but the sky was cloudy, with a raw wind from the north-west. We did not feel the same hard, griping cold as the day previous, but a more penetrating chill. The same character of scenery continued, but with a more bleak and barren aspect, and the population became more scanty. The cloudy sky took iway what little green there was in the fir-trees, and they gloomed as black as Styx on either side of our road. The air was terribly raw and biting as it blew across the hollcwg tnd open plains. I did not cover my face, but kept up such a lively friction on my nose, to prevent it from freezing that in the evening I f mnd the skin quite worn away. At Dagl<>sten, the tnird station we stopped an Imur foi PROGRF.SS .NORTHWARDS. A STORM. 57 jreakfast It was a poverty-stricken place, and we could only get some fish-roes and salt meat. The people were all half-idiots, even to the postilion who drove us. We had Borne daylight for the fourth station, did the fifth by twilight, and the sixth in darkness. The cold ( 30) was eo keen that our postilions made good time, and we reached Sunnana on the Skeleftea River, 52 miles, soon after six o'clock. Here we were lodged in a large, barn-like room, so cold that we were obliged to put on our overcoats and sit against the stove. 1 began to be troubled with a pain in my jaw, from an unsound tooth the commencement of a martyrdom from which I suffered for many days afterwards. The existence of nerves in one's teeth has always seemed to me a super- fluous provision of Nature, and 1 should have been well satisfied if she had omitted them in my case. The handmaiden called us soon after five o'clock, and brought us coffee while we were still in bed. This is the general custom here in the North, and is another point of contact with the South. The sky was overcast, with raw violent wind mercury 18 below zero. We felt the cold very keenly; much more so than on Christmas day. The wind blew full in our teeth, and penetrated even beneath our furs. On setting out, we crossed the Skeleftea River by a wooden bridge, beyond which we saw, rising duskily in the uncertain twilight, a beautiful dome and lantern, crown- ing a white temple, built in the form of a Greek cross. It was the parish church of Skeleftea. Who could have ex- pected to find such an edifice, here, on the borders of Lap land? The village about it contains many large and hand- some houses. This is one of the principal points of and intercourse between the c >;is' and the interior 58 NORTHKKN TKAVI',1,. The weather became worse as we advanced, traversing the low, broad hills, through wastes of dark pine forests The wind cut like a sharp sword in passing the hollows, and the drifting snow began to fill the tracks. We were full two hours in making the ten miles to Frostkage, and the day seemed scarcely nearer at hand. The leaden, lowering sky S^ave out no light, the forests were black and cold, the snow a dusky grey such horribly dismal scenery I have rarely beheld. We warmed ourselves as well as we could, and started anew, having for postilions two rosy boys, who sang the whole way and played all sorts of mad antics with each other to keep from freezing. At the next station we drank large quantities of hot milk, flavored with butter, sugar and cinnamon, and then pushed on, with another chubby hop-o'- my-thumb as guide and driver. The storm grew worse and worse: the wind blew fiercely over the low hills, loaded with particles of snow, as Tine as the point of a needle and as hard as crystal, which struck full on our eyeballs and stung them so that we could scarcely see. I had great difficulty in keep- ing my face from freezing, and my companion found his cheek touched. By the time we reached Abyn, it blew a hurricane, and we were compelled to stop. It was already dusk, and our cosy little room was doubly pleasant by contrast with the wild weather outside. Our cheerful landlady, with her fresh complexion and splendid teeth, was very kind and at- tentive, and 1 got on very well in conversation, notwith- standing her broad dialect. She was much astonished at my asking for a bucket of cold \\alcr, for bathing. " Why," said she, " 1 always thought that if a person put his feel ::SS NORTHWARDS. A STORM. into cold water, in winter, he would die immediately/' However, she supplied it, and was a little surprised to find me none the worse in the morning. 1 passed a terrible night from the pain in my face, and was little comforted, on rising, by the assurance that much snow had fallen. The mercury had risen to zero, and the wind still blew, although not so furiously as on the previous day. We therefore determined to set out, and try to reach Pitea. The landlady's son, a tall young Viking, with yellow locks hanging on his shoulders, acted as postilion, and took the lead. We started at nine, and found it heavy enough at first. It was barely light enough to see our way, and we floundered slowly along through deep drifts for a mile, when we met the snow-plows, after which our road became easier. These plows are wooden frames, shaped somewhat like the bow of a ship in fact, I have seen very fair clipper models among them about fifteen feet long by ten feet wide at the base, and so light that, if the snow is not too deep, one horse can manage them. The farmers along the road are obliged to turn out at six o'clock in the morning whenever the snow falls or drifts, and open a passage for travellers. Thus, in spite of the rigorous winter, commu- nication is never interrupted, and the snow-road, at last, from frequent plowing, becomes the finest sleighing track in the world. The wind blew so violently, however, that the furrows were soon filled up, and even the track of the baggage-sled fifty yards in advance, was covered. There was one hollow where the drifts of loose snow were five or six feet deep, and here we were obliged to get out and struggle across, sinking 60 NORTHERN TRAVEL to our loins at every step. It is astonishing how soon ont becomes hardened to the cold. Although the mercury stood at zero, with a violent storm, we rode with our faces fullj exposed, frost-bites and all, and even drove with bare hands, w.thout the least discomfort. But of the scenery we saw this day, i can give no description. There was nothing but long drifts and waves of spotless snow, some dim, dark, spectral fir-trees on either hand, and beyond that a wild chaos of storm. The snow came fast and blinding, beating full in our teeth. It was impossible to see ; the fine parti- cles so stung our eyeballs, that we could not look ahead. My eyelashes were loaded with snow, which immediately turned to ice and froze the lids together, unless 1 kept them in constant motion. The storm hummed and buzzed through the black forests ; we were all alone on the road, for even the pious Swedes would not turn out to church on such a day. It was terribly sublime and desolate, and I enjoyed it amazingly. We kept warm, although there was a crust of ice a quarter of an inch thick on our cheeks, and the ice in our beards prevented us from opening our mouths. At one o'clock, we reached the second station, Gefre, unrecognisable by our nearest friends. Our eyelashes were weighed down with heavy fringes of frozen snow, there were icicles an inch long hanging to the eaves of our moustaches, and the hand- kerchiefs which wrapped our faces were frozen fast to the flesh. The skin was rather improved by this treatment, but it took us a great while to thaw out. At Gefre, we got some salt meat and hot milk, and then started on our long stage of fifteen miles to Pitea. The wind had moderated somewhat, but the snow still fell fast and thick. We were again blinded and frozen up more firmly than ever, cheeks and all, so that our eyes and lips were the only features to be seen. After plunging along *br more than two hours through dreary woods, we came ipon the estuary of the Pitea River, where our course waa marked out by young fir-trees, planted in the ice. The world became a blank; there was snow around, above and below, and but foi these marks a man might have driven at random until he froze. For three miles or more, we rode over the solid gulf, and then took the woods on the opposite shore. The way seemed almost endless. Our feet grew painfully cold, our eyes smarted from the beating of the fine snow, and my swollen jaw tortured me incessantly. Finally lights appeared ahead through the darkness, but another half hour elapsed before we saw houses on both sides of us. There was a street, at List, then a large mansion, and tc our great py the" ikjutsbonde turned into the court-yard of an inn. 4 NORTHERS TRAVEL CHAPTER VI JOURNEY FROM P1TEA TO HAPARANDA. MY jaw was so painful on reaching Pi tea, that I tossed about in torment the whole night, utterly unable to sleep. The long northern night seemed as if it would never coine to an end, and I arose in the morning much more fatigued and exhausted than when I lay down. It was 6 below zero, and the storm still blowing, but the cold seemed to relieve my face a little, and so we set out. The roads were heavy, but a little broken, and still led over hills and through interminable forests of mingled fir and pine, in the dark, imperfect day. I took but little note of the scenery, but was so drowsy and overcome, that Braisted al last filled the long baggage-sled with hay, and sat at the rear, so that I could lie stretched out, with my head upon his lap. Here, in spite of the cold and wind, I lay in a warm, stupid half-sleep. It was dark when we reached Ersnfis, whence we ha nearly eight o'clock, very cold, and I was thoroughly exhausted. But the inn was already full of travellers, and there was no place to lay our heads. The landlord, a sublimely indifferent Swede, coolly advised us to go on to Perso. ten miles distant. I told him I had not slept fur twc nights, but he merely shrugged his shoulders, repeated his advice, and offered to furnish horses at once, .to get us off. It was a long. cold, dreary ride, and I was in a state of semi-consciousness the whole time. We reached Perso about eleven, found the house full of travellers, but procured two small beds in a small ruom with another man in it. and went to sleep without supper. I was so thoroughly woru out that I got about three hours' rest, in spite of my pain. We took coffee in bed at seven, and started for Ranbyu on the Ranea River. The day was lowering, temperature 8 below zero. The country was low, slightly undulating with occasional wide views to the north, over the inlets oi the gulf, and vast wide trac".-* <>f forest. The settlement* JOURNEY FROM PITEA TO HAPARANDA. fifi were still as frequent as ever, but there was little apparent cultivation, except flax. Ranbyn is a large village, with a stately church. The people were putting up booths for a fair (a fair in the open air, in lat. 65 N., with the mercury freezing !), which explained the increased travel on the road We kept on to Hvita for breakfast, thus getting north of the latitude of Tornea ; thence our road turned eastward at right angles around the head of the Bothnian Gulf. Much snow had fallen, but the road had been ploughed, and we had a tolerable track, except when passing sleds, which sometimes gave us an overturn. We now had uninterrupted forest scenery between the stations and such scenery ! It is almost impossible to paint the glory of those winter forests. Every tree, laden with the purest snow, resembles a Gothic fountain of bronze, covered with frozen spray, through which only suggestive glimpses of its delicate tracery can be obtained. From every rise we looked over thousands of such mimic fountains, shooting, low or high, from their pavements of ivory and alabaster. It was an enchanted wilderness white, silent, gleaming, and tilled with inexhaustible forms of beauty. To what shall I liken those glimpses under the boughs, into the depths of the forest, where the snow destroyed all perspective, and brought the remotest fairy nooks and coverts, too lovely and fragile to seem cold, into the glitter- ing foreground ? " Wonderful !" " glorious !" I could only exclaim, in breathless admiration. Once, by the roadside, we saw an Arctic ptarmigan, as white as the snow, with ruby eyes that sparkled like jewels as he moved slowly and silently along, not frightened in the least. 66 NORTHERN TUAVKT. The sun set a little after one o'clock and we poshed ou to reach the Ka*ix River the same evening At the las! station we got a boy postilion and two lazy horses, and were three hours and a half on the road, with a temperature ol 20 below zero. My feet became like ice, which increased the pain in my face, and I began to feel faint and sick with BO much suffering and loss of rest. The boy aggravated us so much by his laziness, that Braisted ran ahead and cuffed his ears, after which he made better speed. After a drive through interminable woods, we came upon the banks of the Kalix, which were steep and fringed with splendid firs. Then came the village of Mansbyn, where, thank Heaven> we got something to eat, a warm room, and a bed. WhiL VF.NTURF,S AMONG I'HE FINNS. 87 silent. Half an hour passed, and the spirit moved no one to open his mouth. I judged at last that the horses had been baited sufficiently, silently showed my watch to the postilions, who, with ourselves, got up and went awaj without a word having been said to mar the quaint droller} of the incident. While at Haparanda, we had been recommended to stop at Kingis Bruk, at the junction of the Tornea and Muonio. "There," we were told, "you can get everything you want: .nere is a fine house, good bed?, and plenty to cat and drink." Our blind interpreter at Kardis repeated this advice. " Don't go on to Kexisvara ;" (the next station) said he, "stop at Kengis, where everything is good." Toward Kengis, then, this oasis in the arctic desolation, our souls yearned. We drove on until ten o'clock in the brilliant moonlight and mild, delicious air for the temperature had actually risen to 25 above zero ! before a break in the hills announced the junction of the two rivers. There was a large house on the top of a hill on our left, and. to our great joy, the postilions drove directly up to it. " Is this Kengis ?" I asked, but their answers I could not understand, and they had already unharnessed their horses. There was a light in the house, and we caught a glimpse of a woman's face at the window, as we drove up. But the light was immediately extinguished, and everything became silent. I knocked at the door, which was partly open, but no one came. I then pushed : a heavy log of wood, which Was leaning against it from the inside, fell with a noise which reverberated through the hor.se. I waited awhile, and then, groping my way along a passage to the door of gg NORTHERN TR. VEL. the room which had been lighted, knocked loudly. After I little delay, the door was opened by a young man, whc ushered me into a warm, comfortable room, and then quietly itared at me, as if to ask what I wanted. " We are travel- era and strangers," said I, " and wish to stop for the night." 'This is not an inn," he answered; "it is the residence of the patron of the iron works.' 3 I may here remark that it is the general custom in Sweden, in remote districts, for travellers to call without ceremony upon the parson, magis- trate, or any other prominent man in a village, and claim his hospitality. In spite of this doubtful reception, con sidering that our horses were already stabled and the Station three or four miles further, I remarked again : ' : But perhaps we may be allowed to remain here until morning ?' " I will ask," he replied, left the room, and soon returned with an affirmative answer. We had a large, handsomely furnished room, with a sofa and curtained bed, into which we tumbled as soon as the servant-girl, in compliance with a hint of mine, had brought up -ome bread, milk, and cheese. We had a cup of coffee in the morning, and were preparing to leave when the patron appeared. He was a short, stout, intelligent Swede, who greeted us courteously, and after a little conversation, urged us to stay until after breakfast. We were too hungry lo need much persuasion, and indeed the table set with tjdde, or capercailie (one of the finest game birds in tie world), potatoes, cranberries, and whipped cream, accom- panied with excellent Umea ale, and concluded with coffee surpassed anything we had sat down to for many a day The potion gave me considerable information about th< ADS I.M I KK.S AMONG THE FINNS. gt< ;ouiitry, and quieted a little anxiety I was beginning to feel by assuring me that we should find post-horses all the way to Muonioniska, still ninety-five miles distant. He in- formed me that we had already got beyond the daylight, aa the sun had not yet risen at Kengis. This, however, was n consequence of a hill to the southward, as we afterwards found that the sun was again above the horizon. We laid in fuel enough to bst us through the day, and then took leave of our host, who invited us to visit him on our return. Crossing the Tornea, an hour's drive over the hills brought us to the village of Kexisvara, where we were obliged to wait some time for our horses. At the inn there was a well forty feet deep, with the longest sweep-pole I ever saw. The landlady and her two sisters were pleasant bodies, and sociably inclined, if we could have talked to them. They were all spinning toAv, their wheels purring like pleased lionesses. The sun's disc came in sight at a quarter past eleven, and at noon his lower limb just touched the horizon. The sky was of a splendid saffron hue, which changed into a burning brassy yellow. Our horses promised little for speed when we set out, and their harness being ill adapted to our sleds increased the difficulty. Instead of hames there were wide wooden yokes, the ends of which passed through mortices in the ends of the shafts, and were fastened with pins, while, as there was no belly-bands, the yokes rose on going down hill, bringing our leds upon the horses' heels. The Finnish sleds hav excessively long shafts, in order to prevent this. Our road all day was upon the Muonio River, the main \ ranch of the Tornea, and the boundary between Sweden and Russia, NORTHERN TRAVEL. above the junction. There had been a violent wind during the night, and the track was completely filled up.. The Tornea and Muonio are both rery swift rivers, abounding in dangerous rapids, but during the winter, rapids and alL they are solid as granite from their sources to the Bothnian Gulf. We plunged along slowly, hour after hour, more than half the time clinging to one side or the other, to pre- vent our sled from overturning and yet it upset at least a dozen times during the day. The scenery was without rhange : low, black fir forests on either hand, with the decorative snow blown off them ; no villages, or signs of life, except the deserted huts of the wood-cutters, nor did we meet but one sled during the whole day. Here and there, on the banks, were sharp, canoe-like boats, twenty or thirty feet long, turned bottom upward. The sky was overcast, shutting out the glorious coloring of the past days The sun set before one o'clock, and the dull twilight deepened apace into night. Nothing could be more cheerless and dis- mal : we smoked and talked a little, with much silence between, and I began to think that one more such day would disgust me with the Arctic Zone. It was four o'clock, and our horses were beginning to .tagger, when we reached a little village called Jokijalka, on the Russian side. The postilion stopped at a house, or rather a quadrangle of huts, which he made me comprehend was an inn, adding that it was 4 poldn and 3 belikor (a fearfully unintelligible distance!) to the next one. We entered, and found promise enough in the thin, sallow, Bandy-haired, and most obsequious landlord, and a whole herd of rosy children, to decide us to stop. We were iDVENTURES AMONG THE FINNS. ushered into the milk-room, which was warm and carpeted and had a single narrow bed. I employed my vocabulary with good effect, the quick-witted children helping me out and in due time we got a supper of fried mutton, bread butter, and hot milk. The children carue in every few minutes to stare at our writing, an operation which they probably never saw before. They would stand in silent suriosity for half an hour at a time, then suddenly rush out, and enjoy a relief of shouts and laughter on the outside Since leaving Matarengi we had been regarded at all the stations with much wonder, not always unmixed with mis- trust. Whether this was simply a manifestation of the dislike which the Finns have for the Swedes, for whom they probably took us, or of other suspicions on their part, we could not decide. After a time one of the neighbors, who had been sent for on account of his knowing a very few words of Swedish, waa ushered into the room. Through him I ordered horses, ana ascertained that the next station, Kihlangi, was three and a half Swedish miles distant, but there was a place on the Russian side, one mile off, where we could change horses. We had finished writing, and were sitting by the stove, con- sulting how we should arrange the bed so as to avoid contact with the dirty coverlet, when the man returned and told us we must go into another house. We crossed the yard to the opposite building, where, to our great surprise, we were ushered into a warm room, with two good beds, which had clean though coarse sheets, a table, looking-glass, and a bit of carpet on the floor. The whole male household congregated to see us take possession and ascertain whether NORTHERN TRAVEL. our wants were supplied. 