northward, into dark forests, over the 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 _forbud_ 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 postman, wrapped in wolf-skin, and with a face reddened by
the wind, came up, and handed out my _forbud_ ticket. Such was our first
experience of _forbud_.

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 Bothnian 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 sawmill. 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 _forbud_ an hour
previous, and, according to law was allowed three hours to get ready his
second 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 the
most promising. Coming upon solid snow 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