eces of carpentry I ever met with; nor do I
hesitate in saying, that an approximation to a civilized condition was
more evident among savages I have seen, than in this first glimpse of
Sweden. I could hardly persuade myself I was not more than six hundred
miles from London; and when the driver began to talk to me about the
result of the war in China, and ask if George the Third was dead, I was
not at all astonished that the Baron Munchausen could write such travels
as he did.

We arrived about three o'clock at the river where salmon were said to
abound; but when the evening brought the labour of an entire day to its
close, neither R---- nor P---- were able to speak to the truth of that
abundance, for they had not even a _bite_ between them. It was our
original intention to sleep at a cottage on the banks of this river; but
it seemed to be inhabited by a patriarch, the father of so many
suspicious-looking sons, grown in want to maturity, that we thought the
most prudent plan was to return and rest for the night at Falkenborg.
Resuming our place of purgatory in the carriole, we were soon galloping
on our way home; for the Swedes, like the Norwegians, drive at a
tremendous pace, and it is astounding how these carrioles, so
barbarously joined together, scouring over ruts and stones, do not
tumble to pieces.

At every river we had to cross, a large boat, like a coal barge, without
stem or stern, is to be found, and stowing carriole, horses, and
everything else connected with them into this huge ferry boat, the
driver, by means of a rope made fast and extending from one bank to the
opposite one, draws boat and cargo across, and, reaching the shore he
desires, remounts his box, and, heeding not from which quarter the next
traveller may come, drives off, and leaves the barge where he did not
meet with it. I do not know how a wayfarer, following in our track,
contrives to reach our side of the water; but I fancy some person,
unseen, must be left in charge of these ferries, and rows across in a
skiff, or other smaller boat when necessity requires.

Passing along we saw several horses dying on the roadside from hunger;
and one poor brute, that we observed, in the morning, lying in a ditch,
was quite dead when we reached the same spot in the evening. Our driver,
who was an intelligent man, and, having been a volunteer in the English
service, spoke our language fluently, said, that all the oats and corn
which could be spared had