1 slept luxuriously until awaa- enfcd by the sound of our landlord bringing in wood to light the fire. He no sooner saw that my eyes were open than he snatched off his cap and threw it upon the flo^r, moving bout with as much awe and silence as if it were the Emperor's bedroom. His daughter brought us excellent coffee betimes. We washed our faces with our tumblers of drinking water, and got under way by half-past six. The temperature had changed again in the night, being 28 below zero, but the sky was clear and the morning moonlight superb. By this time we were so far north that the moon did not set at all, but wheeled around the sky, sinking to within eight degrees of the horizon at noonday. Our road led across the river, past the church of Kolare, and through a stretch of the Swedish forests back to the river again. To our great surprise, the wind had not blown here, the snow still hung heavy on the trees, and the road was well beaten. At the Russian post-house we found only a woman with the usual troop of children, the eldest of whom, a boy of sixteen, was splitting fir to make torches I called out " hevorste !" (horses), to which he made a deliberate answer, and went on with his work. After some consultation with the old woman, a younger boy was sent off somewhere, and we sat down to await the result. I called for meat, milk, bread, and butter, which procured us in course of time a pitcher of cold milk, some bread made of gf und barley straw, horribly hard and tough, and a lump of sour frozen butter. There was some putrid fish in a wooden bowl, on which the family had breakfasted, while an immense pot }f sour milk, buter, broken bread, and straw ADVENTURES AMONG THE FINNS. 93 meal, hanging over the fire, contained their dinner. Thig was testimony enough to the accounts we had heard in Stockholm, of the year's famine in Finland ; and we seemed jkely to participate in it. I chewed the straw bread vigorously for an hour, and jracceeded in swallowing enough to fill my stomach, though not enough to satisfy my hunger. The younger children occupied themselves in peeling off the soft inner bark of the fir, which they ate ravenously. They were handsome, fair- skinned youngsters, but not so rosy and beautiful as those of the Norrland Swedes. We were obliged to wait more than two hours before the horses arrived, thus losing a large part of our daylight. The postilions fastened our sleds behind their own large sledges, with flat runners, which got through the snow more easily than ours. We lay down in the sledge, stretched ourselves at full length upon a bed of hay, covered our feet with the deerskin, and set off. We had gone about a Swedish mile when the postilions stopped to feed the horses before a house on the Russian side. There was nobody within, but some coals amonjr the ashes on the hearth showed that it had been used, apparently, as a place of rest and shelter. A tall, powerful Finn, who was travelling alone, was there, smoking his pipe. We all sat down and did likewise, in the bare, dark hut. There were the three Finns, in complete dresses of reindeer skin, and ourselves, swaddled from head to foot, with only a small segment of scarlet face visible between our frosted furs and icy beards. It was a true Arctic picture, as seen by the pale dawn which glimmered on the wastes of snow outside. We had a poor horse, which soon shov/ed signs of breaking 5* SOUTHERN TRAVEL down, especially when we again entered a belt of countr) where the wind had blown, the trees were clear, and the track filled up. At half-past eleven we saw the light of the gun on the tops of the hills, and at noon about half his disc was visible. The cold was intense ; my hands became so stiff and benumbed that I had great difficulty in preventing them from freezing, and my companion's feet almost lost all feel- ing. It was well for us that we were frequently obliged to walk, to aid the horse. The country was a wilderness of mournful and dismal scenery low hills and woods, stripped bare of snow, the dark firs hung with black, crape-like moss, alternating with morasses. Our Finnish postilions were pleasant, cheerful fellows, who insisted on our riding when there was the least prospect of a road. Near a solitary hut (the only one on the road) we met a man driving a reindeer. After this we lost all signs of our way. except the almost obliterated track of his pulk. The snow was deeper than ever, and our horses were ready to drop at every step. We had been five hours on the road ; the driver said Kihlangi was " v,x verst" distant, and at three, finally, we arrived. We appreciated rather better what we had endured when we found that the temperature was 44 below zero I at once ordered horses, and a strapping young fellow was tient off in a bad humor to get them. We found it impossi- ble, however, to procure milk or anything to eat, and as the cold was not to be borne else, we were obliged to resort to a bottle of cognac and our Haparanda bread. The old woman sat by the fire smoking, and gave not the least attention to our demands. I paid our postilions in Norwegian orfs, which they laid upon a chair and counted, with the assist ADVF.NTTRES AMONG TITE FINNS Mice of the whole family. After the reckoning was finished they asked me what the value of each piece was, which gave rise to a second general computation. There was, apparen tly, more than they had expected, for they both made me a formal address of thanks, and took my hand. Seeing that I had produced a good effect I repeated my demand for milk. The old woman refused, but the men interfered in my behalf; she went out and presently returned with a bowl full, which she heated for us By this time our horses had arrived, and one of our new postilions prepared himself for th? journey, by stripping to the loins and putting on a clean shirt. He was splendidly built, with clean, firm muscle, a white glossy skin, and no superfluity of flesh. He then donned a reindeer of p6sk, leggings and boots, and we started again. It was nearly five o'clock, and superb moonlight. This time they mounted our sleds upon their own sledges, so that we rode much higher than usual. Our way lay up the Muonio River : the track was entirely snowed up, and we had to break a new one, guided by the fir-trees stuck in the ice. The snow was full three feet deep, and whenever the sledge got a little off the old road, the runners cut in so that we could scarcely move. The milk and cognac had warmed us tolerably, and we did not suffer much from the intense cold. My nose, however, had been rubbed raw, and I waa obliged to tie a handkerchief across my face to protect it. While journeying along in this way, the sledge suddenly tilted over, and we were flung head foremost into the snow. Our drivers righted the sledge, we shook ourselves and got n again, but had not gone ten yards before the same thing 96 NORTHERN TRAVEL. happened again. This was no joke on such a night, but art took it good-humouredly, to the relief of the Finns, ^ho seemed to expect a scolding. Very soon we went over a third time, and then a fourth, after which they kept near us and held on when there was any danger. I became very drowsy, and struggled with all my force to keep awake, for sleeping was too hazardous. Braisted kept his senses about him by singing, for our encouragement, the mariner's hymn : " Fear not, but trust in Providence, Wherever thou may'st be." Thus hour after hour passed away. Fortunately we had gocd, strong horses, which walked fast and steadily. The scenery was always the same low, wooded hills on either side of the winding, snowy plain of the river. We had made up our minds not to reach Parkajoki before midnight, but at half- past ten our track left the river, mounted the Swedish bank, and very soon brought us to a quadrangle of low huts, having the appearance of an inn. I could scarcely believe my eyes when we stopped before the door. " Is thia Parkajoki ?" I asked. " Ja /" answered the postilion. Braisted and I sprang out instantly, hugged each other in delight, and rushed into the warm inn. The thermometer Htill showed 44, and we prided ourselves a little on hav ing travelled for seventeen hours in such a cold with so little food to keep up our animal heat. The landlord, a young man, with a bristly beard of three weeks' growlfc. showed us into the milk room, where there was a bed oi reindeer skins. His wife brought us some fresh hay, a ADVENTURES AMONG THE FINNS 97 ^uilt and a sheepskin coverlet, and we soon forgot both GUI hunger and our frozen blood. In the morning coffee was brought to us, and as nothing else was to be had, we drank four cups apiece. The land lord asked half a rigs (13 cents) for our entertainment, and was overcome with gratitude when I gave him double th sum. \Ve had the same sledges as the previous night, but new postilions and excellent horses. The temperature had risen to 5 below zero, with a cloudy sky and a light snow falling. We got off at eight o'clock, found a track partly broken, and went on at a merry trot up the river. We took sometimes one bank .and sometimes the other, until, after passing the rapid of Eyanpaika (which was frozen solid, although large masses of transparent ice lay piL'd like rocks on either side), we kept the Swedish bank. We were in excellent spirits, in the hope of reaching Muorioniska l>efre dark, but the steady trot of our horses brought ua out of the woods by noon, and we saw before us the long, scattering village, a mile or two distant, across the river To our left, on a gentle slope, stood a red, two-story build- ing, surrounded by out-houses, with :t few humbler habita- tions in its vicinity. This was Muoniovara, on the Swedish side the end of our Finnish journey. NORTHERN TRAVK1. CHAPTER IX. LIFE IN LAPLAND. As we drove up to the red two-story house, a short man with dark whiskers and a commercial air came forward to meet us. I accosted him in Swedish, asking him whether the house was an inn. He replied in the negative, adding that the only inn was in Muonioniska, on the Russian side, a mile or more distant. I then asked for the residence of Mr. Wolley, the English naturalist, whose name had been mentioned to me by Prof. Retzius and the botanist Hart- man. He thereupon called to some one across the court, and presently appeared a tall, slender man dressed in the universal gray suit which travelling Englishmen wear, from the Equator to the Poles. He came up with extended hand, on hearing his own language ; a few words sufficed for ex- planation, and he devoted himself to our interests with the cordiality of an old acquaintance. He lived with the Swede, Herr Forstrom, who was the merchant of the place ; but the wife of the latter had just been confined, and there was no room in his house. Mr. Wolley proposed at first to send lo the inn in Muonioniska, and engage a room, but after- wardfc arranged with a Norsk carpenter who lived on the i.lFE IX LAPLAND. 99 lull above, to give us quarters in his house, S3 that we might be near enough to take our meals together. Nothing could have suited us better. We took possession at once, and then descended the hill to a dinner I had ventured to hint at our famished condition of capercailie, cranberries, sof bread, whipped cream, and a glass of genuine port. Warmed and comforted by such luxurious fare, we climbed the hill to the carpenter's house, in the dreary Arctic twi- light, in the most cheerful and contented frame of mind Was this, indeed, Lapland ? Did we, indeed, stand already in the dark heart of the polar Winter ? Yes ; there was no doubt of it. The imagination could scarcely conceive a more desolate picture than that upon which we gazed the plain of sombre snow, beyond which the black huts of the village were faintly discernible, the stunted woods and bleak hills, which night and the raw snow clouds had half obscured, and yonder fur-clad figure gliding silently along beside his reindeer. Yet, even here, where Man seemed to have set- tled out of pure spite against Nature, were comfort and hospitality and kindness. We entered the carpenter's house, lit our candles and pipes, and sat down to enjoy at ease the unusual feeling of shelter and of home. The building was of squared fir-logs, with black moss stuffed in the crevices, making it very warm and substantial. Our room contained a loom, two tables, two beds with linen of voluptuous soft- ness and cleanness, an iron stove (the first we had seen in Sweden), and the usual washing apparatus, besides a piece of carpet on the floor. What more could any man desire ? The carpenter, Herr Knoblock, spoke some German ; his son, Ludwig, Mr. Wolley's servant, also looked after oui Jt)0 NOKT1IKRN TRAVEL needs ; and the daughter, a fair, blooming girl uf about nineteen, brought us coffee before we were out of bed, and kept our fire in order. Why, Lapland was a very Sybaris in comparison with what I had expected. Mr. Wolley proposed to us another luxury, in the snaps of a vapour-bath, as Herr Forstrom had one of those bath- ing-houses which are universal in Finland. It was a little wooden building without window's. A Finnish servant-girl who had been for some time engaged in getting it in readi- ness, opened the door for us. The interior was very hot and moist, like an Oriental bathing -hall. In the centre was a pile of hot stones, covered with birch boughs, the leaves of which gave out an agreeable smell, and a large tub of water. The floor was strewn with straw, and under the roof was a platform extending across one end of the building. This was covered with soft hay, and reached by means of a ladder, for the purpose of getting the full effect of the steam Some stools, and a bench for our clothes, completed the ar- rangements. There was also in- one corner a pitcher of water, standing in a little heap of snow to keep it cool. The servant-girl came in after us, and Mr. W. quietly proceeded to undress, informing us that the girl was bathing- master, and would do the usual scrubbing and shampooing. This, it seems, is the general practice in Finland, and is out another example of the unembarrassed habits of the people in this part of the world The poorer families go into their bathing-rooms together father, mother, and Children and take turns in polishing each other's backs. [t would have been ridiculous to have shown any hesitation ander the circumstances in fact, an indignity to the honest LIFK IN LAPLAND. iiK\>ir* hearted, virtuous girl and so we deliberately nib dressed also. When at last we stood, like our first parents in Paradise, "naked and not ashamed," she handed us bunches of birch-twigs with the leaves on, the use of which was suggested by the leaf of sculpture. We mounted tc the platform and lay down upon our backs, whereupon she increased the temperature by throwing water upon the hoi stones, until the heat was rather oppressive, and we began to sweas of squirrel tails strung on reindeer sinews, The carpenter's uecond son, Anton, a lad of fifteen, was engaged to accompany us as nn interpreter. 