momentary views of the gulf breaking through the valleys, would impart variety and romantic interest to every turn.

Arriving at the destined port or ferry, we prepared to cross to the next island, called Skorpas. The distance being short, one boat only was in waiting. I therefore went over first with my kibitka, leaving Schmidt to follow with the other. In due time I was landed on a point covered with thickets and grotesque masses of rock. The late storms had made little ceremony in laying the branching honours of the wood in the dust, or rather in the snow; for numbers of trees were stretched on the ground, hurled one upon another, and side by side, so interwoven by icicles adhering to and uniting their mingling arms, that to proceed seemed almost impracticable, to separate them would be impossible. However, extremity engenders enterprise, and enterprise success! Over we went; but how, I cannot tell you: and soon after our achievement, I observed my honest squire, with the other kibitka in his train, surmounting the supine forest with as much determination as his

master.

Two hours elapsed before we could procure horses: but that being effected, we proceeded as usual, drawn alternately by them, men, women, and boys, over plains of ice and hills of hardened snow. By these means sufficient progress was made, thank heaven! to bring us to the island of Aland; but not until the brittle causeway had three times given way with my kibitkas, plunged overhead in the petrifying brine, drenched to my skin, and pierced through with cold, wet, and a forked sleet beating in my face, I really felt myself completely miserable; and would have given worlds to have been in my sledge on the distant roads of Torneo; happy, amidst those frozen regions even beyond the arctic circle, to escape the life-consuming damps and ever varying wretchedness of these horrible isles.

Aland is the largest and the finest in the gulf. Like Skorpas, it is enriched with wood, and exceeds all the others in marks of thorough cultivation. A few posts and a little more ice tramping brought us to the little port in Echero, where we were to await a fair wind for Grislehamn.

-The inn, house, hotel, with whatever title you choose to honour it, had as much pretensions to the one name as to the other, all were equally unbefitting; and when I drew towards it, I fancied that my servant had made a mistake, and was ushering me into a cow shed. All the other execrable habitations I had visited, even the den of Warsala itself, were palaces to this. Filth greeted my eyes and nose at the first step: the salute was too potent to be borne, and turning about, I told my followers that if I herded with the wolves, I would not enter so murderous a hole. However necessitas non habet leges; I could not get a boat to convey me onward till the next morning; and so I was obliged to cover my plumes, and pass the thirtieth day of my watery pilgrimage under this anathematised roof.

It is exactly one month since I left St. Petersburgh! So long have I been threading in and out of passages which, in summer, would have taken me across in the course of twenty-four hours. You have often praised my patience! Now, I hope (notwithstanding a few hard wrung complaints have been wrested out of me), you will call me a sort of male Grisel; for I have endured without flinching, ten thousand times as many buffets from the elements, as she suffered at the hands of her boisterous lord. And yet, with all this boasting, I know of no temptation that could persuade me to take another winter trip across this abominable water, but news of a peace between the two countries I love, and a speedy recal to St. Petersburgh. Leander swam the Hellespont: I would do more; I would recross the gulf! But in serious sadness, my dear friend, this is no trifling encounter; for many have perished in the attempt, some have died in the passage from cold and fatigue; and others, expired immediately on gaining the main land, from an cxhaustion that never could be redeemed.

On the morning of the thirteenth, I hired a very large boat to convey myself and vehicles direct to Grislehamn. The charge was nine dollars, with additions, should the changing wind, or any other obstacle prevent our reaching the opposite coast that day, and oblige us to land on an island (which Heaven forbid!) that lay in the track. In such a case I am to

pay the boatmen sixteen schillings a day for their subsistence while with me. Such expensive consequences of delay, as well as other attendant disagreeables, you may be sure I am anxious to avoid. And now being summoned to my boat, I am off.

Grislehamn, January.

