1883.] FOBEST BAMBLES. 



without discerning even a mound or hillock a dozen feet in height. 

 Belts of Fir and Birch diversify %yhat would otherwise be a mono- 

 tonous expanse of rougli moorland ; but within the Russian frontier 

 the soil improves, and we pass hundreds of acres of potatoes and red 

 cabbage, and here and there large tracts of woodland, mainly com- 

 posed of Poplar, Scotch Fir and Birch, amongst which tall Spruces 

 display their exquisite symmetry of form and profusion of foliage. 

 After a short stay in the capital, we returned to Wiborg, along the 

 same line of railway, and thence took a river steamer up the first 

 twenty miles or so of stream, which forms the southern stage of the 

 Saima Canal. The scenery is extremely pretty, the banks above 

 Wiborg being studded with the villas of the leading merchants, 

 whose gardens and lawns slope down to the water's edge. Higher 

 up the forest closes in on either hand, and here and there the 

 spreading branches of the Spruces almost touch the steamer's awning. 

 The stream passes through one or two lakes of considerable extent, 

 and we have to ascend nine locks in the course of three hours' 

 steaming, finally arriving at Eattiarvi, the point of debarkation for 

 the Imatra Falls, whence a drive of twenty-three miles brings us to 

 the great cataract. The country passed through is undulating, partly 

 forest of Scotch Fir and Birch, but mainly cleared land and fairly 

 cultivated, though, to the eye of an Englishman, much in need of 

 drainage in many places. Our vehicle, a kind of waggon, to the 

 floor of which were fixed four chairs and a sofa, was drawn by three 

 horses abreast and driven by a flaxen-haired youngster of thirteen 

 years, who, in true northern style, urged his team into a gallojid own 

 the steepest hills, and allowed them to go to sleep at the flat. 



The Imatra Falls, which have been styled the grandest falls in 

 Europe, though in the opinion of my friend and myself less imposing 

 than the Falls of Njommelsaska, described in 'Forest Rambles in 

 Lapland,' deserve a few passing notes. The Vuoksa River, issuing 

 from the south-east corner of Lake Saima, flows for some four miles 

 over shallows and rapids, before reaching the Imatra gorge. Im- 

 mediately above the Falls it is about four hundred yards in breadth 

 and is divided into two currents by a small densely-wooded island ; 

 its banks are also thickly clothed with Scotch Fir and a profusion of 

 fine Birches. The entrance of the gorge is a hundred yards or so 

 across, but it rapidly narrows, and for a distance of some five hundred 

 yards measures no more than from forty to eighty yards in breadth. 

 Down this canal-like passage the great river rushes at headlong speed 

 in a deep torrent of breaking waves and boiling eddies, hurling tall 

 jets of creamy spray and huge masses of white water high into the 

 air, and breaking against the rocks lying at the foot of the confining 

 cliffs with terrific force, the roar of the Fall being heard at a distance 