6 110 NOKTHEKX TKAVEL. CHAPTER X. A REINDEER JOURNEY ACROSS LAPLAND. WE left Muoniovara at noon on the 15th, fully prep an -d for a three days' journey across the wild? of Lapland. AVe were about to traverse the barren, elevated table-land, which divides the waters of the Bothnian Gulf from those of the Northern Ocean, a dreary, unfriendly region, inhabited only by a few wandering Lapps. Even without the preva- lence of famine, we should have had difficulty in procuring food from them, so we supplied ourselves with a saddle of reindeer, six loaves of rye bread, sugar, and a can of coffee. The carpenter lent us a cup and saucer, and Anton, who fell all the responsibility of a boy who is employed for the first time, stowed everything away nicely in the broad baggage pulk. We found it impossible to procure Lapp leggings and shoes at Muonivara, but our Russian boots proved an ad- mirable substitute. The poesk of reindeer skin is the warmest covering for the body which could be devised. It ig drawn over the head like a shirt, fitting closely around the neck and wrists, where it is generally trimmed with ermine, and reaching half-way below the knee. A thick woollen .Math, wrapped first uround the neck, the ends theD KF.INDEER JOURNEY ACROSS LAPI.AN1>. HI twistc-d together down to the waist, where they are passec tightly around the bodv and tied in front, not only increases the warmth and convenience of the garment, but gives it a highly picturesque air. Our sea-otter caps, turned down so as to cover the ears and forehead, were fastened upon our heads with crimson handkerchiefs, and our boas, of black and red squirrel tails, passed thrice around the neck, reached to the tips of our noses. Over our dog-skin mittens we drew gauntlets of reindeer skin, with which it was difficult to pick up or take hold of anything ; but as the deer's rein is twisted around one's wrist, their clumsiness does not interfere with the facility of driving. It would seem impossible for even Arctic cold to penetrate through such defences and yet it did. Herr Forstrom prepared us for the journey by a good breakfast of reindeer's marrow, a justly celebrated Lapland delicacy, and we set out with a splendidly clear sky and a cold of 12 below zero. The Muonio valley was superb, towards sunrise, with a pale, creamy, saffron light on the snow, the forests on the tops of the hills burning like jagged masses of rough opal, and the distant range of Palastyntre bathed in pink light, with pure sapphire shadows on its northern slopes. These Arctic illuminations are transcend- ent; nothing can equal them, and neither pen nor pencil can describe them. We passed through Muonioniska, arid kep up the Russian side, over an undulating, wooded country The road was quite good, but rny deer, in spite of his siz und apparent strength, was a lazy beast, and gave me much trouble. I was obliged to get out of the pulk frequently nd punch him in the flanks, taking my chance to tumble ir I 12 NORTHKRX TRAVEL. headbng as he sprang forward again. I soon became dis gusted with reindeer travelling, especially when, after we had been on the road two hours and it was nearly dark we 'cached Upper Muonioniska, only eight miles. We thert ook the river again, and made better progress to Kyrkes juando, the first station, where we stopped an hour to feed the deer. Here there was a very good little inn, with a bed for travellers. We had seven reindeer, two of which ran loose, so that wt could change occasionally on the road. I insisted on chang- ing mine at once, and received in return a smaller animal, which made up in spirit what he lacked in strength. Our sonductor was a tall, handsome Finn, with blue eyes and a bright, rosy complexion. His name was Isaac, hut he was better known by his nickname of Pitka Isaaki, or Long Isaac. He was a slow, good-humoured, prudent, careful fel- low, and probably served our purpose as well as anybody we could have found. Anton, however, who made his first jour- ney with us, was invaluable. His father had some misgiv- ings on account of his timidity, but he was so ambitious to give satisfaction that we found him forward enough. I have already described the country through which we passed, as it was merely a continuation of the scenery below Muonioniska low, wooded hill?, white plains, and every- where rinow, snow, snow, silence and death. The cold in- creased to 33 below zero, obliging me to bury my nose in my boa and to keep up a vigorous exercise of my toes to pre- vent them from freezing, as it is impossible to cover one's be Jta in a pulk. The night was calm, clear, and starry ; but after an hour a bank of auroral light gradually arose in the A REINDEER JOURNEY ACROSS LAPLAND. HJj north, and formed a broad arch, which threw its lustre over the snow and lighted up our path. Almost stationary ai first, a restless motion after a time agitated the gleaming bow ; it shut out broad streamers of yellow fire, gathered them in and launched them forth again, like the hammer of Thor. which always returned to his hand, after striking the blow for which it had been hurled. The most wonderful ap- pearance, however, was an immense square curtain, which fell from all the central part of the arch. The celestial scene-shifters were rather clumsy, for they allowed one end to fall lower than the other, so that it over-lapped and dou- bled back upon itself in a broad fold. Here it hung for pro- bably half an hour, slowly swinging to and fro, as if moved by a gentle wind. What new spectacle was in secret prepara- tion behind it we did not learn, for it was hauled up so bung- lingly that the whole arch broke and fell in, leaving merely f\ pile of luminous ruins under the Polar Star. Hungry and nearly frozen, we reached Pah'joki at half- past nine, and were at once ushered into the guests' room, a little hut separated from the main building. Here, barring an inch of ice on the windows and numerous windy cracks in the floor, we felt a little comfort before an immense fire kindled in the open chimney. Our provisions were already adamantine ; the meat was transformed into red Finland granite, and the bread into mica-slate. Anton and the old Finnish landlady, the mother of many sons, immediately commenced the work of thawing and cooking, while I, by th light of fir torches. i,ok the portrait of a dark-haired, black- eyed, olive-skinned, big-nosed, thick-lipped youth, who gare his name as Eric Johan Sombasi. When our meal of meat, [14 NORTHERN TRAVEL bread, and coffee had been despatched, the old woman made a bed of rciideer skins for us in one corner, covered with a coarse sheet, a quilt, and a sheepskin blanket. She then took her station near the d jor, where several of the sons were al- ready standing, and all appeared to be waiting in silent ci> riosity to see us retire. We undressed with genuine Fin- nish freedom of manner, deliberately enough for them to understand the peculiarities of our apparel, and they never took their eyes from us until we were stowed away for the night in our warm nest. It was snowing and blowing when we arose. Long Isaac- had gone to the woods after the reindeer, and we employed the delay in making a breakfast off the leavings of our sup- per. Crossing the Muonio at starting, we entered the Russian territory and drove up the bed of the Palajok, a tributary stream which comes down from the north. The sky became clearer as the dawn increased ; the road w;is tolerably broken, and we sped merrily along the windings of the river, under its tall banks fringed with fir trees, which, loaded with snow r shone brilliantly white against the rosy sky. The temperature was 8 below zero, which felt un- pleasantly warm, by contrast with the previous evening. After' a time we left the river and entered a rolling up- land alternate thickets of fir and birch, and wastes of fro- zen marsh, where our path was almost obliterated. After more than two hours' travel we came upon a large lake, at the further end of which, on the southern side of a hill, was the little hamlet of Suontaj&rvi. Here we stopped to bait the deer, Braisted's and mine being nearly fagged out. Wt entered one of the huts, where a pleasant woman was taking A KF.IXDEER JOURNEY ACROSS LAPLAND. H5 charge of a year-old baby. There was no fire on the hearth, and the wind whistled through the open cracks of the floor Long Isaac and the woman saluted each other by placing their right arms around each other's waists, which is the universal manner of greeting in Finland. They only shak bands as a token of thanks for a favour. We started again at noon, taking our way across a wil- derness of lakes and snow-covered marshes, dotted with stunted birch-thickets. The road had entirely disappeared, but Eric of Palajoki, who accompanied us as an extra guide, went ahead with a strong reindeer and piloted us. The sagacity with which these animals find the track under a smooth covering of loose snow, is wonderful. They follow it by the feet, of course, but with the utmost ease and ra- pidity, often while going at full speed. I was struck by the sinuous, mazy character of our course, even where the ground was level, and could only account for it by the sup- position that the first track over the light snow had followed the smoothest and firmest ridges of the marshes. Our pro- gress was now slow and toilsome, and it was not long before my deer gave up entirely. Long Isaac, seeing that a change must be made, finally decided to give me a wild, powerful animal, which he had not yet ventured to intrust to either of us. The deer was harnessed to my pulk, the rein carefully secured around my wrist, and Long Isaac let go his hold A wicked toss of the antlers and a prodigious jump followed, ind the animal rushed full tilt upon Braisted, who was next Before me, striking him violently upon the back. The more I endeavored to rein him in, the more he plunged and Jig NORTHERN TRAVEL tore, now dashing against the led deer, n )w hurling rne ova the baggage pulk, and now leaping off the track into bot- tomless beds of loose snow. Long Isaac at last shouted to m< to go ahead and follow Eric, who was about half a mile in advance. A few furious plunges carried me past our little caravan, with my pulk full of snow, and my face likewise Now. lowering his neck and thrusting out his head, with open mouth and glaring eyes, the deer set off at the top of his speed. Away I went, like a lance shot out from the aurora: armoury ; the pulk slid over the snow with the swiftness of a fish through the water ; a torrent of snow-spray poured into my lap and showered against my face, until 1 was com- pletely blinded. Eric was overtaken so quickly that he had no time to give me the track, and as I was not in a condi- tion to see or hear anything, the deer, with the stupidity of his race, sprang directly upon him, trampled him down, and dragged me and my pulk over him. We came to a stand in the deep snow, while Eric shook himself and started again. My deer now turned and made for the caravan, but I succeeded in pulling his head around, when he charged a second time upon Eric, who threw himself out of his pulk to escape. My strength was fast giving way, when we came to a ridge of deep, loose snow, in which the animals sank above their bellies, and up which they could hardly drag us, My deer was so exhausted when we reached the top, that 1 lad no further difficulty in controlling him. Before us stretched a trackless plain, bounded by a low mountain ridge. Eric set off at a fast trot, winding hither Mid thither, as 1 is deer followed the invisible path. I kepi A REINDEER JOURNEY ACROSS THE PLAINS 1 17 jlose behind him, white as a Polar bear, but glowing like a volcano under my fure. The temperature was 10 C belo* rero. and I could have wished it ten degrees colder. My deer, although his first savage strength was spent, was stil] full of spirit, and I began to enjoy this mode of travel We soon entered the hills, which were covered with thickets of frozen birch, with here and there a tall Scotch fir, com- pletely robed in snow. The sun, which had showed about half his disc at noon, was now dipping under the horizon, and a pure orange glow lighted up the dazzling masses of the crystal woods. All was silver-clear, far and near, shining, as if by its own light, with an indescribable radiance. We had struck upon a well-beaten track on entering the hills, and flexv swiftly along through this silent splendour, this jewelled solitude, under the crimson and violet mode of the sky. Here was true Northern romance; here was poetry beyond all the Sagas and Eddas that ever were written. We passed three Lapps, with heavy hay-sleds, drawn by a reindeer apiece, and after a time issued from the woods upon a range of hills entirely bare and white. Before us was the miserable hamlet of Lippajftrvi, on the western side of the barren mountain of Lippivara, which is the highest in this part of Lapland, having an altitude of 1900 feet above the sea. I have rarely seen anything quite so bleak and God-forsaken as this village. A few low black huts, in a desert of snow that was all. We drove up to a sorl of station-house, where an old, white-headed Finn received me kindly, beat the snow off my poesk with a birch broom, and hung my boa near the fire to dry. There was a wild, fterce-lookins: Lipp in the room, who spoke some Norwegian, 6* 118 NOttTHKKX TKAVEL. and at once asked who and what I was. His Lead was cov ercd with a mop of bright brown hair, his eyes were dark blue and gleamed like polished steel, and the flushed crim- son of lis face was set off by the strong bristles of a beard of three weeks growth. There was something savage and ferocious in his air, as he sat with his clenched fists planted upon his knees, and a heavy knife in a wooden scabbard hanging from his belt. When our caravan arrived I trans- ferred him to my sketch-book. He gave me his name as Ole Olsen Thore, and I found he was a character well known throughout the country. 'Long Isaac proposed waiting until midnight, for moon rise, as it was already dark, and there was no track beyouo Lippajarvi. This seemed prudent, and we therefore, with the old woman's help, set about boiling our meat, thawing bread, and making coffee. It was necessary to eat even beyond what appetite demanded, on account of the long dis- tances between the stations. Drowsiness followed repletion, as a matter of course, and they gave us a bed of skins in an inner-room. Here, however, some other members of the family were gathered around the fire, and kept up an inces- gant chattering, while a young married couple, who lay in 3ne corner, bestowed their endearments on each other, so that re had but little benefit of our rest. At midnight all was ready, and we set out. Long Isaac had engaged a guide and procured fresh deer in place of those which were fa- tigued. There was a thick fog, which the moon scarcely brightened, but the temperature had risen to zero, and was as mild as a May morning. For the first time in many days our beards did uot freeze. A REINDEER JOURNL'Y ACROSS LAPLAND. \\$ We pursued our way in complete silence. Our httle car- avan, in single file, presented a strange, shadowy, mysterious appearance as it followed the winding path, dimly seen through the mist, first on this side and then on that ; not a Bound being heard, except the crunching of one's own pulk over the snow. My reindeer and myself seemed to be the only living things, and we were pursuing the phantoms oi other travellers and other deer, who had long ago perished in the wilderness. It was impossible to see more than a hundred yards ; some short, stunted birches, in their spec- tral coating of snow, grew along the low ridges of the deep, loose snow, which separated the marshes, but nothing else interrupted the monotony of the endless grey ocean through which we went floundering, apparently at hap-haz- ard. How our guides found the way was beyond my com- prehension, for I could discover no distinguishable land- marks. After two hours or more we struck upon a cluster of huts called Palajarvi, seven miles from Lippaj&rvi, which proved that we were on the right track. The fog now became thicker than ever. We were upon the water-shed between the Bothnian Gulf and the North- ern Ocean, about 1400 feet above the sea. The birches be- came mere shrubs, dotting the low mounds which here and there arose out of the ocean of snow. The pulks all ran in the same track and made a single furrow, so that our gunwales were generally below the sea-level. The snow was packed so tight, however, that we rarely shipped any Two hours passed, and I was at length roused from a half- Bleep by the evidence of our having lost the way. Long Isaac and the guide stopped and consulted every few mi J20 NORTHERN TRAVEL nutes. striking sometimes in one direction and sometimes in another, but without any result. We ran over ridges oi heavy, hard tussocks, blown bare of snow, which pitched our pulks right and left, just as I have bumped over the coral reefs of Loo-Choo in a ship's cutter. Then followed deep beds of snow-drifts, which tasked the utmost strength ol our deer, low birch thickets and hard ridges again, over which we plunged in the wildest way possible. After wandering about for a considerable time, we sudden- ly heard the barking of a dog at some distance on our left. Following the welcome sound, we reached a scrubby ridge, where we were saluted with a whole chorus of dogs, and soon saw the dark cone of a Lapp tent. Long Isaac arous- ed the inmates, and the shrill cry of a baby proclaimed that there was life and love, ven here. Presently a clumsy form, enveloped in skins, waddled out and entered into con- versation with our men. I proposed at once to engage a Lapp to guide us as far as Eitajarvi, which they informed us was two Norwegian (fourteen English) miles further. The man agreed, but must first go off to the woods for his deer, which would detain us two hours. He put on his snow- skates and started, and I set about turning the delay to prc- fit by making acquaintance with the inmates of the tents. We had now reached the middle of the village ; the lean wolfish dogs were yelling on all sides, and the people began to bestir themselves. Streams of sparks issued from the open tops of the tents, and very soon we stood as if in the midst of a group of volcanic cones. The Lapj'S readily gave us permission to enter. We lifted the hangi \g door of reindeer hide, crept in. stumbling A RKIXOKKR JOURNEY ACROSS LAPLAND. 1'^] contused mixture of dogs and deer-skins, until w found rooLi to sit down Two middle-aged women, dressed in poesks. like the men, were kindling a fire between some large stones in the centre, but the air inside was still as cold as outside. The damp birch sticks gave out a thick smoke, which almost stifled us, and for half an hour we could scarcely see or breathe. The women did not appear to be incommoded in the least, but I noticed that their eyes were considerably inflamed. After a time our company was increased by the arrival of two stout, ruddy girls of about seventeen, and a child of two years old, which already wore a complete reindeer costume. They were all very friendly and hospitable in their demeanour towards us, for conversa tion was scarcely possible. The interior of the tent wa.. hung with choice bits of deer's hide, from the inside of the flanks and shoulders, designed, apparently, for mittens. Long Isaac at once commenced bargaining for some of thenj, which he finally purchased. The money was deposited in a rather heavy bag of coin, which one of the women drew forth from under a pile of skins. Our caps and Russian boots excited their curiosity, and they examined them with the greatest n inuteness. These women were neither remarkably small nor remark- ably ugly, as the Lapps are generally represented. The ground-tone of their complexion was rather tawny, to be iuro. but there was a "lowing red on their cheeks, and their eyes were a dark bluish-grey. Their voices were agreeable, and the language (a branch of the Finnish) had none of that barbaric harshness common to the tongues of nomadic tribes These favorable features, nevertheless, were far from recoD 122 NORTHERN TRAVEL. oiling me to the idea of a trial of Lapp life. When I saw the filth, the poverty, and discomfort in which they lived, ] decided that the present experience was all-sufficient Roasting on one side and freezing on the other, with smart- ing eyes and asphyxiated lungs, 1 soon forgot whatever there was of the picturesque in my situation, and thought only of the return of our Lapp guide. The women at last cleared away several dogs, and made room for us to lie down a more tolerable position, in our case ; though how a whole family, with innumerable dogs, stow themselves in the com- pass of a circle eight feet in diameter, still remains a mys- tery. The Lapp returned with his reindeer within the allotted time, and we took our leave of the encampment. A strong south wind had arisen, but did not dissipate the fo, and for two hours we had a renewal of our past experiences, in thumping over hard ridges and ploughing through seas of snow. Our track was singularly devious, sometimes doub- ling directly back upon itself without any apparent cause. At last, when a faint presentiment of dawn began to glimmer through the fog, the Lapp halted and announced that he had lost the way. Bidding us remain where we were, he Btruck off into the snow and was soon lost to sight. Scarcely a quarter of an hour had elapsed, however, before we heard his cries at a considerable distance. Following, as we best could, across a plain nearly a mile in diameter, we found him at last in a narrow dell between two hills. The ground now sloped rapidly northward, and I saw that we had crossed the water-shed, and that the plain behind us must br the lake Jedeckejaure, which, according to Von Buch, is 137C feet above the sea. A REINDEER JOURNEV ACROSS LAPLAND. 