it or not. Our taxes amount to 40
_rigs_ yearly, ten of which, in Mora parish, go to the priest. They say
he has an income of half a _rigs_ every hour of his life. King Oscar
wishes to make religion free, and so it ought to be, but the clergy are
all against him, and the clergy control the _Bondestand_ (House of
Peasants), and so he can do nothing." The woman was thirty-one years
old, and worn with hard labour. I asked her if she was married. "No,"
she answered, with a deep sigh, looking at the betrothal-ring on her
finger. "Ah," she continued, "we are all poor, Sweden is a poor country;
we have only iron and timber, not grain, and cotton, and silk, and
sugar, like other countries."

As we descended towards the post-station of Vik we caught a glimpse of
the Siljan Lake to the south, and the tall tower of Mora Church, far to
the eastward. At Vik, where we found the same simple and honest race of
people, we parted with the postillioness and with our host of Kettbo,
who thanked us again in Pehr's name, as he shook hands for the last
time. We now had fast horses, and a fine road over a long wooded hill,
which was quite covered with the _lingon_, or Swedish cranberry. From
the further slope we at last looked down upon Mora, at the head of the
Siljan Lake, in the midst of a broad and fertile valley. Ten miles to
the eastward arose the spire of Orsa, and southward, on an island in the
lake, the tall church of Solleron. "You can see three churches at once,"
said our postillion with great pride. So we could, and also the large,
stately inn of Mora--a most welcome sight to us, after five days on
potato diet.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

LAST DAYS IN THE NORTH.

Mora, in Dalecarlia, is classic ground. It was here that Gustavus Vasa
first harangued the people, and kindled that spark of revolution, which
in the end swept the Danes from Sweden. In the cellar of a house which
was pointed out to us, on the southern shore of the Siljan Lake, he lay
hidden three days; in the barn of Ivan Elfssen he threshed corn,
disguised as a peasant; and on the road by which we had travelled from
Kettbo, in descending to the lake, we had seen the mounds of stone,
heaped over the Danes, who were slain in his first victorious
engagement. This district is considered, also, one of the most beautiful
in Sweden. It has, indeed, a quiet, tranquil beauty, which gradually
grows upon the eye, so that if one is not particularly aroused on first
acquaintance, h