l, a fairy world we
beheld--too beautiful to be lifeless, but every face we met reminded us
the more that this was the chill beauty of Death--of dead Nature. Death
was in the sparkling air, in the jewelled trees, in the spotless snow.
Take off your mitten, and his hand will grasp yours like a vice; uncover
your mouth, and your frozen lips will soon acknowledge his kiss.

Even while I looked the same icy chills were running through my blood,
precursors of that drowsy torpor which I was so anxious to avoid. But
no; it _would come_, and I dozed until both hands became so stiff that
it was barely possible to restore their powers of motion and feeling. It
was not quite dark when we reached Kuckula, the last station, but thence
to Haparanda our horses were old and lazy, and our postillion was a
little boy, whose weak voice had no effect. Braisted kept his hands warm
in jerking and urging, but I sat and froze. Village after village was
passed, but we looked in vain for the lights of Tornea. We were
thoroughly exhausted with our five days' battle against the dreadful
cold, when at last a row of lights gleamed across the river, and we
drove up to the inn. The landlord met us with just the same words as on
the first visit, and, strange enough, put us into the same room, where
the same old Norrland merchant was again quartered in the same stage of
tipsiness. The kind Fredrika did not recognise us in our Lapp dresses,
until I had unrobed, when she cried out in joyful surprise, "Why, you
were here before!"

We had been so completely chilled that it was a long time before any
perceptible warmth returned. But a generous meal, with a bottle of what
was called "_gammal scherry_" (though the Devil and his servants, the
manufacturers of chemical wines, only knew what it was), started the
flagging circulation. We then went to bed, tingling and stinging in
every nerve from the departing cold. Every one complained of the
severity of the weather, which, we were told, had not been equalled for
many years past. But such a bed, and such a rest as I had! Lying between
clean sheets, with my feet buried in soft fur, I wallowed in a flood of
downy, delicious sensations until sunrise. In the morning we ventured to
wash our faces and brush our teeth for the first time in five days, put
on clean shirts, and felt once more like responsible beings. The natives
never wash when the weather is so cold, and cautioned us against it. The
wind had fallen but t