128 On emerging from the dell we found a gentle slope before us, covered with hard ice, down which our pulks flew likt the wind. This brought us to another lake, followed by a similar slope, and so we descended the icy terraces, until, in a little more than an hour, some covered haystacks gave evi dence of human habitation, and we drew up at the huts of Eitajftivi, in Norway. An old man, who had been watching our approach, immediately climbed upon the roof and re- moved a board from the chimney, after which he ushered us into a bare, cold room, and kindled a roaring fire on the hearth. Anton unpacked our provisions, and our hunger was so desperate, after fasting for twenty hours, that we could scarcely wait for the bread to thaw and the coffee to boil. We set out again at noon, down the frozen bed of a stream which drains the lakes, but had not proceeded far before both deers and pulks began to break through the ice, probably on account of springs under it. After being almost swamped, we managed to get up the steep snow-bank ind took to the plain again, making our own road over ridge and through hollow. The caravan was soon stopped, that the pulks might be turned bottom upwards and the ice scraped off, which, like the barnacles on a ship's hull, impeded their progress through the snow. The broad plain we were traversing stretched away to the north without a break or spot of color to relieve its ghastly whiteness ; but toward the south-west, where the sunset of an unrisen sun spread its roseate glow through the mist, arose some low mounds, covered with dropping birches, which shone against the soft, mellow splendor, like sprays of silver embroidered MI rose-colored satin. 124 NORTHI:KX THAVEL. Our course, for about fifteen miles, lay alternately upon the stream (where the ice was sufficiently strong) and the wild plain. Two or three Lapp tents on the bank exhibited the usual amount of children and dogs, but we did not think it worth while to extend the circle of our acquaintance in that direction. At five o'clock, after it had long been dark, we reached half a dozen huts called Siepe, two Norwegian miles from Kautokeino. Long Isaac wished to stop her* for the night, but we resolutely set ourselves against him The principal hut was filthy, crowded with Lapps, and filled with a disagreeable smell from the warm, wet poesks hang- ing on the rafters. In one corner lay the carcases of two deer-calves which had been killed by wolves. A long bench, a table, and a rude frame covered with deerskins, and serv- ing as a bed, comprised all the furniture. The usual buck- ets of sour milk, with wooden ladles, stood by the door. No one appeared to have any particular occupation, if we ex- cept the host's wife, who was engaged with an infant in reindeer breeches. We smoked and deliberated while the deers ate their balls of moss, and the result was, that a stout yellow-haired Lapp youngster was engaged to pilot us to Kautokeino. Siepe stands on a steep bank, down which our track led to the stream again. As the caravan set off, my deer, which had behaved very well through the day, suddenly became fractious, sprang off the track, whirled himself around on his hind legs, as if on a pivot, and turned the pulk completely over, burying me in the snow. Now. I had come from Muoniovara, more than a hundred miles, without }eing once overturned, and was ambitious to make the whole \ RRINDRER fOTTRNRY ACROSS LAPLAND. 128 journey with equal success. I therefore picked myself up highly disconcerted, and started afresh. The very same thing happened a second and a third time, and I don't think I shall be considered unreasonable for becoming furiously angry. I should certainly have committed cervicide had any weapon been at hand. I seized the animal by the horns, shook, cuffed, and kicked him, but all to no purpose. Long Isaac, who was passing in his pulk, made some remark, which Anton, with all the gravity and conscientiousness of his new position of interpreter, immediately translated, " Long Isaac says," he shouted, " that the deer will go well enough, if you knew how to drive him." " Long Isaac may go to the devil !" was, I am sorry to say, my profane reply, which Anton at once translated to him. Seating myself in the pulk again, I gave The deer the rein, and for a time kept him to the top of his speed, following the Lapp, who drove rapidly down the windings of the stream. It was quite dark, but our road was now somewhat broken, and for three hours our caravan swiftly and silently sped on its way. Then, some scattered lights appeared in the distance ; our tired deers leaped forward with freshen spirit, and soon brought us to the low wooden huts of Kau- tokeino. We had travelled upwards of sixty miles sinc leaving Lippajiirvi, breaking our owi road through deep snow for a great part of the way. During tlas time om deers had not been changed. I cannoi but respect the pro- fiting animals after such a toat. J2ck Ely, the high fir-fringed oanks of which I remembered, for they denoted our approach to the Muonio : but it was long, long before we descended from the marshes upon the winding road of snow-covered ice. In rain I shifted my aching legs and worked my be- numbed hands, looking out ahead for the emboochure of (he river. Braisted and I encouraged each other, whenever we were near enough to hear, by the reminder that we had Tie more day with reindeer. After a long time spent in this way, the high bank? flattened, level snows and woodi preceded, and we sailed into the port of Palajoki. 15C NORTHERN TRAVEL. The old Finnish lady curtsied very deeply as she recog nised us, and hastened to cook our coffee and reindeer, and to make us a good bed with sheets. On our former visit the old lady and her sons had watched us undress and get into bed, but on this occasion three buxom daughters, of age? ranging from sixteen to twenty-two, appeared about the time for retiring, and stationed themselves in a row near the door, where they watched us with silent curiosity. As we had shown no hesitation in the first case, we determined to be equally courageous now, and commenced removing our gar- ments with great deliberation, allowing them every oppor- tunity of inspecting their fashion and the manner of wear- ing them. The work thus proceeded in mutual silence until we were nearly ready for repose, when Braisted, by pulling off a stocking and displaying a muscular calf, suddenly alarmed the youngest, who darted to the door and rushed out. The second caught the panic, and followed, and the third and oldest was therefore obliged to do likewise, though with evident reluctance. I was greatly amused at such an unsophisticated display of curiosity. The perfect compo- sure of the girls, and the steadiness with which they watch- ed us, showed that they were quite unconscious of having committed any impropriety. The morning was clear and cold. Our deer had strayed so far into the woods that we did not get under way before the forenoon twilight commenced. We expected to find a broken road down the Muonio, but a heavy snow had fallen the day previous, and the track was completely filled. Long Isaac found so much difficulty in taking the lead, his deel Constantly bolting from the path, that Anton finally relieved THE RETURN TO MUOXIOVARA 151 him. and by standing upright in the pulk and thumping the deer's flanks, succeeded in keeping up the animal's spirit* and forcing a way. It was slow work, however, and the gun, rolling his whole disc above the horizon, announced mid- day before we reached Kyrkessuando. As we drove up to the little inn, we were boisterously welcomed by Hal, Hen Forstrom's brown wolf-dog, who had strayed thus far from home. Our deer were beginning to give out, and we were very anxious to reach Muoniovara in time for dinner, so we only waited long enough to give the animals a feed of moss and procure some hot milk for ourselves. Thfc snow-storm, which had moved over a narrow belt of country, had not extended below this place, and the road was consequently well broken. We urged our deer into a fast trot, and slid down the icy floor of the Muonio, past hills whose snows flashed scarlet and rose-orange in the long splendour of sunset. Hunger and the fatigue which our journey was producing at last, made us extremely sensitive to the cold, though it was not more than 20 below zero. My blood became so chilled, that I was apprehensive the extremi- ties would freeze, and the most vigorous motion of the mus- cles barely sufficed to keep at bay the numbness which at- tacked them. At dusk we drove through Upper Muonioniska, and our impatience kept the reindeers so well in motion that before five o'clock (although long after dark,) we were climb ing the well-known slope to Herr Forstrom's house at Mu oniovara. Here we found the merchant, not yet departed to the Lapp fair at Karessuando, and Mr. Wolley, who welcom ed ns with the cordiality of an old friend. Our snug room it the carpenter's was already warmed and set in order, and 15 NORTHERN TRAVEL after our reindeer drive of 250 miles through the wildest parts of Lapland, we felt i home-like sense of happiness and comfort in smoking our pipes before the familiar iron stove. The trip to Kautokeino embraced about all I saw of I ,app life during the winter journey. The romance of the tribe, as I have already said, has totally departed with their con* version, while their habits of life scarcely improved in tb< least, are sufficiently repulsive to prevent any closer experi- ence than I have had, unless the gain were greater. Mr. Wolley, who had been three years in 1 /apland, also informed me that the superstitious and picturesque traditions of the people have almost wholly disappeared, and the coarse mys- ticism and rant which they have engrafted upon their im- perfect Christianity does not differ materially from the same excrescence in more civilized races. They have not even (the better for them, it is true) any characteristic and picturesque vices but have become, certainly to their own great advant- age, a pious, fanatical, moral, ignorant and commonplace people. I have described them exactly as I found them, and as they have been described to me by those who knew them well. The readers bing, and sometimes by cries or groans, until the victim was either exhausted or fell into a trance, which lasted some hours The persons who were affected wen ,58 NOKTHI:I:X TU.UKL always treated with the greatest respect during the DO one ventured to smile, no matter how absurd a form the visitation might take. The principle of abstinence from strong drinks was promulgated about the same time, ind much D the temperance of the Finns and Lapps is un dou^tedly owing the impression made upon their natures bj these phenomena. The same epidemic has often prevailed in the United States, England and Germany. The barking and dancing mania which visited Kentucky thirty or forty years ago, and the performances of the " Holy Rollers," were even more ludicrous and unnatural. Such appearances are a puzzle alike to the physiologist and the philosopher ; their frequency shows that they are based on some weak spot in human nature ; and in proportion as we pity the victims we have a right to condemn those who sow the seeds of thr pes- tilence. True religion is never spasmodic ; it is calm as the existence of God. I know of nothing more shocking than such attempts to substitute rockets and blue lights for Hea- ven's eternal sunshine. So far as regards their moral character, the Finns have as little cause for reproach as any other people We found them as universally honest and honourable in their dealings as the Northern Swedes, who are not surpassed in the world in this respect. Yet their countenances express more cun- ning and reserve, and the virtue may be partly a negative one, resulting from that indolence which characterises the frigid and the torrid zone. Thus, also, notwithstanding physical signs which denote more ardent animal passions than their neighbors, they are equally chaste, and have aa ABOUT THH FINNS. high a standard of sexual purity. Illegitimate births are quite rare, and are looked upon as a lasting shame and dis- grace to both parties. The practice of " bundling" which until recently, was very common among Finnish lovers, very seldom led to such results, and their marriage speedily re- moved the dishonour. Their manners, socially, in this res- pect, are curiously contradictory. Thus, while both sexes freely mingle in the bath, in a state of nature, while the women unhesitatingly scrub, rub and dry their husbands, brothers or male friends, while the salutation for both sexes is an embrace with the right arm, a kiss is considered gross- ly immodest and improper. A Finnish woman expressed the greatest astonishment and horror, at hearing from Mr. Wolley that it was a very common thing in England for a husband and wife to kiss each other. " If my husband were to attempt such a thing," said she, "I would beat him about the ears so that he would feel it for a week." Yet in con- versation they are very plain and unreserved, though by no means gross. They acknowledge that such things as gen- eration, gestation and parturition exist, and it may be that this very absence of mystery tends to keep chaste so excita- ble and imaginative a race. Notwithstanding their superstition, their love of poetry, and the wild, rich, musical character of their language, there is a singular absence of legendary lore in this part of Fin- land Perhaps this is owing to the fact that their ancestors have emigrated hither, principally within the last two cen- turies. from the early home of the race Tavastland, the shores of the Pajana Lake, and the Gulf of Finland. It is a difficult matter to preserve family traditions among I 60 NORTHERN TRAVEL. them, or even any extended genealogical record, from tht circumstance that a Finn takes his name, not only from hifl father's surname, but from his residence. Thus, Isaki takefl the name of " Anderinpoika" from his father Anderi, and idds " Niemi," the local name of his habitation. His son Nils will be called Nils Isakipoika, with the addition of the name of his residence, wherever that may be ; and his family name will be changed as often as his house. There may be a dozen different names in the course of one generation, and the list soon becomes too complicated and confused fur an uneducated memory. It is no wonder, therefore, that the Finn knows very little except about what happened during his own life, or, at best, his father's, I never heard the Kalewala spoken of, and doubt very much whether it is known to the natives of this region. The only sor.gs we heard, north of Haparanda, were hymns devout, but dis- mal. There must be ballads and household songs yet alive, but the recent spiritual fever has silenced them for the time. I was at first a little surprised to find the natives of the North so slow, indolent and improvident. We have an idea that a cold climate is bracing and stimulating ergo, the further north you go, the more active and (merge tic yon will find the people. Rut the touch of ice is like that <>i fire. The tropics relax, the pole benumbs, and the practical result is the same in both cases. In the long, long winter when there are but four hours of twilight to twenty of dark- ness when the cows are housed, the wood cut, the hay gathered, the barley bran and fir bark stowed away for Wad and the summer's catch of fish salted what can a man do ABOUT THE FINNS. 161 when his load of wood or hay is hauled borne, but eat, gos- 3ip and sleep ? To hed at nine, and out of it at eight in the morning, smoking and dozing between the slow perform- ance of his few daily duties, he becomes at last as listles? and dull as a hibernating bear. In the summer he has per- petual daylight, and need not hurry. Besides, why should he give himself special trouble to produce an unusually large crop of flax or barley, when a single night may make his labours utterly profitless? Even in midsummer the blight- ing frost may fall : nature seems to take a cruel pleasure in thwarting him : he is fortunate only through chance ; and thus a sort of Arab fatalism and acquiescence in whatever happens, takes possession of him. His improvidence is also to be ascribed to the same cause. Such fearful famine and suffering as existed in Finland and Lapland during the win- ter of 1856-7 might no doubt have been partially prevent- ed, but no human power could have wholly forestalled it. The polar zone was never designed for the abode of man. In the pre- Adamite times, when England was covered with palm-forests, and elephants ranged through Siberia, things may have been widely different, nnd the human race then (if there was any) may have planted vineyards on these frozen hills and lived in bamboo huts. But since the ireolo- gical emvutes and revolutions, and the establishment of the terrestrial regime, I cannot for the life of me see whatever induced beings endowed with human reason, to transplant themselves hither and here take root, nhile such vast spaces lie waste and useless in more irenial climes. A man may be pardoned for remaining where the providences of birth tnd education have thrown him, but I cannot excuse th 162 NORTHERN TRAVEL. first colonists for inflicting snch a home upon centuries of descendants Compare even their physical life the pure animal satisfaction in existence, for that is not a trifling matter after all with that of the Nubians, or the Malays, or the Polynesians ! It is the difference between a poor hare, hunted and worried year after year by hounds and visions of hounds and the familiar, confiding wren, happiest of creatures, because secure of protection everywhere. Oh that the circle of the ecliptic would coincide with that of the equator ! That the sun would shine from pole to pole for evermore, and all lands be habitable and hospitable, and the Saharan sands (according to Fourier) be converted into bowers of the Hesperides, and the bitter salt of the ocean brine (vide the same author) become delicious champagne punch, wherein it would be pleasure to drown ! But I am afraid that mankind is not yet fit for such a millennium. Meanwhile it is truly comforting to find that even here, where men live under such discouraging circumstances that one would charitably forgive them the possession of many vices, they are, according to their light, fully as true, and honest, and pure, as the inhabitants of the most favoured countries in the world. Love f or each other, trust in each other, faith in God, arc all vital among them ; and their shortcomings are so .few and so easily accounted for, that one must respect them and feel that his faith in man is not lessened in knowing them. You who spend your lives at home can never know how much good there is in tne world, in rude unrefined race?, evil naturally rises to the surface, and one can discern the character of the stream beneath its scum It is only in the highest civilization where the out ABOUT THE F1XK8. 