We sailed with a side wind. But the demon of frustration again put his hand between me and the wished for haven; and at three o'clock we brought up at the infernal island I had hoped to pass. Here destiny fixed us for at least the night. Singleshare it is called. A naked rock: not a blade of grass could it ever boast: and all the habitations it contains are two miserable hovels for the reception of unfortunates like myself, obliged to seek shelter amidst desolation and horrors. A telegraph is here to communicate with the main land and the island we had left. This spot being as bare of fertility as its few inhabitants are of honesty; bleak as may be their situation, their hospitality is bleaker; the only eatables we could procure, and at an exorbitant price, were potatoes and milk. Their means of existence are drawn from Aland; and their ingenuity is of course exerted to make them last as long as possible. Young seals are the very treasury of these people; for at certain seasons they catch them, prepare them into food, eating part fresh, and curing the rest into hams, &c. The entrails they dry for their cows' winter nourishment.

Our old extortioning host told us that the cattle he possesses (three in number, resembling those on the Scottish isles), swim during the summer from island to island, to seek their scanty meal of grass amongst the fissures of the rocks. Even in the most blowing weather these creatures defy the violence of the waves, and cross more than four English miles of sea, alternately swimming, and resting themselves on their sides. when fatigued. Having gleaned the neighbouring cliffs, they take the flood again and return to their home. I forgot to ask my informer, whether the damsels of his household did not sometimes, in the European fashion, take a trip to the other isles on The backs of these adventurous animals. It would be no very

uninteresting sight, to see one or two of the pretty Swedish girls, with their fair hair floating in the wind, speeding their way through the summer waves to their expecting lovers on a distant shore. Could I have found cow or calf inclined to brave the element in winter, I belive I would have tried my luck, and galloped, à la Neptune, through the waters, to the fair haven of Grislehamn.

My purgatory in this solitary Share, (for you must remark that share is Swedish for rock), continued two days. However, on the fifteenth of this month, a fine morning appeared, with a favourable wind; and embarking with as much eagerness as poor Achilles would have done, if, by jumping into Charon's ferry, he might have been translated to the upper world again, I pushed away from Singleshare, most devoutly hoping that single should ever be my share of visiting that execrable rock.

At eight o'clock in the morning we were under sail; and in three hours drew close to the shore of the continent. But here my evil genius, like a shrewish wife, determining to have the last word, would not let me escape even now without another proof of her spleen. We were driven on a lee shore full of drifting ice, and there stuck, or struggled for extrication, till eight in the evening; when, though wet and fatigued, yet at last, thank God, we disembarked on the firm land at Grislehamn.

The inn that bade us welcome smelt so much of Warsala, that, having ordered my poor fellow to take a little rest while I completed my aquatic annals to you, I have determined to proceed immediately. Horses aré ready; and at midnight I shall be on my way to Stockholm. May letters await me there, that will inform me of all in England, dear to your faithful friend!

LETTER XXXIV.

Stockholm, January, 1808.

OWING to the late heavy falls of snow I was detained a little until the roads could be sufficiently cleared to allow me to pass. This useful operation is performed by the peasantry in a manner so ingenious as to deserve noting. A large and open triangle formed of very strong and heavy planks, is placed upon the snow on the high road. To this machine horses are attached, which drag it forward; the acute angle plowing up the snow as they advance, and throwing the wintry impediment to the right and left, the road is cleared, and travellers can proceed with ease and rapidity.

The management of this convenience is excellently regulated; it being impossible for the peasantry ever to neglect their duty any part of the year; for, throughout the whole term, the good state of the roads is particularly guarded. Every parish or district, by a strict ordinance, and under a severe penalty, is obliged to send a certain number of people every day into the roads, to keep them open in winter, and repair them in summer. Whatever may be the forfeiture annexed to disobedience of these orders, I do not hear that it has ever been levied: all seem so interested in preserving this branch of the police, both the heads of the districts who command, and the peasants who obey, that I am told, complaints are never heard, and that the roads themselves are not to be equalled even in England.

Towards the evening of the following day I arrived at Osby, being four Swedish miles (about twenty-four English), from the capital. I would have proceeded that night, but the intense cold, and the civility of the people at the inn, were inducements for halting I could not resist; and ordering a comfortable bed to be got ready, I prepared to await the morning there, when I would start for Stockholm at an early hour.

I found the rooms of my honest host and hostess not so warm as their wishes. I was put into a miserably bleak apart