163 side is goodly to the eye, too often concealing an interior r oul to the core. But I have no time to moralise on these matters. My duty is that of a chronicler ; and if I perform that consci- entiously, the lessons which my observations suggest will need no pointing out. I cannot close this chapter, however, with- out confessing my obligations to Mr. Wolley, whose thorough knowledge of the Lapps and Finns enabled me to test the truth of my own impressions, and to mature opinions which I should otherwise, from my own short experience, have hesi- tated in stating. Mr. Wolley, with that pluck and persist- ence of English character which Emerson so much admires, had made himself master of all that Lapland can furnish to the traveller, but intended remaining another year for scien- tific purposes. If he gives to the world as I hope and trust he will the result of t^is long and patient inquiry and in- vestigation, we shall have at last A standard authority for this little-known corner of Europe. We were also indebted to Mr. Wolley for much personal kindness, which 1 take pleasure in acknowledging in the only way he cannot pre- vent. 164 NORTHERN TRAVEL. CHAPTER XIV. EXPERIEXCES OF ARCTIC WEATHER. WE bade a final adieu to Muoniovara on the afternoon of the 24th of January, leaving Mr. Wolley to wait for June and the birds in that dismal seclusion. Instead of resuming skfuts, we engaged horses as far as Kengis from Herr For- strom and a neighbouring Finn, with a couple of shock-headed natives as postillions. Our sleds were mounted upon two rough Finnish sledges, the only advantage of which was to make harder work for the horses but the people would have it so. The sun was down, but a long, long twilight succeeded with some faint show of a zodiacal light. There was a tolerable track on the river, but our Finns walked their horsea the whole way, and we were nearly seven hours in making Parkajoki. The air was very sharp ; my nose, feet and hands kept me busily employed, and I began to fear that I was be- coming unusually sensitive to cold, for the thermometer indi- cated but 15 below zero when we started. At Parkajoki, however, my doubts were removed and my sensations ex- plained, on finding that the temperature had fallen to 44 below. We slept warmly and well on our old tad of reindeer skiiv EXPERIENCES OF ARCTIC WF.ATHER. 155 in one corner of the milk-room. When Braisted, who rose first, opened the door, a thick white mist hurst in and rolled heavily along the floor. I went out, attired only in my shirt and drawers, to have a look at the weather. I found the air very still and keen, though not painfully cold but I was .still full of the warmth of sleep. The mercury, however, had sunk into the very bulb of the thermometer, and was frozen so solid that I held it in the full glare of the fire for about a minute and a half before it thawed sufficiently to mount. The temperature was probably 50 below zero, if not more greater than any we had yet experienced. But it was six o'clock, and we must travel. Fortifying ourselves with coffee and a little meat, and relying for defence in case of extremity on a bottle of powerful rum with which we had supplied ourselves, we muffled up with more than usual care, and started for Kihlangi. We devoted ourselves entirely to keeping warm, and during the ride of six hours suffered very little except from the gradual diminution of our bodily temperature. It was a dreary journey, following the course of the Muonio be- tween black, snow-laden forests. The sun rose to a height of seven or eight degrees at meridian ; when we came over the same road, on our way north, he only showed half his disc. At Kihlangi the people recognised us, and were as well disposed as their stupidity would allow. The old woman cooked part of our reindeer joint, which, with half a dozen cups of strong coffee, brought back a comfortable warmth to our extremities. There were still twenty-four miles to be traversed ; the horses were already exhausted, and the temperature only rose to 42 C at mid-day, after 8* I 6(j NORTHERN TRAVEL. which it fell again. We had a terrible journey. Step by step the horses slowly pulled us through the snow, every hour seeming lengthened to a day, as we worked our be- numbed lingers and toes until the muscles were almost powerless, and yet it was dangerous to cease. Gradually the blood grew colder in the main channels ; insidious chills succeeded, followed by a drowsy torpor, like that which is produced by a heavy dose of opium, until we were fain to have recourse to the rum, a horrid, vitriolic beverage, which burned our throats and stomachs like melted lead, yet gave us a temporary relief. We almost despaired of reaching Jokijalka, on finding, about ten o'clock at night, that our postillions had taken us to the village of Kolare, and stopped before a large log house, where they seemed to think we would spend the night. Everybody had gone to bed, we knew not where we were and had set our hearts upon the comfortable guest's room at Jokijalki. It was impossible to make the fellowb understand me, but' they saw that we were angry, and after a short consultation passed on. We again entered the snowy woods, which were dimly lighted up by an aurora be- hind us a strange, mysterious, ghastly illumination, like the phosphorescent glow of a putrefying world. We were desperately cold, our very blood freezing in our veins, and our limbs numb and torpid. To keep entirely awake was impossible. We talked incessantly, making random answers, as continual fleeting dreams crossed the current of our ecu- Boiousness. A heavy thump on the back was pardoned by him who received it, and a punch between the eyes would have been thankfully accepted had it been necessary. EXPERIENCES JF ARCTIC WLATHEM. 167 At last, at lust, Kolare church on the river bank came in flight ; we crossed to the Russian side, and drove into th yard of the inn. It was nearly midnight, 47 below zero and we had been for seventeen hours exposed to such a tern perature. Everybody had long been asleep. Locks and bolts are unknown, however, so we rushed into the family room, lit fir splinters, and inspected the faces of the sleeping group until we found the landlord, who arose and kindled a fresh fire in the milk -room. They made us coffee and a small bed, saying that the guest's room was too cold, which indeed it was, being little less than the outside temperature On opening the door in the morning, the cold air rushed in as thick and white as steam. We had a little meat cooked, but could not eat enough, at such an early hour, to supply much fuel. As for taking anything with us for refreshment on the road, it was out of the question. One of our Finns turned back to Muoniovara with the laziest horse, and we got another from our Russian landlord. But it was a long, long journey to the next station (twenty miles), and the continuance of the extreme cold began to tell upon us. This part of the road was very heavy, as on the journey up seemingly a belt of exposed country where the snow drifts more than elsewhere. At Kexisvara are found two of the three pleasant women, who cooked our last fragment of reindeer meat, and sent off for horses to Kardis. We here parted with our other Finn, very glad to get rid of his horse, and take a fresh start We had no difficulty now in making our way with the people, as they all recognised us and remembered our over- payments ; besides which, 1 had enlarged my Finnish voc 168 NORTHERN TRAVEL. bulary at Muoniovara. Our horse.- were bettor, our sletliro? lighter and we were not long in reaching the iron-works at Kengis, which we passed at dusk. I should willingly have sailed upon the hospitable bruk-patrnn, but we were in too great a hurry to get out of the frigid zone. We were warmed by our meal, and sang lustily as we slid down the Tornea, finding its dreary, sparsely settled banks cheerful and smiling by contrast with the frightful solitudes we had left. After some hours the postillion stopped before a house on the Swedish bank to hay his horses. We went up and found a single inhabitant, a man who was splitting fir for torches, but the conversation was limited to alternate puffs from our pipes There was a fine aurora behind us a low arch of white fire, with streamers radiating outward, shifting and dancing along its curve. It was nearly ten o'clock before we reached Kardis, half unconscious from the cold. Our horse ran into the wr-nig place, and we lost sight of the baggage-sled, our only guide in the darkness. We could no longer trust the animal's in- stinct, but had to depend on our own. which is perhaps truer at least, I have often found in myself traces of that blind, unreasoning faculty which guides the bee and the bird, and have never been deceived in trusting to it We found the inn, and carried a cloud of frozen vapor into the kitchen with US; as we opened the door. The graceful wreaths of ice-smoke rolled before our feet, as before those of ascending saints in the old pictures, but ourselves, hair from head to foot, except two pairs of eyes, which looked out through icy loop-holes, resembled the reverse of saints. I told the land- lord in Finnish that we wanted to sleep "mm tarvi nuku EXPERIKNCKS OK ARCTIC VVI.ATHKK. J69 a." He pointed to a bed in the corner, out of which rose a sick girl, of about seventeen, very pale, and evidently suffer- ing. They placed some benches near the fire, removed the bedding and disposed her as comfortably as the place per- mitted. We got some hot milk and hard bread, threw some reindeer skins on the vacant truck, and lay down, but not 1o uleep nuch. The room was so close and warm, and the dozen persons in it so alternately snoring and restless, that our rest was con Liuualiy disturbed. We, therefore, rose early 11 id aroused the lazy natives. The cold was still at 47 below zero. The roads were so much better, however, that we descended again to our own runners, and our lively horses trotted rapidly down the Torne'i. The signs of settlement and comparative civilisa- tion which nuw increased with every mile were really cheer- iiu- Part of our way lay through the Swedish woods and over the intervening mora. COI'KXHAGEN. 223 not include meals, which are furnished at a fixed price, amounting to $6 more. The time occupied by the voyage varut-; from two and a half to four days. In the night we passed through the lock at Sdderteljc, where St. Olaf. when a heathen Viking, cut a channel for his ships into the long Baltic estuary which here closely approaches the lake, and in the morning found ourselves running down the eastern shore of Sweden, under the shelter of its fringe of jagged rocky islets. Towards noon we left the Baltic, and steamed up the long, narrow Bay of S5derk5ping, passing, on the way, the magnificent ruins of Stegeborg Castle, the first mediae- val relic I had seen in Sweden. Its square massive walls, and tall round tower of grey stone, differed in no respect from those of cotemporary ruins in Germany. Before reaching S5derkoping, we entered the canal, a very complete and substantial work of the kind, about eighty feet in breadth, but much more crooked than would seem to be actually necessary. For this reason the boats make but moderate speed, averaging not more than six or seven milea an hour, exclusive of the detention at the locks. The country is undulating, and neither rich nor populous before reaching the beautiful Rox-en Lake, beyond which we en tered upon a charming district. Here the canal rises, by eleven successive locks, to the rich uplands separating the Iloxen from the Wetter, a prently rolling plain, chequered, so far as the eve could ivach. with pveii squares uf spring- ing wheat and the dark mould of the newly ploughed bar- ley fields. While the boat was passing the locks, we walk- ed forward to a curious old church, called Yreta K luster. The building dates from the year 1128, and contains the 324 \ORTHKRX TRVVEL. tombs of three Swedish kings, together with that of tht Count Douglas, who fled hither from Scotland in the time of Cromwell. The Douglas estate is in this neighbour- hood, and is, I believe, still in the possession of the family. The church must at one time have presented a fine, vener- able appearance : but all its dark rich colouring and gilding are now buried under a thick coat of white wash. We had already a prophecy of the long summer days of the North, in the perpetual twilight which lingered in the sky, moving around from sunset to sunrise. During the second night we crossed the Wetter Lake, which I did not see ; for when I came on deck we were already on the Viken, the most beautiful sheet of water between Stockholm and Gottenburg. Its irregular shores, covered with forests of fir and birch, thrust out long narrow headlands which divide it into deep bays, studded with wild wooded islands. But the scenery was still that of winter, except in the absence of ice and snow. We had not made much southing, but we ex- pected to find the western side of Sweden much warmer than the eastern. The highest part of the canal, more than 300 feet above the sea, was now passed, however, and oa we des- cended the long barren hills towards the Wener Lukft I found a few early wild flowers in the woods. In the afteinoon we same upon the Wener, the third lake in Europe, b^ing one hundred miles in extent by about fifty in breadth. To the west, it spread away to a level line against #he sky ; but, as I looked southward. I perceived two opposite promontories, with scattered islands between, dividing the body of water into almost equal portions. The scenery of the Wener has great resemblance to that of the northern portion of Lake JOURNEY TC GOTTEXI5URG AND COPENHAGEN Michigan. Further down on the eastern shore, the hill oi Kinuekulle, the highest land in Southern Sweden, rises tc the height of nearly a thousand feet above the water, with a graceful and very gradual sweep ; but otherwise the scenery s rather tame, and, I suspect, depends for most of its beauty upon the summer foliage. There were two or three intelligent and agreeable pas- Bengers on board, who showed a more than usual knowledge of America and her institutions. The captain, however, as we walked the deck together, betrayed the same general im- pression which prevails throughout the Continent (Germany in particular), that we are a thoroughly material people, having little taste for or appreciation of anything which is not practical and distinctly utilitarian. Nothing can be further from the truth ; yet I have the greatest difficulty in making people comprehend that a true feeling for science, art. and literature can co-exist with our great practical genius There is more intellectual activity in the Free States than in any other part of the world, a more general cultivation, and, taking the collective population, I venture to say, a more enlightened taste. Nowhere ;ire greater sums spent for books and works of art, or for the promotion oi scientific objects. Yet this cry of " Materialism" has be- come the cant and slang of European talk concerning Amer- ica, and is obtruded so frequently and so offensively that 1 have sometimes been inclined to doubt whether the good breeding of Continental society has not been too highly rated. While on the steamer, I heard a \ interesting story of a Swedish nobleman, who is at present attempting a practica' 226 NORTHERN TRAVEL. | protest against the absurd and fossilised ideas by which his class is governed. The nobility of Sweden are as proud as they are poor, and, as the father's title is inherited by each of his sons, the country is overrun with Counts and Barons who, repudiating any means of support that is not somehow connected with the service of the government, live in a con- tinual state of debt and dilapidation. Count R , how- ever, has sense enough to know that honest labor is alwaya bouourable, and has brought up his' eldest son to earn hig living by the work of his own hands. For the past three years, the latter has been in the United States, working as a day-labourer on farms and on Western railroads. His ex- periences, I learn, have not been agreeable, but he is a young man of too much spirit and courage to give up the attempt, and has hitherto refused to listen to the entreaties of his family, that he shall come home and take charge of one of his father's estates. The second son is now a clerk in a mercantile house in Gottenburg, while the Count has given his daughter in marriage to a radical and untitled editor, whose acquaintance I was afterwards so fortunate as to make, and who confirmed the entire truth of the story. We were to pass the locks at Trollhitta in the middle of the night, bnt I determined to visit the celebrated falls of the Gdtha River, even at such a time, and gave orders that we should be called. The stupid boy, however, woke up th wrong passenger, and the last locks were reached before the mistake was discovered. By sunrise we had reached Lilla Edet, on the GStha River, where the buds were swelling on the early trees, and the grass, in sunny places, showed a little sprouting greenness. We shot rapidly down the swifl JOURNEtf TO GOTTENBURG AND COPENHAGEN. 227 brown stream, between brown, bald, stony hills, whose forests have all been stripped off to feed the hostile camp-fires of past centuries. Bits of bottom land, held in the curves of the river, looked rich and promising, and where the hills fell back a little, there were groves and country-houses but th scenery, in general, was bleak and unfriendly, until we drew near Gotteuburg. Two round, detached forts, built accord- ing to Vauban's ideas (which the Swedes say he stole from Sweden, where they were already in practice) announced our approach, and before noon we were alongside the pier. Here, to my great surprise, a Custom-house officer appeared and asked us to open our trunks. " But we came by the canal from Stockholm !" " That makes no difference," he replied; " your luggage must be examined." I then appealed to the saptain, who stated that, in consequence of the steamer's being obliged to enter the Baltic waters for two or three hours between Sodertelje and Soderkoping, the law took it for granted that we might have boarded some foreign vessel during that time and procured contraband goods. In other words, though sailing in a narrow sound, between the Swed- ish islands and the Swedish coast, we had virtually been in a foreign country ! It would scarcely be believed that this sagacious law is of quite recent enactment. We remained until the next morning in Gottenburg. This is, in every respect, a more energetic and wide- awake place than Stockholm. It has not the same unrivalled beauty of position, but is more liberally laid out and kept in better order. Although the population is only about 40,000, its commerce is much greater than that of the capital and so are, proportionately, its wealth and public spirit 228 NORTHERN TRAVEL. The Magister Hedlund, a very intelligent and accomplished gentleman, to whom I had a letter from Mfigge, the novelist, took me up the valley a distance of five or six miles, to a very picturesque village among the hills, which is fast growing into a manufacturing town. Large cotton, woollen and paper mills bestride a strong stream, which has such a tall that it leaps from one mill-wheel to another for the distance of nearly half a mile. On our return, we visited a number of wells hollowed in the rocky strata of the hills, to which the country people have given the name of " The Giant's Pots." A clergyman of the neighbourhood, even, has written a pamphlet to prove that they were the work of the antediluvian giants, who excavated them for the purpose of mixing dough for their loaves of bread and batter for their puddings. They are simply those holes which a peb- ble grinds in a softer rock, under the rotary action of a cur- rent of water, but on an immense scale, some of them being ten feet in diameter, by fifteen or eighteen in depth. At Herr Hedlund's house, I met a number of gentlemen, whose courtesy and intelligence gave me a very favourable impres- sion of the society of the place. The next morning, at five o'clock, the steamer Viken, from Christiania, arrived, and we took passage for Copen- hagen. After issuing from the Skdrgaard, or rocky archi- pelago which protects the approach to Gottenbur? from the sea, we made a direct course to Elsinore, down the Swedish coast, but too distant to observe more than its general out- line. This part of Sweden, however the province of Halland is very rough and stony, and not until after passing the Sound does one see the fertile hills and vales of JOURNEY TO GOTTENBtTRG ANT) COPENHAGEN. 229 Scania. The Cattegat was as smooth as an inland sea, and our voyage could not have been pleasanter. In the afternoon Zealand rose blue from the wave, and the increase in the number of small sailing craft denoted our approach to the Sound. The opposite shores drew nearer to each other, and finally the spires of Helsingborg, on the Swedish shore, and the square mass of Kronborg Castle, under the guns of which the Sound dues have been so long demanded, appeared in sight. In spite of its bare, wintry aspect, the panorama was charming. The picturesque Gothic buttresses and gables of Kronborg rose above the zigzag of its turfed out- works ; beyond were the houses and gardens of HelsingSr (Elsinore) while on the glassy breast of the Sound a fleet of merchant vessels lay at anchor, and beyond, the fields and towES of Sweden gleamed in the light of the setting sun. Yet here, again, I must find fault with Campbell, splendid lyrist as he is. We should have been sailing " By thy wild and stormy steep, Elainore !" only that the level shore, with its fair gardens and groves, wouldn't admit the possibility of such a thing. The music of the line remains the same, but you must not read it on the spot There was a beautiful American clipper at anchor off the Castle. " There," said a Danish passenger to me, " is one jf the ships which have taken from us the sovereignty of the Sound." " I am very glad of it,'' I replied ; " and I can only Bonder v, hy the mar time nations of Europe have so long robmitted to such an imposition." " I am glad, also," said 11 230 NORTHERN TRAVEL. he, " that the question has at last been settled, and our pri vilege given up and I believe we are all, even the Govern- ment itself, entirely satisfied with the arrangement." 1 heard the same opinion afterwards expressed in Copenhagen and felt gratified, as an American, to hear the result attri buted to the initiative taken by our Government ; but I also remembered the Camden and Amboy Railroad Company, and could not help wishing that the same principle might be applied at home. We have a Denmark, lying between New-York and Philadelphia, and I have often paid satta dues for crossing her territory. At dusk, we landed under the battlements of Copenhagen. "Are you travellers or merchants?" asked the Custom-house officers. "Travellers," we replied. "Then," was the an- swer, ' there is no necessity for examining your trunks," and we were politely ushered out at the opposite door, and droTc without further hindrance to a hotel. A gentleman from Stockholm had said to me : " When you get to Copenhagen you will find yourself in Europe :" and 1 was at once struck with the truth of his remark. Although Copenhagen is b) no means a commercial city scarcely more so than Stock- holm its streets are gay, brilliant and bustling, and have an air of life and joyousness which contrasts strikingly with the gravity of the latter capital. From without, it makes very little impression, being built on a low, level ground; and surrounded by high earthen fortifications, but its inte- rior is full of quaint and attractive points. There is already a strong admixture of the German element in the population, Hoftening by its warmth and frankness the Scandinavian eeerve. In their fondness for out-door recreation, the Daiief JOURNEY TO GOTTEN BURG AKD COPENHAGEN. 23i quite equal the Viennese, and their Summer-garden ci Tivoli is one of the largest and liveliest in all Europe. In costume, there is such a thing as individuality ; in manners, somewhat of independence. The Danish nature appears to be more pliant and flexible than the Swedish, but I canno judge whether the charge of inconstancy and dissimulation, which I have heard brought against it, is just. With regard to morals, Copenhagen is said to be an improvement upon Stockholm. During our short stay of three days, we saw the prin- cipal sights of the place. The first, and one of the plea- santest to me, was the park of Rosenberg Palace, with its fresh, green turf, starred with dandelions, and its grand avenues of chestnuts and lindens, just starting into leaf. On the llth of May, we found spring at last, after six months of uninterrupted winter. 1 don't much enjoy going the round of a new city, attended by a valet-de-place, and performing the programme laid down by a guide-book, nor is it an agreeable task to describe such things in catalogue style; so I shall merely say that the most interesting things in Copenhagen are the Museum of Northern Antiquities, the Historical Collections in Rosenborg Palace, Thorwald- sen's Museum, and 1,he Church of our Lady, containing the great sculptor's statues of Christ and the Apostles. We have seen very good casts of the latter in New- York, but one must visit the Museum erected by the Danish people, which is also Thorwaldsen's mausoleum, to learn the num- oer, variety and beauty of his worka Here are the caste of between three and four hundred statues, busts and bas NORTHERN TRAVEL. reliefs, with a number in marble. No artist h:is e/er had s Hans Chris tian Andersen, reminding him of the greeting which he had nee sent me through a rnutua' friend, and asking him to appoint an hour for me to call upon him. The same after- noon, as I was sitting in my room, the door quietly opened, and a tall, loosely-jointed figure entered. He wore a neat *rening dress of black, with a white cravat ; his head was thrown back, and his plain, irregular features wore an ex- pression of the greatest cheerfulness and kindly humour. I recognised him at once, and forgetting that we had never met so much did beseem like an old, familiar acquaintance cried out " Andersen !" and jumped up to greet him. " Ah,' J said he stretching out both his hands, "here you are! Now I should have been vexed if you had gone through Copenha- gen and I had not known it." He sat down, and I had a delightful hour's chat with him. One sees the man so plain- ly in his works, that his readers may almost be said to know him personally. He is thoroughly simple and natural, and those who call him egotistical forget that his egotism is only a naive and unthinking sincerity, like that of a child. In fact, he is the youngest man for his years that I ever knew. u When I was sixteen," said he, " I used to think to myself, ' when I am twenty-four, then will I be old indeed' but now [ am fifty-two, and I have just the same feeling of youth as at twenty." He was greatly delighted when Braisted, whc was in the room with me, spoke of having read his " Impro- fisatore" in the Sandwich Islands. " Why, is it possible T JOURNEY TO GOTTENBURG ANL> COPENHAGEN 233 he exclaimed: " when I hear of my bt was visible! but at a con- siderable distance, all day. Fleeting gleams of sunshine 11* 238 NORTHERN TRAVEL sometimes showed the broken inland ranges of mountains with jagged saw-tooth peaks shooting up here and there, When night came there was no darkness, but a strong golden gleam, whereby one could read until after ten o'clock. We reached the mouth of Christiania Fjord a little after mid- night, and most of the passengers arose to view the scenery After passing the branch which leads to Drammen, the fjord contracts so as to resemble a river or one of our island-stud- ded New England lakes The alternation of bare rocky islets, red-ribbed cliffs, fir-woods, grey-green birchen groves, tracts of farm land, and red-frame cottages, rendered this part of the voyage delightful, although, as the morning ad- vanced, we saw everything through a gauzy veil of rain. Finally, the watering-pot was turned on again, obliging even oil cloths to beat a retreat to the cabin, and so continued until we reached Christiania. After a mild custom-house visitation, not a word being said about passports, we stepped ashore in republican Norway, and were piloted by a fellow-passenger to the Victoria Hotel, where an old friend awaited me. He who had walked with me in the colonnades of Karnak, among the sands of Kom- Oinbos, and under the palms of Philae, was there to resume our old companionship on the bleak fjelds of Norway and on the shores of the Arctic Sea. We at once set about prepar- ing for the journey. First, to the banker's who supplied me with a sufficient quantity of small money for the post-sta (ions on the road to Drontheim ; then, to a seller of carrioles of whom we procured three, at $> 36 apiece, to be resold tc him for $24, at the expiration of two months ; and then tc supply ourselves with maps, posting- bor k, hummer, nailp RETURN TO THE NORTH. CHIUSTIAN1 . 235 rope, gimlets, and other necessary helps in case of a break- down. The carriole (carry-all, lucus a non lucendn, be- cause it only carries one) is the national Norwegian vehicle, and deserves special mention. It resembles a reindeer-pulk mounted on a pair of wheels, with long, flat, flexible asi, shafts, and no springs. The seat, much like the stern of a canoe, and rather narrow for a traveller of large basis, slopes down into a trough for the feet, with a dashboard in front. Youi single valise is strapped on a flat board behind, upon which your postillion sits. The whole machine resemble? an American sulky in appearance, except that it is spring- less, and nearly the whole weight is forward of the axle, We also purchased simple and strong harness, which easily accommodates itself to any horse. Christiania furnishes a remarkable example of the pro- gress which Norway has made since its union with Sweden and the adoption of a free Constitution. In its signs of growth and improvement, the city reminds one of an Amer- ican town. Its population has risen to 40,000, and though inferior to Gottenburg in its commerce, it is only surpassed by Stockholm in size. The old log houses of which it once was built have almost entirely disappeared ; the streets arc broad, tolerably paved, and have what Stockholm cannot yet boast of decent side-walks. From the little nucleus o the old town, near the water, branch off handsome new streets, where you often come suddenly from stately three-story blocks upon the rough rock and meadow land. The broad Carl- John n sgade, leading directly to the imposing white front of the Royal Palace, upon an eminence in the rear ol the city, is worthy of any European capital. On the old 40 NOUT1IHKX TRAVEL. market square a very handsome market hall of brick, u Bern i-Byzan tine style, has recently been erected, and the only apparent point in which Christiania has not kept up with the times, is the want of piers for her shipping. A railroad, about forty miles in length, is already in operation as far as Eidsvold, at the foot of the long Miosen Lake, OD which steamers ply to Lillehammer, at its head, affording an outlet for the produce of the fertile Guldbrandsdal and the adjacent country. The Norwegian Constitution is ip almost all respects as free as that of any American state, and it is cheering to see what material well-being and solid pro- gress have followed its adoption. The environs of Christiania are remarkably beautiful. Prom the quiet basin of the fjord, which vanishes between blue, interlocking islands to the southward, the knd rises gradually on all sides, speckled with smiling country-seats and farm-houses, which trench less and less on the dark evergreen forests as they recede, until the latter keep their old dominion and sweep in unbroken lines to the summits of the mountains on either hand. The ancient citadel of Aggershus, perched upon a rock, commands the approach to the city, fine old linden trees rising above its white walls and tiled roofs; beyond, over the trees of the palace park, in which stand the new Museum and University, towers the long palace-front, behind which commences a range of villas and gardens, stretching westward around a deep bight of th fjord, until they reach the new palace of Oscar-hall, on peninsula facing the city. As we floated over the glassy water, in a skiff, on the ;ifternoon following our arrival, watching the scattered sun-gleams move across the lovelj RETURN T-- THE NOKTH. CHKlSTlAXlA. 241 panorama, we found it difficult to believe that we were in the latitude of Greenland. The dark, rich green of the fo- liage, the balmy odours which filled the air, the deep UUP of the distant hills and islands, and the soft, warm colors of the houses, all belonged to the south. Only the air, fresh without being cold, elastic, and exciting, not a delicious opiate, was wholly northern, and when I took a swim under the castle walls, I found that the water was northern too. It was the height of summer, and the showers of roses in the gardens, the strawberries and cherries in the market, show that the summer's best gifts are still enjoyed here. The English were off the next day with their dogs, guns, fishing tackle, waterproofs, clay pipes, and native language, except one, who became home-sick and went back in the next steamer; We also prepared to set out for Ringerike, the ancient dominion of King Ring, on our way to the Dovre-fjeld and Drontheim. NORTHERN TRAVE1 CHAPTER XXI. INCIDENTS OP CARRIOLE TRAVEL. IT is rather singular that whenever you are about to start upon a new journey, you almost always fall in with some one who has just made it, and who overwhelms you with all sorts of warning and advice. This- has happened to me so frequently that I have long ago ceased to regard any such communications, unless the individual from whom they come inspires me with more than usual confidence. *While in- specting our carrioles at the hotel in Christiania, I was ac- costed by a Hamburg merchant, who had just arrived from Droutheim, by way of the Dovre Fjeld and the MiSsen Lake. " Ah," said he, " those things won't last long. That oil-cloth covering for your luggage will be torn to pieces in a few days by the postillions climbing upon it. Then they hold on to your seat and rip the cloth lining with their long nails; besides, the'rope reins wear the leather off your dash board, and you will be lucky if your wheels and axles don't snap on the rough roads." Now, here was a man who had travelled much in Norway, spoke the language perfectly, and might be supposed to know something ; but his face betray ed thn croaker, and T knew, moreover, that of all fretfully INCIDENTS OF CAUH1OLE TRAVEL. . 243 luxurious men. merchants and especially Xoith-German merchants are the worst, ?<> 1 let him talk and kept my own private opinion unchanged. At dinner he renewed the warnings. ".You will have great delay in getting horses at the stations. The < nly way is to be rough and swaggering, and threaten the people and even that won't always answer." Most likely, I thought. " Of course you have a supply of provisions with you ?' he continued. " No," said I, " I always adopt the diet of the country in which I travel." " But you can't do it here !' he exclaimed in horror, " you can't do it here ! They have no wine, nor no white bread, nor no fresh meat; and they don't know how to cook anything !" " I am perfectly aware of that," I answered; "but as long as I am not obliged to come down to bread made of fir-bark and barley-straw, as last winter in Lapland, I shall not complain." ' k You pos- sess the courage of a hero if you can do such a thing ; but you will not start now, in this rain I" We answered by bidding him a polite adieu, for the post-horses had come, and our carrioles were at the door. As if to reward out resolution, the rain, which had been falling heavily all the morning, ceased at that moment, and the grey blanket of heaven broke and rolled up into loose masses of cloud. I mounted into the canoe-shaped seat, drew the leathern apron over my legs, and we set out, in single tile, through the streets of Christiania. The carriole, as I have already said, has usually no springs (ours had none at least), except those whicli it makes in bounding over the stones. We had not gone a hundred yards before I was ready to cry out "Lord, have mercy upon me !" Such a shattering of the NORTHERN TRAVEL. joints, such a vibration of the vertebrae, such a churning of the viscera, I had not felt since travelling by banghy-cart ID India. Breathing went on by fits and starts, between the iolts ; ray teeth struck together so that I put away my pipe, iest 1 should bite off the stem, and the pleasant sensation rf having been pounded in every limb crept on apace. Once off the paving-stones, it was a little better ; beyond the hard turnpike which followed, better still ; and on the gravel and sand of the first broad hill, we found the travel easy enough to allay our fears. The two skydsbonder, or postillions, who accompanied us, sat upon our portmanteaus, and were continually jumping off to lighten the ascent of the hills. The descents were achieved at full trotting speed, the horses leaning back, supporting themselves against the weight of the carrioles, and throwing out their feet very firmly, so as to avoid the danger of slipping. Thus, no matter how steep the hill, they took it with perfect assurance and boldness. never making a stumble. There was just sufficient risk left, however, to make these flying descents pleasant and exhilar- ating. Our road led westward, over high hills and across deep valleys, down which we had occasional glimpses of the blue fjord and its rocky islands. The grass and grain were a rich, dark green, sweeping into a velvety blue in the dis- tance, and against this deep ground, the bright red of the houses showed with strong effect a contrast which was sub- lued and harmonised by the still darker masses of the ever- green forests, covering the mountain ranges. At the endol twelve or thirteen miles we reached the first post-stati6n, at the foot of the mountains which bound the inland prospecl INCIDENTS OF CARRIOLE TRA, EL 24fi from Christiania on the west. As it was not a ''fast sta. tion, we were subject to the possibility of waiting trfo or three hours for horses, but fortunately were accosted on the road by one of the farmers who supply the skyds, and changed at his house. The Norwegian skyds differs from the Swedish skjuts in having horses ready only at the fast stations, which are comparatively few, while at all others you must wait from one to three hours, according to the dis- tance from which the horses must be "brought. In Sweden there are always from two to four horses ready, and you are only obliged to wait after these are exhausted. There, alsOj the regulations are better, and likewise more strictly en- forced. It is, at best, an awkward mode of travelling very pleasant, when everything goes rightly, but very an- noying when otherwise. We now commenced climbing the mountain by a series of terribly steep ascents, every opening in the woods disclosing a wider and grander view backward over the lovely Chris- tiania Fjord and the intermediate valleys. Beyond the crest we came upon a wild mountain plateau, a thousand feet above the sea, and entirely covered with forests of spruce and fir. It was a black and dismal region, under the low- ering sky : not a house or a grain field to be seen, and thus *e drove for more than two hours, to the solitary inn of Krogkleven, where we stopped for the night in order to visit the celebrated King's View in the morning. We got a tol- erable supper and good beds, sent off a messenger to the station of Sundvolden, at the foot of the mountain, to order horses for us, and set out soon after sunrise, piloted by th landlord's son, Olaf. Half an hour's walk through the for- 246 NORTHERN TRAVEL. est brought us to a pile of rocks on the crest si the moun tain, which fell away abruptly to the westward. At our feet lay the Tyri Fjord, with its deeply indented shores and its irregular, scattered islands, shining blue and bright in the morning sun, while away beyond it stretched a grea semicircle of rolling hills covered with green farms, dotted with red farm-houses, and here and there a white church glimmering like a spangle on the breast of the landscape. Behind this soft, warm, beautiful region, rose dark, wooded hills, with lofty mountain-ridges above them, until, far and faint, under and among the clouds, streaks of snow betrayed some peaks of the Nore Fjeld, sixty or seventy miles dis- tant. This is one of the most famous views in Norway, and has been compared to that from the Righi, but without sufficient reason. The sudden change, however, from the gloomy wilderness through which you first pass to the sunlit picture of the enchanting lake, and green, inhabited hills and valleys, may well excuse the raptures of travellers. Ringer- ike, the realm of King Ring, is a lovely land, not only as Been from this eagle's nest, but when you have descended upon its level. I believe the monarch's real name was Halfdan the Black. So beloved was he in life that after death his body was divided into four portions, so that each province might possess some part of him. Yet the noblest fume is transitory, and nobody now knows exactly where my one of his quarters was buried. A terrible descent, through a chasm between perpendicular cliffs some hundreds of feet in height, leads from Krogkleven to the level of the Tyri Fjord. There is no attempt here, nor indeed upon the most of the Norwegian roads we trav INCIDENTS OK CARRIOLE FRAVKL. 5^47 elled, to mitigate, by well-arranged curves, the steepness ol the hills. Straight down you go, no matter of how break- neck a character the declivity may be. There are no drags to the carrioles and country carts, and were not the nativi horses the toughest and surest-footed little animals in th world, this sort of travel would be trying to the nerves. Our ride along the banks of the Tyri Fjord, in the clear morning sunshine, was charming. The scenery was strik- ingly like that on the lake of Zug, in Switzerland, and we missed the only green turf, which this year's rainless spring had left brown and withered. In all S\veden we had seen no such landscapes, not even in Norrland. There, however, the people carried off the palm. We found no farm-houses here so stately and clean as the Swedish, no such symmet- rical forms and frank, friendly faces. The Norwegians are big enough, and strong enough, to be sure, but their car- riage is awkward, and their faces not only plain but ugly. The countrywomen we saw were remarkable in this latter respect, but nothing could exceed their development of waist, bosom and arms. Here is the stuff of which Vikings were made, I thought, but there has been no refining or ennobling since those times. These are the rough primitive formations of the human race the bare granite and gneiss, from which sprouts no luxuriant foliage, but at best a few simple and hardy flowers. I found much less difficulty in communicat ing with the Norwegians than 1 anticipated. The languag is so similar to the Swedish that I used the latter, with a few alterations, and easily made myself understood. Thfl Norwegian dialect, I imagine, stands in about the same re lation to pure Danish as the Scotch does to the English 5>48 NORTHERN TRAVEL. To my ear, it is less musical and sonorous than the Swedish though it is often accented in the same peculiar sing-song way. Leaving the Tyri Fjord, we entered a rolling, well-culti- vated country, with some pleasant meadow scenery. The crops did not appear to be thriving remarkably, probably on account of the dry weather. The hay crop, which the farmers were just cutting, was very scanty ; rye and winter barley were coming into head, but the ears were thin and light, while spring barley and oats were not more than six inches in height. There were many fields of potatoes, how- ever, which gave a better promise. So far as one could judge from looking over the fields, Norwegian husbandry is yet in a very imperfect state, and I suspect that the resour- ses of the soil are not half developed. The whole country was radient with flowers, and some fields were literally mosaics of blue, purple, pink, yellow, and crimson bloom. Clumps of wild roses- fringed the road, and the air was de- licious with a thousand odours. Nature was throbbing with the fullness of her short midsummer life, with that sudden and splendid rebound from the long trance of winter which she nowhere makes except in the extreme north. At KlSkken, which is called a lilsigelse station, where horses must be specially engaged, we were obliged to wait two hours and a half, while they were sent for from a dis- tance of four miles. The utter coolness and indifference ol the people to our desire to get on faster was quite natural, and all the better for them, no doubt, but it was provoking to us. We whiled away a part of the time with breakfast which wa* composed mainly of boiled eggs and an immense INCIDENTS OF CARRIOLE TRATEL. 249 dish uf wild strawberries, of very small size but e fragrant flavour. The next station brought (*s to Vaa- bunden, at the head of the beautiful Randsfjord, which was luckily a fast station, and the fresh horses were forthcoming n two minutes. Our road all the afternoon lay along the eastern bank of the Fjord, coursing up and down the hills through a succession of the loveliest landscape pictures. This part of Norway will bear a comparison with the softer parts of Switzerland, such as the lakes of Zurich and Thun. The hilly shores of the Fjord were covered with scattered farms, the villages being merely churches with half a dozen houses clustered about them. At sunset we left the lake and climbed a long wooded mountain to a height of more than two thousand feet. It was n weary pull until we reached the summit, but we rolled swiftly down the other side to the inn of Teterud, our des- tination, which we reached about 10 P.M. It was quite light enough to read, yet every one was in bed, and the place seemed deserted, until we remembered what latitude we were in. Finally, the landlord appeared, followed by a girl, whom, on account of her size and blubber, Braisted compared to a cow- whale. She had been turned out of her bed to make room fur us, and we two instantly rolled into the warm hollow she had left, my Nilotic friend occupying a separate bed in another corner. The guests' room was an immense apartment ; eight sets of quadrilles might have been danced in it at one time. The walls were hung with extraordinary pictures of the Six Days of Creation, in which the Almighty was represented as an old man dressed in a long gown, with i peculiarly good-humoured leer suggesting a wink, on hi 250 NORTHERN I'RAVia face. I have frequently seen the same series of pictures in the Swedish inns. In the morning I was aroused by Brai- Bted exclaiming, " There she blows !'' and the whale came up to the surface with a huge pot of coffee, some sugar candy, excellent cream, and musty biscuit. It was raining when we started, and I put on a light coat, purchased in London, and recommended in the advertisement as being " light in texture, gentlemanly in appearance, and impervious to wet," with strong doubts of its power to resist a Norwegian rain. Fortunately, it was not put to a severe test, we had passing showers only, heavy, though short. The country, between the Randsfjord and the Miosen Lake was open and rolling, everywhere under cultivation, and ap- parently rich and prosperous. Our road was admirable, and we rolled along at the rate of one Norsk mile (seven miles) an hour, through a land in full blossom, and an atmosphere of vernal odors. At the end of the second station we struck the main road from Christiania to Drontheim. In the sta- tion-house I found translations of the works of Dickens and Captain Chamier on the table. The landlord was the most polite and attentive Norwegian we had seen ; but he made us pay for it, charging one and a half marks apiece for a break- fast of boiled eggs and cheese. Starting again in a heavy shower, we crossed the crest ol a hill, and saw all at once the splendid Midsen Lake spread out before us, the lofty Island of Helge, covered with farms and forests, lying in the centre of the ojcture. Our road went northward along the side of the vast, sweeping slope oi farm-land which bounds- the lake on the west. Its rouirh and muddy condition showed how little land-travel there if INCIDENTS OF CARRIOLE TRAVEL. 25J at present, since the establishment of a daily line of steamer? on the lake. At the station of Gjovik, a glass furnace situated in a wooded little dell on the shore, I found a young Norwegian who spoke tolerable English, and who seemed astounded at our not taking the steamer in preference to OUT carrioles. He hardly thought it possible that we could be poing all the way to Lillehammer, at the head of the lake, oy the land road. When we set out, our postillion took a way leading up the hills in the rear of the place. Knowing that our course was along the shore, we asked him if we were on the road to Sveen, the next station. " Oh, yes ; it's all right," said he, " this is a new road." It was. in truth, a superb highway ; broad and perfectly macadamised, and leading along the brink of a deep rocky chasm, down which thundered a powerful stream. From the top of this glen we struck inland, keeping more and more to the westward. Again we asked the postillion, and again received the same answer. Finally, when we had travelled six or seven miles, and the lake had wholly disappeared, I stopped and de- manded where Sveen was. ' Sveen is not on this road,'' he answered ; " we are going to Mustad !" " But," I exclaimed, ' we are bound for Sveen and Lillehammer !" " Oh, v said ho, with infuriating coolness, "you can go there after' wards /" You may judge that the carrioles were whirled iround in a hurry, and that the only answer to the fellow's remonstrances was a shaking by the neck which frightened him into silence. We drove back to Gj6vik in a drenching shower, which failed to col our anger. On reaching the station I at once made a complaint against the postillion, and the landlord NORTHERN TRAVEL called a man who spoke good English, to settle the inattei The latter brought me a bill of $2 for going to Mustad and back. Knowing that the horses belonged to farmers, whc were not to blame in the least, we had agreed to pay for their use ; but I remonstrated against paying the full price when we had not gone the whole distance, and had not in tended to go at all. " Why, then, did yju order horses foi Mustad?" he asked. " I did no such thing!'' I exclaimed, in amazement. " You did !" he persisted, and an investiga- tion ensued, which resulted in the discovery that the Nor- wegian who had advised us to go by steamer, had gratui- tously taken upon himself to tell the landlord to send Q3 to the Randsfjord, and had given the postillion similar lirections ! The latter, imagining, perhaps, that we didn't actually know our own plans, had followed his instructions. I must say that I never before received such an astonishing mark of kindness. The ill-concealed satisfaction of the people at our mishap made it all the more exasperating. The end of it was that two or three marks were taken ofl the account, nhich we then paid, and in an hour afterwards phipped ouielves and carrioles on board a steamer for Lillehampiw. The Norwegian who had caused all this trouble came along just before we embarked, and heard the story with the most sublime indifference, proffering not a word of apology, regret, or explanation. Judging from this specimen, the King of Sweden and Norway has good reason to style himself King of the Goths and Vandals. I was glad, nevertheless, that we had an opportunity oi seeing the Miosen, from the deck of a steamer. Moving over the 'assy pale-green water, midway between its shores IM.'IUENTS OP CARRIOLE TRAVEL. 253 we had a far better exhibition of its beauties than from the land-road. It is a superb piece of water, sixty miles in length by from two to five in breadth, with mountain shores of picturesque and ever-varying outline. The lower slopes re farm land, dotted with the large g-aards, or mansions of the farmers, many of which have a truly stately air ; be- yond them are forests of fir, spruce, and larch, while in the glens between, winding groves of birch, alder, and ash come down to fringe the banks of the lake. Wandering gleams of sunshine, falling through the broken clouds, touched here and there the shadowed slopes and threw belts of light upon the water and these illuminated spots finely relieved the otherwise sombre depth of colour. Our boat was slow, and we had between two and three hours of unsurpassed scenery before reaching our destination. An immense raft of timber gathered from the loose logs which are floated down the Lougen Elv, lay at the head of the lake, which contracts into the famous Guldbrandsdal. On the brow of a steep hill on the right lay the little town of Lillehammer, wher* 1 we were ere long quartered in a very comfortable hotel. 12 254 NORTHERN TRAVEL. CHAPTER XXII. GULDBRAXDSDAL AND THE DOVRE FJELD. We left Lillehammer <>n a heavenly Sabbath morning. Then* was scarcely a cloud in thr sky, the air wa< warm and balmy, and the verdure of the valley, freshened by the previous day's rain, sparkled and glittered in the sun. The Miflsen Lake lay blue and still to the south, and the bald tops of the mountains which inclose Guldbrandsdal stood sharp and clear, and almost shade wless, in the flood of light which streamed up the valley. Of Lillehammer, I can only say that it is a common-place town of about a thousand in- habitants. It had a cathedral and bishop some six hundred years ago, no traces of either of which now remain. We drove out of it upon a splendid new road, leading up the eastern bank of the river, and just high enough on the mountain side to give the loveliest views either way. Our horses were fast and spirited, and the motion of our carrioles over the firmly macadamised road was just sufficient to keep the blood in nimble circulation. Rigid Sabbatarians may be shocked at our travelling on that day ; but there were few hearts in all the churches of Christendom whose hymns of praise were more sincere and devout than ours. TV <;i I.miK \M>SI\I. AM) Till-. DOVRE FJELD 255 Longtn roared an anthem fur us from his rocky oed: the mountain streams, Hashing down their hollow channels; seemed hastening to join it; the mountains themselves stood silent, with uncovered heads ; and over all the pale- blue northern heaven looked lovingly and gladly down i smile of God upon the grateful earth. There is no Sab- bath worship better than the simple enjoyment of such a day. Toward the close of the stage, our road descended to the banks of the Lougen, which here falls in a violent rapid almost a cataract over a barrier of rocks. Masses of wa- ter, broken or wrenched from the body of the river, are hurled intermittently high into the air, scattering as they fall, with fragments of rainbows dancing over them. In this scene I at once recognised the wild landscape by the pencil of Dahl, the Norwegian painter, which had made such an impression upon me in Copenhagen. In Guld- brandsdal, we found at once what we had missed in the Bcenery of Ringerike swift, foaming streams. Here they leapt from every rift of the upper crags, brightening the gloom of the fir-woods which clothed the mountain-sides, like silver braiding upon a funeral garment. This valley is the pride of Norway, nearly as much for its richness as for it.- beauty ami rraiuleur. The houses were larger and more substantial, the Ik-Ids bloominir, with frequent orch- ards of fruit-trees, and the fanners, in their Sunday attire, .-howi'd in their faces a little mure intelligence than the peo- ple we had seen on our way thither. Their countenances had a plain, homely stamp; and of all the large-limbed, strong-backed forms I saw, not one could be called graceful, 256 NORTHERN TRAVEL. or even symmetrical. Something awkward and uncoi.tl stamps the country people of Norway. Honest and simple- minded they are said to be, and probably are ; but of native refinement of feeling they can have little, unless all outward ?igns of character are false. We changed horses at Moshuus, and drove up a leveJ splendid road to Holmen, along the river- bank. The high- way, thus far, is entirely new, and does great credit to Nor- wegian enterprise. There is not a better road in all Europe ; and when it shall be carried through to Drontheim, the ter- rors which this trip has for timid travellers will entirely dis- appear. It is a pity that the skyds system should not be improved in equal ratio, instead of becoming even more in- convenient than at present. Holmen, hitherto a fast sta- tion, is now no longer so ; and the same retrograde change is going on at other places along the road. The waiting at the tilsigelse stations is the great drawback to travelling by skyds in Norway. You must either wait two hours or pay fast prices, which the people are not legally entitled to ask. Travellers may write complaints in the space allotted in the post-books for such things, but with very little result, if one may judge from the perfect indifference which the sta- tion-masters exhibit when you threaten to do so. I was more than once tauntingly asked whether I would not write a complaint. In Sweden, I found but one instance of inat- tention at the stations, during two months' travel, and ex- pected, from the boasted honesty of the Norwegians, to meet with an equally fortunate experience. Travellers, however, and especially Rnglish, are fast teaching the people the usual arts of imposition. ( )h, you hard-shelled, unplastic, insu GULDBRANDSDAL AND THE DOVRE FJELD. 25? lated Englishmen ! You introduce towels and fresh water and tea, and beef-steak, wherever you go, it is true but yob teach high prices, and swindling, and insolence likewise! A short distance beyond Holmen, Ihenew road terminated, and we took the old track over steep spurs of the mountain, rising merely to descend and rise again. The Lougen River here forms a broad, tranquil lake, a mile in width, in which the opposite mountains were splendidly reflected. The water is pale, milky-green colour, which, under certain ef- fccts of light, has a wonderful aerial transparency. As we approached Losnfts. after this long and tedious stage, I was startled by the appearance of a steamer on the ri ver. It is utterly impossible for any to ascend the rapids below Mos- huus ; and she must therefore have been built there. We could discover no necessity for such an undertaking in the thin scattered population and their slow, indifferent habits Her sudden apparition in such a place was like that of an omnibus in the desert. The magnificent vista of the valley was for a time closed by the snowy peaks of the Rundan Fjeld ; but as the direc- tion of the river changed they disappeared, the valley con- tracted, and its black walls, two thousand feet high, almost overhung us. Below, however, were still fresh meadows, twinkling birchen groves and comfortable farm-houses. Out of a gorge on our right, plunged a cataract from a height of eighty or ninety feet, and a little further on, high up the mountain, a gush of braided silver foam burst out of the dark woods, covered with ^learning drapery the face of a huge perpendicular crag, and disappeared in the woods again My friend drew up his horse in wonder and rapture. u ) 258 NORTHERN TRAVEL. know all Switzerland and the Tyrol," he exclaimed, ' out I have never seen a cataract so wonderfully framed ir, the setting of a forest." In the evening, as we approached our destination, two streams on the opposite side of the valleyj f ell from a height of more than a thousand feet, in a series of linked plunges, resembling burnished chains hanging dangling from the tremendous parapet of rock. On the meadow before us, commanding a full view of this wild and glorious scene, stood a stately gaard, entirely deserted, its barns, out-houses and gardens utterly empty and desolate. Its aspect saddened the whole landscape. We stopped at the station of Lillehaave, which had only been established the day before, and we were probably the first travellers who had sojourned there. Consequently the people were unspoiled, and it was quite refreshing to be courteously received, furnished with a trout supper and ex- cellent beds, and to pay therefor an honest price. The morning was lowering, and we had rain part of the day ; but, thanks to our waterproofs and carriole aprons, we kept comfortably dry. During this day's journey of fifty miles, we had very grand scenery, the mountains gradually in- creasing in height and abruptness as we ascended the Guld- brandsdal, with still more imposing cataracts " blowing their trumpets from the steeps." At Viik, I found a complaint in the post-book, written by an Englishman who had come w ith us from Hull, stating that the landlord had made him ay five dollars for beating his dog off his own. The com- plaint was written in English, of course, and therefore use- less so far as the authorities were concerned. The landlord whom I expected, from this account, to find a surly, swind- GVLUIiRANLJSOAL AND THE DOVRE F.'ELD 259 ling fellow, accosted us civilly, and invited us into hia house to see some old weapons, principally battle-axes. There was a cross-bow, a battered, antique sword, and a buff coat, which may have been stripped from one of Sinclair's men in the pass of Kringelen. The logs of his house, or part of them, are said to have been taken from the dwelling in which the saint-king Olaf the apostle of Christianity in the North, was born. They are of the rel Norwegian pine, which has a great durability ; and the legend may be true, although this would make them eight hundred and fifty years old. Colonel Sinclair was buried in the churchyard at Viik, and about fifteen miles further we passed the defile of Kringelen, where his band was cut to pieces. He landed in Romdal's Fjord, on the western coast, with 900 men intend- ing to force his way across the mountains to relieve Stock- holm, which was then (1612) besieged by the Danes. Some three hundred of the peasants collected at Kringelen. gathered together rocks and trunks of trees on the brow of the cliff, and. at a concerted signal, rolled the mass down upon the Scotch, the greater part of whom were crushed to death or hurled into the rivjer. Of the whole force only twc escaped. A wooden tablet on the spot says, as near as 1 could make it out, that there was never such an example ol courage and valour known in the world, and calls upon the people to admire this glorious deed of their fathers. "Cou- M_re and valour;" cried Braisted, indignantly; "it was a owardly butchery ! If they had so much courage, why did ,hey allow 900 Scotchmen to get into t T> e very heart of f he Country before they tried to stop them ?* Well, war ia full 250 KORTHERN TRAVEL. of meanness and cowardice. If it were only fair fighting on an open field, there would be less of it. Beyond Laurgaard, Guldbrandsdal contracts to a uarro* g)rge, down which the Lougen roars in perpetual foam. This pass is called the Rusten ; and the road here is exces- sively steep and difficult. The forests disappear ; only hardy firs and the red pine cling to the ledges of the rocks j and mountains, black, grim, and with snow-streaked sum- mits, tower grandly on all sides. A broad cataract, a hundred feet high, leaped down a chasm on our left, so near to the road that its sprays swept over us, and then shot un- der a bridge to join the seething flood in the frightful gulf beneath. 1 was reminded of the Valley of the Reuss, on the road to St. Gothard, like which, the pass of the Rusten leads to a cold and bleak upper valley. Here we noticed the blight of late frost on the barley fields, and were for the first time assailed by beggars. Black storm-clouds hung over the gorge, adding to the savage wildness of its scenery ; but the sun came out as we drove up the Valley of Dovre, with its long stretch of grain-fields on the sunny sweep of the hillside, sheltered by the lofty Dovre Fjeld behind them. We stopped- for the night at the inn of Toftemoen, long before sunset, although it was eight o'clock, and slept in a half-daylight until morning. The sun was riding high in the heavens when we left, and dark bwering clouds slowly rolled their masses across the mountain-tops. The Lougen was now an inconsiderable erream. and the superb Guldbrandsdal narrowed to a bare, bleak dell, lik; those in the high Alps. The grain-fields had a chilled, struggling appearance: the forests forsook OULDBRAN >SD.\L AND THE DOVRE FJELD. 261 the mountain-sides and throve only in sheltered spots at their b;tses ; the houses were mere log cabins, many of which were slipping off their foundation-posts and tottering to their final fall ; and the people, poorer than ever, came out of their huts to beg openly and shamelessly as we passed Over the head of the valley, which here turns westward to the low water-shed dividing it from the famous Romsdal. rose two or three snow-streaked peaks of the Hurunger Fjeld ; and the drifts filling the ravines of the mountains on our left descended lower and lower into the valley. At Dombaas, a lonely station at the foot of the Dovre Fjeld, we turned northward into the heart of the mountains. My postillion, a boy of fifteen, surprised me by speaking very good English. He had learned it in the school at Drontheim. Sometimes, he said, they had a schoolmaster in the house, and sometimes one at Jerkin, twenty miles distant. Our load ascended gradually through half-cut woods of red pine, for two or three miles, after which it entered a long valley, or rather basin, belonging to the table land of the Dovre Fjeld. Stunted heath and dwarfed juni- per-bushes mixed with a grey, foxy shrub-willow, covered the soil, and the pale yellow of the reindeer moss stained the rocks. Higher greyer and blacker ridges hemmed in the lifeless landscape ; and above them, to the north and west, broad snow-fields shone luminous under the heavy folds of the clouds. We passed an old woman with bare legs and arms, returning from a sdter, or summer chalet of the shep herds. She was a powerful but purely animal specimen of humanity, "beef to the heel," as Braisted said. At last a cluster of log huts, wi*h a patch of irreea pasture-ground 12* 262 SOUTHERN TRAVEL. about them, broke the monotony of the scene. It wcu Fogstuen, or next station, where we were obliged to wait half an hour until the horses had been caught and brought in. The place had a poverty stricken air ; and the slovenly woman who acted as landlady seemed disappointed that we did not buy some horridly coarse and ugly woolen gloves of her own manufacture. Our road now ran for fourteen miles along the plateau ?f the Dovre, more than 3000 feet above the level of the sea. This is not a plain or table land, but an undulating region, with hills, valleys, and lakes of its own ; and more desolate landscapes one can scarcely find elsewhere. Everything is grey, naked, and barren, not on a scale grand enough to be imposing, nor with any picturesqueness of form to relieve its sterility. One can understand the silence and sternness of the Norwegians, when he has travelled this road. But I would not wish my worst enemy to spend more than one summer as a solitary herdsman on these hills. Let any dw ciple of Zimmerman try the effect of such a solitude. The statistics of insanity in Norway exhibit some of its effects, and that which is most common is most destructive. There never was a greater humbug than the praise of solitude : it is the fruitful mother of all evil, and no man covets it who has not something bad or morbid in his nature. By noon the central ridge or comb of the Dovre Fjeld rose before us, with the six-hundred-year old station of Jerkin in a warm nook on its southern side. This is re- nowned as the best post-station in Norway, and is a favour- ite resort of English travellers and sportsmen, who come hither to climb the peak of Snaehfttteii, and to stalk rein- GULDBRANDSDAJ, AND THE DUVRE FJELD. 26S jeer. F did not find the place particularly inviting. The two women who had charge of it for the time were unusuall) silent and morose, but our dinner was cheap and well gotten up, albeit the trout were not the freshest. We admired the wonderful paintings of the landlord, which although noticed by Murray, give little promise for Norwegian art in these high latitudes. His cows, dogs, and men are all snow-white, and rejoice in an original anatomy. The horses on this part of the road were excellent, the road admirable, and our transit was therefore thoroughly agreeable. The ascent of the dividing ridge, after leaving Jerkin, is steep and toilsome for half a mile, but with this exception the passage of the Dovre Fjeld is remarkably easy. The highest point which the road crossed is about 4600 feet above the sea, or a little higher than the Brenner Pass in the Tyrol. But there grain grows and orchards Dear fruit, while here, under the parallel of 62, nearly all vegetation ceases, and even the omnivorous northern sheep can find no pasturage. Before and behind you lie wastes of naked grey mountains, relieved only by the snow-patches on their summits. I have seen as desolate tracts of wilder- ness in the south made beautiful by the lovely hues which they took from. the air ; but Nature has no such tender fan- cies in the north. She is a realist of the most unpitying stamp, and gives atmospheric influences which make that which is dark and bleak still darker and bleaker. Black clouds hung low on the horizon, and dull grey sheets of rain swept now and then across the nearer heights. Snaehiitten, o the westward, was partly veiled, but we could trace his olunt mound of altercate black rock and snow nearly to the 264 NORTJIKKX niAVEL. apex. The peak is about 7700 feet above the sea, and waf until recently considered the highest in Norway, but the Skagtolstind has been ascertained to be 1 60 feet higher, and SnsehStten is dethroned. The river Driv came out of a glen on our left, and en- tered a deep gorge in front, down which our road lay, fol- lowing the rapid descent of the foaming stream. At the station of Kongsvold, we had descended to 3000 feet again, yet no trees appeared. Beyond this, the road for ten miles has been with great labour hewn out of the solid rock, at the bottom of a frightful defile, like some of those among the Alps. Formerly, it climbed high up on the mountain- side, running on the brink of almost perpendicular cliffs, and the Vaarsti, as it is called, was then reckoned one of the most difficult and dangerous roads in the country. Now it is one of the safest and most delightful. We went down the pass on a sharp trot, almost too fast to enjoy the wild bcenery as it deserved. The Driv fell through the cleft in a succession of rapids, while smaller streams leaped to meet him in links of silver cataract down a thousand feet of cliff. Birch and fir now clothed the little terraces and spare cor- ners of soil, and the huge masses of rock, hanging over oui heads, were tinted with black, warm brown, and russet orange, in such a manner as to produce the most charming effects of colour. Over the cornices of the mountain-walls, hovering at least two thousand feet above, gleamed here and there the scattered snowy jolims of the highest fjeld. The pass gradually opened into a narrow valley, when; ire found a little cultivation again. Here was the post of DrivBtuen, kept by a merry old lady. Our next stage do- GUL1)1!KAXUSDAJL AND THE UOVKE FJELD. 265 wended through increasing habitation and culture to tne inn of Rise, when- we stopped for the night, having the Dovre Fjeld fairly behind us. The morning looked wild and *hreatening, but the clouds gradually hauled off to the east- ward, leaving us the promise of a fine day. Our road led over hills covered with forests of fir and pine, whence we looked into a broad valley clothed with the same dark gar- ment of forest, to which the dazzling white snows of the fjeld in the background made a striking contrast. We here left the waters of the Driv and struck upon those of the Orkla, which flow into Drontheim FjorJ. At Stuen, we got a fair breakfast of eggs, milk, cheese, bread and butter. Eggs are plentiful everywhere, yet, singularly enough, we were nearly a fortnight in Norway before we either saw or heard a single fowl Where they were kept we could not discover, and why they did not crow was a still greater mys- tery. Norway is really the land of silence. For an inhab- ited country, it is the quietest I have ever seen. No won- der that anger and mirth, when they once break through the hard ice of Norwegian life, are so furious and uncontroll- able. These inconsistent extremes may always be reconcil- ed, when we understand how nicely the moral nature of man is balanced. Our road was over a high, undulating tract for two stages, commanding wide views of a wild wooded region, which is Baid to abound with game. The range of sncwy peaks be- hind us still filled the sky, appearing so near at hand as to deceive the eye in regard to their height. At last, we came upon the brink of a steep descent, overlooking the deep glen of the Orkla, u singularly picturesque valley, issuing from NORTHERN TRAVEL. between the bases of the mountains, and winding away tcr the northward. Down the frightful slant our horses plunged, and in three minutes we were at the bottom, with flower- sown meadows on either hand, and the wooded sides of the glen sweeping up to a waving and fringed outline against the sky. After crossing the stream, we had an ascent as abrupt, :>n the other side; but half-way up stood the station ol Bjserkager, where we left our panting horses. The fas stations were now at an end, but by paying fast prices we got horses with less delay. In the evening, a man travelling on foot offered to carry f&rbud notices for us to the remain- ing stations; if we would pay for his horse. We accepted ; I wrote the orders in my best Norsk, and on the following day we found the horses in readiness everywhere. The next stage was an inspiring trot through a park-like country, clothed with the freshest turf and studded with clumps of fir, birch, and ash. The air was soft and warm, and filled with balmy scents from the flowering grasses, and the millions of blossoms spangling the ground. In one place, I saw half an acre of the purest violet hue, where the pansy of our gardens grew so thickly that only its blossoms were visible. The silver green of the birch twinkled in the sun, and its jets of delicale foliage started up everywhere with exquisite effect amid the dark masses of the fir. There was little cultivation as yet, but these trees formed natural orchards, which suggested a design in their planting and redeemed the otherwise savage character of the scenery. We dipped at last into a hollow, down which flowed one ol the tributaries of the Guul Elv, the course of which we thence followed to Drontheim. UlU>BKAXUt>UAl, AND THE DOVRE FJELD. 207 One of the stations was a lonely guard, standing apart from the road, on a high hill. As we drove up, a horrid old hag caine out to receive us. " Can I get three horses soon ?' 1 asked. " No," she answered with a chuckle. " How Boon ?" " In a few hours," was her indifferent reply, but the promise of paying fast rates got them in less than one. My friend wanted a glass of wine, but the old woman said she hud nothing but milk. We were sitting on the steps with our pipes, shortly afterwards, when she said : " Why don't you go into the house ?" " It smells too strongly of paint," I answered. " But you had better go in/' said she, and shuffled off. When we entered, behold ! there were three glasses of very good Marsala on the table. " How do you sell your milk ?" I asked her. " That kind is three skillings a dram/' she answered. The secret probably was that she had no license to sell wine. 1 was reminded of an incident which occurred to me in Maine, during the prevalence of the prohibitory law. I was staying at an hotel in a certain town, and jestingly asked the landlord : " Where is the Maine Law ? I should like to see it." " Why," said he, " I have it here in the house ;" and he unlocked a back room and astonished me with the sight of a private bar, studded with full decanters. The men folks were all away at work, and our postillion was a strapping girl of eighteen, who rode behind Braisted. She was gotten up on an immense scale, but nature had ex pended so much vigour on her body that none was left for hei bruin. She was a consummate representation of health and stupidity. At the station where we stopped for the night I could not .help admiring the solid bulk of the landlady's NORTH r.RX TRAVEL. sister. Although not over twenty four she must havt weighed full two hundred. Her waist was of remarkable thickness, and her bust might be made into three average American ones. I can now understand why Miigge calls his neroine Ilda " the strong maiden. " A drive of thirty-five miles down the picturesque valley of the Guul brought us to Drontheim the next day the eighth after leaving Christiania. DRON FHKIM VO> AGK L'P THE COAST OF NORWAY 269 CHAPTER XX111. PROITTHIIM. VOYAGE UP THE COAST OF NORWAY. OUR first view of Drontheim (or Trondhjem, as I should pnperly be written) was from the top of the hill behind ihe town, at the termination of six miles of execrable road, and perhaps the relief springing from that circumstance heightened the agreeable impression which the scene made upon our minds. Below us, at the bottom of a crescent- shaped bay, lay Drontheim a mass of dark red, yellow, and brown buildings, with the grey cathedral in the rear. The rich, well cultivated valley of the Nid stretched be- hind it, on our ri^ht, past the Lierfoss, whose column of foam was visible three miles away, until the hills, rising more high and bleak behind each other, completely enclosed it. The rock-fortress of Munkholm, in front of the city, broke the smooth surface of the fjord, whose further shores, dim with passing showers, swept away to the north-east, hid- ing the termination of this great sea- arm, which is some fifty miles distant. The panorama was certainly on a grand icale, and presented very diversified and picturesque fea- tures; but 1 can by no means agree with Dr. Clarke, whc compares it to the Bay of Naples. Not only the rich col NORTHERN TRAVtl.. ours of the Mediterranean are wanting, out those harmonic sweeps and curves of the Italian shores and hills have nothing in common with these rude, ragged, weather beaten, defiant forms. Descending the hill between rows of neat country-houses.